I worry about Ron a bit, he tends to take drastically opposing positions, they guy seems all over the map, apparently for no rhyme or reason. Either cantancorous by nature, or something is eating him. Which is the question?

I'm pretty conservative but agree with you on this one. There is nothing more essential to the rule of law than judicial review. This is the second time this legislature has moved to limit what U.S. courts can hear. Disgusting.

Inexcusable and inexplicable (altho I'd like to hear him try to explain it). Worse yet, he somehow makes Sen. Smith look good by comparison (since he took his "moderate medicine" yesterday apparently and voted "no" to this nonsense).

Here is a link to the vote, the Amendment, and the Appropriations bill.

It was sloppy to forgoe this, TA.

http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&session=1&vote=00319

I'm interested in seeing whether one of his staffers will come in and rationalize this vote. Wayne?

Very well said, T.A.. I suspect most of the people Wyden talked to prior to the vote were in a malicious mode and Wyden went along with them. This happened in Central Oregon (and probably other parts of the state) prior to the Bush Crusade on Iraq. Wyden was clearly leaning towards the war, but he got an earful of opposition and voted "no" to the war. Wyden should have known better when he saw Lieberman and Landrieu cross over to join the Republicans. If you are their company you're hanging around with the wrong crowd. And what does McCain's vote in favor of this travesty say about him? He's another flip-flopper talking out of both sides of his mouth and a candidate for the title of most over-rated politician in Washington. Straight talk express, my butt.

Ron wyden has been a champion for comsumer rights and civil liberties [at least for US citizens] throughout his public career. He has often disappointed me with his positions on trade and foreign relations, though.

--- Democrats Provided Edge on Detainee Vote ---

Check out this urgent NYT piece. It appears that Ron is equivocating:

Josh Kardon, chief of staff to Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon ... suggested that Mr. Wyden was also looking for a compromise to make the Guantánamo tribunal process more accountable to the Senate and "ensure the fair and humane treatment of detainees."

which maybe too late, the chances of rewriting this amendment are close to zero as pointed out by the NYT, $500B defense (war?) budget hangs on it. So Ron can be fairly considered the enabler for this unacceptable amendment. The amendment is unacceptable because it is too broadly written, it blocks most of the access to federal courts for people held in DoD and CIA prisons. The argument that US lawyers abused that access to file frivolous cases (diet, mail) is nonsensical, courts in this country have broad powers to harshly penalize those who file frivolous cases and have been known to use that power freely.

The whole case could be easily avoided if the legal claims (and grounds for their indefinite imprisonment) of the detainees were adjudicated by some impartial international body/court under the auspices of UN and conforming to international standards of justice. Military tribunals of warring parties have no place in modern societies.

Yes, this was a terribly disappointing vote and I'd really like to hear the justification from Wyden or his staff. Wyden had been doing so great the last couple weeks--he was on Air America as Harry Reid's point person on the shine-the-light-on-the-lies offensive and was just generally on a roll doing great stuff. Then this. What gives?

Wolcott, of course, says it best:

Torture, black sites, indefinite detention and deprival of due process--the United States has forfeited its right to lecture other nations about freedom and democracy. Red, white, and blue are no longer the true colors of this country's flag; the flags that fly in the Capital should be henceforth be prison gray. And in Paul Craig Roberts' book of tyrants, trailing behind Lindsey Graham, should traipse the five miserable excuses for Democrats who voted for this wormy bill. Each should have an interrogation room at Guantanamo named in their honor. <a href="http://www.portlandleft.blogspot.com/"</a>

assuming this blog gets read by Wyden or his people here is a plea

Dear Sen. Wyden

Your vote last Thursday on was a big suprise to a great many people in your home state. We do not understand it. It seems out of character for you. Here is why:

a) we thought we shared the basic human rights beliefs with you. Concepts that say that no human being can be held incommunicado by any authority for any significant period of time w/o the legality of his detention evaluated by an independent judicial authority. Your vote directly violates this standard for a certain class of people. Stripping people of a meaningful access to independent courts is unacceptable and in direct violation of our obligations under Universal Declaration on Human Rights.

b) we believe that once you start stripping certain people of their basic human rights there is no stopping. God forbid another 9/11 happens, we see no reason why the government would not seek similar powers, for a certain class of people domestically, people like Brandon Mayfield for example. For our own safety.

c) we do not believe that a stealth, Patriot Act like, method of legislating is wise, proper or advisable especially when dealing with issues as weighty as habeas corpus. The amendment you voted for was not properly discussed either in public nor in Senate. Legislative one-day quickies demean and corrupt the process and people who vote for them. There was no harm in delaying voting on this amendment, the people affected by it can easily afford another month or two, they've been sitting in our prisons for 4 years already.

In short it appears you voted yes on a highly questionable, insufficiently debated, and potentially dangerous amendment knowing full well that once passed, there was no going back, the amendment will be adopted. Most of your colleagues on the left isle knew that and voted accordingly. You did not.

We maybe missing something, so it is critical that you share your thinking with your electorate. The statement by Josh Kardon, your chief of staff who per the NYT " ... suggested that Mr. Wyden was also looking for a compromise to make the Guantánamo tribunal process more accountable to the Senate and "ensure the fair and humane treatment of detainees .. " is entirely insufficient, his suggestions as to your goals are irrelevant, you need to level directly with your voters.

wg: You don't really expect Wyden to level directly with his voters do you? But your point on the International Declaration of Human Rights - note the INTERNATIONAL - was well taken. In the movie "Good Night, And Good Luck" there is a brief clip with former President Eisenhower talking about the importance of habeas corpus. Both are connected. Nevertheless, Wyden and 48 other hypocrites in the senate rejected both. "... with liberty and justice for all" is apparently meaningless claptrap to these people.

The stripping of basic civil rights of any person smacks of a police state and unworthy of all the principles the U.S.A. at its best stands for, at home and abroad. Senator Wyden, wake up and change your vote on the Graham amendment.

I just called Wyden's office (4:00 pm) and was informed that Wyden will be voting for the Bingaman Amendment tomorrow (9/15) and that Wyden has issued a statement that was read to me. It is essentially a half-baked rationale for his vote supporting the Graham Amendment that falls short of the confession that he should have made; that is, that he made a monumental blunder. I also learned from the conversation that Wyden's staff pays attention to www.blueoregon.com where he was well taken to task.

Some mind find it instructive about Ron Wyden to call his office and ask two specific questions.

1) Does Ron Wyden believe that the status and manner of detention of detainees in Guantanamo are not covered by the Geneva Convention? You will be shocked (I hope) to find out he agrees with the administration and not the well-reasoned legal opinions of the numerous legal scholars who have spoke out to the contrary on this issue in general, and against Ron's vote in particular. "Unlawful combatants" are not mentioned in the GCs (only "combatant"), meaning they are defined by implication of the reader. That Ron has willfully chosen at this point to keep intellectual and moral company with the Adminstration is stunning.

2) How does Ron view the legal differences between those detainees from the Afghanistan war, where arguably we had a causus belli, and those from Iraq war, where once again mainstream legal opinion is that we had no legitimate causus belli? Once again, you will be shocked (I hope) that the staff has does not have an even remotely coherent response to this question. When I called they re-read the statement like automatons and then ended the conversation. The Geneva Conventions make substantial distinctions between those cases, but Graham's amendment does not acknowledge that distinction and in fact defines status based on the place where detainees are held. This concept has no basis in the Geneva Convention, which for good reason defines status based on the nature of the conflict and the person's actual role.

To be fair, Graham's amendment is an attempt, albeit disingenuous, to fulfill the GC's requirement that status be determined by a competent tribunal. However, that provision appears to only be applicable to certain classes of detainees, and most notably not to anyone who is either resisting an invader (pretty much anybody captured in Iraq) and not an actual armed combatant at time of capture (which appears to be the majority of those held from the Afghanistan conflict).

Since Ron has failed to provide any exposition to his constituents of his views on this matter, either on his website or in the media, it is fair to question the personal values and intellectual integrity that leads him to this particular conclusion.

On the other hand, perhaps Ron is more interested just in being a Senator than anything else at this point, and, like a lot of Democrats in these times, has been in over his head for quite some time.

I cut Wyden more slack now that he is senator of a purple state than when he was representative of one of the bluest districts in the country. But this vote runs counter to his decent record on civil liberties and particularly hurts as this administration continues to erect blocks in the wall of the imperial police state.

Bingaman amendment is history already. Frenzied horsetrading currently in progress. If I understand it correctly they want to take Graham, civilize it a bit, rename it Graham-Levin and link it to McCain amendment. The goal is to give the administration Graham (restriction of access to courts, by nulling relevant Supreme Court rulings) as long as they agree to McCain's anti-torture language.

I don't think administration will buy it, they like torture too much.

In any case I don't like the fact that they are trying rush it. Haste makes waste, and in matters this weighty this demeans the entire process. Furthermore the language of the proposed Graham-Levin amendment has not been published yet. This is crucial because scribes writing those things usually sneak in some stinkers that never get publicly discussed. For example the original Graham amendment (the one Wyden voted for) gave detainees the right to appeal their sentences/imprisonments but made that appeal worthless. Specifically under the original Graham-Wyden courts could only review whether a military tribunal followed its own standards and procedures, not merits of cases.

I fully expect the new Graham-Levin to contain something equally smelly. They need to publish the full text and let the public debate begin.

Senator Wyden's vote for the Graham/Kyl amendment is particularly galling to me personally. My entire family was rounded up like dogs and sent to internment camps during WW II. I lost a brother-in-law in the 442nd in Italy. My other brother-in-law survived and was a highly decorated veteran of the 442nd. Habeas corpus is not some strange latin term to me. What would Senator Wyden have done to my parents who were denied American citizenship by law? Transport them to Guantanamo? There were some Japanese-Americans that spent the entire period of WW II in detention like Guantanamo. He should think about who he represents and the history of our great State.

Senator Wyden should talk to Brandon Mayfield, a fellow Oregonian. Mr. Mayfield is probably the ONLY American citizen rounded up and disappeared into the internal American gulag. After having his name destroyed, the FBI released him and said: "Gee... we're sorry..."

I agree with ta and wg. Wyden doesn't represent me or the State of Oregon. He represents some distorted concept floating around in his mind. Wyden get real. Even Gordon has some common sense. What has happened to our United States Senators? Have we gone from Wayne Morse, the lone voice against an unjust war to apologists for the Bush Crime Family. Impeach the whole bunch of crooks.

There is some consolation for R. Konno in that we may reasonably presume that Wyden has learned that it is wrong to ship Japanese-Americans off to concentration camps. The problem is that he, Lindsey Graham and the others that voted for Graham's squalid amendment don't seem to know that it is equally wrong to similarly abuse others. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights applies to all members of the human species. There are no exceptions for Muslims, Arabs, Middle-Easterners and South Asians rounded up for right and wrong reasons and shipped to such vile places as Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, Bagram, and other despicable places operated by our "friends" around the planet. What are those words we hear these Congresspeople recite at the end of the Pledge of Allegiance? "... with liberty and justice for all?" Really? I wonder what that phrase means to them, if anything.

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Why-done answered Thom Hartmann's call on the 11/15 show to explain his vote to betray the principle against murder and torture and body-snatching un-habeas-ness. Senator word-danced away from Hartmann half in lies, half in procedural gobbledygoop. Thom, for his fault, let him get away with not speaking English, and essentially let him get away with corrupt morals and all, without objection.

How about this: Wyden either is guilty of complicity in war crimes against humanity if he KNOWS what is done by his serial votes to appropriate invasion and torture-prison funds, or is complicitly guilty of aiding and abetting war criminals if he does NOT KNOW what he votes for and only follows neo-con Pentagon orders, extorted to harbor his fuhrer with silent obedience.

It is ridiculous and Why-done is deranged to discuss procedure and compromise and any half-loaf of legality when the question is to the senator's soul how he participates to beat humans to death and murder them in cages. Cages Wyden knowingly and silently funds.

And shame on Thom Hartmann for combing over listener's ears the hairs Why-done split.

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<h2>In Re: Wyden and the Graham amendment- what do you expect from a guy who thinks he's married to someone who wasn't married before.</h2>