By Dave Lindorff

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and Federal District Court
Judge Fernando Gaitan of the Missouri Western District Court have at
least two things in common: they are both appointees of President
Ronald Reagan, and they both think it’s just fine for the US to execute
innocent people. The same can be said for Judge C. Arlen Beam of the
8th Circuit Court of Appeals.

In a recent dissent in a 5-4 Supreme Court ruling ordering a habeas
hearing in federal court for South Carolina death row inmate Troy
Anthony Davis, a man slated to die after being convicted for the murder
of an off-duty Savannah police officer, Scalia wrote, “This court has
never held that the constitution forbids the execution of a convicted
defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to
convince a habeas court that he is `actually’ innocent.”

By Dave Lindorff

In the category of yawn-inducing stories that we knew all about
before they happened, comes word that the jury of senior uniformed
officers sitting in judgement of Osama Bin Laden’s chauffeur in the
first Bush-league military tribunal to actually go to a hearing at
Guantanamo Naval Station found the prisoner, Salim Hamdan…

Drum roll please…

Guilty of supporting terrorism.

I pause here for gasps of astonishment.

It’s awfully silent…

By Dave Lindorff

With a viral campaign underway via email, right-wing radio, and on the street suggesting that Barack Obama is a black “Manchurian Candidate,” secretly trained as a Muslim fanatic who will insinuate himself into the White House, thence to undermine all that we hold dear, perhaps it is time to look at the Manchurian Candidate we already have in the White House, who, together with his handler over in Blair House, has pretty much done all the damage already.

George Bush came to office in 2001 promising a new era of integrity, civility and “compassionate conservatism,” an era of humble American foreign policy, and a bi-partisan approach to government.

What did we actually get?