Before we give Lindsey Graham too much credit for Morality...Read This

[KoKo]

The McCain vote, of course, garnered front-page coverage around the country and on the networks. "President Backs McCain on Abuse," declared The New York Times. What was mostly missed, however, were two key facts. First, the amendment, worthy as it was, wasn’t as strong as advertised. It contained no enforcement clause: soldiers or CIA agents couldn’t abuse prisoners, the bill stated, but it didn’t provide for any penalties if they did. The amendment, in other words, was mostly a statement of principle, without teeth.

What’s more, McCain’s amendment was undercut by another little-noticed amendment that was passed as part of the same defense appropriations bill. Sponsored by Senators Lindsey Graham, Carl Levin, and John Kyl, the amendment — which was combined with McCain’s measure to become the Detainee Treatment Act (DTA) — states that testimony gained through “coercion” can be used in military tribunals. Unlike the McCain amendment, which merely reaffirms existing laws, the Graham-Levin-Kyl measure muddies what had been clear waters. The amendment’s portion of the DTA also severely restricts detainees’ access to U.S. courts and strips them of the right to habeas corpus. It limits detainee cases to a single hearing in front of an appeals court, at which detainees have no clear right to present the facts of their case.

Cheney and his allies “took their opponents to the cleaners,” Marty Lederman, a law professor at Georgetown who served in the Justice Department until 2002, wrote at the time on a blog called Balkanization. “The Graham amendments . . . are far more beneficial to their detention and interrogation policies than the McCain amendment is detrimental.”

But that’s not how the matter has played in the media. The triumph of the McCain amendment was a compelling story, a personality play in which the little-liked Cheney was brought to heel by the much-adored maverick senior senator from Arizona. The Graham-Levin-Kyl amendment — a legalistic, obscure, and at least nominally bipartisan effort — had no such drama. And it got no equivalent coverage. The morning after that amendment passed, only one major paper, The New York Times, gave it front-page treatment, and it simply wasn’t mentioned on the network news.

{Excerpted from excellent long expose of Bush's Torture and it's implications by Columbia Journalis Review's Eric Urmansky:}

http://www.cjr.org/issues/2006/5/Umansky.asp

[China_cat]

1. From a person living in SC

Don't ever trust anything you hear from Graham. If he says it's raining, go look out the window before you grab your umbrella.

[KharmaTrain]

2. I Have Faith Graham Will Weasel Out

And so will McCain. Surely Rove is wondering how many voter lists and connections to big money funders to hook McCain up with (can you say quid pro quo?)

This is a big game...one to give some Repugnicans shelter...ones in tight races where tweeking booosh in this final push could mean the difference between more earmarks or getting a real job. It's a win-win if you think about it...They can puff up their balls and pretend to be against beating their wives and standing up to Booosh...and then just before adjourning pass a watered down "compromise" at 2am...which won't matter since Asshat will issue a "signing statement" that will allow his torture party to go on.

The great compromise? Bullyboy will stop the waterboarding, and in return he and his cronies get immunity from their past crimes and get time to cover their tracks about the crimes ongoing.

[Benhurst]

3. Lovely Lindsey pops out from the closet from time to time to make

sanctimonious statements, only to scamper back in, slamming the door behind him, leaving others to do dirty work for the Bush Administration he never challenges.

It would be funny, if it weren't so sad.

[JDPriestly]

4. The quarrel among Republicans is a total ruse to placate moderates

and distract from the Democratic stance in favor of strict respect for human rights in all our dealings. Don't trust McCain, Graham or any of them. They are Bush lackeys, nothing more.

[KoKo]

5. kick...............

[KoKo]

6. Some more posters are thinking Graham has great integrity....so

I'll give another kick to this for a read of why he may not be what we would hope to think he is. :-(

[cosmicdot]

7. k&r

"Coaching a judicial nominee behind-the-scenes is not the proper role for a Judiciary Committee member who must subsequently sit in judgment on that nominee," writes Think Progress, . "It could be a violation of the ethical duties of a senator."

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you either have integrity or you don't

it's not 'some', 'a little', on 1 to 5 scale, a 2, for a fleeting moment, closer to election day, running as interference for coverup


Alito Confirmation Hearings

During the Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings for Judge Samuel Alito for a seat on the United States Supreme Court, Graham was accused by Democrats of having coached Alito before the hearings, having sat on a "moot court" at the White House before the hearings.

The Village Voice went so far as to state, "Lindsey Graham, the Republican senator from South Carolina, may very well have irreparably compromised himself."

According to Think Progess, a project of the American Progress Action Fund, "Coaching a judicial nominee behind-the-scenes is not the proper role for a Judiciary Committee member who must subsequently sit in judgment on that nominee," writes Think Progress, . "It could be a violation of the ethical duties of a senator."

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Lindsey_Graham#Alito_Confirmation_Hearings

[moondust]

8. Graham wants "aggressive measures" too.

He said so on Face the Nation. Hadley came on later and said he was pleased to hear Graham say that.

It's code for torture.

[flaminbats]

9. but Lindsey is such a great guy..

he wants all his fellow men to know in the worst possible way!! :rofl:

[converted_democrat]

10. Thank you for posting this.. I really thought he was trying to do the

right thing..