A couple of Washington Post articles caught my attention on Saturday morning. In "
US Prosecuters Move to Block Padilla's Questioning of Pentagon," the reporter opens with these words:
Federal prosecutors asked a judge Thursday to prevent Jose Padilla's defense attorneys from questioning Defense Department officials or obtaining documents about his treatment during 3 1/2 years in military custody as an "enemy combatant."
And in "
US Denies Liability in Torture Case," these opening words:
The Bush administration asserted in federal court yesterday that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and three former military officials cannot be held liable for the alleged torture of nine Afghans and Iraqis in U.S. military detention camps because the detainees have no standing to sue in U.S. courts.
If, as in the case of Jose Padilla, citizens have no legal recourse against the government that confines and subjects them to punishment, and if, as in the case of the nine Afghanies, foreigners have no legal recourse against the government that they assert tortured them, then what does that mean about the government under which we live today and our relationship to it?
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