Our Nation Unhinged

by Honigsberg, Peter Jan

• ISBN13: 9780520254725
• ISBN10: 0520254724
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-05-18
• Publisher: Univ of California Pr

Summary

Jose Padilla short-shackled and wearing blackened goggles and earmuffs to block out all light and sound on his way to the dentist. Fifteen-year-old Omar Khadr crying out to an American soldier, "Kill me!" Hunger strikers at Guantaacute;namo being restrained and force-fed through tubes up their nostrils. John Walker Lindh lying naked and blindfolded in a metal container, bound by his hands and feet, in the freezing Afghan winter night. This is the story of the Bush administration's response to the attacks of September 11, 2001--and of how we have been led down a path of executive abuses, human tragedies, abandonment of the Constitution, and the erosion of due process and liberty. In this vitally important book, Peter Jan Honigsberg chronicles the black hole of the American judicial system from 2001 to the present, providing an incisive analysis of exactly what we have lost over the past seven years and where we are now headed.

Table of Contents

The Cuban Iguana and American Jurisprudence	p. xiii
Foreword	p. xv
Opening	p. 1
Manipulating The Law
Introducing the Term Enemy Combatant	p. 15
Justifying Harsh Interrogations and Torture	p. 22
Asserting Absolute Power as Commander in Chief	p. 31
Lawless Detentions In America
Yaser Hamdi, American Citizen	p. 41
Jose Padilla, American Citizen	p. 46
Ali Saleh Kalah al Marri, American Resident	p. 57
Preventive Detention	p. 63
Lawless Detentions In Guantanamo
Guantanamo and the Road to the Supreme Court, 2002-2004	p. 75
Why Guantanamo?	p. 75
Martin Luther King Weekend, January 2002	p. 79
The Road to the Supreme Court	p. 83
With a Little Help from the Cuban Iguana	p. 85
A Historic Supreme Court Decision: Rasul v. Bush	p. 91
Inhumane Treatment of Detainees at Guantanamo	p. 94
Interrogation Log of a Guantanamo Detainee	p. 94
FBI Report: July 29, 2004	p. 98
Denial of Treatment	p. 99
Suicides at the Base	p. 103
The Emergency Response Force	p. 104
Hunger Strikers and Force-feeding	p. 105
The Administration under Siege, 2004-2006	p. 113
Combatant Status Review Tribunals	p. 114
Administrative Review Boards	p. 127
Government Interference with Attorneys	p. 128
The Administration's Legal Position Falters	p. 140
Winds of Change, 2006-2008	p. 144
A Second Historic Supreme Court Decision: Hamdan v. Rumsfeld	p. 144
The Military Commissions Act	p. 147
The Third Guantanamo Case: Boumediene v. Bush	p. 150
Supreme Court Oral Arguments	p. 152
A Parallel Case on Reviewing CSRT Hearings	p. 154
The Return to War Crime Prosecutions: Hicks, Khadr, and Hamdan	p. 156
Victory: Boumediene V. Bush	p. 170
Another Blow to the Administration: Parhat v. Gates	p. 173
Foreign Prisons and Cia Black Sites
The Evolution of Extraordinary Rendition	p. 179
Case Study: Khalid El-Masri	p. 184
Case Study: Maher Arar	p. 188
Case Study: Abu Omar	p. 190
Violating Human Rights Laws	p. 191
Detentions In America With Due Process
John Walker Lindh	p. 197
Richard Colvin Reid	p. 214
Zacarias Moussaoui	p. 214
The Lackawanna Six	p. 217
Closing	p. 223
Addendum: Visiting Guantanamo Bay	p. 227
List of Abbreviations	p. 245
Notes	p. 247
Index	p. 295
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.