Folks on the right are also duly pissed about the video produced by Lizard Cheney's website, Keep America Safe. One of the Powerline bloggers Paul Mirengoff wrote a piece about this heinous horseshit, although he did detract some of what he wrote later. John Bellinger III, legal advisor to Condi Rice has also weighed in on this fuckery:
“I think it’s unfortunate that these individuals are being criticized for their past representation. It reflects the politicization and the polarization of terrorism issues," Bellinger said. "Neither Republicans nor Democrats should be attacking officials in each other’s administrations based solely on the clients they have represented in the past.”
“We’ve had a long-standing tradition in our country for lawyers to represent unpopular causes, and they shouldn’t be attacked for doing so," Bellinger added.
Peter D. Keisler, who headed the Civil Division of the Justice Department under the Bush43 administration, has also defended the attorneys in a piece printed by the NYTimes:
“There is a longstanding and very honorable tradition of lawyers representing unpopular or controversial clients,” Mr. Keisler said. “The fact that someone has acted within that tradition, as many lawyers, civilian and military, have done with respect to people who are accused of terrorism – that should never be a basis for suggesting that they are unfit in any way to serve in the Department of Justice.”
I have no problem with the request to name the attorneys, it's called transparency, but what jerks my chain is the sliming of these attorneys as the "Al-Qaeda 7". It's a purely political motivation on the part of Cheney and her co-horts in slime. Even Ted Olsen, Bush43's Solicitor General, and widower, who's wife was killed on 9/11 and the lead attorney for The Shrub in Bush v Gore, wrote (pdf) a scathing piece in the Legal Times in 2007 about the witch hunt for lawyers that represented Gitmo detainees. HuffPo has more on Mr. Olsen's pov along with the reprint of the LT piece. A few quotes from Mr Olsen and Mr. Neal Katyal's 2007 article, which rings as true today as it did in 2007:
"The ethos of the bar is built on the idea that lawyers will represent both the popular and the unpopular, so that everyone has access to justice. Despite the horrible Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, this is still proudly held as a basic tenet of our profession," Olson wrote.
"When government officials are called 'war criminals' and when public-interest lawyers are called 'terrorist huggers,' it not only cheapens the discourse, it scrambles the dialogue. The best solutions to these difficult problems will emerge only when the best advocates, backed by weighty resources, bring their talents to bear. And the heavy work of creating solutions for these complicated issues can only move forward when the name-calling ceases."
*Snip*
"One of the wisest things the administration did after Sept. 11 was to permit lawyers to do their jobs in defending detainees," he and Katyal wrote. "From the enormously talented judge advocates general who directly represented Guantánamo detainees to the hundreds of private practitioners who took on individual cases, they have upheld our best principles by providing a vigorous defense. Patriotism is believing that the American system, not whim and insult, will reach the right results." (emphasis mine)
That last line should be engraved in stone, in my humble yet vocal opinion. The ABA (American Bar Association) has weighed in on the video as well, from TPM Muckraker:
In response to the Liz Cheney Web ad that questions the loyalty of lawyers who have represented Guantanamo detainees, the president of the American Bar Association said it is "a divisive and diversionary tactic" to impugn "the character of lawyers who have sought to protect the fundamental rights of unpopular clients."
In a statement to TPMmuckraker, ABA President Carolyn Lamm said that lawyers have an ethical obligation to "provide representation to people who otherwise would stand alone against the power and resources of the government--even to those accused of heinous crimes against this nation in the name of causes that evoke our contempt."
Lamm added: "The American people understand this obligation, and the corollary principle that representing a client is a commitment to a legal system that requires justice, not to any one client's political, economic, social or moral views or activities."
So fuck you Liz Cheney and the burro you rode in on. If brilliant minds on the right lambast your fuckwitted ass for this politically-motivated shit...you sincerely deserve it..and I hope you rot in hell sooner than later, ya worthless cunt.
And take Charles the douchenozzle Grassley with you.
