Habeas Corpus Lives!

In a stunning victory for all that is good in the world (because who expects that these days?), the Supreme Court has just ruled that prisoners in Guantanamo Bay do indeed have the right to habeas corpus (a legal action to protect people from unlawful imprisonment). This means every single one of them, some of whom have been there for years, can now go before a U.S. federal judge to challenge their detention. A massive blow to the Bush administration, this decision strikes down a law Dubya pushed through a 2006 Republican congress that stripped terrorism suspects of habeas corpus and officially designated them as "enemy combatants". Not one of the 270 prisoners at Gitmo (thanks, "A Few Good Men") have ever been charged with anything. In the dissenting opinion, Justice Antonin Scalia (in his role as Bush mouthpiece) said there would be "disastrous consequences of what the court has done today," and went on to say:

"Today, for the first time in our nation's history, the court confers a constitutional right to habeas corpus on alien enemies detained abroad by our military forces in the course of an ongoing war."

Of course, the only way we know these men are alien enemies is because the Bush administration, that bastion of truth, tells us so. What exactly is the harm of letting these guys have their day in court? If they are guilty of terrorism, their crimes will come to light. If they are some poor schmuck with a funny name rounded up in the name of the Patriot Act, hopefully a judge will send them home with our deepest apologies. Somehow, the checks and balances system of government devised by our founding fathers still works every once in while. This is an important step in restoring us to some sort of human decency as a nation. I have to go hang streamers while Rach orders our "Take That, Bush" sheet cake (white cake, buttercream frosting, mmmm) Score one for Harry!