The WaPo has a more detailed article on Bush’s defense of military tribunals. As it turns out, he does attempt to justify them on the basis that FDR used military tribunals to try a group of saboteurs back in 1942. Of course, in that case, FDR asked for a tribunal to hear the specific case of saboteurs who had already been caught, not for blanket authority to use them against any non-citizen at his discretion. He did this when the nation was officially at war with Germany. Furthermore, he took the issue to the Supreme Court rather than just issuing an executive order granting himself the right to hold the tribunals. And finally, the Supreme Court decision is generally looked back on as a mistake and a miscarriage of justice, so trying to justify the current executive order on those grounds is disingenuous at best.

This Cal Thomas column on LBJ and the Vietnam war complements the previous item rather nicely. Here’s how the column winds up:

A staggering 58,000 Americans are dead because Johnson would not listen to his inner voice, revealed on the tapes, or the voices of McGovern, Hatfield, Gruening and Morse, who many conservatives at the time labeled un-American.

Among the many lessons of Vietnam, which, as Beschloss notes, can teach us something about present and future conflicts, is that no president should have exclusive power when it comes to committing so many American lives and resources to a war.

The Johnson tapes should also teach conservatives a lesson. Many anti-war activists love this country as much as those who supported the Vietnam War. Just because someone is of a different party or persuasion does not necessarily mean they are wrong.

(Link via Kausfiles.)

The thing I find most disturbing about the Bush administration is the total resistance to any form of accountability. The entire administration stance was captured in a nutshell yesterday when President Bush was asked about the need for military tribunals, and he basically responded by saying “because I say so.” The WaPo today documents the Bush administration’s refusal to be accountable to other branches of the government. When you look at the breadth of the executive power grab that’s been going on since Bush was inaugurated, it is truly frightening. Here’s a guy that would have lost the Presidential election had balloting been conducted competently in Florida who now thinks that he’s as much emperor as President.

President Bush today defended his decision to order military tribunals for any terrorists that we might catch, but he didn’t justify it. He said that it was “absolutely the right thing to do” but offered no explanation as to why. Oh, wait, he said we’re dealing with “evil people” again. There you go.

I was looking for a specific article at Slate (which I couldn’t find), but I did find the archives for The Explainer. Nearly every one of the recent articles looks interesting, and I haven’t read most of them.

Mozilla Custom Keywords are one more reason to dump that browser you’re currently using and try out Mozilla instead.

The New York Times today documents refugee reports that the foreign Taliban forces that are holding Kunduz have conducted mass executions of Afghan Taliban soldiers that were trying to defect, and massacres of men in local villages as well. In the meantime, the Northern Alliance has agreed to allow any Afghan fighters in Kunduz to leave the city safely, but will not extend the same courtesy to foreign fighters. It disturbs me to say it, but I imagine that they’ll all be killed.

Today, Salon runs the first part of Damien Cave’s two part article on the role the oil industry plays in the Bush administration. The article is very balanced, and mainly details the various oil industry ties held by Bush, Cheney, and other cabinet members. The second part will focus on Bush himself.

One common assumption by people with political leanings that are generally close to my own is that the US media will, by default, gloss over the brutal histories of much of the Northern Alliance leadership because they’re now considered US allies. Fortunately, that has not proven to be the case. The New York Times has an article today that discusses the return to power of many of the same characters who ripped Afghanistan apart before the Taliban came to power. I believe that despite the fact that the factions that make up the Northern Alliance were awful last time they were in power, they can help to build a better government this time. At the same time, unless we remain aware of their past behavior and watch for signs of it in the future, Afghanistan very well might repeat its awful history.

For some reason, the US is still bombing the town of Gardez, which kicked out the Taliban last week. In the process, we blew up a building belonging to a UN mine clearing agency, and killed a family of refugees taking shelter near it. These seem like the kinds of mistakes we should be able to avoid, especially now that Afghanistan is crawling with both US soldiers and international journalists. The BBC reporter in the town certainly knows that it’s no longer occupied by the Taliban, why doesn’t US Central Command?