The Rule of Law

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/08/opinion/08sat3.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=The%20Rule%20of%20Law&st=cse

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: barry levine 
Date: Sat, Jan 8, 2011 at 8:48 PM
Subject: re: The Rule of Law
To: letters@nytimes.com


To the Editors:

    There are both active and passive elements in upholding the rule of law. In violating the FISA statute (and our Fourth Amendment) to wiretap Americans without warrants, President Bush actively attacked the rule of law. Likewise when he authorized torture.  President Obama hasn't actively attacked the rule of law to our knowledge (although a lot remains hidden behind "State Secrets").He even passively accepts the Rule of Law in honoring the Congress's distribution of moneys for detainees at Guantanamo.  I'll call all of these things progress. Still, I'm waiting for the Change we voted for.  That would require an active embrace of the Rule of Law. When our Constitution says that our chief executive must "take care that the laws be faithfully executed" it means that he (through his Attorney General) must prosecute torturers even when that's politically inconvenient, and must prosecute wiretappers even when they're big political donors.  We're waiting.

Barry Levine