Nightcap notes (a corollary to the more common
morning coffee notes): tonights nightcap,
Milwaukee's Best!An a web feature for
The American Prospect, Katharine Berland writes an excellent article about a case in Florida that proves
the need for an international criminal court, which the Bush administration has so nimbly (for some definition of nimbly) ducked out of in their continuing "Not Invented Under Clinton" campaign to turn back every advance made in the last eight to thirty years (these are
my editorializations, not necessarily those of TAP).
In any case,
Katharine's article is a worthy read, and not easily summarized here.
My own feelings on the matter: the Bush Administration's party line on this one is that the International Criminal Court (ICC) could be abused by America haters to call into question any American act in the world, and that it would put innocent Americans at risk. Yet, the Clinton Administration signed a treaty to establish the court in the first place. To me, it feels like the Clinton Administration felt that the United States and its armed forces should be held accountable to the same international-human-rights laws and decisions as the rest of the world. It makes sense, given what we (Americans) like to pride ourselves in. But why does the Bush Administration want to avoid that accountability? Protecting U.S. citizens sounds fine on the surface, but it also gives a large U.S. only shield to hide unknown operations behind.
So the U.S. marches on with an administration proudly wearing the badge of being so much more right than others, it is exempt from their jurisdiction. This applies not only to the ICC, but to the UN as well, particularly in the whole Iraq "will we or won't we" invade game. There is an excellent write up of this at
CrimesOfWar.org covering
the 'Bush Doctrine' of pre-emptive self-defence, which is another fine read (and one I need to read in more detail and wakefulness) detailing why the U.S. is having such a hard time finding real support for its Iraq Invasion cause, and why that cause can be a tough sale (since it's hard to determine, particularly in this case, if it really is the right or wrong course of action).