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The Pain Cannot Go On: RICO and Abu Ghraib

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On June 9, 2004, a civil rights group, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) filed a class-action lawsuit in the Southern District of California. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of about a thousand Iraqis who had been imprisoned in Abu Ghraib. The lawsuit alleges violations of the Alien Tort Claims Act, assault and battery, sexual assault and battery, wrongful death, violations of the Fourth, Eigth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, among other things. And, most significantly, it alleges that a consortium of U.S companies and their employees violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) through their work in the Abu Ghraib prison. Over the next few days, ObWi will explore the extent and nature of the Abu Ghraib RICO allegations.

I’d say that the Abu Ghraib claims are shocking, if the term “shocking” wasn’t already so diluted by its association with Britney’s marriages, thirty-year-old National Guard pay stubs, and JacketGate, etc. A sixteen year-old boy “was [allegedly] prevented from eating, drinking water, sitting, or sleeping. He described being sexually abused by Americans who placed their fingers in his anus.” One man was purportedly told by American interrogators that if he didn’t talk, they’d “torture him and rape his sister.” Other men were purportedly tortured, threatened with death, or sexually humiliated. And, allegedly, some were murdered in cold blood by their American interrogators and guards.

These allegations are enough to fill anyone with rage. But don’t let your rage be blind. As we get into the details of the case, you may begin to raise real questions regarding the truth of some of these allegations. You may also see that blame for the nightmare of Abu Ghraib may not fall to the persons accused. And you will see, I hope, that there’s a reason why we have judges and juries in this country, and that things are usually not so black-and-white that you can pick up a newspaper, read a story, dispense justice, and get on with your day.

The only thing worse than a crime, after all, is to convict the wrong person for it.

(There’s more.)

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Or are you just happy to see me?

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Eric Muller shows us exactly what Kerry had in his pocket during his debate with President Bush. I’ve been unexpectedly called away, so my upcoming report on the Abu Ghraib RICO lawsuit won’t appear until tomorrow morning. ‘Till then, this is another open thread. UPDATE: For those unfamiliar with “Jacketgate” (and, thus, Muller’s reference) see … Read more

A note for lawyers (and open thread)

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I used to litigate “complex commerical” disputes, but, through five years of whittling-it-down (and maybe getting a bit whittled in the process), I’ve pretty much reduced myself to two fields — patent law (65%) and RICO litigation (25%) (the other 10% is everything else — mostly trademark and copyright work, though I do love a … Read more

Checking the spin

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It’s starting to look like the right-wing blogosphere has decided that Kerry’s “global test” blunder is gonna be their talking point from the debate. As I’ve blogged, it’s a good one. Kerry deserves the heat. But the Left — they’ve pretty much been all over the map. Self-congratulatory in Kerry’s apparent victory, they’ve lost focus. … Read more

A.Q. Khan and “Justice”

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In last night’s debate, Bush stated (on more than one occasion): The A.Q. Khan network has been brought to justice. (Transcript, courtesy of the Washington Post.) I’m hardly a Kerry-tine, but this truly irks me. The A.Q. Khan network has not been brought to justice. A.Q. Khan was caught, immediately pardoned by President Musharraf of … Read more

Debate roundup

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“Let me look you in the eye and tell you, very directly and forthrightly and firmly, and with a not-insubstantial-amount of vigor and vim, exactly what it is that I am about to say.” Which is: despite occasional crap like the above, Kerry won the debate. Judge it not by the substance (we’ve all made … Read more

The Respectfully Dissenting (nee’ Protest) Placeholding Thread

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I’m all for fiscal discipline, and Lord knows I’ve been critical of Bush for lacking such discipline in the past. But the rather modest tax relief proposed by Republicans and discussed by Hilzoy, below, is hardly undisciplined. Yes, the proposed poultry-litter biofuels tax “relief” probably ain’t worth the crap it’s derived from, but the rest … Read more

Malkin in the Middle

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Professor Bainbridge* and Joe Carter at The Evangelical Outpost weigh in on Michelle Malkin’s “In Defense of Internment”; each has a thoughtful post as to why the blogosphere and media haven’t given more play to Professor Muller‘s takedown of Malkin’s arguments. Meanwhile: Professor Leiter weighs in with the expected less-than-temperate take on the matter; Professor … Read more

Blog Law

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From Orin Kerr at Volokh, I see that the U.S. House has “approved a bill that would increase jail time for identity thieves and other fraudulent Web users who register sites under false identities.” This is a kinda big deal, because it appears to criminalize the rather-common practice of bloggers to submit false information in … Read more

Variations on a Theme

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Vox Day offers to debate Michelle Malkin regarding her book, “In Defense of Internment,” on September 25, 2004 on the Northern Alliance Radio Show. Eugene Volokh is calling on Christians to condemn certain extraordinarily condemnable remarks by Jimmy Swaggert regarding homosexuality. Eric Muller is noting the curious tendency of many in the right-wing blogosphere to … Read more

Iraq Update

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Having been so negative on Iraq of late, I’m pleased to pass along a contrary view from one of our soldiers serving in theatre (via Smash). Remember, though: Just as a bird’s eye view risks missing the sand for the desert, a ground’s eye view risks a greater failing — seeing only the sand, and … Read more

Wow.

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I’ve just started delving into the recent filings in the Abu Ghraib RICO lawsuit and, man, they’re fascinating. (Whether they’ll be fascinating to a lay audience, however, remains to be seen.) I’ll have a more fulsome post later on. Happy weekend, all. Update: For Francis, here’s a copy of Defendant Titan Corporation’s Memorandum in Support … Read more

Things we give away.

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Posts will be light from me for the next few days, but a few procedural notes: 1. Comments suggesting, even obliquely, that armed rebellion is acceptable if [George Bush/John Kerry/Ralph Nadar/me] is elected president are not welcome here. Commentators making such threats/insinuations in the future will be promptly banned. There is no “but-I’m-a-regular” exception. Nor … Read more

Through a glass, and darkly.

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On March 2, 2004, when this blog had about a third of the daily readership that it has today, I wrote the following. Watch as it comes back to bite me in the ass:

I have no idea how the average Iraqi feels about his situation, but Kevin Drum, David Adesnik, and Bird Dog at Tacitus all feel pretty darn good about our progress. Here’s a sentence I thought I’d never write: Drum, Adesnik, and Bird Dog are in agreement on Iraq.

All three posted before today’s round of bombings and attacks, so it’s fair to say that they’ve been somewhat upstaged by events. But their claim still holds up. Iraq is getting better. …

(There’s more.)

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Orin Kerr Gets It

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Over at Le Conspiracy d’Volokhs, Orin Kerr writes: The CBS memos deserve front page coverage- for a day, maybe two. They deserve some blog posts — maybe two, maybe three. But my sense is that something different is happening. My sense is that bloggers are embracing Memogate to the exclusion of other things, as if … Read more

OK, I Give Up

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This will be my sole substantive post on Rathergate: Former CIA Boss Tenet Calls CBS Memos ‘Slam Dunk’ From Scrappleface.

The Diaper Wars

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That sound you heard, just now, was my jaw falling from my skull and drop-drop-dropping onto the floor after finishing Stephen Moore’s recent NRO article on Bush’s anti-trust policy. “Extraordinarily underwhelming” doesn’t begin to do justice as a desciption. (And, so we’re clear, I disfavor most forms of antitrust regulation; i.e., I’m putatively on Moore’s “side.”) The key passage, from which the rest of Moore’s analysis flows, is the following:

Antitrust actions may have made sense during the era of Theodore Roosevelt, when firms like Standard Oil could truly monopolize local markets. But in the 21st century, where markets are global, the idea that firms can gouge consumers on prices is as antiquated as the stage coach. Consumers are more fickle and cost-conscious than ever before. If prices get out of line in any market where there are no barriers to entry, competitors swoop in and lower costs so that monopoly rents disappear.

(Emphasis added.) The problem with this paragraph (and the highlighted sentence in particular) is not merely that it betrays a profound misunderstanding of the practicalities of “entry barriers” — though it does — but that it also demonstrates no appreciable concern for the realities of the present-day marketplace. This is the kind of passage a sociology major might write, between bong hits, and having learned all of his economic theory from Krugman’s New York Times columns. (‘Tis true that Krugman is an economic genius, but the evidence for it is of a super-Times-ular nature.)

As a threshold matter, there is no such thing as a market “where there are no barriers to entry.” Every market has entry barriers. Even with the most ephemeral or fungible products, you have to hire someone to create it, build some sort of office (or telecommuting) environment, pay for start up marketing, etc. Indeed, even if these entry costs did not exist (and they always do), entry into a new market at a minimum costs the sum of your next best opportunity. (Tom, in comments, notes that the economic (as opposed to actual) costs of entry may still be zero if the next best opportunity is not as good as the proposed market-entry; he’s right, of course, and my phrasing of this sentence is confusing. For the moment, consider it withdrawn.)

So Moore is simply silly on this first point. But Moore’s also wrong on a second, admittedly more sophisticated point. The very markets that Moore highlights as having small or nonexistent entry barriers — software companies — in fact usually have fairly high entry barriers. (Here, Yglesias’s analysis of Moore’s article also stumbles.) Meet the modern patent regime: wherein even “clearly” invalid patents have value.

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Sow’s ears, Silk purses, et cetera

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I look at Putin’s power grab in Russia, and I conclude that Bush’s handling of Russia has borne sickly fruit, and Bush’s proposed pull-out from Europe may be premature. The normally far-brighter-than-I Professor Bainbridge looks at Putin’s power grab, and decides to shadow-box the far left. Eh, whatever. Just don’t try selling that sow’s ear … Read more

Three. Trillion. Dollars.

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From the Washington Post: The expansive agenda President Bush laid out at the Republican National Convention was missing a price tag, but administration figures show the total is likely to be well in excess of $3 trillion over a decade. …. Bush’s pledge to make permanent his tax cuts, which are set to expire at … Read more

Precious Bodily Fluids: Round up

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Tacitus‘s and Bird Dog‘s reservations regarding our “strategy” in Fallujah are echoed by the outgoing U.S. Marine Corps general in charge of western Iraq: “When you order elements of a Marine division to attack a city, you really need to understand what the consequences of that are going to be and not perhaps vacillate in … Read more

Two thougts.

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1. The Shins’ latest is a good hear. Incidently, does anyone have any good indy hip-hop? At present, my tastes have mellowed to jazz-hop — yet, I’m stuck somewhere in the mid-90s. (And please don’t suggest Jurrasic 5; they try to hard for my liking.)* 2. Is there any desire among the the readership to … Read more

Is Joe Lieberman Still Available?

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I want a President who finishes what he starts. (The linked CSIS Report on Iraq is required reading, y’all. Via Sullivan.)

I hate to be shrill on this, and I hate all the more for Obsidian Wings to turn (further) to the left as the election approaches. I am, after all, the putative moderate on this site, and I have an interest in keeping this site (and its commentators) suitably moder-iffic. But, enough is enough. What the Hell does a guy have to do to get fired in this town?

(Yglesias, excerpted and embellished upon by our own Hilzoy, provides the rest of the answer.)

So, Lieberman — aka the Big Lieb, aka the Ninja, aka Joey from the CT — is still running, right? Whew, that’s a relief. I was afraid I was gonna have to vote for some warmed-over, two-faced, flip-floppin’ peacenik — like Kerry.

(Even Dean is preferrable. You reading this, Katherine?*)

von

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No Moderate Muslims?

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Are you sure that you’re looking hard enough? (Via Constant Reader Rilkefan and Eugene Volokh.) No, we’re not there yet — as Sebastian notes in these very (virtual) pages. But there’s cause for hope. There is yet cause for hope.

Happy Arrival Day

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And let’s have many more future celebrations of that fine day in 1654 when Jewish folks first arrived in America. Mazel tov! (Via Drezner and Eszter at Crooked Timber.)

Thorley Winston Placeholder Thread

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Yes, I do intend to post on (and condemn) the widening attacks on Bush’s National Guard service during the Vietnam War. Indeed, I can think of few things less important to the nation right now than this continued harping on a war that’s thirty years old. After all, your chance of being attacked in your … Read more

(UPDATED) Two Questions.

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UPDATE: In light of Ms. Malkin’s updates (here and here) of today, two questions. Both have been asked before, and both go to the heart of Ms. Malkin’s claims; yet, to my knowledge, Ms. Malkin has failed to squarely address either.

1. If the Japanese posed only a threat of “hit-and-run raids … in the first months of” World War II, and, as Ms. Malkin must concede, Germany posed an equal (and likely greater) risk of hit-and-run raids not merely in the first months but rather throughout the first years of World War II, why were Japanese-Americans* interned on the West Coast but German-Americans not interned on the East Coast?

2. If the answer to Question #1 is, as Ms. Malkin writes,

The disparate treatment of ethnic Japanese versus ethnic Germans and ethnic Italians is often assumed to be based on anti-Japanese racism rather than military necessity. Japan, however, was the only Axis country with a proven capability of launching a major attack on the United States.

“In Defense of Internment,” p. 84 (emphasis mine), what distinguishes the threat posed by Japanese-Americans of 1941 from the threat posed by Arab-Americans of 2001? What distinguishes the case for Japanese internment from a present day case for Arab internment? Merely saying that you do not advocate Arab internment is not enough; tell us why.

A direct response on both points, from Ms. Malkin or her defenders, would be appreciated.

Finally, please take note that one can favor some form of profiling against present-day terrors, without favoring or defending the internment of the Japanese during World War II. (Further to this point, the Weisenthal Center’s Op-Ed is actually a major slam of Ms. Malkins’ work (“But [Malkin] is wrong in justifying the World War II internment of Japanese Americans as a model for how we should deal today with an alleged “fifth column” among Arabs and Muslim Americans.”); I have no idea why Ms. Malkin cites it as though it supports her.)

von

*I use the term “Japanese-Americans” to indicate those persons of Japanese descent who had been born in the United States and who had not spent significant time in Japan.

UPDATE TWO: In a subsequent post, Malkin asks “What are they so afraid of?” (referring to teachers and principals who have refused to change their lesson plans to account for Malkin’s revisions). Fear has nothing to do with it; as I understand their decision, they believe that Malkin’s work does not meet their minimum academic standards. Schools are not required to teach crap.

Geez, this used to be a lesson that the Left had trouble with — all views are equal, every perspective deserves equal respect, yada yada yada. Now I find the same silliness on the uber-Right. If Malkin wants to be taken seriously by serious people, she’s got to defend her thesis against attack over the course of years, and convince the experts in the field that her thesis is the best one. Only then can we start talking about changing lesson plans.

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New additions to Von’s blogroll

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Eric Muller of “Is That Legal?” Stan of “Logic & Sanity.” Lawrence Lessig. Oh, and I’d like to formally sign on to the following e-mail to Todd Zywicki at the Volokh Conspiracy: “At this point I swear I will pay solid money in small bills to make the wine wars stop. Signed, A Fan“ Yes. … Read more

The Wrong Approach

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I just caught Richard Gephardt on Fox News Sunday: In response to virtually every question, Gephardt brought up Kerry’s experience in Vietnam and said that the electorate wants “a change in direction” — and not much else. Memo to Gephardt (and the Kerry campaign): We all know about Kerry’s Vietnam experiences.* If Kerry’s going to win (and it’s starting to look unlikely), he’s got to start talking about the future. He’s gotta tell us what he will do once elected. [There’s more.]

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What?

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UPDATE TWO: Professor Reynolds has updated and clarified the post discussed below. Please keep Reynolds’s update in mind as you read the following, which was drafted before the update. (My personal view of Reynolds’s update is, “well done.”) Yglesias has also updated; please read it as well. [Ad hominem attack by yours truly on a … Read more

Holiday Open Thread

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There’s no telling who’ll be around to post, so I offer up this holiday open thread. Keep it light — between botched Russian rescues, Clinton in surgery, Zell on Earth,* and insinuations regarding Dick Cheney’s and Kerry’s patriotism(s), there are plenty of other threads to vent. As for me: Well, I’ve had two favorable settlements … Read more

Big Swingin’ Governments

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President Bush’s speech last night was about the future — and, in general, it was well presented. Bush did not fall into le trap de Kerry, as I feared he might. But I was utterly amazed by the kind of future that Bush presented. Not a future of small government, but a future of expanded … Read more