Obama’s First 100 Days: A Lack of Constitutional Respect

Today is the 100th day of the Obama presidency.  What this means is that today is a meaningless day that liberals will use to say what a great job Obama has been doing, and conservatives will use it to say what a horrible job he has been doing.  So this author has decided, if you can’t beat them, join them.

It is true, in my opinion, that Obama has done a pretty decent job in his first 100 days in office, but there are some areas that his lack of progress from the Bush administration policies has been very alarming, namely in the area of rights abuse.  If the first 100 days is any sort of indication, than it looks like President Obama has decided that the Bush administration knew what it was talking about when it asserted the policy of “I’m in charge, and I will do what I want.”

One area where this has become apparent is in regards to Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan, which the current administration seems determined to make into a new Gitmo.  While the administration has decided to shut down Gitmo, they have decided that Bagram would make a fine new base of operations for a black hole site.  The administration wishes to be able to deny any prisoners there judicial review of the legality of their detention.  A prison in Afghanistan, an active war zone, is a little trickier than one located in Cuba, and it is understandable to deny judicial review to prisoners caught on the battlefield.  What is alarming is that the Obama team also wishes to be able to fly prisoners into Bagram from around the world, and then deny them judicial review.  This is the exact same problemthat we faced at Gitmo.  When you are able to ship in prisoners and then deny them rights because they are now in an active war zone you might as well have kept Gitmo open.  Even more worrisome is the fact that since Bagram is located in a war zone far away from America it will become even easier to restrict investigation into any human rights abuses going on there. 

The Obama administration has also moved to strike down a law here at home that requires a lawyer be present for a police to question a suspect who has retained a lawyer or asks for one.  While some might say, “Well just don’t answer anything until your lawyer gets there,” it is easy to imagine the potential for abuse of mentally challenged or uneducated suspects.  There is little conceivable downside to waiting for a lawyer, and too much potential for abuse for this to be considered a reasonable move by the Obama team.

The Obama DOJ has also supported the continuation of the “state secret” privilige invented by the Bush administration, and has added to that a “sovereign immunity” claim which says that citizens cannot sue the government for illegal activities unless the government chooses to disclose what they learned from the illegal activities.  So, even if it is known the government is acting illegally, there is nothing that can be done about it unless the government essentially decides it is okay with being sued.  This is a claim that even the Bush administration didn’t see fit to create, and truly worrisome for anyone concerned about keeping checks on the government’s ability to invade the private lives of its citizens.  Combined with the state secrets privilege the Obama administration is seeking the power to be able to do whatever it wants, and, so long as it is classified as secret, any actions will not be subject to judicial review.

President Obama is also seeking to destroy the Fourth Amendment by forcing cell phone carriers to turn over cell tower data without warrants, a move that legal scholars reject as being unconstitutional.  This would allow the government to seize private data, without cause, to track the location of anyone in the U.S. that it sees fit.  Such brazen disregard for the constitution, by a former constitutional law professor, is ludicrous.

The examples listed above point to an administration that is continuing the previous presidency’s complete disregard for constitutional protections that people in America believe they are protected by.  While there is much to celebrate in the first 100 days of the Obama presidency, unfortunately a respect for the constitution cannot, at this time, be counted to highly on the list.

: : : : : : : : : : :