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US Attorney General Nominee Judge Michael Mukasey
Are we the only ones who are ready to retch at the constant stream of praise for the president’s choice for attorney general? asks attorney Shane Kadidal in his latest Huffington Post blog Mukasey Will Suck (And He Hates Us) Shane goes on to list how US attorney general nominee Judge Michael Mukasey wrongly describes the role of the Center for Constitutional Rights defending Guantanamo detainees and other mis-characterizations.
Guest – Shane Kadidal, staff attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights and has been at CCR since 2001. He works on the Center’s major case on the illegal NSA domestic spying program, CCR v. Bush, as well as the Center’s Patriot Act case, and testified before Congress this past spring on the material witness statute. He also works on Turkmen v. Ashcroft, representing people swept up on immigration charges after 9/11 and unlawfully detained and abused; with the Vulcan Society of Black Firefighters challenging discriminatory hiring policies of the New York City Fire Department; and with the Sikh Coalition against religious discrimination by New York’s Transit Authority, among other cases.
Guest – attorney Jesse Berman. Berman was an attorney for Osama Awadallah, a US citizen, Palestinian and Muslim. Awadallah was a student at a San Diego college when he was arrested as a material witness shortly after 9/11. Berman describes how federal Judge Mukasey responded to an attorney claiming Awadallah had been beaten while in jail. Mukasey says “he looks fine to me.”
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Center For Constitutional Rights Caterpillar Case Dismissed
Recently the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed the Center for Constitutional Rights’ case charging Caterpillar, Inc with aiding and abetting war crimes. Caterpillar is the company that provided bulldozers to Israel knowing that would be used to demolish homes and endanger civilians in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
The case, Corrie, et al. v. Caterpillar Inc. was brought by the parents of Rachel Corrie and four Palestinian families whose family members were killed or injured when Caterpillar bulldozers demolished their homes. Corrie, a 23-year-old American peace activist and student at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, was killed March 2003, in the Gaza Strip by a Caterpillar D9 bulldozer while protecting a home from illegal demolition. [Click here to download the Decision] from a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals found that it did not have jurisdiction to decide the case because Caterpillar’s bulldozers were ultimately paid for with money from the United States. For years, Caterpillar has had notice that the IDF was using its D9 bulldozers for human rights violations; despite this, the company has continued to provide them to the Israeli government.
Guest – Maria LaHood, senior attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights.
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The Sugar Law Center for Economic and Social Justice
Today on Law and Disorder we talk with the Executive Director and Legal Director of the Sugar Law Center for Economic and Social Justice. They’re a national, non-profit organization, that provides legal support and advocacy for working people and their communities.
Basically holding corporations and goverments accountable to their legal and moral responsibilities regarding illegal and abusive working conditions. Recently the Sugar Law Center has handled cases involving Wal-Mart and Wackenhut, the private prison corporation.
Guest – Tova Perlmutter, Executive Director of the Sugar Law Center.