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Kagan “Loves” the Federalist Society

Hosts discuss Elena Kagan’s background with Francis Boyle, Professor of law at the University of Illinois. Boyle is author of “Tackling America’s Toughest Questions.” In his article titled  – – Supreme Court Pick: Kagan “Loves” the Federalist Society, – – Boyle notes Kagan explicitly endorsed the Bush administration’s bogus category of ‘enemy combatant,’ whose implementation has been a war crime in its own right. He also writes that “Kagan has actually said ‘I love the Federalist Society.’  Almost all of the Bush administration lawyers responsible for its war and torture memos are members of the Federalist Society.  Read – Dean Elena Kagan: Harvard’s Gitmo Kangaroo Law School — The School for Torturers

Law Professor, Francis Boyle:

  • She has fully defended the hideous Bush atrocities, civil rights, human rights, civil liberties.
  • No retreat or abandonment of the Bush positions.
  • She (Kagan) did write this tome in the Harvard Law Review, equivalent to the Federalist Society, unitary executive power theory of the presidency.
  • She’d be a total disaster on the cases that really count for the future of the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
  • She’s a neo-conservative and has no qualifications to speak of.
  • (She) hired Jack Goldsmith, author of torture memos and helped set up kangaroo court system in Guantanamo. We are still fighting Kagan supporting the Bush war on terrorism.
  • Kagan stated on National Public Radio on December 22, 2009, “I Love The Federalist Society”
  • Obama and his people know that Kagan will be the spear carrier for presidential powers on the Supreme Court
  • This is a very dangerous time for the future of our republic and Constitution.  The statement that she cares for the common people. . . she’s an elitist snob.
  • There she is promoting globalization at Harvard Law School?? Hiring people to teach “globaloney” just to lick the boots of Larry Summers?  While dean at Harvard Law School, she was moonlighting at Goldman Sachs payroll.
  • This is all incredibly incestuous. Unlike Bush who wasn’t a lawyer, Obama taught Constitutional Law at the University of Chicago Law School, he should know better.

Guest – Professor Francis Boyle, A scholar in the areas of international law and human rights, Professor Boyle received a J.D. degree magna cum laude and A.M. and Ph.D. degrees in political science from Harvard University. Prior to joining the faculty at the College of Law, he was a teaching fellow at Harvard and an associate at its Center for International Affairs. He also practiced tax and international tax with Bingham, Dana & Gould in Boston.

He has written and lectured extensively in the United States and abroad on the relationship between international law and politics. His eleventh  book, Breaking All the Rules: Palestine, Iraq, Iran and the Case for Impeachment was recently published by Clarity Press. His Protesting Power: War, Resistance and Law has been used successfully in  anti-war protest trials.

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In Memory of Attorney Rhonda Copelon

Hosts talk with Cathy Albisa, executive director of the National Economic and Social Rights Initiative. about the human rights legacy of Rhonda Copelon.  Rhonda had a huge influence on changing international law for human rights.  She founded the International Women’s Human Rights Law Clinic.  

Lawyers You’ll Like series with Rhonda Copelon. Part 1 Part 2.

Attorney Cathy Albisa:

  • I worked with Rhonda at CUNY,  we both co-counseled with CCR on a couple of cases.
  • I met Rhonda on a car ride, a 25 hour car ride. We spent 25 hours talking about human rights in the United States.  Rhonda had a huge influence on NESRI
  • Rhonda never stopped lamenting Harris v McRae, she was still furious and outraged.
  • The assumption embedded in that case is the court is saying, we’re not responsible as a society, the poverty of this woman.  Copeland Fund For Gender Justice.  Rhonda thought it was critical that a progressive gender perspective be embedded into some body of work that really looked at these gender issues in a cross cutting way, that understood the relevance of poverty, the relevance of race, the relevance of sexual minorities.
  • Rhonda was not a wealthy woman, she was a law professor and saved her money. She gave 1 million dollars for this fund and that was everything. The case that she says always saved my life was Filártiga v. Peña-Irala.
  • She founded the International Women’s Human Rights Law Clinic. What she did with that clinic is challenge the traditional model of human rights law coming out of the United States.
  • She made no claims of being objective, she was on the side of victims, of people with similar politics to her own.
  • This changed international law. Rhonda: Don’t disregard the banal, the ordinary things that actually represent deep violations.
  • The way Rhonda went about things, she merged intellectual capital with a strategic ferocity and personal good will and relationship building.
  • She thought it was very important that people understand they’re part of a broad social justice and human rights movement.Cathy Albisa joins us today to talk about her work with the National Economic and Social Rights Initiative and Rhonda’s work as legal adviser to the Women’s Caucus for Gender Justice.

Guest- Cathy Albisa, is a constitutional and human rights lawyer with a background on the right to health. Ms. Albisa also has significant experience working in partnership with community organizers in the use of human rights standards to strengthen advocacy in the United States. She co-founded NESRI along with Sharda Sekaran and Liz Sullivan in order to build legitimacy for human rights in general, and economic and social rights in particular, in the United States.

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