Michael Dawson wrote:
>4. Like Churchill, she has nothing to apologize to the left for.
-Not right now, no. Why is this so hard to understand? They're the -leading edge of an intensified crackdown, and respectability is no -defense.
This is what I just don't buy. I'm not out publicly washing my hands of Stewart, but I don't buy that she's the leading edge of the crackdown. To be honest, I think the whole focus on Stewart as an individual reflects a pervasive racism that validates a white lawyer over the many other people being sent overseas for secret torture, all the immigrants being held without lawyers for years, and a range of other mostly non-white folks who are on the real leading edge of authoritarianism in this country.
And the whole line that Stewart just broke a minor rule is completely batshit. Her client is possibly the most notorious prisoner in this country-- a bomber of the World Trade Center who is still alive -- and she gave him a chance to in some way communicate with his followers against all efforts to prevent that. I can understand the "vigorous advocacy" behind her actions, but to almost every outside observer, it reasonably looks like collaboration with potential murder that goes far beyond what most people think the role of a lawyer should be.
And the bottom line, and this is not unimportant, is that there is no good politics behind her actions. The Shiek represents terrible, horrible politics so there is no broader political meaning; it's just Voltarian fighting to defend unspeakable beliefs. But I just see far less reason to make Stewart the poster child for Bush fascism when there are so many other people out there suffering FAR WORSE oppression than Lynne Stewart and whose politics are far more meaningful.
If I have to hear the "first they came for the ..." type lines again, I'll just upchuck. Lynne Stewart is not the test case for political correctness on the left. I can be down with the legal rights of the Gitmo detainees to demanding habeous for Padia to denouncing the confiscation of Islamic charities and still not be moved by the Stewart case. She had a trial by a New York City jury -- which even she admits was as good as she could get -- and they still looked at the evidence, deliberated for weeks for full consideration, and decided she had done wrong. This wasn't a railroading trial, so at some point you are at complete war with democracy and the idea that one should respect a fair jury's deliberations.
As I've said, on the legal issues, I think the taping of lawyer-client conversations is a good issue for appeal on whether the jury should have heard it, but that just doesn't cut it as fascism or quasi-fascism to me. The jury heard the evidence and could have kicked the case if they thought it was a terrible injustice. They didn't.
-- Nathan Newman