Who the hell is Robert H. Jackson?
posted by MedfordTim 02/28/2008 01:45:45 AM EST
I watched the latest
Noam Chomsky speech at Democracy Now! called
Why is Iraq Missing from 2008 Presidential Race? tonight, and caught a name I hadn't thought of in awhile.
The guy who said the following: (emphasis mine)
"We must make clear to the Germans that the wrong for which their fallen leaders are on trial is not that they lost the war, but that they started it. And we must not allow ourselves to be drawn into a trial of the causes of the war, for our position is that no grievances or policies will justify resort to aggressive war. It is utterly renounced and condemned as an instrument of policy."
Robert H. Jackson - if these quotes pique your interest, find out more about this incredible public servant, statesman, Nuremberg judge, and Supreme Court Justice .
A few more quotes, again - emphasis mine:
"We must never forget that the record on which we judge these defendants is the record on which history will judge us tomorrow. To pass these defendants a poisoned chalice is to put it to our own lips as well."Apply the above in liberal amounts to the current "Military Tribunal" kangaroo courts of the Bush Plan...
"The day that this country ceases to be free for irreligion it will cease to be free for religion - except for the sect that can win political power."
...wouldn't surprise me to find out that one is James Dobson's favorite...
"[T]he effect of the religious freedom Amendment to our Constitution was to take every form of propagation of religion out of the realm of things which could directly or indirectly be made public business, and thereby be supported in whole or in part at taxpayers' expense. That is a difference which the Constitution sets up between religion and almost every other subject matter of legislation, a difference which goes to the very root of religious freedom[...] This freedom was first in the Bill of Rights because it was first in the forefathers' minds; it was set forth in absolute terms, and its strength is its rigidity. It was intended not only to keep the states' hands out of religion, but to keep religion's hands off the state, and, above all, to keep bitter religious controversy out of public life by denying to every denomination any advantage from getting control of public policy or the public purse." This is what Mike
"And that's what we need to do -- to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards" Huckabee keeps forgetting while parading in that homespun "aw, shucks" persona of his.
John McCain says.
"I would probably have to say yes, that the Constitution established the United States of America as a Christian nation." He conveniently stops short of pointing out
where that part of the Constitution is. Obama and Clinton are disappointing if this respect too, but I'm tired of linking. Let's do another quote:
"The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities and officials, and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. One's right to life, liberty, and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections."
As Ken likes to say, 'contrast and compare' those words with these from current
SCOTUS Justice Antonin Scalia:
"It seems to me you have to say, as unlikely as that is, it would be absurd to say you couldn't, I don't know, stick something under the fingernail, smack him in the face. It would be absurd to say you couldn't do that," Can't end a post on a downer like that...
Here's a quote from Will Rogers, as timely today as it was then:
"Everything is changing. People are taking their comedians seriously and the politicians as a joke."
