The Worst of the McCain Compromise
This bill stinks.
It ought to be called the Abu Ghraib Authorization and Whitewash Act of 2006.
A quick survey of it’s most transparently terrible provisions:
Geneva gives no enforceable rights:
(a) IN GENERAL. No person may invoke the Geneva Conventions or any protocols thereto in any habeas or civil action or proceeding to which the United States, or a current or former officer, employee, member of the Armed Forces, or other agent of the United States, is a party as a source of rights, in any court of the United States or its States or territories.
Bush gets to define Geneva as he wishes:
(3) INTERPRETATION BY THE PRESIDENT. (A) As provided by the Constitution and by this section, the President has the authority for the United States to interpret the meaning and application of the Geneva Conventions and to promulgate higher standards and administrative regulations for violations of treaty obligations which are not grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions.
A decade of lawbreaking wiped clean:
(2) RETROACTIVE APPLICABILITY. The amendments made by this section, except as specified in paragraph 2441(d)(2)(E) of title 10, United States Code, shall take effect as of November 26, 1997, as if enacted immediately after the amendments made by section 583 of Public Law 105-118 (as amended by section 4002 of Public Law 107-273).