Two House Republicans Vote Without Being Sworn In, Violating Constitution On Day It Was Read

Now slow down. It's not like they sold arms to Iran or set up a system of secret prisons to avoid giving POW's access to due process. Give them time. I'm sure they will violate the Constitution in a way worthy of the Republican party.

Are we really going to have to go over the difference between "POW" and "enemy combatant" again...?

Ah yes, so people captured in a "War on Terror" aren't "prisoners of WAR"........... right.

Not to mention, you may want to go read the Convention documents again, you still missed it ;)

I'm not.....the Geneva Convention addresses POWs and Civilian persons of war. I know the prisoners in GITMO are not civilian persons of war so they must be POWs and the geneva convention should apply. Bush the mental midget and his cronies never satisfacturaly argued that!

'The third Geneva Convention ("Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War") covers members of the armed forces who fall into enemy hands. They are in the power of the enemy State, not of the individuals or troops who have captured them

Prisoners of war MUST be:

- Treated humanely with respect for their persons and their honour.
- Enabled to inform their next of kin and the Central Prisoners of War Agency (ICRC, the International Red Cross) of their capture.
- Allowed to correspond regularly with relatives and to receive relief parcels.
- Allowed to keep their clothes, feeding utensils and personal effects.
- Supplied with adequate food and clothing.
- Provided with quarters not inferior to those of their captor's troops.
- Given the medical care their state of health demands.
- Paid for any work they do.
- Repatriated if certified seriously ill or wounded, (but they must not resume active military duties afterwards) .
- Quickly released and repatriated when hostilities cease.

Prisoners of war must NOT be:
-Compelled to give any information other than their name, age, rank and service number.
- Deprived of money or valuables without a receipt (and these must be returned at the time of release).
- Given individual privileges other than for reasons of health, sex, age, military rank or professional qualifications.
- Held in close confinement except for breaches of the law, although their liberty can be restricted for security reasons.
- Compelled to do military work, nor work which is dangerous, unhealthy or degrading.'

Some of those in Gitmo are straight from the battlefield in Afghanistan and have been there since the invasion. If they are not POW's, the word has lost all meaning. But I'm sure that's what Bush and his Liberty University lawyers intended.

@ ImNotTryingToBeFunny

Oh...and for the person who said that they are prisoners of war because of the war on terrorism...you can't possibly be serious, can you? The "war on terrorism" is a colloquialism...it's not actually a "war".

I was indeed being facetious.

However, it certainly is an interesting dynamic that was created. President Bush made it very clear: "This was not an act of terrorism, it was an act of war". Congress passed a resolution of war against those responsible for this "act of war", yet when the same terminology is used for the actual actions motivated by such statements, the statements become colloquialism. Fair enough, but resolutions of war certainly are admissable as colloquialism, are they?

Were all the deaths, innocent and otherwise, in the name of our 'colloquial' war on terror simply 'colloquial' collateral damage as well? Last I checked, the "war" is still going and those who "died" are still "dead". That's an awful lot of death and destruction in the name of a catch phrase, wouldn't you say?

CORRECTION: Fair enough, but resolutions of war certainly aren't admissable as colloquialism, are they?

@ Imnottryingtobefunny

A few more things:

Are we really going to have to go over the difference between "POW" and "enemy combatant" again...?

It's like some of you people have literally never read the Geneva Conventions.

Actually, the first two comments in this comment thread were about the Constitution, not the Geneva Convention.

And, according to the Supreme Court (on more than one occasion), the term "enemy combatant" doesn't apply to Gitmo detainees; that they are in fact "prisoners" link. And furthermore, that they thus have Constitutional rights.

I would encourage you people to actually read the Geneva Conventions. The Geneva Convenctions give very detailed and explicit definitions of what a "prisoner of war" is. A jihdadist is not a prisoner of war.

If I actually have to copy/paste them, it'll only make you look more foolish

C'mon now.... you could only believe that if you stopped reading after article 4 of the third convention. True, article 4 of the third convention seems to rather directly define what qualifies as a prisoner of war: " having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance . . . of carrying arms openly . . . of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war."

That doesn't sound like Al Qaeda, the taliban, or any other such outfit would count. But, the FIFTH article muddies the water a bit:

Should any doubt arise as to whether persons, having committed a belligerent act and having fallen into the hands of the enemy, belong to any of the categories enumerated in Article 4, such persons shall enjoy the protection of the present Convention until such time as their status has been determined by a competent tribunal.

Hmm.... not so clear now.... huh?

But again, none of that even matters at this point because the Supreme Court has ruled that Gitmo prisoners have Constitutional rights.

Alberto Gonzales invented the term "enemy combatant" in regard to Gitmo detainees - so implying that the Geneva Conventions designate Gitmo detainees as a word which didn't exist in the current form at the time of the Geneva Conventions is laughable.........

ImNot

Even though you admit that you were being "facetious" with POW's being prisoners of the "war on terror", you turn right around and start beating that same dead horse some more with allegation of Congress sanctioning a "war on terror"...

Nice strawman.

I never said Congress sanctioned a war on terror; I simply stated that they sanctioned a war. And based upon that sanctioning of war, numerous people have been killed and/or captured. Those are facts ({fakts}"something that actually exists; reality; truth").

I simply find it peculiar how the terminology is cherrypicked based on the need to stir up rabid angst and war support. And, more specifically, how a linguine phrase was used to sanction a war and yet it's dismissed by you as mere "colloquialism".

And the SCOTUS defining the people at GITMO as "prisoners" has absolutely NO relevance to the definition for "prisoners of war" relative to the Geneva Conventions.

Yes, but the original comments were about the CONSTITUTION. YOU brought up the Geneva Convention. The SCOTUS defining the people at GITMO as "prisoners" has absolute relevance to the definition of rights relative to the CONSTITUTION.

The SCOTUS has no authority or jurisdiction to interpret the meanings of the Geneva Convention...it only deals with issues of U.S. law.

Yes, and if US Law deems that people in GITMO are granted rights, then they can't be tortured or held without trial. Period.

I think a case *could* be made that the Geneva Convention language was drafted without consideration for "rogue" individuals. With that min mind, I think the spirit of the Geneva Convention was such that we undermine it when we start justifying reasons why we can still treat prisoners inhumanely based upon a technicality.

The Geneva Conventions stating that if people don't qualify as "POW's" then they should still be afforded the protections of the Geneva Convention is until they are "officially categorized" still does not MAKE them POW's.

But your semantical games do nothing to change the facts. Regardless of what you want to call them, we still didn't have the authority to treat them the way we treated them - regardless of whether you view the situation through the lens of the Geneva Conventions OR the Constitution.

While you're arguing about an acronym, our nation continues to desecrate all that it says it stands for......... we've been reduced to justifying the very behaviors we've deemed as barbaric when perpetuated by others - and we're justifying them through semantical wordplay. NICE.

Yes but now on faux noose they will show some clips and make it appear it was read with much poise and emphasis to all of the GOP who cried and made it their lifelong path to religiously follow this document, if there was a poll after the segment probably 95% of right wingers would regurgitate this 'fact' which is all they were after from the beginning.

Yeah who cares about that pesky swearing in and all... clarke you know if it had been a Democrat there would be howls of outrage and calls to have their vote expunged.

Thats exactly my point. No intentional shennanigans going on and the right would still be screaming.

Let them, I don't want to be like that though.

That is the difference between them and us.

Clarke- it's not making a mountain out of molehills to point out the repeated GOP hypocrisy. They wanted this Constitution read as a major statement of their commitment. Then they couldn't even get some of their party members to show up for the swearing in, and lost most of the ones that did show up by the midpoint of the reading. Even Boehner scheduled a press conference somewhere during the reading. It is also hypocritical to suggest over and over again that the GOP is committed to ethics, openness, budgeting, jobs, and have them spend their time at fundraisers, trying to repeal things they have no votes for, backing down on the budget cuts commitment, and not coming up with anything progressive (in the sense of progress, not in the sense of liberal.) There little foxbots and TP'ers need to hear about this, and we are the only ones who will tell them.

O.K. then! I take it back!

They're all filthy communist welfare scum!

Worse!

Much, much worse!

lol.

yes clark, it is a mole hill, but a very big one in the eyes of the duped genuflectors.

and to begin slamming these loud-mouths immediately and continuously with the absolute falsehood of their demeanors is perfectly within the

bounds, rights and responsibilities of

the sovereign.

that's us. for whatever it's worth, and, right now, if we don't do this, continuously, not even the little cockroach on the wall will recognize the

rights of the sovereign.

not that voice action counts for much, or anything, but we must just keep talking, until some of us have the opportunity to put our bodies where our mouths are.

then we will see how deep one of two things are -

1 - the pain and disgust and despair and rage of the sovereign, or

2 - the immense level of co-option already embedded in the 'would-be sovereign' who has lost, if they had ever known of, the existence of the 'constitution' they so stupidly adhere to, without a

CLUE as to what the original writers were trying to get at.

yes, it is a trainwreck. a bad one. it will get worse. it may not get better.

but i prefer to go down swinging, with maybe a few bodies left in my path.

Didn't the Republicans go ballistic when the Chief Justice bobbled a word at Obama's swearing in? So much so that he needed a 'do-over' later? Imagine what they would have said if Obama had missed the swearing-in entirely!

@ rls8r

Imagine what they would have said if Obama had missed the swearing-in entirely!

They would have said that his absence was due to his attendance at the "Hate America" celebratory ice cream social hosted by Bill Ayers for Obama and all of his socialist, marxist, elitist, racist, communist, fascist, corporatist, muslim, terrorist friends.

Maybe so, but that place was PACKED! I can't imagine even Obama would have been able to squeeze in.

rls8r

I heard it was packed too..... that was happens when Kanye headlines :P

I mean really, who in their right mind would miss his/her swearing in ceremony?

Thank you for pointing out that it not only violates the Constitution, but also common sense.

That's the part that gets me, not even enough sense of pride in the position you just got to stand there and proudly take the oath?

sigh.

Yeah, but they were at a FUNDRAISER which PROVES that they have their priorities straight and all of us whiners on the Vine are just confused!

A reminder of ghosts of scandals past ... of both political parties. Too bad those who voted for the clowns among those who are actually good legislators don't know how to tell the difference, or read history or understand the seriousness of current events beyond surface ideology. I guess they believe it keeps them from having to rub two brain cells together to take responsibility for those they send to Washington.

But, in our current political landscape, this is the kind of petty screw up that could end up costing someone an election.

I hope it's my asshat congressman Fiztpatrick.

The fact that he was my congressman during the Bush administration only makes this worse as he should know better. But his wealthy patrons from Solebury township need their Capitol tours and I guess he figured it was worth making a fool out of himself becuase the people that matter, you know, middle and working class of PA's eighth, are easily fooled and suffer from severe amnesia.

Make no mistake, in the grand scheme of things, this means absolutely nothing

Well, in the world of mega-vapors super-sensitive hyper-critical Republican @!$%#s, it's a big deal. I certainly am not going to pause in CONSTANTLY slinging criticism at them for EVERY @!$%#ING LITTLE THING as it was the thousand cuts that destroyed the mandate the Democrats achieved in 2008.

If they are going to hold the Dems to these standards, they are going to be bloody well judged EVERY SINGLE TIME they fail, to those exact same standards.

At least they're consistent.

Consistently full of jackassery.

Seriously, that's all their designated "first acts" are turning out to be (I'm not surprised I'm just saying). I really, really, REALLY hope people who voted for this poor showmanship and complete lack of leadership are paying attention.

Can't wait to see if SNL does a sketch on Bachmann's new committee. That reality is funnier than anything you can make up.

Not only that, but a fundraiser that violated the very Constitution they claim to know and love (no fundraising in the Capital Bldg).

but a fundraiser that violated the very Constitution they claim to know and love (no fundraising in the Capital Bldg)

Where is that in the constitution?

Where is that in the constitution?

You are correct it's not in the Constitution, but it was federal law they were breaking on their first day accepting money while they blew off vowing to uphold the Constitution. Priorities.

Corporate donors come first.

Scary part is, I could envision him in an SS uniform and eye patch.

Mike Fitzpatrick, my asshat congressman.

OMG........you poor thing. I'm so sorry.

Maybe his opponent can use this incident next election to get some traction and vote him out.

In order TO vote, you actually have to be a sworn member of Congress. Which they were NOT. Therefore, they broke the very Constitution they claim to know and love so much.

Where the H... are you from, Pelosi is the worst Speaker in the History of the USA.

She claims she will be back in '12, like he!!

Next is the Senate and you know what is after that, actually simultaneously.

Have you ever BEEN to Ohio? Even the biggest city hasa silo ...and barn. The streets are full of gangs.....towns abandoned

I've been to Ohio. I loved it. I like Ohio. I was in Kucinich's district though. I've been a couple of other places in Ohio too. They were all nice.

Don't dis Ohio. Ohio Rocks!

Where the H... are you from, Pelosi is the worst Speaker in the History of the USA.

Per your opinion which is of no consequence.

If they do this for the swearing in, will they actually show up for any votes. I hope not!

Ooops.......Too late. I guess they voted without being sworn in too.

A couple of tube socks........dirty tube socks.

No record, just business as usual.