kgosztola

Hello, Chris

What can you say about the effort by the Obama Justice Department and other so-called legal scholars to vilify Judge Forrest for her decision and for standing by it when she refused to stay her ruling?

Kevin Gosztola, Firedoglake.com writer

Tangerine or David (and even Bruce or Carl if around):

What are your thoughts on how this NDAA lawsuit is preemptive—in the sense that none of the plaintiffs have been indefinitely detained but could have potentially—and how it might be a model for activists all over the country to challenge laws, which can be used to violate civil liberties? I say this with the understanding that Congress is not going to amend some of the worst post-9/11 laws or do away with them and maybe going to the courts is what people of this country have to do now. And they have to assert the laws chill their rights as an American.

Do you think activists can seek out plaintiffs to challenge laws Congress and the White House allow to pass that should not be law in the US? Is there much of a history of this? I would think typically a law is only challenged in courts when people are wholly violated.

I suppose an issue might be finding people with standing, but from an organizing standpoint, it would be possible to target horrific laws by putting together campaigns similar to the Stop NDAA campaign.

—Kevin Gosztola, Firedoglake.com writer