Skip to content
The World Can't Wait
Menu
  • Home
  • Events
  • About
    • About World Can’t Wait
      • History of World Can’t Wait
  • Projects
    • War Criminals Watch
    • We Are Not Your Soldiers!
    • Fire John Yoo
    • Sudan’s Struggle
  • Media
    • Audio
      • Video
    • Public Svc. Announcements
    • Press & Press Releases
      • Press Releases
      • Press Coverage
    • Photos
  • Take Action
    • Materials in English
    • Materials in Spanish
    • What You Can Do Now
    • Donate
    • More Resources
      • News & Analysis
        • Alternet
        • Antiwar.com
        • Black Agenda Report
        • Common Dreams
        • CounterPunch
        • Dissident Voice
        • Media Matters
        • Next Left Notes
        • OpEd News
        • Project Censored
        • Raw Story
        • Revolution Newspaper
        • Truthdig
        • Truthout
      • Anti-War
        • Afghans for Peace
        • Courage to Resist
        • Drone Warfare Awareness
        • Iraq Vets Against the War
        • Peace of the Action
        • Veterans for Peace
        • Voices for Creative Non-Violence
        • War is a Crime
      • Anti-Torture/Detention
        • Andy Worthington
        • Close Guantanamo
        • Free Detainees
        • Int’l Justice Network
        • No More Guantánamos
        • Religious Campaign Against Torture
        • Witness Against Torture
      • Political Repression
        • Bill of Rights Defense Committee
        • Center for Constitutional Rights
        • Committee to Stop FBI Repression
        • Drop the Charges on Gregory!
        • National Lawyers Guild
        • No Separate Justice
        • Project Salam
        • Stop Mass Incarceration
      • Women’s Rights/Theocracy
        • Defend Science
        • Feministing
        • RH Reality Check
        • Stop Patriarchy
        • Talk 2 Action
        • Theocracy Watch
        • Walk for Choice
      • Environment
        • Bill McKibben
        • Climate Connections
        • Enviros Against War
        • Grist
        • Tar Sands Action
  • En Español
Menu

Dangerous New Turn in Obama Administration’s Assault on Fundamental Rights

Posted on October 2, 2012
Share:

from Revolution Newspaper

The Obama administration has demonstrated yet again its resolve to clear away any legal obstacles to enforcing the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). This law, enacted in December 2011, contains a provision (section 1021) that gives the government the power to indefinitely detain, without charge or trial, a broad and vague category of people—which could include people who have nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks or with terrorism in general.

The NDAA is a dangerous assault on fundamental rights.

A lawsuit, Hedges et al. v. Obama et al., brought by Chris Hedges, Daniel Ellsberg, Noam Chomsky, and four other plaintiffs, challenges this draconian provision of the law. On May 16, Federal District Court Judge Katherine Forrest ruled in their favor, declaring that section 1021 of the NDAA is unconstitutional. The judge imposed an injunction temporarily blocking enforcement of the law. The Obama administration immediately appealed.

On September 12, Judge Forrest rejected a government request to reconsider her ruling and ordered a permanent injunction against this section of the NDAA. But within 24 hours, Obama administration lawyers filed a motion to stay this order, claiming that the injunction caused “irreparable harm to national security and the public interest.” And this stay was granted.

In other words, the NDAA is in effect! The government’s expanded authority to arbitrarily detain citizens and non-citizens, under the pretext of national security, is now being enforced—pending further legal challenges.

Harmful Characterization Still Part of Trial Record

It is especially alarming that as this lawsuit winds through the courts, the erroneous and potentially harmful mischaracterization of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA and Bob Avakian that Judge Forrest incorporated into her May 16 opinion remains part of the official trial record of this case.

Judge Forrest’s ruling, though mainly positive, contains a profound mischaracterization of the RCP and Bob Avakian. Specifically, it says that the Party “endorses the use of violence towards revolutionary ends,” a phrase that could lend itself to the false interpretation that the RCP might seek to achieve its aims through acts of terrorism. For critical background on this threatening situation for the RCP and Bob Avakian, readers should go to: “Letter Points to Dangerous Mischaracterization in National Defense Authorization Act Ruling,” Revolution #274, July 8, 2012, and “Brief Filed Objecting to Dangerous Mischaracterization of RCP, USA,” Revolution #275, July 22, 2012.

Acting on the seriousness of this assault, including the unacceptable singling out of the RCP and its Chairman Bob Avakian, “A Call To Stand Together To Oppose The Obama Administration’s Dangerous Assault On Fundamental Rights” has been issued. This public statement has been signed by over 650 people including Daniel Ellsberg; Cornel West; actor-director Mark Ruffalo; attorneys Ron Kuby and Michael Steven Smith; Cindy Sheehan; scholars Stephen Zunes, Donna Haraway, Colin Dayan, and Andrew Ross; film/TV actor Peter Coyote; antiwar veterans Scott Olsen and Matthis Chiroux; and Project Censored founders Mickey Huff and Peter Phillips.

The call declares: “Those of us signing this statement cannot speak for the RCP and indeed have various levels of familiarity with and a variety of views on its philosophical and political principles and objectives. But we do not countenance—and recognize as very dangerous—the designation by the powers-that-be of groups as politically ‘acceptable’ and ‘unacceptable.’ History teaches, by negative and positive example, that we must stand against attempts to divide progressive, radical, and revolutionary forces along any such lines.”

The call also states: “The pattern is disturbingly clear: not just a continuation but a further leap in the draconian measures taken by the Bush administration—under the pretext of the open-ended, so-called War on Terror—to detain, torture, and assassinate… not just a continuation but a further leap in measures to restrict and criminalize dissent and opposition to the status quo.”

This call is all the more important in the face of the latest legal turn. It can be signed at opposerepressionndaa.net. Funds are being raised for high-profile publication of the call in coming weeks.

This article originally appeared on revcom.us on October 1, 2012.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Because humanity & the planet come first...
store
Don’t stop… Don’t conciliate... Don’t accommodate... Don’t collaborate... and support World Can't Wait.

Sign up for email

Stop FBI Repression
Know your rights
If An Agent Knocks

About

World Can't Wait mobilizes people living in the United States to stand up and stop war on the world, repression and torture carried out by the US government. We take action, regardless of which political party holds power, to expose the crimes of our government, from war crimes to systematic mass incarceration, and to put humanity and the planet first.

Read More

Subscribe to E-Newsletter

Contact World Can't Wait

TOPICS

  • Afghanistan & Pakistan
  • Covert Drone War
  • Crimes are Crimes
  • Culture of Bigotry
  • Environment
  • G.I. Resistance
  • Haiti
  • Immigrants
  • Iran
  • Iraq
  • Libya
  • Mass Incarceration
  • Obama
  • Occupy
  • Palestine
  • Police State Repression
  • Real History Lessons
  • Reproductive Rights
  • Reports on Protest & Resistance
  • Theocracy
  • Torture
  • Wikileaks
  • Calls to Action
  • The Expanding War on the World

Projects

  • War Criminals Watch
  • We Are Not Your Soldiers
  • Get Involved

  • Donate
  • Download filters, stickers and posters
  • More ways to get involved
  • ©2025 The World Can't Wait | Design: Newspaperly WordPress Theme
    Menu
    • Home
    • Events
    • About
      • About World Can’t Wait
        • History of World Can’t Wait
    • Projects
      • War Criminals Watch
      • We Are Not Your Soldiers!
      • Fire John Yoo
      • Sudan’s Struggle
    • Media
      • Audio
        • Video
      • Public Svc. Announcements
      • Press & Press Releases
        • Press Releases
        • Press Coverage
      • Photos
    • Take Action
      • Materials in English
      • Materials in Spanish
      • What You Can Do Now
      • Donate
      • More Resources
        • News & Analysis
          • Alternet
          • Antiwar.com
          • Black Agenda Report
          • Common Dreams
          • CounterPunch
          • Dissident Voice
          • Media Matters
          • Next Left Notes
          • OpEd News
          • Project Censored
          • Raw Story
          • Revolution Newspaper
          • Truthdig
          • Truthout
        • Anti-War
          • Afghans for Peace
          • Courage to Resist
          • Drone Warfare Awareness
          • Iraq Vets Against the War
          • Peace of the Action
          • Veterans for Peace
          • Voices for Creative Non-Violence
          • War is a Crime
        • Anti-Torture/Detention
          • Andy Worthington
          • Close Guantanamo
          • Free Detainees
          • Int’l Justice Network
          • No More Guantánamos
          • Religious Campaign Against Torture
          • Witness Against Torture
        • Political Repression
          • Bill of Rights Defense Committee
          • Center for Constitutional Rights
          • Committee to Stop FBI Repression
          • Drop the Charges on Gregory!
          • National Lawyers Guild
          • No Separate Justice
          • Project Salam
          • Stop Mass Incarceration
        • Women’s Rights/Theocracy
          • Defend Science
          • Feministing
          • RH Reality Check
          • Stop Patriarchy
          • Talk 2 Action
          • Theocracy Watch
          • Walk for Choice
        • Environment
          • Bill McKibben
          • Climate Connections
          • Enviros Against War
          • Grist
          • Tar Sands Action
    • En Español