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Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Politics McDermott on NDAA: "We're stuck with it."

Posted by Eli Sanders on Tue, Dec 20, 2011 at 2:21 PM

Jim McDermott: I've been upset for a long time about it.

Jim McDermott: "I've been upset for a long time about it."

Earlier today, I spoke with Congressman Jim McDermott (D-Seattle) about the controversial National Defense Authorization Act. Here's our conversation, as transcribed by Stranger news intern Marley Zeno:

Eli Sanders: Let’s talk about the National Defense Authorization Act. You were pretty upset about it on the House floor the other day. A lot of our commenters are really alarmed about its provisions related to indefinite detention of American citizens. Tell me why you, personally, are so concerned about the act's passage.

Congressman Jim McDermott: Well, I didn’t start being upset the other day. I’ve been upset for a long time about it.

Beginning with way back when 9/11 happened, we began a process in this country of eroding our civil rights protections under the Constitution. And the first of them, in my view, was the PATRIOT Act, where they came in with all kinds of ideas about things they needed to look into without having a court look at it. And my view is that we have a system—we say we live by a system—of laws. But if you give somebody the power, but don’t give anybody the chance to review it, you have simply done away with law. You give them freedom to do whatever they want to somebody.

And they started that process with the collecting of data from the telephone and from the computers and going into libraries and finding out what books people were reading—all this kind of stuff has been kind of a gradual process. Then the next thing that came out what Abu-Ghraib. And you had a situation where we were using torture to extract information out of people, and of course we walk around proudly saying we don’t use torture, but in fact we did. And we had a president who had lawyers who were sitting there writing him memos explaining why it was alright for him to do it.

And the gradual erosion of civil rights, in my view, and ethical behavior, in my view, is a very dangerous thing for a democracy because it’s easy to step across the line into a place where you are after people who you wouldn’t think we’d be after. One of my favorite authors is Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Bonhoeffer was, as you know probably, a Lutheran minister who ultimately died in the concentration camps. He has a very famous quote about the fact that, “When they came for the trade unionists, I wasn’t a trade unionist so I didn’t speak up. When they came for the socialists…” And at some point, “When they came for me there was no one left to speak up.” And we think that it will never affect us because we’re good people. You and me would never be a problem, right?

But the fact is that we have to give that same protection to everyone—that whatever anyone does it can be reviewed by the law, by the courts, and you can’t put people in prison forever.

I visited the Soviet Union back in '82, so I understand gulags and governments that put people away and that’s the end of them. You can’t allow that to happen in this country. And that’s why it’s very troublesome to see this piece of legislation, the National Defense Authorization Act. We have been able to handle terrorists in the court system in this country without any problems. We’ve had more convictions in the courts than we have in military courts, something like 400 convictions or something, as compared to half a dozen or whatever in military courts. So it’s clear that our judicial system can handle dealing with terrorists.

This business of giving the president the right to detain people indefinitely without review erodes what we as Americans say we are.

So I’m very concerned that we do it, and we don’t even recognize we’re doing it. That’s the thing that’s the problem for me. People just sort of don’t notice that this is happening because it isn’t happening to them. Yet, we have had already a number of people where it’s pretty clear they were picked up and abused by the system and taken away under renditions, they’ve been taken to other countries and tortured and all of this has happened. So when I see a piece of legislation like this, I look at it very carefully. And my view was that this was a bad piece of legislation.

You voted against this act, but there wasn't anyone else in the Washington State delegation who voted "No" along with you. What do you make of that?

Well, you know, we’re all elected and we do what we think is best for the people that we represent. I can’t speak for anybody else. But it’s hard for me to understand how people would not see this. I do know that Congressman Adam Smith worked very hard to try and change this. In fact, he and I had a conversation about this and he was trying to convince me that it was not something I should worry about because it didn’t do what people said it did. Well, I remain unconvinced, and I think there’s an awful lot of people like me, very substantive people who have looked very carefully at this, and that proves to me that in fact it does do some things, but other things it’s unclear.

As I understand it, the president said he was going to veto this, and then he didn’t, but then he promised he would never use the provisions. Is that understanding right? Is that your understanding?

I hadn’t heard that he said he wouldn’t use it. That may be true. I did not hear that. But that doesn’t change it for me. I’m not going to be here forever. There’s going to be a time when I’m gone and circumstances happen and somebody’s going to say, “You know, let’s just put that guy away forever.”

And they’ll find the law and they’ll say, “Oh gee, we can do it! Alright!” So my view is that you have to take the long-term view. You can’t simply think in terms of what you have today because the president... When the president says, “I won’t use it,” I have no reason to doubt him. I’m not making accusations or anything else. But the fact is that this country goes on after Barack Obama.

Do you think he should have vetoed it?

My view would be that he should have stuck with his promise to veto it because even though it was watered down, the question about whether American citizens are in it or not is unclear. And in fact what you now have is a couple of bills dropped in by bi-partisan groups—Democrats and Republicans are putting bills in to clarify that section.

But you already had 283 house members voting for this, so they obviously weren’t that concerned about the detention provisions. Do you think that you can get any of these new bills passed that seek to clarify the situation?

No.

So what’s the remedy?

Well, the remedy is we’re stuck with this. And, see, I’m not a lawyer. So you’re going to get me into deep water here if I try and be a lawyer. What I do know is that we’ve written a law—I don’t know if it’s been signed by the president yet. We have been unable to confirm that he’s in fact signed it.

I believe he has. But you would be more able to confirm it than me, honestly.

Well we tried and we could not confirm it. So that’s as far as I can go with you on that issue. But the fact is, it is there and now we’re stuck with it. And that troubles me. I don’t like to be in the situation where I’m thinking that I’m trusting Scalia and Alito and Mr. Roberts to guarantee my civil rights. [UPDATE, via McDermott spokesman Kinsey Kiriakos: "We contacted the White House, and the President has yet to sign the bill into law. He has stated, though, that he intends to do so."]

You’ve noted that a lot of your constituents are alarmed by this. You’ve represented their alarm by voting no. You’ll probably support the attempts to clarify the law, in order to continue representing your constituents' alarm, but those attempts are going to fail, as you say. So what do you suggest your constituents do with their sense of alarm going forward?

You know sometimes I don’t have an answer. At this moment I don’t have an answer for that.

It is very, very, very troublesome to me that I have to say that to you but I really don’t know what we can do at this point. I mean, it has been put in law.

It’s very reassuring in some ways that my colleagues are now running around to change what they voted so enthusiastically for... See, people sometimes don’t think long term. They think just in terms of how it will look in the next election, how people will say, “Well you’re soft on terrorism” or “Don’t you think some of those people should be locked up forever?”

But any person detained in the United States is entitled to be examined before the court and to see that their continued detention is in order. The fact that we are willing to allow people to be put away indefinitely to me is very troublesome.

I don’t suspect that it’s ever going to be a problem for me, but I do think that—we know in this country that we’ve done things. I’m very close to the Japanese community and we just awarded a medal to the Nisei vets that were put in camps in Idaho and they were then given the right to come from detention and join the United States Army and go and fight, and they fought bravely. It’s a remarkable story but the fact is that they were put away. In a democracy. So from my point of view that is very, very, very troublesome… It’s a tired aphorism, but George Santayana said, “Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it."

Comments (6) RSS

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Well, I remain unconvinced, and I think there’s an awful lot of people like me, very substantive people who have looked very carefully at this, and that proves to me that in fact it does do some things, but other things it’s unclear.

Love ya, Jim, but Barney Frank with the words you're not.

Posted by gloomy gus on December 20, 2011 at 2:37 PM

I think in this case, actions speak louder than words. His actions regarding this legislation and regarding the Gingrich/Boehner Ethics committee thing several years ago are coming through loud and clear. Personally, I'd rather one less politician "talk pretty" to me and start actually representing me.

Posted by AletheiaGrey on December 20, 2011 at 3:10 PM

I like this guy. I respect this guy. I'm proud to vote for this guy.

Posted by dwightmoodyforgetsthings

on December 20, 2011 at 3:35 PM

Nice interview. Only thing is incorrect statement that Obama has signed the NDAA. He has not yet signed it. He has til the 26th to sign or veto. You can go to the whitehouse website, and look at bills waiting for his sig, and those he has signed. Not listed.

Posted by fgar on December 20, 2011 at 7:36 PM

Blah blah blah - Obama said he'd veto it - blah blah blah - we're stuck with it - blah blah blah - it seems bad. Stuck with what? If the sheeple of this country ever wake the f ** k up and VOTE OUT whomever doesn't tow the line we tell them to tow then it would and could be repealed without question. Just like the Patriot act. Remember in 2003 when Obombya said he'd veto the Patriot act? "Yes, I would vote to repeal the U.S. Patriot Act, although I would consider replacing that shoddy and dangerous law with a new, carefully crafted proposal that addressed in a much more limited fashion the legitimate needs of law enforcement in combating terrorism (for example, permitting a warrant for the interception of cell phone calls, and not just land-based phones to accommodate changes in technology)." Quick people, hold your breath and count to.................. As long as we keep buying the "demorat" versus "republican't" game nothing will change.

Posted by HopeIsn'tAStrategy on December 20, 2011 at 9:57 PM

Adam Smith is NO protector of rights. He Sponsored this bill into the house himself. If he was so 'troubled' he was 'working hard to change it' he NEVER should have voted FOR it. We need to boot EVERY WA state rep that passed this bill and Recall those who aren't up in Nov.

Posted by RecallNDAA on January 7, 2012 at 12:29 AM