Executive Omnipotence Under Court Review

The order given to the State of Texas by its former governor, now Cretin-1 in the White House, hasn't gone down easily, if at all. As I mentioned in an earlier post about the attempts to exceed his constitutional powers, the occupier of the White House has chosen to act as if the law is for other folks.

Texas' challenge of the right of the national executive to tell the state to follow the orders of the International Court of Justice is now bringing it before the Supreme Court. There is an execution at stake.

Yesterday the court let the 60 minutes alloted to hearing attorney argument to 90 minutes. When a life hangs in the balance, 30 minutes was not deemed a big whoop? Okay, it's not really funny that Texas likes killing people.

The admitted killer, Jose Medellin, was not informed of his right to contact the Mexican consulate. Cretin-1 took the unprecedented step of telling Texas to follow the ICJ's order that the court review its death sentence.

Texas Solicitor General Ted Cruz conceded that police violated the 1963 Vienna Convention in denying Jose Medellin, a Mexican citizen, the chance to contact the Mexican Consulate for legal help after his 1993 arrest in the gang rape and murder of two Houston teenagers.

But he said President Bush's remedy for the treaty violation — making state courts review the convictions and death sentences of Medellin and 50 other Mexican inmates — would give the president unprecedented power over the judiciary and give the "World Court" authority over U.S. law.

The treaty dispute, which the World Court decided in Mexico's favor after that country sued the U.S., should be resolved through political and diplomatic channels, Cruz told the justices. No other nation, including Mexico, would allow U.S. inmates in their countries to use their court systems to enforce the World Court's ruling, he said.

He said that long before the World Court's involvement, state and federal courts had rejected Medellin's consular claim and decided that since he failed to raise it at his original trial, he had waived it.

Even if Medellin had been represented by his countrymen, he still would have been convicted and sentenced to death, Cruz said.

Mexican officials, whose country has no death penalty, had argued that if they had been informed of Medellin's arrest, they would have advised him not to speak to police without a lawyer present.
(snip)
Scalia said he had a problem with giving the World Court any say in U.S. domestic law.

"I am rather jealous of that power," he said.

But Justices Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg indicated they were leaning toward cooperation.

"The United States gave its promise," Ginsburg said.

Outside on the courthouse steps, Donovan [Medellin's attorney] agreed.

"The United States did not have to go to this court, but once we agree to go, we abide by its decision because we are a country of laws," he said. "A deal is a deal."

The trial that is being conducted now is a trial of laws. It is the actions of the executive that have skirted laws and brought about a crisis. Normal courses of actions and normal remedies are available. That Cretin-1 hurled his stupid defiance of the available recourse against due process has turned a routine into a mash pit.

The sense of relief when this reign of power-hungry morons is over will be intense everywhere.