I suppose I'm suffering from Greenwald Syndrome -- yes, Obama's done some good things, but I just can't get past the civil liberties horrors of the Bush era that he not only defends, his policies embrace:
The victims of the Bush administration's programme of "extraordinary rendition" will not be able to sue the private company which transported them to foreign countries for torture by the CIA, after the present White House stepped in to squash their lawsuit on the grounds of national security.
A California court has sided with the Obama administration, which argued that a case led by the British resident Binyam Mohamed against the aerospace giant Boeing was bound to reveal state secrets and sensitive intelligence information.
Legal supporters of Mr Mohamed raised uproar at the decision, which the judge in charge of the case said had presented a "painful conflict between human rights and national security".
Ben Wizner, attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, who argued the case, called it "a sad day not only for the torture victims whose attempt to seek justice has been extinguished, but for all Americans who care about our nation's reputation in the world", and vowed to appeal to the US Supreme Court. "To date, not a single victim of the Bush administration's torture programme has had his day in court," the attorney said.
