Ohio state House speaker jokes that Obama should be sent to jail

[highplainsdem]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/election-2012/post/ohio-state-house-speaker-jokes-that-obama-should-be-sent-to-jail/2012/02/18/gIQAdAbXMR_blog.html

AKRON, Ohio — State House speaker William Batchelder (R) joked to a crowd of Republicans here Saturday night that President Obama shouldn’t just be denied four more years in office — he should be sent to jail.

“The liberals are asking us to give Obama more time. And I think 25-to-life would be a good start,” Batchelder told a crowd of more than 1,000 people at the Summit County Republican Party Lincoln Day Dinner. He made the remarks as he was introducing former senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa.), who has been spending the past two days campaigning in the Buckeye State.

-snip-

“I don’t want to say that he’s incompetent, but as you’ll recall, Jimmy Carter endorsed him early on,” he said. “The reason for that is so that Jimmy Carter wouldn’t be the worst president in the history of the United States.”

Oh, those Santorum supporters and their sense of "humor"...

[sce56]

1. And Shrub should be sent to the Hague for War Crimes!

[proud2BlibKansan]

7. +1

[Kurmudgeon]

16. +2

[sueh]

17. +3

[TexasTowelie]

20. +4

[Suji to Seoul]

25. +1000

[wordpix]

57. +1001

[AsahinaKimi]

66. +1005

eom.

[24601]

26. It's an interesting question. Who should go? Bush because of the orders he

gave that killed?

But as Gallagher says - what IS the limit?

Barak Obama for murdering people by hellfire missiles fired from drones, including US citizens not afforded due process?

(Cheney/Biden as VP could give no orders as Veeps aren't in the chain of command)

Extradite Bill Clinton to Belgrade to serve his war crimes sentence? (he was tried and convicted in absentia after the bombing there - expecially the one that hit the Chinese embassy)

And as accomplices, we can lock up anyboty who vote for any the above - that will get about 90% of likely voters.

[The Doctor.]

27. Out of those examples, only one has a chain of intention. n/t

[24601]

34. You are confusing intent with motive. Intent is required to prove a case while

motive is not.

All the cases cites involved a decision where our Presidents intended violence.
None of them intended to do something else and the missile "just slipped". Of course there are other factors such as matters in extenuation and/or mitigation to be decided by juries.

[The Doctor.]

39. By that reasoning, every single President who presided over any military conflict is a 'war criminal

The difference is that Bush actually ordered torture and presided over an unprovoked invasion.

If you refuse to draw lines or make distinctions, then everyone is guilty or everyone is innocent.

[24601]

43. Not at all. Homocide refers to death of people. Manslaughter and murder refer

to unlawful homocide. Circumstances of self defense and defense of others are put before judges and/or juries to determine if there was a legally justifiable reason to commit homocide.

Let's start by saying no charges have been proven in court (except Serbia's in absentia trial of Bill Cinton) and that every has the right to a presumption of innocence. But just suppose Bush did authorize measures that DoJ said were not torture but a jury said he did.

But now suppose Obama orderd, without a judicial process, the killing of a US citizen overseas because he (Obama) has judged it appropriate and was probably advised by DoJ that it was legal. Should a jury get that case too?
Should the President have the presumption that DOJ advice is reliable?

Regarding ordering the use of military force, was it authorized IAW the War Powers Act by a majority vote in both houses of Congress?

[joshcryer]

46. The Geneva Convention has no protections for unlawful combatants.

Targeted killing is immoral, but perfectly legal under the guise of International Law.

[24601]

52. Are you saying it's lawful to kill & torture someone who is an unlawful combatant? Aren't there

Common Article III protections applying to all POWs, as well as captured unlawful combatants - with additional protections in other article for lawful combatant POWs?

[joshcryer]

61. POWs are only protected if they are fighting for a recognized state. An unlawful combatant is one...

...who is attacking a state or people without recognition. They're trying to fix this "loophole" in international law but it would require the western states to sign off on it, so don't expect those protections for unlawful combatants any time soon.

One might be able to make the case that the innocent civilians killed by targeted killing were murdered illegally, but that would 1) require the state in which the killings took place to make a case and 2) completely disavow all targeted killing mechanisms (ie, not allow drones in their airspace and make a concerted effort to blow those drones up). Otherwise the US has either implicit (or in Pakistan's case, explicit) permission to enact targeted killing within those states.

If the protections existed then there would be a legal case, imo. And I hate to admit this, btw, I think targeted killing is immoral, unethical, and should be stopped. It's legalized assassination. I read the book "The Law of Armed Conflict: International Humanitarian Law in War" and it makes the case cut in dry, though the author (Gary Solis) tries to make a legal case that it's not really assassination. He doesn't address the moral or ethical implications, though.

edit: to clarify further, the Bush era anti-terrorist laws made it so that a President could legally enact targeted killings across the board without congressional approval for each military act or "drone occupation." Obama has taken it to an unprecedented level never before imagined. The US has quite literally occupied the airspace of middle eastern states with its drones and uses the unlawful combatant rule beyond anything anyone could've conceived. If we want to end it we need to get Bush's laws repealed, as a President should not have those powers.

[24601]

62. I still believe that I'm accurate about some protections being afforded to underprivileged

(illegal) combatants who are captured. Absolutely it's not the same level as POWs, but I'll post a link and a paragraph. The underlining is mine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unlawful_combatant

"While the concept of an unlawful combatant is included in the Third Geneva Convention, the phrase itself does not appear in the document. Article 4 of Third Geneva Convention does describe categories under which a person may be entitled to POW status; and there are other international treaties that deny lawful combatant status for mercenaries and children. In the United States, the Military Commissions Act of 2006 codified the legal definition of this term and invested the U.S. President with broad discretion to determine whether a person may be designated an unlawful enemy combatant under United States law. The assumption that such a category as unlawful combatant exists is not contradicted by the findings of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in the Celebici Judgment. The judgment quoted the 1958 ICRC commentary on the Fourth Geneva Convention: Every person in enemy hands must be either a prisoner of war and, as such, be covered by the Third Convention; or a civilian covered by the Fourth Convention. Furthermore, "There is no intermediate status; nobody in enemy hands can be outside the law,"because in the opinion of the ICRC, "If civilians directly engage in hostilities, they are considered 'unlawful' or 'unprivileged' combatants or belligerents (the treaties of humanitarian law do not expressly contain these terms). They may be prosecuted under the domestic law of the detaining state for such action".

[joshcryer]

63. That's fair enough, but I was speaking generally. In the case of the US we see how difficult...

...it has been to afford these detainees the same protections that a lawful combatant would have gotten years ago. The most recent example is the Gulf War where we released all Iraqi prisoners within days.

If domestic law allows indefinite detention (which ours does), then even that is perfectly legal.

But my point was more about targeted killing as opposed to detainees.

[LoisB]

36. LoisB

+ Infinity

[AlbertCat]

42. And Shrub should be sent to the Hague for War Crimes!

Really.

The irony that Dubya actually in reality should be in jail AND is actually in reality the worst president we've ever had escapes their pointed little heads.

GOP humor never works because they never get that THEY are the real joke.

Epic fail

[Mira]

50. Plus all I can count to n/t

[ScottLand]

51. +1 million. But we're not joking.

[msongs]

2. 3 years of kissing up to republicans doesn't buy immunity nt

[CaliforniaPeggy]

3. Oh, isn't he sweet?

My God.

Talk about inappropriate! He is just too much. That borders on treasonous.

[Skittles]

12. it's his racism showing

his pointy little repuke head just cannot accept a black president - but one that goes to jail, well, THAT COMPUTES!!

[AsahinaKimi]

67. I was thinking the exact same thing...

Republicans can't think of a man of color without them being behind bars first!

Son na baka na!

[Arctic Dave]

4. And repugs should go to the landfill.

WOW! This game is fun!

[eyewall]

5. Jimmy Carter was one of our best presidents.

He just had one of the worst congresses ever.

Until Dubya came along, Reagan was the worst president we ever had. Bush/Cheney easily took that historical dishonor.

[Rhiannon12866]

10. +1!

I agree and always believed that history would prove us right. Not only that, but he's still out there doing wonderful work!

[airplaneman]

13. I am absolutely disgusted with todays Republicans.

Even Jimmy Carter came out and said on CNN Pierce Morgan that his congress was actually cooperative and compromising a stark contrast to the one Obama has now. The disrepect and downright contempt these Republicans have towards our president makes me sick and I hope they all get voted out for the next 50 years or more.
-Airplane

[tabasco]

44. Absolutely true.

This nation of cretins did not deserve a leader like Carter.

[SheilaT]

45. Thank you.

I agree that Carter was a very good President who has gotten almost no credit for what he actually accomplished. He was vilified by the press, mocked for being a Southerner, laughed at for being sufficiently non-pretentious as to carry his own suitbag when boarding an airplane.

In the long run he will be far more highly regarded than Reagan or either Bush.

[eyewall]

48. It's easy to understand that a man

of such exemplary character as Jimmy Carter could be hated by republicans. His purity of intent and his remarkable tolerance and compassion put him in a class of humanity that no republican I can think of could ever hope to join.

I really can't stand to see exactly the same mistreatment of Pres. Obama. In fact it was applied with the same dark vigor to Pres. Clinton, inspiring one of our greatest first ladies to warn of the dangers of a "vast right wing conspiracy". She was so right. Although I'm not sure what could have been done at that point since most of the media was controlled by the conspiracy she named.

It's like wondering how the military industrial complex could have taken over so much of our govt after we were warned in clear exact terms by Pres. Eisenhower. I don't think we let it happen but we certainly watched it happen.

Let's hope history gets it right, the good guys won't get credit if history is written by the bad guys.

[wordpix]

58. and he's the best post-president

[proud2BlibKansan]

6. What an ass. He can join our KS GOP House speaker in the butthead group.

Our Speaker sent out an email calling the president's wife "yo mama".

[CBHagman]

32. Speaking of buttheads...

...don't forget Representative James Sensenbrenner's rude remarks about our slim, elegant first lady:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1211/70788.html

Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner sent a note of apology Thursday to Michelle Obama for referring to her “large posterior” and “big butt,” his spokesperson told POLITICO.

Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) was overheard talking about the first lady’s healthy food initiative — and her “large posterior” — on Wednesday in the Delta Crown lounge at Reagan National Airport, FishbowlDC reported. The representative was recounting a recent conversation he’d had at a Wisconsin Episcopal church and said loudly on the phone that Obama “lectures us on eating right while she has a large posterior herself,” according to Fishbowl.

Google a few pictures of Rep. Sensenbrenner to provide context. Guess he hasn't heard about glass houses or BMI.

[unkachuck]

64. "large posterior"??

....I'm thinking the old puke is just jealous and would love to have a little of that "large posterior"....not that he could do anything with it....

[Deep13]

8. I know Batchelder personally.

He's a fucking Nazi.

[bulloney]

35. Batchelder looks like a 60-something Ernie Douglas from the TV show My Three Sons

[Deep13]

55. I think he looks like a child molester.

But what he is is a decrepit, corrupt, right-wing pig.

[Ikonoklast]

47. And has done so little except kiss Old Money ass in Medina Lo! these many years

in order to keep his seat, and done absolutely nothing for anyone else.

[Deep13]

53. True, that and Christian conservative ass. nt

[Drunken Irishman]

9. haha, if Obama's the worst president ever...

And the Republicans are about to get their asses kicked by him this November...what's that make them?

[cliffordu]

11. On the other hand:

WHO GIVES A FUCK WHAT THIS GUTLESS SHIT SUCKING CRETIN HAS TO SAY??

I mean, except here in Concern Central??

[saras]

14. Exactly. DU wastes so much time pretending that these people THINK, and MEAN things

You make the right noises and people react. They follow you, or they attack. You spend billions of dollars a year on researching how to do this better. You suppress any related research into how people might resist it (anyone else old enough to remember when we had public-interest psychology research?).

And people here worry over the MEANING of what they say, as though it were great literature.

[lunatica]

28. I thought that was kind of mild myself

And certainly not very original, but what am I saying? This is a Presidential election year and the teabaggers call the shots this time around. No one said they have a sense of humor, though to give them credit they do find themselves constantly saying they're only joking when they're expected to explain whatever their latest smear means.

The emotions will be ratcheted up again this time around. Remember the bloody fights DU had during Obama and Hillary's Presidential campaigns?

[caveat_imperator]

15. Ironic...

coming from someone whose party members include george w bush and dick cheney.

[earcandle]

18. George W. who?

[SleeplessinSoCal]

19. They have nothing.

[Sherman A1]

21. Oh, those madcap Republicans

Will the zany humor never cease?

[hobbit709]

22. They're NOT joking.

If it was up to them, they would.
That's the scary part.

[JJW]

23. Another treasonous Republican

who gives encouragement to our enemies during a time of war.

[BzaDem]

24. His wife is a federal appeals court judge on the 6th circuit, and was rumored to be a Supreme Court

candidate for Sandra Day O'Connor's vacancy. She is somewhere between Scalia and Thomas on the ideological scale, but closer to Thomas. She is intensly partisan (to the extent a judge can be). She once officially found misconduct by the liberal lion on the court (without even giving him a chance to defend himself). She and judge Martin were apparently not on speaking terms for years.

Back in 2008, a few weeks before Obama's election, she (with a majority of the full appeals court) ruled that Ohio had start a process that could strike over 200,000 voters from the rolls (with most being solely because of things like spelling errors and mismatches). The ruling was absurd, and the Supreme Court unanimously summarily reversed it without argument a few days later.

But she really should have recused herself, since the Republican party was the one filing the case, and her husband (the focus of the OP) was standing for election as speaker of the Ohio house. She basically said that she shouldn't have to recuse herself even if (for the sake of argument) her husband would gain electoral advantage from the case's outcome, because "voter fraud" is bad.

That is quite some couple.

[Kolesar]

29. Wow. I missed that story...eom

[WCGreen]

37. I saw them both in action back in the 70's when I was a page in the State House..,

He was in the minority leadership back then.

And now he is the Speaker of the House.

[CBHagman]

30. Ah, the Party of Spite and Mendacity.

You'll recall that Newt Gingrich was ready to send authorities after Chris Dodd and Barney Frank for the high crime of having their names on a piece of legislation duly passed by the Congress.

[47of74]

31. Do these people have their Klan robes on when they say this crap?

[bora13]

33. IPPM

New Breeding Program Aimed At Keeping Moderate Republicans From Going Extinct

[link:http://tinyurl.com/7gndhb5|

[valerief]

38. Uh, is that treasonous talk? nt

[awoke_in_2003]

49. stupid talk? yes...

treasonous talk? no

[The Second Stone]

40. It's free speech. I disagree with it

but it is his right to say it. And demonstrate to the world that he is a f'in idiot.

[Beacool]

41. Nothing new.

That joke about Carter being now the second worst president has been doing the rounds on right wing blogs for quite some time.

[evilhime]

54. Waste of air

for these people to speak. They have nothing productive to say but instead stir up an already less than bright crowd. If I had my way there would be a lie detector hooked to someplace sensitive and each time they toss out a lie or line like this, they get a zap. Of course, they might enjoy it.

[Roy Rolling]

56. Jimmy Carter

The only reason Republicans bash Jimmy Carter is because Carter brought the oil companies to their knees with national insulation programs, fuel-efficiency standards, and temporary speed limits. That immediately reduced oil imports and eventually brought down the price of oil so that Iran and oil companies could no longer gouge the American consumer.

Carter was an effective leader and a genuinely honest president---which is why the GOP hates him. Conversely, Reagan destroyed the middle class and they idolize him. 'Nuff said.

[the_chinuk]

59. A-hah, a-hah, a-hah. What wit.

Actually, the real joke is the person who occupies the office of the Speaker of the Ohio State House of Representatives.

And kids, he ain't funny.

[Tiggeroshii]

60. huh

If this wasn't a joke (and it doesn't seem a lot like one), shouuld the secret sevice be notified?

[Judi Lynn]

65. Instead of trying to ape a not-so-spectacular comedian,

Batchelder should spend some time reviewing whether or not he could manage to look less shockingly absurd.

[center][/center]

[AsahinaKimi]

68. Yeah..

Whats with the KLINGON EYBROWS?

[HughBeaumont]

69. FLY! FLY AWAY HOME!!

He laughs at himself a lot.



I bet those telescopes are windows to the future. Hey, wonder how that SB5 worked out for him and Kat$hit?