Terror 2016

Aziz Huq

September 29, 2006

Aziz Huq directs the Liberty and National Security Project at the Brennan Center for Justice . He is co-author of Unchecked and Unbalanced: Presidential Power in Times of Terror (New Press, 2007), and recipient of a 2006 Carnegie Scholars Fellowship. This article, originally posted here Thursday, is updated to reflect Thursday's Senate vote on the Military Commissions Act.

This week, Republicans —aided by Democratic fecklessness—bargained away both liberty and decency in the name of partisan security

On Wednesday, the House of Representatives enacted the Military Commissions Act , a law that strikes harder at American liberties and at the fundamentals of American government than any since the authorization of the Japanese internment. Thursday, the Senate passed the same bill , and President Bush is expected to waste no time and sign it today.