Source: New York Post
OBAMA'S MOST PERILOUS LEGAL PICK
By MEGHAN CLYNE
Last updated: 2:59 am
March 30, 2009
Posted: 1:23 am
March 30, 2009
JUDGES should interpret the Constitution according to other nations' legal "norms." Sharia law could apply to disputes in US courts. The United States constitutes an "axis of disobedience" along with North Korea and Saddam-era Iraq.
Those are the views of the man on track to become one of the US government's top lawyers: Harold Koh.
President Obama has nominated Koh -- until last week the dean of Yale Law School -- to be the State Department's legal adviser. In that job, Koh would forge a wide range of international agreements on issues from trade to arms control, and help represent our country in such places as the United Nations and the International Court of Justice.
It's a job where you want a strong defender of America's sovereignty. But that's not Koh. He's a fan of "transnational legal process," arguing that the distinctions between US and international law should vanish.
What would this look like in a practical sense? Well, California voters have overruled their courts, which had imposed same-sex marriage on the state. Koh would like to see such matters go up the chain through federal courts -- which, in turn, should look to the rest of the world. If Canada, the European Human Rights Commission and the United Nations all say gay marriage should be legal -- well, then, it should be legal in California too, regardless of what the state's voters and elected representatives might say.
He even believes judges should use this "logic" to strike down the death penalty, which is clearly permitted in the US Constitution.
The primacy of international legal "norms" applies even to treaties we reject. For example, Koh believes that the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child -- a problematic document that we haven't ratified -- should dictate the age at which individual US states can execute criminals. Got that? On issues ranging from affirmative action to the interrogation of terrorists, what the rest of the world says, goes.
Including, apparently, the world of radical imams. A New York lawyer, Steven Stein, says that, in addressing the Yale Club of Greenwich in 2007, Koh claimed that "in an appropriate case, he didn't see any reason why sharia law would not be applied to govern a case in the United States."
A spokeswoman for Koh said she couldn't confirm the incident, responding: "I had heard that some guy . . . had asked a question about sharia law, and that Dean Koh had said something about that while there are obvious differences among the many different legal systems, they also share some common legal concepts."
Score one for America's enemies and hostile international bureaucrats, zero for American democracy.
Koh has called America's focus on the War on Terror "obsessive." In 2004, he listed countries that flagrantly disregard international law -- "most prominently, North Korea, Iraq, and our own country, the United States of America," which he branded "the axis of disobedience."
He has also accused President George Bush of abusing international law to justify the invasion of Iraq, comparing his "advocacy of unfettered presidential power" to President Richard Nixon's. And that was the first Bush -- Koh was attacking the 1991 operation to liberate Kuwait, four days after fighting began in Operation Desert Storm.
Koh has also praised the Nicaraguan Sandinistas' use in the 1980s of the International Court of Justice to get Congress to stop funding the Contras. Imagine such international lawyering by rogue nations like Iran, Syria, North Korea and Venezuela today, and you can see the danger in Koh's theories.
Koh, a self-described "activist," would plainly promote his views aggressively once at State. He's not likely to feel limited by the letter of the law -- in 1994, he told The New Republic: "I'd rather have [former Supreme Court Justice Harry] Blackmun, who uses the wrong reasoning in Roe [v. Wade] to get the right results, and let other people figure out the right reasoning."
Worse, the State job might be a launching pad for a Supreme Court nomination. (He's on many liberals' short lists for the high court.) Since this job requires Senate confirmation, it's certainly a useful trial run.
What happens to Koh in the Senate will send an important signal. If he sails through to State, he's a far better bet to make it onto the Supreme Court. So Senate Republicans have a duty to expose and confront his radical views.
Even though he's up for a State Department job, Koh is a key test case in the "judicial wars." If he makes it through (which he will if he gets even a single GOP vote) the message to the Obama team will be: You can pick 'em as radical as you like.
Meghan Clyne is a DC-based writer.
COMMENTS
 | biasmedia wrote: I think President Obama wants to Topple the White power structure..and everything this nation stood for. There is no where else to go...Is a revolution coming. 3/30/2009 3:11 PM EDT | ||
| | THE BEAST wrote: GLENN RUSH AND HANNITY AND LEVIN ARE RIGHT!!!!! THEY KEEP US INFORMED OF WHAT THE GOV. IS DOING... TO TAKE AWAY OUR CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS AS AMERICANS. WE NEED TO PUT A STOP TO THIS ABUSE OF POWER.. PRES. O IS NOT EVEN AN AMERICAN HISSELF AND WANTS ANYONE WHO BELIEVES THE SAME STUFF AS HE DOES ABOUT THE SHARIA LAW.. OUR WOMEN SHOULD HAVE THAT RIGHT TO WEAR WHAT WANT AND THEY NEED TO TREATED AS HUMANS INSTEAD OF AN OBJECT..NOT HIS STUPID A**... GIVE US OUR CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS AND TAKE NO MORE FROM US. HE NEEDS TO BE IMPEACHED NOW AND GET A REAL AMERICAN IN OUR OFFICE AND ALL THE ONES HE HAS IN OFFICE NOW FIRE THEM AND GET NEW PPL WHO BELIEVE IN OUR CONSTITUTION AND RIGHTS SO THAT OUR COUNTRY CAN GO BACK TO THE WAY IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE IN THE FIRST PLACE....WE AS AMERICANS SHOULD HAVE THE RIGHT TO PRAYS TO WHO WE WANT TO. BUT PRES.O WANTS US TO BELIEVE IN HIS GOD AND NO OTHER... ONCE AGAIN WE THE REAL AMERICANS SHOULD GET HIM OUT OF OUR NATIONS CAPITAL AND GET A REAL AMERICAN IN THERE.. 3/30/2009 3:04 PM EDT | ||
| | Abirddog691 wrote: When will this country learn to stand up for itself? It did back in 1764 and it began a revolution against England. We are sitting back and letting this governement take away our God given rights as US citizens and they want eveyone in the world to have these rights no matter their status. The world sits back and laughs at us (this is fact) they now know we are weak. We should not care what the world thinks of us we need to take care of our own first then take care of the world. 3/30/2009 2:33 PM EDT | ||
| | Montana_Koot wrote: Shaking My head in total disbelief...we unfortunately have an uninformed, coddled and pampered generation (under 40 years of age) that has never had to sacrifice, They don't know anything but "I want what I want, when I want it"..they are now sheep for the socialist, useful idiots..and will wake up one day and look around wondering..what hppened.. I predicted in the 1960's (I am old enough to have the advantage of foresight and hindsight) That the anti-establishment people of the 60's would some day be in control..or their minons will be....Obama is a case in point..who did he go to when he wanted to begin his "political Life"?...who are in charge of "higher learning"..this appointment proves My assertion...Our Constitution is no longer the law of the land..Let something the left (socialist) disagrees with they challenge as unconstitutional..but where are the challenges to the flagrant disregard for the constitution related to all these bailouts and bankrupting of our country..? WHen I was a kid, we were free..fighting for the freedom of the world..but we were free..maybe I have lived to long.. It's a sad day..but maybe this is what will wake the silent majority..I believe they are still alive..just need a prod..(poke, poke) 3/30/2009 2:33 PM EDT | ||
| | SemperFiPatriot wrote: Pres O is getting very close to the predictions of some prophets that a third Anti-Christ will come to lead the foolish into destruction and disorder that will come to the whole world. 3/30/2009 2:32 PM EDT | ||
| | destined wrote: It's not too late to accept Jesus!! And then, contact your representatives!! 3/30/2009 2:31 PM EDT | ||
| | HENRY wrote: I think this kind of thinking is going down the wrong path and will in the end give away all american right over to people that have nothing to lose only we will 3/30/2009 2:30 PM EDT | ||
| | SKTConstLvr wrote: Get to your nearest tea party on April 15th! This is your chance to stand up and have your voices heard. You can find a tea party near you at either Meetup.com or NationalTeaParty.com. 3/30/2009 2:24 PM EDT | ||
| | SKTConstLvr wrote: This man does not care what the constitution says. We must contact our senators to let them know that we are fed up and this is NOT the person we want representing us ANYWHERE. 3/30/2009 2:17 PM EDT | ||
| | Overseer wrote: You have to admit that when "O" was campaigning he looked like a guy that for a minute knew what he was talking about until he proposed the "Distribution of Wealth" program he wants to put in effect 2011.That's when it was clear what his agendas really were.Got to hand it to "Joe the Plumber" and a few others that seen right through "O". The only transparency we'll get is seeing right through his radical "change".. 3/30/2009 2:16 PM EDT |
All I can say is " WE WEARNED THE LIBTARDS MORONS..." OBLAHBLAH is asisciople of Alinsky, Ayers and Marx.. But did the Morons Listen????So now sooner than Later we may have to revisit 1776....???Startinmgh with Tea parties and followed by other means....
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