User talk:George Swan/sandbox/Benjamin G. Davis

The {{subpages}} template is designed to be used within article clusters and their related pages.
It will not function on User talk pages.

	NOTICE, please do not remove from top of page.
	No "from wikipedia" disclaimer is necessary because I was the sole author of this version. George Swan 00:12, 15 April 2008 (CDT)
	Check the history of edits to see who inserted this notice.

Dead link and dubious event

I moved this to the talk page, as the link is dead, and the notability of a "citizen's hearing" is dubious: what legitimacy does it have? Is it a court? Howard C. Berkowitz 05:22, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

• Testified on behalf of Ehren Watada==

Davis testified before a "Citizens' hearing on the legality of U.S. actions in Iraq" that considered the case of Lieutenant Ehren Watada. Watada is an officer in the United States Army who declined to serve in Iraq because he believed the United States actions in Iraq are illegal.

Merge this

The original legal theories here, citing at least one Supreme Court decision, need to be merged into the legal arguments in Extrajudicial detention, U.S., George W. Bush Administration, giving due regard to that Davis was not an attorney directly involved in the process for prosecution or defense and did not participate cases related to it. There are legal opinions from Government attorneys that his summary may counterbalance.

I'll simply note that the habeas corpus involved are more complex than this article suggests. The main prior case denying them had been Johnson v. Eisentrager, while the Court held, in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, that specific circumstances applied to prisoners in Guantanamo.

It would be useful to create an article on the Supreme Court decision mentioned here and not elsewere, Hirota v. McArthur, and link it to other cases that cited it. It would also be useful to have an article on something not covered under that name, the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act, unless this is another term for the Military Commissions Act, which I don't think it is.

Otherwise, this really should be merged and deleted, once the true content goes into broader articles. Many law professors make comments; the notable ones are the ones whose comments relate directly to court cases, legislation, or even signficant public protest. None of those criteria appear to apply here. Howard C. Berkowitz 15:33, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

The link to the Toledo paper, citing his seven arguments, is dead. At this point, I am not trying to track down the statement, as the only content here is addressing relatively old issues that have been addressed in high courts, legislation, and the policies of a new administration. In other words, I can't see it adding anything to CZ; he doesn't seem to have actually been involved in the major cases, written for major publications (sorry, Toledo), or essentially done anything besides write some critical articles. Lots of people have written critical articles.

I can't even put his seven points into an external link from extrajudicial detention, U.S., George W. Bush Administration because, if I may suggest it, they aren't notable enough to be obviously online.

If the undefined points go, what's left in the article other than the existence of a law professor? Let me not say notability -- what's left to maintain? Recommend deletion. Howard C. Berkowitz 18:32, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Notability -- my thoughts on this article

There's a v. similar article about him at WP that was originally written by George. It has been drastically cut over the years by others to resemble, more or less, the present CZ article. Whether it was ever considered for Deletion over There, I didn't bother to look. Both of them seem to me to be jerky and boring, but that's my personal opinion. (The CZ one actually reads quite a bit better.) If a Law or Politics editor who wasn't tied to this article in any way asked for Deletion, that would be another matter. In any case, it's one of those things that can be argued either way, I would think. If John Yoo is worthy of an article on the one side, then why not Benjamin G. Davis on the other. Yes, I *know* that Johnny Yoo is more notable, but it's not as if Davis were a *complete* unknown... Hayford Peirce 18:59, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Hayford, if there were one-tenth the links to specific legal opinions that Yoo wrote, specific criticism of Yoo's theories, I'd have no problem with this. Yoo, however, is a participant and indeed key policy originator, where, as far as I can tell, Davis was a commentator and appeared before a "citizens' tribunal" with no status. I haven't looked at the John Yoo article, but there are abundant references to his formal opinions, in the Bush administration policy articles. I'll merely note that the International Military Tribunal (Nuremberg) had, as defendants, lawyers who drafted policies. It's not, as far as I know, one side vs. another, it's participant vs. commentator. If Davis was involved in a suit against the Bush Administration, he absolutely should be here, because that would put him on a side. I just don't know of any.

Your comment suggests you know of some available reference to Davis. If there's actually some text that talks about participation in a real tribunal, or significant law review or other writings that are cited in court pleadings, that would make this article meaningful. In a quick search, however, I haven't found anything, and, as you may be noticing, I've been working on specific cases, sometimes first having to do some definition (e.g., a straightforward description of the defendant or court) before writing Tenet v. al-Masri; I also started state secrets doctrine because it's key to the Fourth Circuit reasoning. Howard C. Berkowitz 19:31, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

I *said* he was clearly non-notable compared to the egregious Yoo, but who isn't? I'm not an Editor here, nor even a Constable. If you, acting as an Author, think that this non-notable article about a non-notable guy should be merged into some other article (Critics of the Bush Administration, Critics of the G.B. Intern. etc, or Whatever You Think Best, then go ahead and do so. But make a clear justification of your merge on the pertinent pages. And be prepared to defend yourself and your action. Just mes deux sous. Hayford Peirce 19:56, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

What I meant is that I can't find anything to merge, other than he was a law professor that said Bad Bush! Bad Bush! Do we have enough disk space to keep a comprehensive list of everybody that criticized Bush? That's why I'm asking if you had anything of substance, beyond that, which he actually did. It's silly to go hunting for it.

I'm hoping to help us get to 10,500 articles by the end of the weekend, but if there has to be one more because this disappears, I'll consider the effort of writing one more article, of at least as much substance, a worthy effort. *sigh* I wish I could get readability comments on the good work that could be made better, rather than all the effort on the fringes. Indeed, I'm also cranking in computer networking things, some of which I had a hand in developing, if that creates no horrible conflicts. Howard C. Berkowitz 20:11, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

The Internet being a strange place, I used to frequent a blog where a very far left guy turned out to be one of Yoo's high school history teachers. Remembered him well; wondered how he could have taught better. As Truman said of Nixon (Plain Speaking), "I don't think the SOB ever read the Constitution. If he did, he didn't understand it." Howard C. Berkowitz 20:11, 28 March 2009 (UTC)