Glenn Greenwald's Blog: The fictitious Kyl/Graham "floor debate"

Today the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the case of Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. The Court will be called upon to determine--among other things--whether a provision in last year's Detainee Treatment Act ("DTA") effectively strips the Court of jurisdiction to hear Hamdan's case. The Government contends that it does and in support of this position, Republican Senators Lindsey Graham and John Kyl have filed an amicus brief with the Court.

This amicus brief argues that the legislative history of the DTA supports the Government's position. Specifically, the brief cites a lengthy colloquy between Senators Kyl and Graham themselves which purportly took place during a Senate floor debate just prior to passage of the bill. In the exchange, both Kyl and Graham suggest that the bill will strip the courts of jurisdiction over pending detainee cases such as Hamdan. But here's where the story gets interesting.

Apparently this entire 8 page colloquy--which is scripted to read as if it were delivered live on the floor of the Senate, complete with random interruptions from other Senators--never took place. It was inserted into the Congressional Record in written form just prior to passage of the bill.

Lyle Denniston at SCOTUSblog--who appears to have been the first to pick up on this juicy story last Thursday--noted that the authenticity of the floor debate was disputed by Hamdan's attorneys in their reply to the Government's brief. Hamdan's attorneys pointed out that the C-SPAN footage for Dec. 21, 2005--the date this debate supposedly took place--shows no sign of Senators Kyl or Graham (or, for that matter, the other Senators who appear in the record).

more...

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/03/fictitious-kylgraham-floor-debate.html

Michael Moore was right,we are "living in fictitious times".

Do I hear one more K&R?

Hamden v Rumsfeld hearing!

And we're supposed to believe that these guys wouldn't dare cheat us on any election results?

This is just a symptom of a desire to have and hold power at any cost.

While the case is on, this has to be the shot heard around the net... start kicking and pushing and emailing.

i wanna sleep, so someone has to kick for a while and we have to front page this

It would be good to see this story at HuffPost as well.

More Repuke fakery and Constitution assaulting!