"What effect must it have on a nation if it learns no foreign languages? Probably much the same as that which a total withdrawal from society has upon an individual." --G.C. Lichtenberg
"Intrusive discovery." That's what prosecutors in Yaser Esam Hamdi's "enemy combatant" case are calling a federal judge Robert G. Doumar's request for "copies of Hamdi's statements, notes from interviewers, a chronology of his locations, and the names and addresses of his interrogators." Because a determination of whether or not Hamdi is, in fact, an enemy combatant made by someone other than those prosecuting him for it would be too "intrusive," the Justice Department has defied Doumar's order that it hand over the documents.
Stephen Dycus, a national security law expert at the University of Vermont, said he could not think of any other time the government ignored a court's order. "I don't think the Justice Department has the power to simply defy the court," he said. " . . . I don't remember anything in the 4th Circuit's order that would limit the District Court's ability to look into the national security necessity for keeping this guy."
