Our New Teachers about Rule of Law

By:  Tuesday January 10, 2012 5:25 pm

The Gray Lady is dedicating space this week to reflections on Gitmo. In addition to a debate on it (more on that tomorrow), it offered Lakhdar Boumediene and Murat Kurnaz space to tell their stories, albeit in the opinion section.

Both men told of their terrible treatment.

But both also discussed what they learned about American rule of law by being falsely imprisoned for years.

Boumediene describing losing faith in American justice, which not even the knowledge that the case bearing his name is taught in American law schools has yet returned, given the number of men who remain unjustly imprisoned.

The fact that the United States had made a mistake was clear from the beginning. Bosnia’s highest court investigated the American claim, found that there was no evidence against me and ordered my release. But instead, the moment I was released American agents seized me and the five others. We were tied up like animals and flown to Guantánamo, the American naval base in Cuba. I arrived on Jan. 20, 2002.

I still had faith in American justice. I believed my captors would quickly realize their mistake and let me go. But when I would not give the interrogators the answers they wanted — how could I, when I had done nothing wrong? — they became more and more brutal.

[snip]

About 90 prisoners have been cleared for transfer out of Guantánamo. Some of them are from countries like Syria or China — where they would face torture if sent home — or Yemen, which the United States considers unstable. And so they sit as captives, with no end in sight — not because they are dangerous, not because they attacked America, but because the stigma of Guantánamo means they have no place to go, and America will not give a home to even one of them.

I’m told that my Supreme Court case is now read in law schools. Perhaps one day that will give me satisfaction, but so long as Guantánamo stays open and innocent men remain there, my thoughts will be with those left behind in that place of suffering and injustice. [my emphasis]

Kurnaz describes watching Germans, upon his return, teaching Americans about something once renewed in Germany by the Nuremberg trials: the rule of law.

I LEFT Guantánamo Bay much as I had arrived almost five years earlier — shackled hand-to-waist, waist-to-ankles, and ankles to a bolt on the airplane floor. My ears and eyes were goggled, my head hooded, and even though I was the only detainee on the flight this time, I was drugged and guarded by at least 10 soldiers. This time though, my jumpsuit was American denim rather than Guantánamo orange. I later learned that my C-17 military flight from Guantánamo to Ramstein Air Base in my home country, Germany, cost more than $1 million.

When we landed, the American officers unshackled me before they handed me over to a delegation of German officials. The American officer offered to re-shackle my wrists with a fresh, plastic pair. But the commanding German officer strongly refused: “He has committed no crime; here, he is a free man.”

I was not a strong secondary school student in Bremen, but I remember learning that after World War II, the Americans insisted on a trial for war criminals at Nuremberg, and that event helped turn Germany into a democratic country.Strange, I thought, as I stood on the tarmac watching the Germans teach the Americans a basic lesson about the rule of law. [my emphasis]

Gitmo has come to embody many things in this country over the last decade: Bush’s incompetence and criminality, our bigotry and inhumanity, and–as most would like to treat it now–a big political tussle between Obama and Republicans.

But at every turn–from the Bush Administration grasping claiming the piece of land existed outside the rule of law, to the corrupt legal process that created memos authorizing torture there, to Jim Haynes’ insistence that “we can’t have acquittals,” to the DC Circuit’s continued efforts to make sure detainees get no meaningful review of their detention–Gitmo has been about shedding the rule of law. It has been about finding ways for America to defy the law even while maintaining the pretense we still uphold it.

In this country, we have mostly ignored that lesson of Gitmo (not liking what it says about us, I guess). But it’s a lesson our former captives know well.


Fast and Furious Money Laundering

By:  Tuesday January 10, 2012 1:05 pm

Every time I read Treasury’s updates of sanctions designations, I’m reminded that two of our three new trade partners–Colombia and Panama–are really centers for corruption, money laundering, and crime. One of three new kingpins added to the list is from Colombia (the other two from Mexico), something like 23 of 50-some people and companies being taken off the list are Colombian, and something like 8 are from or have ties to Panama. (Speaking of which, former Iraqi Oil Minister Dr. Safa Haji al-Habobi, congratulations on being de-listed!) While you could argue making it easy to import to the US might stem the corruption, you might also argue that our trade agreements just facilitate such corruption.

Which brings me to this story from yesterday’s NYT, describing how the DEA helped drug traffickers launder money as part of an investigation into Colombian trafficker Harold Mauricio Poveda-Ortega.

American drug enforcement agents posing as money launderers secretly helped a powerful Mexican drug trafficker and his principal Colombian cocaine supplier move millions in drug proceeds around the world, as part of an effort to infiltrate and dismantle the criminal organizations wreaking havoc south of the border, according to newly obtained Mexican government documents.

The documents, part of an extradition order by the Mexican Foreign Ministry against the Colombian supplier, describe American counternarcotics agents, Mexican law enforcement officials and a Colombian informant working undercover together over several months in 2007. Together, they conducted numerous wire transfers of tens of thousands of dollars at a time, smuggled millions of dollars in bulk cash — and escorted at least one large shipment of cocaine from Ecuador to Dallas to Madrid.

And since we’ve been tracking sealed dockets, the NYT includes this tidbit:

According to the newly obtained documents, Mexico agreed to extradite Mr. Poveda-Ortega to the United States last May. But the American authorities refused to say whether the extradition had occurred.

This story, of course, follows allegations made by a key Sinaloa cartel member that the US had developed a cooperation deal with the cartel.

Mexican soldiers arrested Zambada Niebla in late March 2009 after he met with DEA agents in a posh Mexico City hotel, a meeting arranged by a US government informant who also is a close confident of Ismael Zambada and Chapo Guzman. That informant, Mexican attorney Humberto Loya Castro, by the US government’s own admission in court pleadings in the Zambada Niebla case, serves as an intermediary between the Sinaloa Cartel leadership and US government agencies seeking to obtain information on rival narco-trafficking organizations.

“Toward the end of June 3, 2005, the CS [informant Loya Castro] signed a cooperation agreement with the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California,” states an affidavit filed in the Zambada Niebla case by Loya Castro’s handler, DEA agent Manuel Castanon. “… Thereafter, I began to work with the CS. Over the years, the CS’ cooperation resulted in the seizure of several significant loads of narcotics and precursor chemicals. The CS’ cooperation also resulted in other real-time intelligence that was very useful to the United States government.”

According to Zambada Neibla, he and the rest of the Sinaloa leadership, through the informant Loya Castro, negotiated a quid-pro-quo immunity deal with the US government in which they were guaranteed protection from prosecution in exchange for providing US law enforcers and intelligence agencies with information that could be used to compromise rival Mexican cartels and their operations.

I understand the need for informants in such investigations. But I also wonder about the level of oversight that exists over such operations.

And I find it really ironic that, even while Republicans try to make gun-running their signature gotcha issue for the Obama Administration (in spite of Bush’s use of the tactic as well), they’re ignoring how much we seem to be fostering money laundering in the guise of law enforcement.


Commodity Bubbles and the Resource Curse

By:  Tuesday January 10, 2012 12:21 pm

The FT links to this Oxford Policy Management study showing that 15 low and medium income countries have become newly dependent primarily on some commodity–fuel or minerals–for export income in the last 14 years.

The number of low- and middle-income countries1 that depend on minerals for more than 25%
of their tangible exports – defined as ‘mineral-dependent’ countries – increased by more than
30% between 1996 and 2010, from 46 to 61 countries.

  • Over this period, seven low- and middle-income countries became dependent on non-fuel minerals including: Montenegro, Guyana, Laos, Burkina Faso, Bolivia, Georgia, Somalia and Ghana.
  • Six low- and middle-income countries became dependent on fuel-based minerals including: Belarus, Belize, Chad, Cote d’Ivoire, Myanmar and Timor-Leste.
  • By 2010, more 80% of non-fuel, mineral-dependent states were low- and middle-income countries, compared to about 70% of fuel-dependent countries.
  • Overall, 45 countries depend on fuel-based minerals and 40 countries depend on non-fuel minerals, nearly half of which are in Africa.

The report goes on to raise concerns about the “resource curse,” the common occurrence by which oil and mineral dependent countries become especially corrupt, resulting in a decline in quality of life for the bulk of people in those countries.

This is an unsurprising outcome of the development- and speculation-driven growth in commodity prices of late. But that–plus our stated intent to conduct small-footprint paramilitary operations in to pursue claimed terrorist and drug threats–does suggest we’re headed for further globalization-driven destabilization. Sure, globalized finance was always part of the problem in developing countries, as corrupt elites incurred debts, stripped their country of cash, and then hid it outside of the country (where it would make western bankers a profit).

But now, it seems likely you’ll see more cash coming in, more weapons, and more inequality.


In Constitutional Showdown, Pakistan Supreme Court Cites Quaint Olmstead v. US on Rule of Law

By:  Tuesday January 10, 2012 9:31 am

Pakistan's Supreme Court today cited Louis Brandeis' eloquent dissent in Olmstead v. United States

The precarious hold that Pakistan’s civilian government has on power took another severe blow today, as the Supreme Court handed down a decision (pdf) which threatens to find Prime Minister Yousuf Reza Gilani unfit to hold office. At issue is the failure of Pakistan’s executive branch to implement a number of corruption probes ordered by the Supreme Court when it overturned the 2007 National Reconciliation Ordinance in 2009. The NRO had provided amnesty to a number of political figures and parties in paving the way for a US-brokered planned transition from a Musharraf government to a likely Bhutto government. President Asif Ali Zardari’s government has steadfastly refused to implement the probes, citing immunity. Ironically, the Supreme Court cited the 1928 case Olmstead v. United States, in which the US Supreme Court upheld the use of illegal wiretaps in the prosecution of a bootlegger. The passage cited by Pakistan’s Supreme Court is from Justice Brandeis’ dissent and is an elegant call to observe the rule of law. Although Olmstead v. United States eventually was overturned, it is particularly ironic that Pakistan’s Supreme Court would cite this case in responding to executive branch claims of immunity at a time when the US is once again litigating the extent of executive branch and corporate immunity in a new era of illegal government wiretaps.

In documenting the crisis, Dawn quotes Supreme Court Justice Asif Saeed Khosa:

Tuesday, Supreme Court’s Justice Asif Saeed Khosa remarked that despite clear court orders, the government and the NAB [National Accountability Board] were not serious about implementing court orders, DawnNews reported.

Justice Khosa said that the apex court was giving a last chance to the government to implement its verdict on the National Reconciliation Ordinance by Jan 16.

He said in case of non-implementation, the court would be forced to take certain steps which would not be “pleasant”.

Khosa goes on to complain that the government has had over two years to respond to the overturning of the NRO, but refuses to act:

He moreover referred to President Asif Ali Zardari and said that the president had, “in an interview, refused to accept the court’s orders”.

The prime minister and the law minister also publicly refused to accept the apex court’s orders, Justice Khosa said, adding that the president and the prime minister preferred loyalty to party over loyalty to state.

It is in response to this failure to act that the written decision cites Justice Brandeis’ dissent in Olmstead v. United States:

In a government of laws, existence of the government will be imperiled if it fails to observe the law scrupulously. Continue reading →


Obama Swaps a JP Morgan Chase Chief of Staff for a Citi One

By:  Monday January 9, 2012 2:22 pm

Former JP Morgan Chase Exec Bill Daley has finally quit the job he sucked at, White House Chief of Staff. He will be replaced by former Citi Exec and current OMB Director Jack Lew.

Chicagoan Bill Daley is stepping down as White House chief of staff and budget director Jack Lew is taking over the president’s team as it heads into a tough election year, senior administration officials say.

Daley gave his letter of resignation to the president in a private meeting in the Oval Office last week, recounting the administration’s successes of his one year on the job and saying it was time for him to return to his hometown of Chicago.

Obama plans to announce the change in leadership in a public event this afternoon. The official shift will take place at the end of this month, giving Lew time to complete the administration’s budget proposal while Daley leads the team through the crafting of the State of the Union address due in two weeks.

The guy who’s been doing Daley’s job for some time–Pete Rouse–and who appears to be quite good at the job has no ties with any TBTF bank.

I guess that’s why he’s not getting the job officially.


The Beat from Hell: Carol Rosenberg’s Decade Covering Gitmo

By:  Monday January 9, 2012 12:25 pm

For the record, Carol Rosenberg has been covering Gitmo for more than the decade that has elapsed since she arrived there on January 9, 2002 to cover the impending arrival of the first war on terror detainees. She filed this story on March 22, 1999 and another a month later for the Charlotte Observer, when she covered the de-mining of the island.

This is “Gitmo,” 45 square miles of U.S.-controlled territory stranded in a time warp and shrinking in resources in the post-Cold War era. Two years ago, it had 6,000 residents, both military and civilian; it will have half that later this year.

Formally called the U.S. Naval Station at Guantanamo Bay, this hemisphere’s last outpost against Communism also is a curious island of Americana on the eastern end of Cuba.

[snip]

Since [Base Commander Larry] Larson arrived two years ago from the Naval War College, the former test pilot has presided over a campaign of cutbacks and downsizing – in keeping with a military-wide austerity kick caused by the collapse of the Iron Curtain.

When he arrived, about 6,000 people – both civilian and military – lived and worked out of some 1,890 buildings, ranging from World War II vintage pump houses to bachelors’ quarters. Their budget was $41 million.

By October 1999, he plans to operate only out of 900 buildings, to cut the budget to $24 million and the population to about 2,500.

But it was 10 years ago today when Rosenberg first started covering the base’s use as a prison for alleged terrorists. As I’ve heard others who have made the trip explain, Rosenberg is now the institutional memory of the place, often describing what a space was used for years before DOD’s current press minders ever showed up. Or, as she described in a National Press Club speech last year, what the rules used to be for journalists and attorneys.

It’s a place the Pentagon likes to call the most transparent detention center on Earth. Hundreds of reporters have visited there, they say, since the first al Qaida suspects arrived eight years ago.

They skip the part about how few go back more than once — stymied by the sheer frustration at the rules, the hoops, the time, and the costs of doing basic journalism. Being a court reporter. Writing a feature story. Conducting an interview.

Continue reading →


While NY Times Agitates for Resumption of Drone Strikes, Peace Talks Set to Add Afghanistan, Haqqani Network

By:  Monday January 9, 2012 10:30 am

Over the weekend, the New York Times published a piece whose headline seemed to cry out that drone strikes in Pakistan need to resume: “Lull in Strikes by U.S. Drones Aids Militants in Pakistan”. In reading the article, it is difficult to find strong evidence for the claim that the lull in strikes has helped militant groups. While the article does note a slight uptick in some forms of violence, there have been no major attacks on US forces in Afghanistan as one would expect if the insurgent groups truly had gained significant additional strength and operational capability. An alternative reading of the lull in strikes, however, is that it has provided an important opening for negotiations aimed at ending hostilities in Afghanistan. Two very important developments on that front are now in place, as Afghanistan is sending a delegation to Qatar to visit the newly established Taliban office there and the Express Tribune reports that the US is ready for the Haqqani network to take part in the peace negotiations. In the meantime, the Express Tribune also reports that negotiations between Pakistan and the US have nearly reached the point that drone strikes will resume. If the strikes resume, will progress in the peace talks be slowed or halted?

The poor footing on which the Times bases its claim that insurgents have been aided by the suspension of drone attacks is given away in the opening sentence of the article:

A nearly two-month lull in American drone strikes in Pakistan has helped embolden Al Qaeda and several Pakistani militant factions to regroup, increase attacks against Pakistani security forces and threaten intensified strikes against allied forces in Afghanistan, American and Pakistani officials say.

Attacks on the US have not increased, we only have American and Pakistani officials saying that “intensified” strikes on NATO forces are possible or threatened. As for the increase in attacks on Pakistani security forces, we have this:

Other militant groups continue attacking Pakistani forces. Just last week, Taliban insurgents killed 15 security soldiers who had been kidnapped in retaliation for the death of a militant commander.

The spike in violence in the tribal areas — up nearly 10 percent in 2011 from the previous year, according to a new independent report — comes amid reports of negotiations between Pakistan’s government and some local Taliban factions, although the military denies that such talks are taking place.

So that’s it when it comes to documentation of the strengthening of militant groups: a 10% increase for the year in violence in tribal areas, when the drone “pause” has only been for the last two months or so, with earlier shorter pauses over the Raymond Davis incident and the killing of Osama bin Laden.

The article also notes that the drones have not stopped flying, it’s just that they are not launching missiles. Perhaps US intelligence personnel will take this opportunity to improve the quality of their intelligence so that fewer innocent civilians will be at risk when missile strikes resume.

Meanwhile, we learn that the newly established office for the Taliban in Qatar is about to be visited by a delegation from Afghanistan’s High Peace Council: Continue reading →


William Welch, Jeffrey Sterling, and the Sixth Amendment

By:  Monday January 9, 2012 9:06 am

As Josh Gerstein reported, the government has submitted a filing in its appeal of some rulings in the Jeffrey Sterling case that reveals a little more about their reason for appealing. The key detail is that the government considers two people, about whom the government withheld impeachment information, so critical to their case that without them, the prosecution would be “terminated.”

The second issue on appeal relates to the district court’s decision to strike two of the government’s witnesses as a sanction for the late disclosure of alleged impeachment material related to those witnesses. This decision was rendered orally at a pretrial hearing and is based on factual conclusions concerning the weight and necessity of the government’s evidence and the history of discovery in this case. The district court’s decision to strike these witnesses effectively terminated the prosecution.

In order to adequately respond to the district court’s decision, the government believes it is necessary to explain the government’s extensive discovery efforts (much of which involved the review and disclosure of classified information); the import of the alleged impeachment material at issue and the ways in which Sterling proposes to use it; and the ways in which the two witnesses are important to the government’s case. The government must also address the effect of precedent from the Supreme Court and from this and other circuits concerning a district court’s limited authority to strike witnesses as a sanction for an alleged discovery violation. [ my emphasis]

I have suggested that one of these witnesses likely leaked classified information, but was not prosecuted for it. If I’m right that this is one of the witnesses that Judge Leonie Brinkema struck, consider what it means: that one of the most critical witnesses in this case also disclosed classified information (behavior, Sterling asserted in a filing, that was “more egregious” than what he was alleged to have done).

The government is preparing to argue that this may not amount to impeachment information. Presumably, they’re also going to offer some excuse for how they didn’t manage to find and turn over this information until shortly before the trial.

And this witness is crucial to the government’s case.

Now couple all that with one of the other disputes at issue: the government wants to withhold the real names of 10 CIA witnesses–not just from the jury, which I understand to a point. But also from Sterling himself.

The third issue on appeal relates to the district court’s decision to require the government to disclose to Sterling and the jury the true names of government witnesses who are covert CIA officers or contractors. This decision was rendered orally at two pretrial hearings, and requires a close familiarity with the extensive procedural history concerning the discoverability and admissibility of the witnesses’ true identities (which are classified).

Now, the government claims these two efforts aren’t that closely related–”each of [these appellate issues] is almost entirely distinct from the others.” Yet is that really true? The government, either by accident or intent, tried to prevent Sterling from learning details about two key witnesses against him. And it is also trying to prevent him from tying the people testifying against him to actions he probably knows firsthand, from his time at the CIA–if not from this late-produced discovery information.

It sure looks like the government is trying to play games with evidentiary issues to eliminate the Sixth Amendment. Typical William Welch.


The Corporatist Free Speech Superiority of the Roberts Court

By:  Sunday January 8, 2012 5:21 pm

Adam Liptak has a pretty interesting article up in today’s New York Times on the relative free speech strength of the Supreme Court under the leadership of John Roberts.

The Supreme Court led by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., the conventional wisdom goes, is exceptionally supportive of free speech. Leading scholars and practitioners have called the Roberts court the most pro-First Amendment court in American history.

A recent study challenges that conclusion. It says that a comprehensive look at data from 1953 to 2011 tells a different story, one showing that the court is hearing fewer First Amendment cases and is ruling in favor of free speech at a lower rate than any of the courts led by the three previous chief justices.

It is no joke that such has been the “conventional wisdom” about free speech in the Roberts era. The validity and veracity of that claim have always mostly escaped me though, and not solely, nor even predominantly because (as the eminent Floyd Abrams argues in Adam’s piece) because of the dreaded progressive evil hobby horse, Citizen’s United.

The root numbers derive from an article by Monica Youn at the American Constitution society’s ACSBlog, which in turn were reviewed for NYT by Lee Epstein and Jeffrey Siegal, who previously wrote a comprehensive law review article (excellent I might add) on the topic in the Journal of Law & Policy. While the root numbers and percentages are interesting, and certainly support the proposition that the Roberts Court is really not all that on the First Amendment free speech protection; they really do not tell the full story of how much, and why, this is really the case.

While both Liptak and Youn discuss some of this depth, I want to emphasize the real nature of the intellectual, and ideological, dichotomy of Roberts court jurisprudence. The Roberts Court has indeed engaged in some notable free speech engagement, but it has been almost entirely in the service of what I would call the “corporatist ideology”. The corporatist ideology is not limited to just corporations and their investors that underpin them, but also to the governmental and military/industrial complex that is now one with business power.

I do not know that I have ever seen a better description of the corporate/government linkage than that offered by Montana Supreme Court Judge Nelson in his dissent in the recent Western Traditions case:

The truth is that corporations wield inordinate power in Congress and in state legislatures. It is hard to tell where government ends and corporate America begins; the transition is seamless and overlapping.

Oh so true, and the same increasingly applies to the courts as well, especially via the Federalist Society mindset that courses rampant in federal courts, including at SCOTUS in the Roberts conservative bloc.

This manifests itself in the legal and factual nature of the Roberts Court’s free speech jurisprudence. As Liptak points out, a “majority of the Roberts court’s pro-free-speech decisions Continue reading →


Wildcard Weekend and Battleship Potemkin Trash

By:  Saturday January 7, 2012 12:16 pm

Sometimes you see things that just make you shake your head and say “what the hell is going on here?”

Here we are at the start of the NFL Playoffs – the always thrilling, and often surprising Wildcard Weekend – topped off by the Saturday night special featuring the Detroit Kitties first return to the playoffs since the late 1990s. And Marcy is going to be getting her culture on at a staging of Battleship Potemkin.

Say what???

Yes, you read that correctly. We have here a playoff game with two, count em two, 5,000 yard passers. Yep, while all the focus down the stretch was on Drew Brees, Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady, Matt Stafford quietly put up one hell of a season and eclipsed the magic 5,000 yard barrier. In short, he has been great and along with a semi-healthy MegaTron Johnson, gives the Lions a puncher’s chance tonight. One other thing about Stafford, while he did give up 16 picks this year, 9 of them came when he was struggling with a protective glove over a broken index finger. That has mostly resolved and Stafford was money down the stretch. Also, the Kitties have their defensive backfield back to full strength with the return of Louis Delmas and CB Aaron Berry. The Saints are, of course what we thought they were. Flat out bad ass nasty good on offense led by the field general Brees and Darren Sproles chewing up ground. The Saints’ O-boys can get some game on, but their defense is not what it was in the Super Bowl run two years ago.

I won’t bet any money on it, but the Lions are more than capable of winning this game over the Saints, and it should be a LOT of fun to watch. Well, that is, assuming you are actually watching the game and not Battleship Potemkin! Which brings up the collateral damage problem. McCaffrey. You see McCaffrey LOVES him some football, and must be in the throes of despair at not being able to watch the Kitties and Saints like other rational American dogs. McCaffrey, seen at left during happier times, is considering filing a lawsuit for emotional distress. Soon as he puts his paw print on the contingency fee agreement, we are off!

The early game on Saturday is Bengals at Texans. If the Texans were at full strength, this is not close. But Matt Schaub is done for the year and Houston is going with rookie TJ Yates, who has a bruised up left shoulder, with Jake Delhomme in reserve. Andre Johnson should play, but is clearly still fairly hobbled. Linebacker Mario Williams also out. Houston really backed in to the playoffs with three losses to close out the season, but do have a great ground game. The Bengals did not exactly light it up down the stretch, but did really shows signs of maturing as a team, and Andy Dalton looks very much like a professional QB rather than a rookie. Edge to the Bengals.

The early game Sunday is Dirty Birds at Gents. If this game was in Hot’Lanta, I think it is not even close. But in NY (okay New Joisey), it is a tossup. The Giants defense seems to be gelling at just the right time and the running game is coming around a little. Atlanta despite the stability that should come from the air/ground combo of Matt Ryan and Michael The Burner Turner, has tendencies to be flaky. Probably all comes down to whether Good or Bad Eli shows up. Bet here is that it is Good Eli and the Giants boasting is correct, they are going to be a tough out in the playoffs.

The late game Sunday is, of course, The Tebowl. Stillers are gonna go pay their respects to Baby Jesus at the Mile High Mount. Probably won’t be much actual respect shown though. Big Ben is gimpy, and Ryan Clark is staying home because of the altitude and his sickle cell issue. And the Steelers have other health issues and blah, blah, blah. They are still the Steelers and Tim is still Tebow, great heart and no arm. Is it possible for the Broncs and Baby Jesus to pull off a shocker and win? Sure, but not damn likely.

This will in all likelihood also be the designated Trash post for Monday’s BCS Championship game. Not much to discuss there, we have already seen this game, it is just that the craptastic BCS is making us watch it again. Both are excellent teams, and both have killer D’s. But, just like last time, the slight edge goes to Honey Badger and LSU.

Throw down some Trash people!