Debriefing

If you are desperately trying, as I am, to get a grip on the Hamdi, Padilla, and Guantanamo (Rasul v. Bush), decisions from today, might I suggest you start with Prof. Balkin?

What I have figured out: this is a fine, if not spectacular victory for civil liberties...the "Guantanamo exists in an alternate universe where there is no legal system" argument died a welcome death...still no word on what "until the end of hostilities" means, and who gets to decide that...Scalia, in a moment of redemption, threw down against his old hunting buddy...Clarence Thomas sees some compelling value in reframing the US as a quasi military dictatorship...more to come, I hope.