UC Hastings started its lecture series this year with a lecture by Jules Lobel, who is promoting his new book Less Safe, Less Free: Why America is Losing the War on Terror, which he co-authored with David Cole. The book compares the Bush administration's preemptive strategy in fighting the war on terrorism to the science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick entitled, Minority Report, in which the Justice Department uses psychic visionaries to predict and prevent future crimes. Unlike the sci-fi story, Bush has no psychic visionaries to guide his preemptive strategy. Lobel convincingly argues that the administration's preemptive strategy has not made us safer but has in fact put us in even more danger.
His lecture was very insightful. His comments about extraordinary rendition were particularly interesting, and to illustrate his points he told the story of Maher Arar, one of his clients. Arar was arrested in the US while he was traveling from Europe to his home in Canada. He never even entered the US, he was merely transferring from one flight to another. He was detained by the US government for 12 days before he was deported to Syria, a rogue nation, where he was tortured for more than a year.
The audio includes an introduction by Evan Lee, a Hastings professor of law. Lobel's lecture can be downloaded here (it's about an hour long): Download Lobel.mp3
Or play the audio here:
Comments