In all of the suits going on in various courts over the NSA's domestic spying programs, the government is arguing that the courts cannot even hear such cases because the process of discovery will violate the state secrets privilege. At least one court, the Federal circuit for the Northern District of California, has now rejected that claim (see ruling here). Now let's hope the ACLU's case here in Michigan goes the same way. And, interestingly enough, Judge Vaughn Walker, who issued the ruling, is a conservative. He was originally nominated for the Federal bench by Reagan, but faced fierce opposition from liberal groups because of his membership in an all-male club and his representation of the US Olympic Committee in a case that prevented a San Francisco group from calling their athletic competition the "Gay Olympics". He ended up being renominated by Bush 41 and confirmed by the Senate, and he is now the Chief Judge for that circuit.
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I find it terribley amusing - I am certain there will now be cries that this judge is a left-wing activist judge too. And simply because he ruled in a very traditionaly conservative fashion. After the Hamden ruling I got into an debate about the "liberal" make-up of SCOTUS and how the Republicans just made a lot of "mistakes" and appointed a bunch of liberals who were just acting conservative to get to SCOTUS. These folks (and many liberals do the same thing) assume that if a justice doesn't rule the way the party that appointed them wants them too then that justice is traitor. The rule of law is meaningless to those cretins.
You know. It is nice to see judges following the law instead of ruling how their parties want them to. Very, very nice.