WaPo stenographer R[epublican]. Jeffrey Smith on the McCain Torture and Republican Incumbent Protection Act:

On the detainee bill, Frist had make clear his desire to ensure that no amendment passed, spokeswoman Amy Call said. She said "we were worried about both" of Specter's amendments.

The more extreme version would have deleted the bill's suspension of habeas corpus rights. The less extreme alternative, which Specter co-sponsored with Sens. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) and Gordon Smith (R.-N.H.), would have allowed detainees to file a single habeas corpus petition after a year of detention.

Unbelievable?

All too believable.

Only in the authoritarian cesspool that the Beltway has become under Republican rule would retaining a millenium of jurisprudence and our Constitutional protections against unjust imprisonment be viewed as "extreme."

You may email Stenographer Smith here.

NOTE Kinda fits in with Bush's idea that "extremists" like us are the enemy, eh?