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Poetry, the imagination, and the creative life.

Wednesday, July 02, 2008

D.C. Circuit Rules Against the President With “Snarky” Poem

For years, many have cited international and domestic law to show that President Bush has committed grave crimes in office. Now, the Court of Appeals has enlisted Lewis Carroll and his poem “The Hunting of the Snark” to bring home the point in it ruling against the Administration in the case of a Huzaifa Parhat, a Chinese Muslim held at Guantanamo Bay.

The Court quoted the 1876 poem to show that the Administration does little in court but repeat the same unsupported assertions and demand that the Court except them without question. The D.C. Circuit said that it was right out of “The Hunting of the Snark.” In the poem, a crew hunt an undefined creature that their leader, The Bellman, simply insists exists. The Bellman simply repeats:
“I have said it thrice: What I tell you three times is true,” the Bellman says in the poem.
Posted by Peter at 6:47 AM
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Poetry can communicate before it is understood. ~T. S. Eliot

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Poetry is nearer to vital truth than history. ~ Plato

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A poet's work is to name the unnameable, to point at frauds, to take sides, start arguments, shape the world, and stop it going to sleep. ~ Salman Rushdie

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Poetry heals the wounds inflicted by reason. ~ Novalis

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Poetry is what maintains our capacity for contemplation and difficulty. — Carolyn Forche

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Poetry must have something in it that is barbaric, vast and wild. — Denis Diderot

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Sometimes something wants to be said, sometimes a way of saying wants to be used. — Paul Valéry

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