Um, yes it is. Of course the district court opinion will be appealed in these issues by the losing party and they will argue the same positions to an appellate court and no doubt to the Supreme Court.  The Obama Administration appealed the state secrets privilege ruling of Judge Vaughn Walker to the 9th Circuit. Moreover, to act as if a district court opinion will not be cited as precedent is simply absurd.

Although I don't really believe that diarist is one who intentionally misleads, I do think it was a somewhat desperate attempt to rationalize this revelation in the face of an ugly truth that threatens to burst the bubble people seem so desperate to keep in tact.

At this point, anything these folks say is about as toothy as the dreaded "sternly worded memo".

He's your candidate, learn to enjoy him, I say.

Third, most of us knew what Obama would do when he got into office.  

Fourth, Obama is ambling towards one-term wonderdom.

Some commentators hold that since kudos is a singular word it cannot be used as a plural and that the word kudo is impossible. But kudo does exist; it is simply one of the most recent words created by back-formation from another word misunderstood as a plural. Kudos was introduced into English in the 19th century; it was used in contexts where a reader unfamiliar with Greek could not be sure whether it was singular or plural. By the 1920s it began to appear as a plural, and about 25 years later kudo began to appear. It may have begun as a misunderstanding, but then so did cherry and pea.

It's a moral cop-out in which the person uttering it is attempting to defuse, divert or avoid the fact that what they are doing is immoral, amoral, unprofessional, or illegal.  On a moral and ethical level, it is no different from "just following orders", and is an equally flimsy defense.

The fact of the matter is, was, and always will be that if you take the paycheck, you buy the whole package and you own it - ethically, morally and legally.  If you can't handle the fact that your work is tearing down the very law and Constitution you swore to uphold and defend, then you should either quit or, if you really need the paycheck, recognize that the morality, ethics and law-abidingness you might have prided yourself upon are no more.

Prostitutes (of all prices and persuasions) have a greater level of honesty and integrity than do clowns like that diarist or, I suspect, the lawyers he'd defend - the hookers know, admit, and agree to the fact that they are selling their [body part(s), minds, whatever] for a price.  The hookers accept that whatever illusions they may have had about being "above it all", as well as scruples against crossing the legal/moral/ethical line left the building about the same time they said "yes" to the money.

That's where those DoJ attorneys reside - either they're honest and admit they have prostituted themselves to expanding government power at the expense of the Constitution they swore to uphold, or they're dishonest.  The diarist, in trying to hide that reality, neither does a good job of it nor makes himself look credible.  The diarist is selling the idea that one can be a little bit dishonest, and that's about as credible as claiming one can be a little bit pregnant.  In other words, not possible.