I think that’s a little paranoid. After all, the Miranda question only arises once an arrest has been made on a substantive charge.

“Materially supported hostilities” is a well-defined term and does not include mere speech, now any more than in the Vietnam era when Viet Cong and PRV flags were so prominent in demonstrations. “Material support” requires actual assistance in the form of money, arms, documents, intelligence data or the like. (This would apply to Code Pink’s fundraising on behalf of al-Qaeda in Iraq.) Words alone, even an open endorsement of the enemy cause, are not enough.

U.S. Attorney General Holder recently suggested that government be allowed to postpone giving terrorist suspects Miranda warnings.

The problem with Holder’s Miranda proposal is that government could arbitrary manipulate the timing of “Miranda warnings” to heavily favor the government to ensure certain statements made by a terrorist suspect, could be used in their prosecution. It should be noted that Attorney General Holder’s proposal to postpone Miranda warnings is all-inclusive; Holder has failed to distinguish between non-violent terrorist acts from violent terrorist acts—as a condition precedent to postponing Miranda Warnings. For example, non-violent terrorist acts” are covered in the Patriot Act to prosecute Persons that support “coercion to influence a government or intimidation to affect a civilian population.” Now consider how Holder’s proposed postponing of Miranda warnings could be used in conjunction with other laws, for example Sen. McCain’s recent introduced March 4, 2010, S.3081: The “Enemy Belligerent Interrogation, Detention, and Prosecution Act of 2010.”

S.3081 is so broadly written innocent anti-war protesters and Tea Party Groups might be arrested and detained just for attending demonstrations; Government would need only charge everyone attending a demonstration “materially supported hostilities” against U.S. Government or a civilian population to indefinitely detain unlawful demonstrators in military custody. Passage of S.3081 would permit U.S. Government to use “mere suspicion” to curtail an individual’s Constitutional Protections against unlawful arrest, detention and interrogation without benefit of legal counsel and trial. Under both Attorney General Holder’s proposal and Sen. McCain’s S.3081, Government would not be required to provide interrogated individuals Miranda Warnings or even an attorney: Your political opinions and statements made against U.S. Government could be used by Authorities to deem you either a terrorist or a “hostile” “Enemy Belligerent” to cause your arrest and indefinite detention.

It is important that Americans not allow Attorney General Holder to jam his new Miranda proposal though Congress before U.S. Citizens have had an opportunity to examine the potential ramifications of Holder’s proposal.

Winston: Bush oversaw the creation of a very good military tribunal system despite the best propaganda efforts of our enemies and their enablers.

I don’t see how Bush providing the bare minimum level of process and law that the Supreme Court said he had to should be evidence that he was careful in balancing military needs against personal rights and the potential for abuse. If the decision had been entirely up to Bush, there wouldn’t have been any sort of tribunals in the first place.

NO. Not the “only legitimate” avenue. We can with equal legitimacy use the Hague-Geneva mechanism, and ought to.

Also, the decision to read someone their Miranda rights does not actually give them any special rights, as you should know. It reminds them of or acquaints them with rights that they already have.

An important part of the fight against Al Qaeda is our ability to maintain a legitimate system for trying and detaining suspected terrorists. The criminal justice system is the only legitimate way of doing so, and Miranda is the only way to keep the criminal justice system legitimate.

My full thoughts: http://source4politics.blogspot.com/2010/02/criminal-justice-helps-us-fight-terror.html

Richard Aubrey: neuro. I couldn’t. Somebody might see it.

And you think that would cause others to have a lower opinion of you?

(Are you aware that just as some people are so impecunious or otherwise unreachable as to be judgment proof, some people are effectively incapable of being libeled/slandered because nothing can be said of them true or false that could further damage them in the eyes of the world? I trust you are neither judgment proof, nor possessed of a reputation so terrible that nothing could possibly cause it to be sullied further.)

Richard Aubrey: neuro.A scoundrel? Well, lawyers would think so, but even if he were, this would go a long way to mitigating his other offenses.

May I suggest you add, “Some of my best friends are lawyers.”

Rich: Gawd, Shakespeare was right–kill all the lawyers. Talk about a bunch of blathering blowhards.

You should try reading Will himself rather than relying on the Cliff Notes version. If you did, you would see that he put those words in the mouth of a scoundrel, who understandably wanted to see all the lawyers killed.

Also, 9/11 had victims, which means cost-benefit analysis is irrelevant!

Anonsters:
CIA’s use of waterboarding on prisoners goes well beyond what is done in SERE training.

So this assumes that there are different degrees of waterboarding — SERE-style waterboarding is not torture, but what goes well beyond that is.

If that is the case, then the argument that “it’s torture because we once prosecuted the Japanese for waterboarding” loses its force since the waterboarding used by the CIA is nowhere near as severe as the waterboarding used by the Japanese in WWII.

If KSM’s waterboarding is somewhere in between SERE-style waterboarding (not torture) and Japanese-style waterboarding (torture) in the continuum of severity, then it’s not clear that it crosses the line. In which case it’s plausible that some forms of waterboarding aren’t torture — including that practiced by the CIA.

Nuance. You gotta love it.

Fred Conblode: This is right on. I am not sure what the Bush did it to argument is supposed to prove in making Obama look good. Especially when Liberals see Bush as an Fing twit.

Just because Bush did it doesn’t mean everyone agrees with it even if you were a Bush supporter.

Fred, my statement was not premised on the argument “Bush did it so that means it’s OK.” It was a response to the multiple defenders of George W. Bush’s decision to try Reid in civilian courts who are commenting in this thread. These same Bush defenders and apologists are attacking Obama and Holder for their decisions surrounding Abdulmutallab. I’m glad you agree that is an inconsistent position and that they must choose one position or the other — either both decisions were OK or neither were.

Bohemond: By the way– if military tribunals were good enough for the Nazis, why aren’t they good enough for al-Qaeda?

The problem has not been with military tribunals, one can make a case for them. When they are conducted as they were in the past. The Bush/Cheney clowns came up with alternatives that looked like military tribunals but were just kangaroo courts. (Remember the one where the detainee’s representative was bound to report admissions and confessions to the court?)

News reports today say that Abdulmutallab has turned on the radical cleric who recruited him. It all looks like a successful investigation to me. If you want anti-terrorism results. If you want to hear the agonized shrieks of bad people, not so much.

Sorry, the 10* executions from the first Nuremberg trial (the IMT, the big guns: Ribbentrop, Jodl, Keitel, Frank etc) were carried out by US Army Master Sergeant John C. Woods.

Pierrepont was only involved in the concentration-camp cases tried under British jurisdiction (including the “Bitch of Belsen” among others).

*12 death sentences, but Bormann was condemned in absentia and Goering committed suicide.

By the way- if military tribunals were good enough for the Nazis, why aren’t they good enough for al-Qaeda?

Bohemond: They should feel no more guilt than the Army hangman who despatched the top Nazis at Nuremberg.

Actually, the top Nazis were executed by a British civilian. But why let the facts get in the way? This brings an interesting question to mind: why shouldn’t he be ashamed of not torturing the Nazis first. I mean, now that we know that torture is the moral thing to do? Is it that the juxtaposition of torture and Nazis makes it obvious how immoral your ideas are?

I don’t think someone whose “evidence” comes from the torturers themselves should be criticizing others’ sources. Unless you really believe all of the Communist show trial confessions, which I expect you don’t.

“reportedly hung for hours on end from his wrists, beaten, and subjected to other agonies for weeks”

Reportedly? By whom? Where is this mystery witness? Or is this just more of the crap Code Pink pulls out of its ass?

“Otherwise, how would they look in the mirror.”

By reflecting on their service to humanity in inflicting on that subhuman filth even a fraction of the suffering he deserves. They should feel no more guilt than the Army hangman who despatched the top Nazis at Nuremberg.

Swan Trumpet: Had you done your homework and READ the OLC memos, you’d know that they don’t ever mention the Naval training of SEALS, and therefore, your claim is either ill-informed, imaginary, or simply prevarication.

How many times were the detainees waterboarded? How many times are SEALs waterboarded. Even leaving out the many other differences, that’s a showstopper.

There is strong reason to believe that the plots torture saved us from are as fictional as the plots KGB and Gestapo victims confessed to, in similar circumstances.

As for K.S.M. himself, who (as Jane Mayer writes) was waterboarded, reportedly hung for hours on end from his wrists, beaten, and subjected to other agonies for weeks, Bush said he provided “many details of other plots to kill innocent Americans.” K.S.M. was certainly knowledgeable. It would be surprising if he gave up nothing of value. But according to a former senior C.I.A. official, who read all the interrogation reports on K.S.M., “90 percent of it was total fucking bullshit.” A former Pentagon analyst adds: “K.S.M. produced no actionable intelligence. He was trying to tell us how stupid we were.”

After you clean up your pants, try to understand how torturers always discover retroactive justification. Otherwise, how would they look in the mirror.

davod: RPT:Read the article.I have not seen any rational criticism of “Courting Disaster” which was the basis for the article.

I have read the article but not the book. Why should I do so? The article is well written, but how can one challenge its factual assertions? Where is the corroboration? MT is a former Bush speech writer tasked in mid-2006, right as the election approached, to write a speech supporting Bush policies. The key sources/witnesses are anonymous. The book is published by Regnery, a publisher with a troubled history of vanity books? “How Barack Obama is inviting the next terror attack?” How can you call this a nonpartisan authority?

Anonsters: So, let’s recap the argument.You: U.S. military personnel who undergo SERE training are waterboarded. We don’t/wouldn’t torture our own soldiers. Therefore, waterboarding isn’t torture.

Me: Except that the CIA’s use of waterboarding goes well beyond what U.S. military personnel are subjected to in SERE training, as demonstrated by the OLC memos.

Had you done your homework and READ the OLC memos, you’d know that they don’t ever mention the Naval training of SEALS, and therefore, your claim is either ill-informed, imaginary, or simply prevarication.

sfalphageek: Ricardo: The psychological terror element is gone in the training sessions for reasons explained.

Said by the man who has obviously never gone through SERE C . . .

True, my reference point is filmed waterboarding of Christopher Hitchens who volunteered to be waterboarded by a couple of military/intelligence community guys. Let’s put it this way: waterboarding in the SERE program has to be at least an order of a magnitude less terrifying than being waterboarded by, say, North Korean agents.

Look, ma, a red herring!It was established, quite a while ago now, that CIA’s use of waterboarding on prisoners goes well beyond what is done in SERE training. How was that established? You know, by actually reading the OLC memos, rather than consulting the contents of your fantasies.

Ah, so then the issue is not the waterboarding per se, but rather what was done well beyond what is done in SERE training. Is it your argument that if we had stuck to waterboarding, that was identical to the waterboarding we use in SERE training that you and countless others calling waterboarding torture would not be calling it torture?

Fred Conblode:
This is right on.I am not sure what the Bush did it to argument is supposed to prove in making Obama look good.Especially when Liberals see Bush as an Fing twit.Just because Bush did it doesn’t mean everyone agrees with it even if you were a Bush supporter.

Your english is atrocious! But, I get your point. The main argument here is that Bush did it so stop putting down Obama. But the fact is, just because Bush did it doesn’t mean I agreed with it then! No one who is not a US Citizen should benefit from our legal system for such a heinous act. Which I see as an act of war. Send him to Gitmo.

Others have explained this earlier. Bush used what was available at the time. Reid arrived before the Military Commissions Act of 2008 was enacted.

memomachine: Hmmmm.“Face it, there was no significant difference between Bush’s decision to try Reid in civilian courts and Obama’s decision to try Abdulmutallab in civilian courts.”Correct!They are both completely and utterly idiotic.Now Bush is supposed to be the dumb one.I guess he’s not sitting in that chair alone eh?

This is right on. I am not sure what the Bush did it to argument is supposed to prove in making Obama look good. Especially when Liberals see Bush as an Fing twit.

Just because Bush did it doesn’t mean everyone agrees with it even if you were a Bush supporter.

Read the article.

I have not seen any rational criticism of “Courting Disaster” which was the basis for the article.

Steve C.: In the US military Summary and Special courts martial do not have jurisdiction over capital offenses. Only a General court martial can assess the death penalty. IAW the Geneva Convention detainees may be tried for crimes against the law of war under the same rules that apply to the detaining powers own soldiers.

That provision only applies to prisoners of war, not all detainees. An unlawful combatant is not a prisoner of war, and is not entitled to that level of protection under the convention.

Marc A. Thiessen’s (the author of Courting Disaster)January 18, 2010, NRO article Meet the Real Jack Bauers describes in part his discussions with CIA interrogators. I recommend reading the full article as the small sample included here does not really do it justice:

“Sitting across the table from me were several CIA officials, including two men I will call Harry and Sam (not their real names), I didn’t know anything about the individuals before me except that they were with the CIA and knowledgeable about the interrogation program.”

“They explained, for example, that there is a difference between “interrogation” and “de-briefing.” Interrogation is not how we got information from the terrorists; it is the process by which we overcome the terrorists’ resistance and secure their cooperation — sometimes with the help of enhanced interrogation techniques.

Once the terrorist agreed to cooperate, I was told, the interrogation stopped and “de-briefing” began, as the terrorists were questioned by CIA analysts, using non-aggressive techniques to extract information that could help disrupt attacks.”

“As they described the information the CIA had gotten from KSM and others, I slowly realized that these men were not simply describing what others in the agency had done; I was sitting face to face with the individuals who had actually questioned terrorists at the CIA’s black sites and gotten the information they were describing to me themselves.

Harry, it turned out, had interrogated KSM. He explained that interrogations involved strict oversight. There was no freelancing allowed — every technique had to be approved in advance by headquarters, and any deviation from the meticulously developed interrogation plan would lead to the immediate removal of the interrogator.”

“For example, information from detainees in CIA custody led to the arrest of an al-Qaeda terrorist named Jose Padilla, who was sent to America on a mission to blow up high-rise apartment buildings in the United States.

Information from detainees in CIA custody led to the capture of a cell of Southeast Asian terrorists which had been tasked by KSM to hijack a passenger jet and fly it into the Library Tower in Los Angeles.

Information from detainees in CIA custody led to the capture of Ramzi Bin al-Shibh, KSM’s right-hand-man in the 9/11 attacks, just as he was finalizing plans for a plot to hijack airplanes in Europe and fly them into Heathrow airport and buildings in downtown London.

Information from detainees in CIA custody led to the capture of Ammar al-Baluchi and Walid bin Attash, just as they were completing plans to replicate the destruction of our embassies in East Africa by blowing up the U.S. consulate and Western residences in Karachi, Pakistan.

Information from detainees in CIA custody led to the disruption of an al-Qaeda plot to blow up the U.S. Marine camp in Djibouti, in an attack that could have rivaled the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut.

Information from detainees in CIA custody helped break up an al-Qaeda cell that was developing anthrax for terrorist attacks inside the United States.

In addition to helping break up these specific terrorist cells and plots, CIA questioning provided our intelligence community with an unparalleled body of information about al-Qaeda — giving U.S. officials a picture of the terrorist organization as seen from the inside, at a time when we knew almost nothing about the enemy who had attacked us on 9/11.

In addition, CIA detainees helped identify some 86 individuals whom al-Qaeda deemed suitable for Western operations — most of whom we had never heard of before. According to the intelligence community, about half of these individuals were subsequently tracked down and taken off the battlefield. Without CIA questioning, many of these terrorists could still be unknown to us and at large — and may well have carried out attacks against the West by now.”

Empty handwaving devoid of content. “Cheney’s legacy disastrous” is nothing more than “He’s an Evil Republican and I hate him”

Sarcastro: When I only look at sources who agree with me politically, the facts are clear:I am right!

Stephen Hayes is partisan? Dana Perino doesn’t even recognize your avatar! She thought the Cuban missile crisis was a problem for the Mavericks’ owner.

Bohemond: RPT:Incidentally, the plot thickens. FBI Director Mueller said today that he strenuously objected to revealing that Fruit of Kaboom was talking (for obvious reasons)- but Holder (without informing him) leaked the info anyway. In other words, our terrorist-assisting racist AG is playing politics with national security.I’ll take Darth Cheney any day.

Stephen Hayes has an article in yesterday’s Weekly Standard on all the contradictions and lies regarding the handling of the panty-bomber. He wrote:

“For days the Obama administration has tried to convince reporters that the Abdulmutallab stopped talking before he was Mirandized. Accounts in both the Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post in recent days carried that claim. Three sources familiar with the interrogations told TWS that those claims were incorrect. And yesterday FBI Robert Mueller acknowledged that that Abdulmutallab stopped talking “after he was given” Miranda warnings.

Last week, the White House argued that the FBI had gotten everything they could out of Abdulmutallab in their 50-minutes of interrogation. Today, the same White House is boasting about the valuable intelligence they are getting from him.

DNI Blair told Congress that an elite interrogation team should have questioned Abdulmutallab — only to amend his remarks hours later to acknowledge that the new unit does not exist.”

Bohemond: RPT:
And your basis for this assertion, beyond “They’re Evil Republicans and I hate them”?
Especially coming from somebody who thinks Eric Holder is trustworthy.Incidentally, the plot thickens.FBI Director Mueller said today that he strenuously objected to revealing that Fruit of Kaboom was talking (for obvious reasons)- but Holder (without informing him) leaked the info anyway.In other words, our terrorist-assisting racist AG is playing politics with national security.I’ll take Darth Cheney any day.

Can you try to stay snark-free for a while?

1. My basis for that evaluation is living in the USA and following events 2001-2009. The examples are legion, and Cheney’s legacy disastrous. He rarely speaks the truth on anything significant.

2. I have not said anything about Holder’s “trustworthiness” in the abstract. I see no basis to disagree with his assertions in the McConnell letter. If you do, please address them, rather than raising general credibility questions. By the way, Scooter Libby’s client Marc Rich was not a terrorist, except in the financial sense.

3. Kit Bond does have some pretty serious false statements in his past, although not to the degree of Cheney. E.g.: “During the January 22 edition of MSNBC’s Hardball, Sen. Kit Bond’s (R-MO) claimed that “we know already that more than 60 of the people who have been released have been killing our troops, our Americans and civilians on the battlefield.”

4. As I said, if the critics are disseminating false statements, what should the administration’s response be?

sfalphageek:
“Geneva Conventions protections?” You keep using that word. I do not think that it means what you think it means . . . Heck, sign me up too. I’d be happy to apply the Geneva and Hague conventions to the current situation, but if you think that MCA 2006 was bad — wow.Absent Protocol One (to which the US is not a signatory), you just get three officers together, bring the detainee in front of them, and answer a few questions: Did the detainee “carry arms openly?” Did he have “a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance?” Did he fight according to the “laws and customs of war?” Was commanded by someone “responsible for his actions?” If all the answers are not yes (and, after the first few months following the initial invasions, I’m not aware of a single situation in Afghanistan or in Iraq where they would have been yes), declare him an unlawful combatant, and he’s no longer entitled to POW status (which is what I think you mean by full Geneva Conventions protections.) At that point, all he’s entitled to is humane treatment (which does not bar a “humane” execution) and “the rights of fair and regular trial,” which can be a field court martial.Appoint an officer (not necessarily a lawyer) as defense counsel, appoint a few more as the board, and, if over the next 15 minutes or so, he’s found by the court martial to have engaged, directly or indirectly, in attacks against US forces while not a protected person, drag him out and shoot him. No access to civilian courts, no process of appeals, no delay in execution of sentence. The traditional law of land warfare is pretty hard on franc tireurs, partisans and guerillas. Is that really what you’re signing up for?

In the US military Summary and Special courts martial do not have jurisdiction over capital offenses. Only a General court martial can assess the death penalty. IAW the Geneva Convention detainees may be tried for crimes against the law of war under the same rules that apply to the detaining powers own soldiers.