Here is the draft executive order for shutting down Guantanamo. Note this language (emphasis added):
Sec. 3. Closure of Detention Facilities at Guantánamo. The detention facilities at Guantánamo for individuals covered by this order shall be closed as soon as practicable, and no later than one year from the date of this order. If any individuals covered by this order remain in detention at Guantánamo at the time of closure of those detention facilities, they shall be returned to their home country, released, transferred to a third country, or transferred to another United States detention facility in a manner consistent with law and the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States.
“Transferred to another United States detention facility”—including an American military facility, an American military facility located in another country?
There is this:
4(c)(5) Consideration of Issues Relating to Transfer to United States. The Review shall identify and consider legal, logistical, and security issues relating to the potential transfer of individuals currently detained at Guantánamo to facilities within the United States and the review participants shall work with Congress on any legislation that may be appropriate.
But that hardly answers the question, indeed, suggests that the answer may be “yes.”
I think the key interesting word here is "released." What is this supposed to mean, that current Guantanamo detainees could be released and allowed to live in the United States?????
Does this mean that the entire Guantanamo base will be closed and revert to Cuban authority or just the "detention facilities" there?
Better idea: If you don't actually want them located within the jurisdiction of the U.S. courts, just outsource the future detention of all the Gitmo alumni to the Chinese. The Chinese will like it because it will fit nicely with their domestic "economic stimulus" policies by helping keep our balance of payments to them as deeply in the red as before the economic downturn. Besides, I hear China also doesn't particularly like Islamic terrorists very much, and given the way their penal and justice systems work, the detainees will all be dead in a year or two and U.S. taxpayers (or debt-holders) can stop funding their incarceration...
(At least if they're foreign nationals; if there are any US citizens in the set of people involved, things might change. But I don't know that any of them are, or for sure that anything would necessarily change .)
Rendition?
In short, all options are open. Why would that be bad, assuming that they'll want to take a careful look at each case?
Their chance of escape was small, but if they did escape, they would most likely be escaping into Cuba, thereby making them not an immediate threat to American lives. The ability of Al Quaeda to organize an outside escape attempt was also greatly diminished. They would almost need the active cooperation of the Cuban government to gather the personnel and material needed to make an attempt.
No other Military detention facility in the world will have both of these advantages.
I think the Bush Administration, in the long run, would have been better off calling these detainees Prisoners of War, and treating them that way in the first place. I know there were political and emotional reasons not too, but I think the US Courts would have been very reluctant to go along with all the Habeus petitions for people designated as POWs.
So then why include that language? Possibly just for flexibility reasons. If Obama truly wants to close Gitmo, then he'll likely want to close other Gitmo-esque bases (or at least not increase their utilization). [Assuming this isn't all just a political ploy].
In response to geosktr--Maybe your finding suggests the meaning of "released". The prisoners will simply be let go in Cuba. Then possibly they will just be part of Cuba, possibly arrested. I don't know what type of international law problems this poses, but I imagine there are some.
So what happens to them?
-Prosecuted in U.S. courts;
-Given to third country, e.g., China;
-Returned to home country;
-Held by U.S. overseas; or
-Held by U.S. at home.
Non-starter.
If the boys are sent elsewhere, they'll still be a tool to bash the war. The Usual Suspects aren't going to bash O, and, since he now owns the war, won't bash that, either.
So we may find--probably not find it, given the change in lineup--that the situation for the Gitmo Goons has not changed, or possibly has changed for the worse, but nobody will be pretending to care.
Someone said years ago that he wished a dem had been elected in 2004, so the dems wouldn't mind winning the war. I hate to see a dem in office, but there is that in the calculations.
As Aubrey says nothing was really wrong at Gitmo. No one died from their treatment there. Hell no one was severely injured which is amazing when you consider the guards literally get shit on damn near everyday.
AntonK--great work!
I agree with much of your post. Gitmo has become a symbol (mostly of of BDS) more than anything else. The Bush Administration chose the location because their legal theory was that it was outside the United States and the host country would have zero say.
The Supreme Court torpedoed the "outside the United States" theory. But even then, Gitmo was possibly the best place to hold the detainees outside of the continental United States.
However, your last paragraph, while nice to contemplate, would never have happened. By 2004, the Democratic Party was tied to the message that Iraq was unwinnable and that we should immediately withdraw.
Even today, I can't think of a single Democrat (outside of Joe Leiberman) who has said, "We were wrong in our 2004 assessment; the surge worked; if the current trajectory continues, we will have won."
If this nonsense wasn't so awful I'd be laughing right now.
And when it turns out that these detainees are transferred to a similar facility that has as it's only value that it's not located in Gitmo, I will laugh at every liberal that screamed about Gitmo.
Because no doubt, since it's Obama, they'll be just A-ok with it.
Personally how about SF Bay? located right next to Code Pink HQ?
That'll get some knickers in a twist.
Art. 22 of GC III (1949) states:
Looks like he has to put them all in one place (unless they concent to be seperated). Other provisions govern the conditions of confinement. Generally those are required to be the same as for the depot troops of the detaining Power. US Army Soldiers are generally provided small suites in which to live (4 Soldiers in 2, 2-bed rooms with a common area, with shower and toilets in the same building (usually on the same floor), and a common area/recreation area with TV, snack machines and video games in the same building (usually on the first floor). [And, "Yes" this does sound like college dorms, since beginning in the early 1980s, that's what has been the model for junior enlisted barracks.]
It doesn't look like anyone who understands what, in fact, is being ordered has reviewed this. Why does that not surprise me?
Fuck'm, shoot'm, leave them in a field. It's easier than being moral.
You could get even more tourists to go look at these guys.
You presume the dems said those things because they believed them.
IMO, they said those things because a republican was president and would have turned on a dime, whatever that is, had a dem won in 2004.
That's one reason that taking a year to close Gitmo is politically shrewd. Obama signs an executive order closing the prison, with much fanfare. Today's headlines: "Obama Signs Order Closing Guantanamo Prison." The left loves it, Europe loves it, the UN loves it.
Twelve months from now Gitmo will be a distant memory, and the left won't even be paying attention to where the former Gitmo prisoners are currently being held.
I could see enemy combatant detention becoming a niche-market specialty in international trade. The island-nation of Nauru operated a contract detention facility with the government of Australia for a few years, so the idea isn’t totally without precedent.
This idea could be developed in many ways, but here's one stab at it:
A maximum-security facility is built in some sovereign state (ex: the fictional nation of Q).
The US turns over detainees to Q, accompanied by a certification that they are lawfully held.* The government’s certification provides Q immunity from any challenge to its role in the detention (provided they perform according to contract). The responsibility for putting a detainee there is entirely the Federal government’s and any attempt to make Q answer for it is enjoined.
Along with the prisoner and the certification, the US also gives Q a sizable bond. If a detainee escapes, Q forfeits the bond. From that point on, Q is paid a modest fee (per prisoner, per day) to cover a portion of its operating costs. At the end of the agreed-upon term of detention – could be years, could be life – Q cashes in the bond and reaps its profit, plus interest.
All detainees would be given a periodic review of their cases. This could be done at the start of a new administration to hedge against use of this system for political purposes, at regular intervals of time or whatever ends up being appropriate. Thus, the law on enemy combatants is allowed room to evolve naturally over the course of time without permanently locking in bad decisions.
If review of a detainee’s case finds the detention improper, the US forfeits the bond to Q (for violating their certification that detention was legal). If review of conditions finds that Q has treated the detainee inhumanely, Q forfeits the bond.
If you wanted to get really wild, you could partner with a Native American tribe to do this on a sovereign reservation. I trust that that would be way messier than working with a country like Nauru, but a part of me also likes the idea of the .gov partnering with Native American tribes to solve difficult legal/political problems. It’d be nice if the US’s default stance towards Native Americans was toward active engagement rather than just ignoring them as much as possible.
*The question of detention facilities is separate from what kind of review best balances detainee due process rights and national security. That is for the President, Congress and the Courts to work out. Regardless of how that process ends up working, you still have to keep people someplace.
Then why is "released" being offered as an alternative to them being "transferred to a third country" or "returned to their home country," both of which also involve them being "released"? I think that Section 3 says that basically one of four things will happen to each detainee: he could be (i) transferred to a different facility, (ii) released and sent home, (iii) released and sent to a third country, or (iv) just "released", which has to mean released in the United States.
That criminal thinking is so January 19, 2009.
Long my ideal solution.
Use a ship though.
For some reason the water tight doors couldn't be opened...
Crap, you saw right through it. We are demonizing Khalid S Muhammed (sic) et al. Nobody there did anything to us, we just demonize them.
It sounds good to hear that we are going to shut down Gitmo, but the reality is that the detainees there have been reviewed and reviewed, and those who are safe to us and have a safe place to go, have probably already been shipped out. That leaves those who are: 1) too dangerous to release; 2) have some value to us (mostly I would guess related to 9/11, since any intelligence value is likely gone due to the time involved, or 3) there is nowhere to send them that is safe.
Wrt those too dangerous to release. This is a big country. If one of those clowns is released and harms an American, it has a vanishingly small chance of being one of those who called for his release. And the injured parties can always be called little Eichmanns. Pigs. Rednecks. Win-win for the proponents of release. No downside.
And this: "as soon as practicable, and no later than one year from the date of this order" is reminiscent of Obama's January 31, 2007 legislative foray that would have, had it been successful, subverted the Iraqi effort at a low ebb, immediately prior to the point where Gen. Petraeus's "surge" strategy was initiated, gained a foothold, and quickly became a winning strategy. The specific wording in that January, 2007 legislation (S.433, Iraq War De-Escalation Act of 2007) being referred to follows:
(1) DEADLINE FOR COMMENCEMENT OF REDEPLOYMENT - Except as otherwise provided in this section, the phased redeployment of the Armed Forces of the United States from Iraq shall commence not later than May 1, 2007.
(2) SCOPE AND MANNER OF REDEPLOYMENT - The redeployment of the Armed Forces under this section shall be substantial, shall occur in a gradual manner, and shall be executed at a pace to achieve the goal of the complete redeployment of all United States combat brigades from Iraq by March 31, 2008, consistent with the expectation of the Iraq Study Group, if all the matters set forth in subsection (b)(1)(B) are not met by such date, subject to the exceptions for retention of forces for force protection, counter-terrorism operations, training of Iraqi forces, and other purposes as contemplated by subsection (g).
In sum, yet another indicator suggesting a legislator's, a lawyer's and a triangulating politician's mind, within an executive's charge. Yet all of it intoned with the same, excessively self-assurred manner he perfected during his campaign and his political career in general.
Do people really need to prove their conservative bona fides by suggesting -- jokingly-but-not-really-nudge-nudge -- that the US stage an "accident" involving its terror detainees? That those who care a little about due process and prisoner treatment want to see people in "real America" killed and call them "little Eichmanns"? It's just tiresome. Take it to Redstate or LGF.
I think "released" means set free. "Transferred" definitely means still in custody; if you read the rest of the order that is clear. Thus, "released" could mean released in a third country. It doesn't necessarily exclude release in the USA, however.
Perhpas the detainee is has been convicted of a crime or is suspected of a crime in a third country. Wouldn't that be extradition/ordinary rendition?
Gitmo is a symbol. Closing it down sends a message to the rest of the world that "we [will] restore the standards of due process and the core Constitutional values that have made this country great even in the midst of war, even in dealing with terrorism."
No, many are not ordinary persons. They are trained fanatics.
But more important, they have armed, ruthless allies outside of the prison. Al Qaeda had no prayer of getting to them at GITMO. Put them in a prison in the US, and Al Qaeda might try something - like kidnapping the families of guards, using explosives to force a breach, etc.
Not likely, but still an issue. GITMO was a brilliant location. Too bad all the pin-heads ruined it with their silly moralizing.
You're watching too much 24 man....
If Obama wanted to start treating the prisoners in Guantanamo Bay like prisoners to whom the Geneva Conventions applied, he could start doing it immediately. Instead we're getting a year-long wind-down of Gitmo, to be followed by some other arrangement for the detention of terrorists that, had Bush done it, would have resulted in cries for impeachment.
If Guantanamo Bay is a war crime, then Obama is a war criminal.
This thread is unpleasant and beneath the Conspiracy.
Unfortunately, the past few years indicate the contrary. Pond scum who endorse murder in cold blood are perfectly welcome here.
Awww, thanks! *Hugs*
Check the news and try to calm the hysteria. Obama's issued an executive order regarding the treatment of detainees that adresses your "concern."
Or would that be too legal and above the board?
You haven't been keeping up.
But,just for grins, let's suppose you support releasing these guys where they can harm Americans. They are released where they can harm Americans. They harm Americans.
Your response?
Keep in mind you'll have to distance yourself from it. One way is to minimize the importance. Like, rednecks, dim-bulb prison guards and their inbred families.
Apologies? Don't think we'd hear it.
Not just a legal Libertarian blog. A legal Libertarian blog run in part by guys who draw their salaries from government universities.
And how is that fact relevant?
And in fairness, it's the commenters, not the blog owners who just can't seem to get it.
So on that example, we should just shoot everyone who's ever released because the charges against him have been dismissed, or because he was acquitted ... because he might hurt somebody in future?
That's just stupid. Also ruthless, evil, and despicable; but first and foremost, just stupid.
Leaving aside, of course, that many Gitmo prisoners may be people who were innocent before, but are by-God bound and determined to kill them some Americans now. We have to keep them locked up because locking them up turned them against us?
If you're looking for Libertarian Ideological Purity (LIP) - which you apparently are - it's best to get it from folks who aren't on the dole, don't you think?
Aside from providing another round of fawning press reports, this order will change what at GITMO? The ICRC has had representatives there all along, who have had 24/7 access to the detainees and were allowed to investigate all complaints. No evidence of mistreatment of detainees by US personnel at GITMO has been revealed (and, "No" I don't consider press releases by attorneys for detainees to be "evidence"). One of the truly laughable aspects of the complaints about the "treatment" of the GITMO detainees is that the most common problem that has been found is weight gain -- in some cases to obesity -- due to being fed right food in whatever portions the detainees want to eat.
Since the federal courts have already held that the detainees have the right to challenge their detention in federal court, and since the Exec Order grants Common Article 3 rights, it will be easy to conclude that the detainees have the right to challenge in federal court the place and conditions of their detention. Art. 22, GC III (1949) prohibits keeping PWs in prisons (unless they are convicted of a crime). And, generally PWs are required to be kept in the same type of facilities as the detaining power keeps its own Soldiers. Since the early 1980s, the "barracks" for US Army Soldiers has been based on college dorms (part of trying to attract college-age kids to enlist).
Although a lot of the current detainees are highly trained and dangerous, they have not been convicted of any crime. As others have noted, transferring them involuntarily to another country sounds like rendition.
Unless the detainees' attorneys are complete fools (and to date they've shown themselves to be smart, aggressive litigators who follows a sophisticated legal and PR strategy to advance their clients' interests), they will be able to block any attempt to either transfer detainees to any other country or hold them in a prison, and likely will force bringing the detainee to the US to be held under conditions that will make maintaining security very difficult.
But, a campaign promise is a campaign promise, right?
Next:
* socialize the remaining 50% of private health care
* decimate the military
* throw Israel to the wolves
* institute 100% inheritance tax
* raise income tax rates to 1950 level
* start up a new "Great Society"
* declare "war on terror" to be over and apologize to the world
2) Bringing the prisoners to the U.S. - yep, you can do that, but as the D.D.C. determined several weeks ago, you can't hold people indefinitely without charges, per Zadyvyas. So you will still be in a release/repatriate/or try them situation. The grants of asylum when this starts ocurring will not doubt trigger outrage on the paranoid right, but fortunately we'll be able to defuse that by just ridiculing conservatives.
3) This leaves the option of the U.S. criminal courts. I have to assume that we'll be giving full protection of the laws to people held on U.S. soil. So any evidence used against the detainees will have to meet 4th Amendment muster. Unless the nature of military service has changed considerably in the years since I served, troops don't generally serve warrants in combat, do not rely on a probable cause standard, or offer Miranda warnings. You could choose to prostitute the court system to get at foreign terrorists seized on foreign lands by dropping ordinary evidentiary requirements and rights protections, but I'm not sure how comfortable I am with that. Similarly, how comfortable are people with the idea that our courts can exercise universal jurisdiction over a foreign people, just because they happen to belong to a group antagonistic to the United States? I believe the domestic courts option is either a canard, or a further movement toward turning the U.S. Court system into an imperialistic victor's justice system - which it has been for quite a while on social policy questions, but not on foreign policy or military questions. There is also the matter that the Geneva Conventions prohibit ordinary criminal trials of enemy prisoners of war, which protection the Supreme Court appeared to extend in Hamdan. You can try them for war crimes, but is merely being a terrorist and killing Americans or host nation citizens a war crime? I don't think so, and believe that no matter what Obama does, he's going to find himself the defendant in some more lawfare cases.
Of course the other solution is we could just pretend that the Gitmo detainees are a bunch of innocent shepherds torn away from their loved ones by teh horrid Bush Regime. Ultimately, I think that's the path I'll take because it doesn't require any hard choices, and when they return to kill again - as some of them do - I can just shrug my shoulders and say "it's better that 650 guilty men go free than a single innocent man be held." Platitudes don't have many calories, but they sure do nourish a man's inflated self-image, if you chew on enough of them... Plus if it all goes bad I can just blame Bush. It worked for the last 8 years, no reason it can't work for the next 8.
Please, not this again. Libertarians think that the benefits of government funding of something are outweighed by the harm done, not that there are no benefits at all. Deciding not to get a job at a government university would be foregoing the benefit without foregoing the harm (since there's no option not to pay taxes, and there's no option to create the non-government jobs that would exist if the government jobs weren't taking their place).
By your reasoning, if I steal your money (which you were going to use for food) buy some inferior food, and give the inferior food to you, you would be a hypocrite if you ate it rather than starve.
You mean, besides Susan Crawford's admission that Qahtani was tortured at Gitmo?
Yes, leaving statements like that aside, there is no evidence.
I believe you've just proved the libertarian case for accepting welfare payments, too.
Or would that be too legal and above the board?"
No, it would just be impossible, no matter how guilty they may be. The courts changed the rules after reasonable chances to gather evidence had passed into history. And we've never trained our soldiers to be detectives. If anyone had ever suggested that such a process would be appropriate as little as a decade ago, they'd have been considered imbecilic. Which is still my opinion.
Not to mention that it would violate core principles of the Geneva Conventions. Detention without trial is exactly what those agreements require.
I was going to write a Harlequin. Sent away for the outline, but I never got around to it. I don't read them.
I apparently touched the trigeminal nerve
I merely asked what would be the response of the supporter of releasing these guys where they could harm Americans if they harmed Americans. I made no policy prescription, shooting or otherwise. But I apparently got to your real vulnerability. You wouldn't really care.
Anyway, your hysterical ascription to me of horrid wishes to shoot just about everybody means you see the problem but have no answer. Nor want one, obviously. So you have to outhowl someone who points it out.
That gets old.
The top Bush administration official in charge of deciding whether to bring Guantanamo Bay detainees to trial disagrees with you.
DaveN, I said "may." Whether any of the prisoners fit that description is something that we don't know, and can't know without some investigation -- and ultimately, without releasing them and seeing what happens.
My point is to rebut the nonsense touted by R. Aubrey, who seems to think he has some kind of valid argument based on the notion that freed prisoners might harm Americans (sic).
-- And then, I see, hides behind "what? I didn't suggest anything, I just asked a question." Because none of us has ever read anything by R. Aubrey before at the VC, after all.
They reached that decision because they were victims of BDS, no doubt.
How do you know someone was guilty of something if you have no evidence of it?
Also, at what point in our history did we ever convict people of war crimes without evidence? That's not how I remember Nuremberg (at least the movie).
Yes, leaving statements like that aside, there is no evidence."
If that's what you take to constitute "evidence," then so be it. But an article in Harpers is not evidence. If you've read that passage in context, all Crawford was "admitting" was that she went "over the edge" and used the word "torture" to describe what she knows was NOT torture. She says she did so because of her sympathy for a prisoner with a medical condition. But the editors at Harpers either can't read or don't care to.
9/11 changed everything.
How about the concern that Obama insists on keeping innocent civilians locked up in steel cages in a concentration camp? How does any executive order justify that? Each day this hypocrite plays with innocent lives in his private gulag, the international community loses more and more respect for the US.
The problem does not stem from Gitmo, it comes from the manner in which our enemy chose to fight us. By eschewing all of the things that would make them fit into our system, such as uniforms, command structure, national government (giving us some agency with which we could conclude a peace) they have made our customs in regard to enemy soldiers unworkable. It is not our disregard for law that leads to a decision to hold them forever, it is the nature of their cause. They are not soldiers of a defeated army, they are warriors in an ongoing Jihad that explicitly mocks the idea of parole. Do not expect any legal remedy for this, it will not come.
So do we keep them forever? I guess so. The military trials seemed like the best(but not good) way to determine if these guys are actually a threat, but it seems that doesn't satisfy our critics. Civilian trials by our rules seem to be elaborate release ceremonies, as none of these guys were mirandized before questioning.
Setting aside the law for the moment, is there a good way to determine if these guys are a threat?
I would like to hear from some law gurus on this, though:
What would be worse for our system, setting alleged terrorists outside our system, or bending our system until we can fit them in?
Dennymack
ps- This is not an endorsement of any proposal, I am searching for someone else's bright idea for a resolution.
You can't clean up the mess Bush made in one day. Although Obama made a great start.
Did you see a poll of the international community regarding the Obama administration or did you just pull this statement out of your a@@?
How so? He said he would do this during his campaign; it's not obviously the most popular of his campaign promises (indeed, it opens him up to all of his "soft on terrorists" stuff you see in this thread); and now he's doing it. A lack of backbone would be doing what some conservative pundits inaccurately predicted (cough, Krauthammer, cough): that Obama would wind up adopting Bush's policies in the "war on terror" after all.
Especially given that Bush and his dwindling band of supporters have been trying to make an overriding virtue out of doing what you believe/what you say even if others think it's a bad idea, how is this a lack of backbone?
I see what you did there.
When you walk into someone's house and spray it with diarrhea, some people might think you are being disingenuous when you turn around and start screaming about how much the place stinks.
Difference is it was Over There, not closer to home.
You link to the WaPo Jan. 16, 2009 report, which states:
The Reuters arfticle, reported in the International Herald Tribune (NYT) Jan. 14, 2009, article captioned U.S. official says Guantanamo detainee was tortured, states:
That's an interesting change in the emphasis and supports different conclusions. Further, even assuming that your intrepretation of her remarks is correct, that's something of an interesting "legal" standard. All of the techniques were authorized and apparently legal, but, because we have an "egg shell terrorist" it's now "torture". (and as Roscoe points out, Judge Crawford never said it was "torture" -- that's a journalistic (editoralizing) conclusion).
Still, the more important issue is what do we do with the detinees? While I disagree with the SCOTUS's holdings, they are the SCOTUS and a 5-4 decision is just as binding as a 9-0 decision till it's overruled. I believe it's a fair conclusion that the SCOTUS has come close to equating PWs with criminals for the purposes of habeas corpus rights and proceedings (except, of course, the detainees have never been convicted of a crime). It was recently reported that some 61 of the detainees previously released (who were thought to be safe to release) are now known to have returned to fighting with terrorist groups. Most of the ones still detained are considered even more dangerous than those previously released. If they are given PW rights (which I believe this order does) and they have full h.c. rights, then basic due process analysis requires looking to an independent source of law to define their rights. GC III (1949) for PWs is the logical source to look at. Art. 22, CG III prohibits putting PWs in prisons unless they are convicted of crimes. Being a combatant is not (by itself) a crime, nor are combat activities as a combatant (so, although they may have killed and are also clearly willing to do so again, that's not a crime -- but, their detentions will be judged under h.c. standards and procedures designed to review the continued detention of people convicted of crimes using evidence admissible under the FRE or similar state laws). Under GC III PWs are to be kept in conditions equivalent to those that the detaining power keeps its own depot troops. To attract college age kids to volunteer to enlist, since the early 1980s, "barracks" in the US have resembled college dorms. The "barracks" being built today for junior enlisted Soldiers are 2 private bedrooms connected with a common area. Bring the detainees to the US and their attorneys can insist that these are the conditions in which they be kept. And, I also believe that they will be able to successfully challenge any attempt to involuntarily transfer detainees to another country. Meanwhile, intell gathered on which the decision has been made to continue to detain won't meet the standards for admission as evidence under the FRE.
So, what do you propose? Closing GITMO means being willing to be responsible for the consequences that flow from that decision.
(Personally, I believe that this order will be a huge "Charlie Foxtrot" -- radio call signs for C.F., the "C" standing for "Cluster" and I believe you're smart enough to figure out what the "F" stands for. Except that I believe this could easily lead to US citizens and citizens of our allies being killed or wounded in future attacks by detainees who I believe the federal courts will order released, I'd find such a massive Charlie Foxtrot to be amusing. But, I don't find much amusing when violent death the the easily foreseeable result of political correctness based decisions).
Maybe you have reached other conclusions on the probable outcome. If so, let's see your analysis and conclusions.
That's terrible. What traitor let them go?
Come on, Mark. You don't really think that's terrible. It's how it's supposed to work.
It's also a lesson on not listening to liberals and about the prudent thing to do with the clowns remaining.
The grown ups are in charge now.
Well said. I suppose we should expect, on a legal blog, for legalisms to triumph over common sense. When all you have is a hammer, you use it for the wrong purposes.
commontheme
Uh huh. Obama may be a grown-up. Too many of the BDS people on this board are not - if "grown-up" means having a reasonable understanding of reality.
Also, I'm going to blame Obama for not accomplishing everything I can imagine now.
I figure, if I complain a lot now, no one will listen to my legitimate complaints later!
Sorry. My culture is lacking. Never saw the show.
And O sure impresses me as a grown up.
Tuesday was a historic day. First time a president was inaugurated who was younger than me.
I hope that "grown ups are in charge" thing isn't too uncomfortable, 'way up there.
I agree with the poster who said this is just a sop to the unhinged left. Sometimr or sooner O! will realize that we can't just shut the place down. He may have realized it already.
Cite? I found this, but the Pentagon doesn't offer any evidence that any of the people that have been released have harmed or killed Americans. Maybe this guy is harming someone's ego, but I don't think that's what you mean. There's also a table over at Wikipedia, but none of the people listed seem to have killed any Americans.
collectively demonized [RPT]
Crap, you saw right through it. We are demonizing Khalid S Muhammed (sic) et al. Nobody there did anything to us, we just demonize them."
Wow. 244 KSM's. Who knew? Or, is it that because there is one KSM, you can "collectively demonize" the rest of them as his equivalent.
We only put the worst of the worst in Guantanamo. How do we know they are the worst of the worst? Because they are in Guantanamo. If they weren't the worst of the worst they wouldn't be in there.
I found some more ex-Guantanamo detainees that are killing and harming Americans.
See, worst of the worst.
Don't confuse the issue with facts. Also, don't feed the trolls :-P
The Fifth Amendment universe:
... nor shall any person ... be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.
Not "any citizen." Not "any American." Any "person."
Welcome to one of the most hallowed ideals of Western civilization and one of the greatest achievements of the Framers.
(Hm. Does torture compel a person to be a witness against himself? Hadn't thought of it like that, but it seems arguable.)
If you've read that passage in context, all Crawford was "admitting" was that she went "over the edge" and used the word "torture" to describe what she knows was NOT torture. She says she did so because of her sympathy for a prisoner with a medical condition.
Roscoe, you lie like a rug.
"We tortured [Mohammed al-]Qahtani," said Susan J. Crawford, in her first interview since being named convening authority of military commissions by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates in February 2007. "His treatment met the legal definition of torture. And that's why I did not refer the case" for prosecution."
... Crawford, 61, said the combination of the interrogation techniques, their duration and the impact on Qahtani's health led to her conclusion. "The techniques they used were all authorized, but the manner in which they applied them was overly aggressive and too persistent. . . . You think of torture, you think of some horrendous physical act done to an individual. This was not any one particular act; this was just a combination of things that had a medical impact on him, that hurt his health. It was abusive and uncalled for. And coercive. Clearly coercive. It was that medical impact that pushed me over the edge" to call it torture, she said.
One's medical condition would be directly relevant to "severe physical or mental pain or suffering," last I checked.
The Washington Post clearly quotes Crawford restating her conclusion that the cumulative effect of legal actions constitutes, somehow, "torture." It is her opinion - sincerely held - but it is rather a daring piece of reasoning, and may be wrong. It is not a different judgment than the one Roscoe cites - it is a restatement of the same fallible and - I think - fallacious belief.
Also - would not your reading of how "person" is to be defined in the fifth amendment render the treatment the Geneva Convention proscribes for qualifying compatants - in other words, POW status - completely unconstitutional?
Someone said they were uncomfortable with U.S. courts claiming universal jurisdiction over acts that occur outside the U.S. This has a long history, though. The Constitution allows Congress to outlaw "piracy on the High Seas" which, by definition, takes place outside the jurisdiction of the U.S. and does not need to be committed by U.S. citizens. I think the law banning the slave trade in the early 19th century did the same. The Alien Tort Claims Act dates back to 1789 and gives foreigners access to the courts in order to file lawsuits to acts "committed in violation of the law of nations or a treaty of the United States."
And there are many more recent examples. There has never been a problem in the past pursuing criminal or civil complaints against foreigners for acts committed outside the U.S. so there is no reason to think the challenges are insurmountable.
On the other hand, for some people the best evidence we have for their guilt was obtained through torture so it's not clear we can ever try them. These are the tough cases and is part of the reason I'm against completely closing down Guantanamo.
It certainly has application regarding persons in the power of the U.S. Government, held on soil it controls. At least, I would think the plain text places the burden on others to rebut it.
The Washington Post clearly quotes Crawford restating her conclusion that the cumulative effect of legal actions constitutes, somehow, "torture."
Authorized actions, not legal actions, tho I suspect she thinks they're legal. However, that is not astonishing. If denying a prisoner sleep one night isn't torture, then you would conclude that denying him sleep 50 nights in a row isn't torture? Really? Come now, sir.
The Torture Act prohibits "the administration or application, or threatened administration or application, of mind-altering substances or other procedures calculated to disrupt profoundly the senses or the personality." As some of Padilla's keepers were injudicious enough to admit, that is precisely what they aimed to achieve in his regard, and Qahtani's treatment seems to have followed a similar principle.
I would not want to be in the dock explaining to a jury how the entries in Qahtani's log were not "calculated" in that manner. Not at all. Would you?
As for Geneva and POW's, the Fifth Amendment guarantees due process of law. Treatment of POW's in accordance with treaty would seem to qualify.
Damn.
And all this from folks whose response to "Menchaca and Tucker" is "Who? Oh. Why should I care?"
What folks are those, exactly? Got any examples? One will do. ONE example of someone indifferent to the torture and death of our troops.
Let me know when you come up with that.
My own reaction is on record, thanks to Google. Note the comment downthread from Private Tucker's cousin:
For these things to be done to him are completely un-imaginable to me.
BUT hatred gets us no where and to the person who asked about murderous Americans; YES I feel the same way about them!!
I speak for myself and my husband when i say hatred gets us NOWHERE!!!!
We love Tommy but I know that there are other families out there who know we all feel and my heart aches for them also!!
God bless them all.
In that order?
They don't necessarily "qualify" for Constitutional protection, but they do qualify for basic human rights. Some of those are included in the Constitution as restrictions on the power of government, such as the due process clause Anderson cited. But the detainees are given basic due process because that's a human right, and because our government is committed to those, not because they "qualfied" for anything (except to the extent of being persons).
Yes. Leonard Levy makes this historical argument in his book The Origins of the Fifth Amendment.
Or perhaps the US government is not enabled to deprive any sentient creature of life, liberty, or property without due process of law?
I admit, if you read it backwards you might get stuck on the moronic objection that the US Constitution has universal application.
I believe the KIA's folks have inhuman patience. God bless them.
My point isn't their reactions. My point is the double standard. As it usually is.
Freed by U.S., Ex-Gitmo Saudi Becomes a Qaeda Chief
All the legalisms substituting for contextually relevant thinking.
Seems he got that right!
Why not? Obama is holding inocent civilians, and claims he can't let them go? Is this a surprise to him? He just walked into the Whitehouse and was shocked to learn about Guantanamo?
He had plenty of time to plan for this. Note he wants immediate congressional action on his stimulus packages, but wants to let inncent civilians languish in squalor as he plays politics with their lives, trashes the constitution, and destroys what little respect the international community has for the US.
By what right does Obama imprison and torture these innocents?
By what right does Obama imprison and torture these innocents?
President Hussein Obama ordered the CIA to stop torturing and mistreating prisoners. It looks like someone showed up with some buckets and bleach to take care of that stench you helped leave.
Does anyone know how moving them to Bagram squares with GCIII, Art. 19 ("Prisoners of war shall be evacuated, as soon as possible after their capture, to camps situated in an area far enough from the combat zone for them to be out of danger") and Art. 23 ("No prisoner of war may at any time be sent to, or detained in areas where he may be exposed to the fire of the combat zone")? Or will DOJ continue to class them as something other than GC POWs, meaning those provisions don't apply?
The sad thing is that any other solution but Bagram will entail the United States assuming the risk of releasing possible terrorists back into the wild. The federal courts are not equipped to try them, and in many cases the evidence is simply insufficient for a conviction. That's the tragedy of Boumediene, surely ranked as one of the worst decisions ever authored by Kennedy.
Close Gitmo, put the boys someplace else under some other agency, the Machine starts up. Doesn't even have to be true, the complaints don't. See Jenin massacre, still used as a symbol of Israeli brutality on the reasonable presumption that the truth has not yet gotten its pants on.
For PR purposes, whatever happens to these guys is meaningless. O is president and, by definition, can do no wrong.
Otherwise his blank-eyed supporters will have to start their crow menu earlier than expected.
The question is whether the libs who want to close Gitmo think of this as a feature or a bug.
I'm guessing feature.
Obama spy choice won't call waterboarding torture
Of course he won't.
Some among the 60+ prisoners cleared for release are going to end up in the US. One hopes they'll be protected from the likes of most of the people who comment here.
Traitor or fool, o unhinged ones?
Right, he's Saudi. I was just noting that Yemen does seem to have a bit of a problem controlling such things.
... Naturally, the recidivism argument (if that's even the word) would require a control, say, the comparable rate for felony prisoners released in the U.S.
Gates said during a Pentagon news conference."
This is obviously not true: Other countries were always, already free to work with us to deal with violent extremists.
That could affect the baseline question of which detainees the government claims to be detainable.
The executive orders yesterday contemplated studying such issues for 180 days. U.S. District Judge John D. Bates would like an answer by Feb. 9.
Meanwhile, DOJ has asked for an extension to reconsider its position in the Al-Marri case.
Libs don't love al Q. They just think anybody who opposes us is right. Because we're not. You can think this of, say, al Q without necessarily loving them.
Yeah, the key is to release terrs into the US and hope nobody bothers them, that some agency protects them from certain commenters on this board and their ilk.
Good point.
*whew* anyone got a cigarette?
Anyhow, they want all the Gitmo terrorists released into America.
Because everyone in Gitmo is a terrorist. And liberals want them all to be released.
Culture of death!
Does that justify his imprisonment of innocent civilians? It's OK to lock them in cages as long as you tell the CIA to use the Army manual unless the AG says they don't have to?
By what right does Obama keep innocent civilians locked in cages?
How about just "Wrong" on this issue?
Well, Texas anyway.
I guess you don't know how right you are. Most of the Gitmo detainees "have never been accused of committing a hostile act against the United States" (link, pdf).
==================
anderson:
Good point. By the way, the Bush State Dept described sleep deprivation as a form of torture. But what they meant, of course, is that it's only torture when other folks do it.
==================
elliot:
In a recent thread here, you repeated the same asinine question at least a dozen times. Hopefully your work in this thread will not fall short of your usual high standard.
Attacking a military target in the field is a fundamentally different issue than the treatment of captives, morally and legally. Among other things, the former is in a position to escape or fight back. The latter is not.
Maybe you should ask "how do the liberals hear feel about" people who ask silly questions.
I hear there's a good-sized ranch in Crawford.
What better way for Bush to spend his golden years than in supervising the orange-suited detainees as they clear brush and build fences?
I don't doubt for a second that Obama's supporters are opposed to jailing the innocent on principle. It just happens to be one of those principles that yields upon contact with another principle: Bush Bad, Obama Good.
Similarly, the left has always had an anti-torture principle, but one that is applied selectively based on who is doing the torturing:
-Pinochet, Bush: Crime against humanity!
-Castro: Did you know that Cubans enjoy free medical care and a 100% literacy rate?
Be prepared for a Time Magazine cover story on "When Torture is Moral" should Obama ever decide that it's necessary.
Unless President Obama usurps the rule of law right now, he's just as bad as Bush!
Here's a "better way:" Bush taking his proper place among "the orange-suited detainees." After a fair trial, of course.
That's right Sarcastro, just like the way conservatives feel about Obama. They don't love him, they just want him to succeed. You understand, don't you?
How about knows who signs his paycheck?
So let's see. There is a possibility that these guys could be released into the US. Nothing so far forbids it.
If so, what then?
Some of their buddies, released earlier, have been killed or captured in Afghanistan, thus sparking my point that some may still want to harm us and may find a suburban shopping mall just dandy. Remember the junior jihadi at the Trolley Square mall had no training. That there was an armed man available was an accident, and in contradiction to the mall's rules.
So, my question is what the fans of release will say then?
Presuming we can get them to respond at all.
Is there an iron-clad guarantee, signed by O (snork), that they won't be released in the US? Any other circumstance offering the same--or better--certainty?
Point is, these guys are still at it.
Well, he does enjoy clearing brush. But I would make him a trustee (trusty?). For one thing, he wouldn't be safe unarmed.
Read your response. Another opportunity to blame Christianity for something.
Absolutely no fear that anyone will click a link and discover how dishonest you are. Just when I think I can't be surprised any further on this thread, you surprise me.
I trust that you are making a sincere statement about yourself, but you are obviously not in a position to make a statement about all conservatives. No one is, but I know of someone in a better position than you. And he said this:
That's some first-rate Dowdification right there. Bravo.
Now if you'll just provide a link to that YouTube video showing the kids praying before the cardboard cutout of Bush, your post will be complete.
They were asking why the cardboard cutout couldn't have been president rather than Bush himself. Why not, O Merciful God? Whyyyyyyyyyyy?
I sure hope not. The best questions are the ones people avoid.
So, by what right does Obama lock innocent civilians in steel cages?
And, as if that were not hilarious enough, he is using repetition, the secret key to humor!
Awesome!
That is fundamentally the question posed in the various habeas corpus actions now underway. See, for example, Hamlily v. Obama.
Yes, please continue to explain how what Rush meant is something other than what he actually said. You folks have lots of practice. After all, for years you've been defending statements like these:
- we found the weapons of mass destruction
- he wouldn't let them in
- a wiretap requires a court order
===============
elliot:
Then you must think that I ask lots of good questions, since you repeatedly avoid answering my questions (example).
I thought one of the great achievements of President Bush was the lack of of terrorist attacks since 9/11? I'm so confused...
Simple: for example, to the extent that Obama attempts to cut taxes, Rush hopes he succeeds. To the extent that Obama attempts to put Larry Tribe on the Supreme Court, Rush hopes he fails.
Did you hope that Bush succeeded at getting Alito confirmed or repealing the estate tax?
Can I please have the praying-Bush-cutout video now please?
The right to lock innocents in steel cages is hardly a function of the jailer's ideals. It is a questions of basic human rights and whether the jailer will follow the US Constitution.
Right. Because it would be impossible to immediately fly the detainees to military bases in the United States and hold them under conditions meeting the requirements of the Geneva Conventions and the US Constitution. That's going to take up to a year.
The fact is that Obama has, is, and will continue to hold prisoners at Gitmo in violation of the Geneva Conventions and whatever other laws the left believes applicable, for up to a year. If mere imprisonment at Gitmo - not torture, not restricted access to counsel - is a war crime (as the left assures us it is), then Obama is currently committing a war crime that he could easily rectify. Get them out of there. Put them up in the Miami Four Seasons with an armed guard at the door if you have to. But for God's sake, Obama, stop committing war crimes.
I believe a statute was enacted during Bush's first term which forbids the release of captured terrorists into the United States. My recollection is that this is part of the argument in the case where a federal district judge ordered that the Uighur (Chinese Muslim) terrorists captured in Afghanistan be released in the U.S.
Even under Bush, no liberals said all detainees are innocent and should be released immediately. What they demanded were trials. And guess what Obama is giving them?
Awesome-O, that goes for you too. It's imprisonment without trial that makes liberals all ticked off, not merely imprisonment.
Well, that and the torture.]
What does matter is that the Democrats and Obama administration have to be perfectly successful in protecting us at home, and that is doubtful. If there are a lot of casualties, the Democrats will lose their Congressional majorities and the White House, and probably not regain either for a very long time.
It is very true that “All politics is local.” What that means here is whether we are hit at home again. If we are, the war on terror will be local and the Democrats will lose right there. That is what happened in 2002 and 2004. If we get lucky, the war on terror will remain foreign, not local.
What the Obama administration does only matters if it produces results, i.e., protects us at home. If it fails, nothing else matters.
Like if there's another 9-11 right now, I figgure it's cause Obama closed Gitmo, and showed those terrorists he was weak!
I mean, 9-11 and the Iraq debacle was the end of Bush's political career, so how could Obama escape?
What's he giving them? He says he'll think about it for a year while they stay locked up. All of them. By what right does Obama do this?
You don't think it takes time to set up proper trial procedures? Hell, even a trial in civil court would take some time to set up.
By what right did the South stay segregated the day after Brown?]
You wish.
The Democrats and Obama have well deserved reputations for weakness on national defense. Republicans and the Bush administration had no such reputation, so the public gave them some slack. The Democrats and Obama administration get no slack and will have to be perfect.
I can hear them now: "Obama's been in office for a full day! He should have prevented the attack in that time!"
Waiting till terrorists strike sure sounds better than actually trying to make the GOP a desirable party.
Does that mean Obama is invoking his bureaupathic right of delay to keep innocents locked in cages? All of them?
So you do not accept the right of necessity to evaluate and set up procedures to figure out who is innocent. I'd prefer an argument, but okay then; what do you suggest Obama do to avoid this whole cage hullabaloo?]
I figured there had to be some reason the SCOTUS worthies didn't offer a spare bedroom apiece until the Uighurs could get on their feet. Would have, otherwise, I'm sure.
However, as you will note from this board, these guys aren't terrs. Some haven't been accused. Some have been but the evidence is either tainted or secret, so they can't be terrorists.
Gitmo is so incredibly alienating that, not only did one of its grads go on to al Q, he was apparently taking staff officer courses from Phoenix U and got himself the number 2 slot right off. Didn't even have to start at the entry level. Who says this isn't a nation of opportunity?
Indeed. The public cut Bush no slack after he was in charge during the largest terrorist attack in US history. When the FBI failed to find the perpetrator of the anthrax attacks, I remember the public calling for blood. When the jihadi DC snipers went on their killing spree the public was ready to impeach Bush. When the "junior jihadi" was shooting up the Trolley Square shopping mall it was the last nail in the coffin.
We could also look at all of the terrorist attacks on our troops overseas and our allies. Obviously Bush did a great job with counter-terrorism, except when he didn't.
I think this is by far my favorite emerging argument. Because the Bush administration released someone from GITMO that became a top leader of al Qaeda, the Democrats are wrong.
Not, "why the hell did the Bush administration release a dangerous person?" Not, "why did the Bush administration hold innocent people for so long?" It's a hacktastic thing to watch.
I think you were not paying attention in 2006 and 2008. The slack ran out. Now the Dems will get slack because no one can believe they could possibly be as incompetent as Bush and his proxies in Congress.
Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 U.S. 356, 369 (1886):
The fourteenth amendment to the constitution is not confined to the protection of citizens. It says: 'Nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.' These provisions are universal in their application, to all persons within the territorial jurisdiction, without regard to any differences of race, of color, or of nationality; and the equal protection of the laws is a pledge of the protection of equal laws.
No, I don't think I could be any more obtuse. But thanks for asking.
(The interesting question of course is then whether Gitmo is "within the territorial jurisdiction"; but the applicaton of the 5th and 14th amendments to noncitizens is quite clear. N.b. that Yick Wo involved a state law, hence the Court applied the 14th, not the 5th Amendment; but the relevant language is the same.)
You don't need that emerging argument to show the dems are wrong. They're wrong. No embellishment needed. Just pick an issue. The dems are wrong. Doesn't mean the reps are right, although that's the way to bet.
However, it does indicate that either what's-his-breath was not only an innocent radicalized by his incarceration but one who picked up, by some kind of osmosis, the skills necessary to end up near the top of an incredibly complex and ever-changing enterprise. All on our dime, too.
Or he was a terr.
He was let go for whatever reason. No idea, speculations would be fruitless. But if he was a terr, then the hold/release criteria are flawed and can't tell the difference, or the hold/release criteria are accurate but so generous that he gets out. If the latter case, then it means the rest of the boys have got to be worse than he.
So, which is it? Do the jailers not have a clue about who's what? Or do they have a clue but it includes letting the (relatively) less dangerous go? If the latter, it means the relatively more dangerous are the ones left.
I wouldn't say letting those guys go is necessarily wrong. If I were a dem.
Really, EVERYONE could be a terrorist. We need to put everyone in jail to be completely safe.
Also, the tribunals are totally consistently applied, so everyone else in Gitmo is worse than what's-his-breath.
Obama had two years to set this up. It was no surprise on Tuesday. We have a very well established justice system. Innocents languish in Obama's cages while he fiddles with task forces. The jailor's inefficiency, incompetence, indecision, and political opportunism never trump basic human rights and the US Constitution. By what right does Obama keep innocents confined in his cages?
The Republicans ran out of luck in 2006 and 2008 because Bush 43 is living proof of Alexander Hamilton's comment that "energy in the executive" is critical. Bush 43 was arguably the least energetic President since Calvin Cooledge.
Plus he protected America at home, so the war on terror wasn't a local issue anymore.
You definitely have a point here:
but that applies only to the economy. There's a lot of ruin in a country. We'll know in a few years whether Obama is a Carter or a Clinton on that.
If we're hit hard at home again, though, nothing else Obama does will save the Democrats or him.
Sure, just look at all of the kvetching from the civil libertarians since Obama has taken office: stopping torture; closing black sites; nullifying all legal opinions on interrogations since 9/11/2001; requiring a higher standard to use executive privilege to classify documents; making FOIA requests easier to fulfill; freezing top White House salaries; and generally trying to create a more open government.
When will this national nightmare ever end?
So, which is it? Do the jailers not have a clue about who's what? Or do they have a clue but it includes letting the (relatively) less dangerous go? If the latter, it means the relatively more dangerous are the ones left.
It goes back to the stinky walls. The Bush administration cocked up the process so badly who knows what series of events let the dangerous people go:
To borrow a phrase from the real estate watchers, whocouldanode? Now the grown ups have come home and they have to sort through the mess that was left all over the house. That will take some time.
Anderson's interpretation of the 14th Amendment is correct. It does apply to non-citizens. He and I disagree about its extra-territorial application.
One President at a time! What, you want Obama to be all presumptuous now?
The left was complaining about Gitmo long before it was clear that anyone would be held indefinitely without trial, and they continue to have complaints about Gitmo other than those about interrogations and lack of trials.
The mere act of holding these folks at Gitmo, for any length of time, was a source of complaint.
So should we be letting more guys go when we don't know if they're bad guys?
Presuming there is such a thing as a bad guy if he's trying to kill Americans, I mean.
Thomas, not sure I was talking about the Fourteenth. Might have looked like it when I was fantasizing about the SCOTUS folks putting up the Uighurs in the spare bedroom. Just until they got the welfare checks going.
Sarcastro. Sometimes I don't know if you're wrong on purpose because of your schtick, or if you just don't get it. In this case, I favor the latter. In fact, the lefties are continually crying that we don't know if these guys are guilty. No trial. Secret hearings. Tainted evidence.
So, if we don't know, what do we do? Let them all out and hope? Keep them all in, just in case? Try to figure it out and hope we got it right? In courses one and three, what will the lefties say if one of the footloose and fancy-free bozos goes all jihadi by, say, organizing a Beslan in Mayberry? Nothing. I know. The kids' fault. Their parents were little Eichmanns.
Fight back against a Hellfire missile? He He
The speed of those missiles and the height they are shot from make fighting back highly unlikely. The targets don't see or hear them until "boom".
Thanks for dodging the question though.
Only bad guys are in Gitmo. How do we know? Because if they weren't bad they wouldn't be in Gitmo! My logic is unassailable!
So should we be letting more guys go when we don't know if they're bad guys?
We should have been trying to determine if they were bad or not over the last 7 years. Well, we should have been competently trying to determine that. Instead we had people like John "crush the testicles of a child" Yoo writing legal opinions that you can drive a truck through.
Obama knew as well as anyone that Guantanamo had to be handled. There was extensive public discussion for years. He told us of it in his campaign. I note he didn't have any problem developing and discussing a stimulus package prior to Tuesday. Now he relies on a task force to trash the constitution, violate Geneva, and keep his cages full.
I diagree with your opinion of Eisentrager. OTOH, Rasul v. Bush made it clear where the Supreme Court was headed, and IMO the Court will hold that the 14th Amendment applies to non-citizens held by the Executive anywhere save where a foreign government exercises at least de jure jurisdiction. Also, IMO, the Supreme Court will eventually require that a foreign government exercise de facto as well as de jure jurisdiction, which will make a difference for failed states like Somalia. But, and on this one I am confident, this unfortunate trend in Supreme Court decisions will be reversed when we suffer another major foreign terrorist attack at home, and that is just a question of when.
IMO the major question then will be whether boiling or baking is preferable as a method of interrogating terrorists. I.e., the Obama administration's reversion to the criminal law model for dealing with captured terrorists will be abandoned in favor of the Gestapo/NKVD model. Which won't save the Democrats from electoral disaster.
Fair enough, and everything I know about the subject I learned from the internet ... so I can't pretend to be an authority here.
But Rasul's discussion of the habeas statute seems relevant:
Whatever traction the presumption against extraterritoriality might have in other contexts, it certainly has no application to the operation of the habeas statute with respect to persons detained within “the territorial jurisdiction” of the United States. Foley Bros., Inc. v. Filardo, 336 U.S. 281, 285 (1949). By the express terms of its agreements with Cuba, the United States exercises “complete jurisdiction and control” over the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, and may continue to exercise such control permanently if it so chooses. 1903 Lease Agreement, Art. III; 1934 Treaty, Art. III. Respondents themselves concede that the habeas statute would create federal-court jurisdiction over the claims of an American citizen held at the base. Tr. of Oral Arg. 27. Considering that the statute draws no distinction between Americans and aliens held in federal custody, there is little reason to think that Congress intended the geographical coverage of the statute to vary depending on the detainee’s citizenship.
Sounds good to me!
The last thing President Obama wants is a terrorist attack on his watch.
My dad worked for the federal government his whole career, and he liked to describe a favorite federal pastime as Elephant Prevention.
An agency requests $$$ for an Elephant Prevention Program, which line item naturally increases year after year.
If the necessity of the program is ever questioned, the agency gestures broadly and exclaims, "But it works! You don't see any elephants here, do you?"
9/11 was in some respects a one-off, a brilliant exploitation of an obvious gap we were too lazy to correct. There are doubtless other plans to attack the U.S., but without knowing more, we can't tell if Bush has been just lucky, whether he's only done what any other person would've done after 9/11, or whether he's been a miserable failure.
If the next attack is nuclear, for instance, I doubt his antiproliferation efforts will be regarded kindly.
But the point remains: Torture is a STUPID way to gather intel. There are better methods. We should be using them.
He has ordered all trials suspended for at least four months. So they are being held and deprived of trials too.
"How so? He said he would do this during his campaign; it's not obviously the most popular of his campaign promises (indeed, it opens him up to all of his "soft on terrorists" stuff you see in this thread); and now he's doing it. A lack of backbone would be doing what some conservative pundits inaccurately predicted (cough, Krauthammer, cough): that Obama would wind up adopting Bush's policies in the "war on terror" after all." Joseph Slater
1) Obama has reversed nothing to this point, he has done nothing other than sign an executive order that states he will do something. This, despite the fact his team has had many, many months since indicating he would do something, on the campaign trail and in conformance with the ravings/demands of EU types and the Left in the U.S.
2) If he would have first studied the problems that attend Guantanamo or that are variously perceived to attend Guantanamo, whether previously or now that he's in office - and then executed and executive order to fulfill the directives and plans that would result from such a study - that would make sense, because that's how executives who are willing to face the realities need to act, if they are to act more responsibly.
3) Hence, again, he has done nothing in any substantive sense whatsoever to this point, other than throw a sop to the exciteable Left.
4) When he actually does something, beyond sign an otherwise inconsequential order, that's when those specific actions can be reviewed. Until then, we can merely take note of what he has yet to do in any more substantive sense - and argue about his putative high moral standing. Harrumph, harrumph.
The exeutive order was not needed to study the situation. He is the Commander in Chief of the military. He is the chief executive.
This is immaterial. We either will or won't be attacked again at home while Obama is President. If we aren't, his re-election will depend on how well the economy is doing.
If we are attacked at home while Obama is President, he'll be a bum and the GOP will take over regardless of how well the economy is doing. Public perception is everything, and that is alterable here only by events.
Whether what Obama does or doesn't do has any effect on whether we're attacked at home won't matter. Only success or failure will. He has to be perfect, and I don't think we'll be that lucky.
I also agree, or at least suspect, that we may well not be that lucky. But with the MSM at the ready to favorably spin everything he does or fails to do, in addition to the wider "personality cult" phenonmenon, I'm less sure about the outcome. Success or failure as measured against reality - vs. success or failure as measured against the political/MSM alliance's spin - are two different things, occasionally they are very different things. And that's why it's worth attempting to correct some misperceptions.
This is really rich, considering the source:
Are we at war with Pakistan? How does Obama justify firing weapons at civilian structures in a country with which we are not at war? How do the targets either escape or fight back when the attacker is invisible (due to altitude) and too fast to avoid (missile moves really quickly)?
Jukebox, you just showed why "box" is in your nick.
You have just explained why Bush 43 was such a bust. He didn't try to affect perception at all, left the field to the other side, and by his complete failure to even try effectively obstructed action by his own side in such matters.
Because Bush 43 had no energy.
This is why I supported Mayor Giuliani last year. He's not merely a fighter, but shares Theodore Roosevelt's joy in political combat. Bush 43 avoided political combat whenever possible. Rudy sought it out. That's how to win.
This is also why the Democrats hate, fear and loathe Governor Palin so much. She's the same as Guiliani in this regard, and both are highly successful in major public office. Governor Jindal has been successful too, but I don't know whether he's a fighter the way Guiliani is.
Had the elephants recently trampled 3,000 people to death?
That is kind of a hoot, isn't it.
Leftie insist that looking for commies is like a witch hunt. Thing is, there were no witches.
Here, we had the elephants stomping all over the living room and somebody's making fun of trying to see it doesn't happen again.
There really are elephants.
It's nice that you think that Rush hopes that. Trouble is, Rush didn't say that. He said this:
Can you show me the place in the transcript where Rush says "to the extent that Obama attempts to cut taxes, Rush hopes he succeeds?" I can't find it. All I see is Rush saying, over and over again, "I hope he fails."
It would nice to see you deal with what Rush actually said, rather than your fantasy of what you think he meant.
I hoped that Bush succeeded at certain things, and not at others. But I certainly never said "I hope he fails." And I certainly never said that before he was even inaugurated.
This would be really helpful: find some leading liberal who said, in 2001, before Dubya was even inaugurated, "I hope he fails."
Got any proof?
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bob:
Fighting back can take the form of attacking an American target somewhere else. Not something a captive can do.
I didn't dodge the question. I just demonstrated that it was irrelevant in a discussion about the treatment of captives. Nice job trying to change the subject, though.
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moore:
Sometimes enemy combatants hide in "civilian structures," and sometimes those civilian structures happen to be located "in a country with which we are not at war." That doesn't mean the enemy combatants stop being enemy combatants, and that doesn't mean we have to stop shooting at them.
If the missile hits the target, you're correct that the target is not going to fight back. But the missile doesn't always hit the target, and then the target has a chance to fight back, via actions directed at some kind of American target.
You already know all this. You also know that the issue of firing at someone in the field is fundamentally separate from the issue of treatment of captives. You're making a transparent attempt to change the subject.
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holsinger:
Please run Palin again. Please. I beg you. In fact, Palin/Wurzelbacher would be the perfect ticket.
and
Actually, someone else changed it. I'm just along for the ride.
I could make a strong argument that firing at possible civilians in a country we are not at war with, without any sort of judicial process and not in immediate self defense, is a war crime.
But I won't.
Actually, someone else changed it and you're trying really hard to help them keep it changed.
So could I, depending on the circumstances. For example, Pakistan is not, say, Canada. So the specifics matter.
By the way, the silly implication of your argument is that I'm a hypocrite for not complaining about Obama firing missiles into Pakistan. Trouble is, I didn't complain when Dubya did it, either. So if you're looking for inconsistency, you'll actually have to find it, rather than simply make it up.
You're part of the reality-free crowd that forms judgments based on your fantasy of what people mean, rather than what they've actually said.
You are a fool as you have proved over and over again. I used to be a California Democrat and hated Governor Reagan. I was very political and recognized that Reagan was an exceptionally capable politician and campaigner.
But I was also a classic Scoop Jackson Democrat, and felt so uncomfortable with the way the Democratic Party had changed that I switched my registration to independent in 1984 when Senator John Glenn endorsed the "Nuclear Freeze". I just couldn't remain a Democrat. I then switched to the GOP based on Jean Kirkpatrick's example.
And it was ex-Democrat Ronald Reagan who really convinced me. I didn't buy everything he said. But he had a core philosophy of government and convinced me he was right.
I recognize political ability. Governor Palin has it in spades. That she is villified by Democrats and the MSM means nothing. So was Ronald Reagan, and he served two terms as Governor of California and as President.
IMO Governor Palin will be elected President some day, and you will never understand why. Because fools don't learn.
I would not say "bust" at all (see here and here), though in substantial part, in spirit, I agree that Bush II should have been more Reaganesque in at least attempting to speak more directly and convincingly to the American public instead of allowing the MSM and some others to spin the issues. Otoh, Bush II had a hugely more difficult task and set of problems with Afghanistan and Iraq at the nascent stages of the war against Salafism, Jihadism and Islamicist militancy in general; Reagan had the Soviets at a latter and more problematic stage in their own arc. Some comparisons are warranted, but only to a limited extent.
Bush 43 did not think that building public support for his policies was part of his job as President. His conception of PR, outside of an election cycle, was to neutralize complaints against him by his own side.
Also Bush 43 was a complete failure as a party leader. He didn't even try.
Obama by contrast has shown thorough understanding of his need to lead the Democrats. His web site and perpetuation of his campaign machinery is proof. I've seem MSM criticism of this which is completely uninformed. They think his objective is to pressure Congress. It isn't.
Obama intends to lead, and educate, public opinion. He is demonstrating considerable foresight and insight here.
IMO his one weakeness in this area is a substitution of ideology for political philsophy, and that is a systemic Democratic problem. They'd be wise to fund their own version of GOP think tanks like the American Enterprise Insttute, and wait for those to produce results in 10-20 years.
If you mean "political ability" in the sense of 'willingness to tell lots of brazen lies' (example), then I have to agree.
As I said, please please please run her again.
When you have a moment to spare from the name-calling, I hope you'll pay a visit here and explain why you disappeared when I caught you making shit up.
Again, I agree in general terms. But it would take something like a thirty thousand word piece to detail the critical nuances of that general agreement and the critical areas where I disagree.
For example, while Pres. Obama is perfectly comfortable with Saul Alinsky's praxis adapted to our own contemporary political, governmental, media driven and cyber realities at the federal/national level, Pres. Bush was not at all given to that form of ideological/political praxis. The latter was much more given to traditional, forthright forms of moral suasion and coalition building - which will always be a step or more behind the curve (of "public opinion") in our essentially post-modern and Alinskian era. That social/political terrain is highly problematic and likewise is exceptionally difficult to navigate; it very often reflects a type of asymmetric warfare at the social/political level, wherein class-based, "tribal," psychological, etc. forms of discontent are brewed, then further manipulated for purposes of social/political power and ends. At the bottom of much of this is not so much an inadequate political leader as an inadequately rooted political base, at least so at the margins, though very likely at the base as well.
That merely serves as a brief and admittedly inadequate attempt to summarize a highly problematic set of factors that anyone short of a Reaganesque political force will not be able to confront and successfully deal with, but suffice to say your own summary is likewise inadequate, despite agreement in more general terms.
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