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SCOTUS Grants Guantanamo Prisoners Habeas Corpus
beebee and other readers sent word that the US Supreme Court has, by a 5 to 4 majority, ruled that the Constitution applies at Guantanamo. Accused terrorists can now go to federal court to challenge their continued detention (the right to habeas corpus), meaning that civil judges will now have the power to check the government's designation of Gitmo detainees as enemy combatants. This should remedy one of the major issues Human Rights activists have with the detention center. However, Gitmo is unlikely to close any time soon. The NYTimes reporting on the SCOTUS decision goes into more detail on the vigor of the minority opinion. McClatchy reports the outrage the decision has caused on the right, with one senator calling for a Constitutional amendment "to blunt the effect of this decision."
Sudden outbreak of common sense?
... a sudden outbreak of common sense? Hard to believe that such a fundamental wrongdoing only gets overturned by a 5 to 4 decision though -- the drawback of politicized appointees I suppose.
Strange how the U.S. Soldiers have fewer rights then the terrorists we are fighting.
I'm torn on this.
I'm glad that this went through. I think it's the right thing to do.
I'm concerned that it went through on 5-4. Then again, I feel somewhat content that we do have some varying opinions within SCOTUS. I suppose I'd rather we have conflicting opinions for the advancement of discussion than 9 Justices all working towards the same agenda.
Those who believe the Internet is private,
find their privates are on the Internet.
How long have those guys been rotting down there? 6 years?
Ok -- so we capture people on the battle field in Afghanistan and take them prisoner. Bush &co. don't want to classify them as "prisoners of war," because then they'd get Geneva Convention protection.
So, reaching back to FDR, they pull this "enemy combatant" thing out of their ass and say that now they can do whatever they want. Now, the Supreme Court is saying that "enemy combatants" are somehow criminals who are entitled to the protections of the civilian legal system.
If they were just reclassified as POWs, then they could be held until the war is over -- which, like the war on drugs, it never will be. So, they could be held forever, without any need for a trial - because you can't be tried for "murder" or "conspiring to murder Americans" if you are a soldier in time of war.
But yet, Bush &co still aren't going to want to reclassify them as POWs.
Jeebus. I seriously can't wait to get a new administration that will just settle on what the status of these prisoners is so that we don't have to hear about this crap anymore. Want to keep them forever? Call them POWs. Want to try them to make some sort of b.s. point like Nuremberg? Then they get the protection of a court system.
I'm really not seeing how they can have it both ways, but then again I'm not a lawyer -- just a human (usually an exclusive option).
The system worked?
The names of the dissenting Supreme Court Justices and those nimrods that are outraged should be posted everywhere so that more pressure can be brought to bear on these idiots that it is not ok to lock people up with no legal recourse no matter what country it is.
The Bush admin will resist this in other ways; admitting that they were wrong and changing their ways is not in the character of the president or his toadies.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Now all the US needs to do is apply the Geneva conventions to the Gitmo prisoners, give them a speedy trials (not that it would make a difference after that many years without indictment in the pokey) and generally treat them more like human beings than animals, then it would start to look more like a country driven by the rule of law.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
This has made my day that much better. Its nice to be able to hope that things will get better.
Recommended reading that didn't make it into this story's writeup:
Glenn Greenwald, Supreme Court restores habeas corpus:
Glenn Greenwald, Conservative vs. authoritarianism:
The decision itself, with my favorite passage being:
In that passage, the Court upbraids the Bush administration, which sought this unconstitutional law and argued to uphold it, for claiming that the President has the right to "switch the Constitution on or off at will." The Court is absolutely correct about this, there is no doubt that this is what our current President has attempted. And the Court is correct that this is an attempt to circumvent the system of separation of powers that is at the heart of the "basic charter" on which the United States was founded.
The fact that this decision was a slim 5-4 majority, with this President's two appointees making up half the dissenting view, is a frightening thought.
They're the farthest thing from it. Real patriots understand why we must defend these rights, even at the cost of our lives -- because without them, we aren't the United States of America; we're just another transient tinpot dictatorship of no value and no lasting importance.
There's a difference between citizen's rights (voting, welfare) and human rights which are universally applicable (free speech, etc). My personal belief is that not being imprisoned without just cause, and being able to challenge your imprisonment is in the latter set.
I'm at a loss as to how anyone can be upset at this decision. Its not like we're turning known terrorists out onto American streets. We're just saying that the people being detained have a right to challenge their detainment.
What bothers me is that 4 Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States voted to suspend Habeas Corpus.
If this were easy, they wouldn't need us to do it!
I came here for a good argument
Actually it should *not* be in Politics because of the Trias Politica
The constitution isn't "granted" to non-citizens, it limits what the government can do to people. Which is a good thing, since then the government can't push the constitution aside by inventing new ways to revoke citizenships.
This is great news, but I'm really surprised given how the Dems have been crying foul for the last 8 years on packing the Supreme Court.
Slashdot: Where people pretend to be twice as smart as they really are by behaving like children.
The Constitution still lives! The tide is turning, and the future looks like we may get on track again. Our Constitution is the single most important part of what makes America the greatest nation on Earth.
P.S. Scalia absolutely disgusts me.
"To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
Sorry, you don't need to be a citizen to get constitutional rights. you just need to "be there". The constitution then grants more rights to the citenship, like to elect representative and so on.
It's not hard to assess which judges disagreed with the ruling. Scalia and Thomas, who haven't taken a non-conservative stance in their entire existence on the court, and Bush's new nominees Alito and Roberts. What a surprise.
So now Bush can either change the Constitution to make what he is doing legal or to give him the power to remove a supreme court judge. Actually the latter is probably better since it means that you only ever need to do one amendment.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
I agree with the majority decision, but I don't agree about "more pressure brought to bear" on the dissenting justices. The reason that Supreme Court Justices are appointed for life is precisely so that (in theory) nobody can pressure them to vote one way or another.
I think you inadvertently bring up the biggest problem about this whole debacle: that so many people feel that this issue is a matter of politics.
Entrepreneur : (noun), French for "unemployed"
So it takes approximately 7 years between blatently unconstitutional actions by one branch to be reviewed and overturned by another branch.
Fortunately for Congress and the President, they can pass new laws and executive orders on time scales shorter than 7 years.
In between lies the downfall of democracy.
1^2=1; (-1)^2=1; 1^2=(-1)^2; 1=-1; 1=0.
It's too bad, I guess, that the actual constitution isn't written in such a way as to "grant" rights; rather, it's written as a restriction on what the US Government can do. As the Government's charter, the Constitution applies to all actions of the federal government, regardless of where they are performed or who is involved.
Of course, the parts of the Constitution that talk about voting rights extend such rights only to citizens. That is a different part of the document.
I have seen the future, and it is inconvenient.
The Constitution does refer to citizens and persons in different contexts. Thus you're saying that all of times "persons" are referenced really means "citizens." The founding fathers certainly were not haphazard with their wording.
The SCOTUS just said, "Fine, you don't want to call them POWs, so now you have to go with the rules we use for people accused of crimes. Your choice, but you must choose one."
For everyone who makes fun of trying suspected terrorists in "ordinary" criminal courts, if it's sufficient for bringing murderers with less grandiose motives to justice, it'll do for ones who think they're doing it for some great cause. Heck, it's possibly more insulting to treat them like common criminals, if that's what makes you happy.
It's a great day to be an American.
Grüß Gott aus Bayern!
It's here.
Hard to believe that such a fundamental wrongdoing only gets overturned by a 5 to 4 decision though
That's the horrendously sad part of this ruling. Reminds me of an interview I saw with Scalia saying something about whether torture in questioning a subject could actually be considered "punishment" and hence exempt from the cruel and unusual standard.
I'm sorry, I don't care how engaging he is personally, his beliefs undermine the Constitution and separation of powers. All four of them threaten the very ideals that formerly made America the envy of the world.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
If these guys are guilty of anything, who not prove it in a fair hearing?
-- Give me ambiguity or give me something else!
I think one of the biggest issues here is that the US military wanted to act like a law enforcement agency. In the case of POWs, you do not execute them or imprison them indefinitely, because they are not guilty of anything. However, these cases cannot be tried in the civilian system, since due process has been violated in every conceivable way with these detainees, so the charges would likely be tossed immediately. Since neither was acceptable, the US Military opted for a third way, and that is unacceptable according to SCOTUS.
A 5-4 decision means that the somewhat-sane members of the court outnumbered the completely-crazy members of the court by One Single Vote. We've got ourselves a Supreme Court that's divided on the meaning of some of the most fundamental aspects American law. This doesn't bode well for the next 30 years.
-Sean
Very well said. You MUST have a right to defend yourself. Else who is to say what you are charged with is made up.
These fundamental freedoms are MORE important, not LESS important, during times of national stress. It is those times when cowards like Bush are most prepared to sell our freedom, so hard-won over the centuries, for the promise of a little temporary security.
Guantanamo is Bush's Manzanar. In the hysteria of the time it might have seemed like the right thing to do, to a few frightened people. The judgment of history will be firmly otherwise.
I piss off bigots.
cuba dumped some of its prisoners on the usa during the mariel boatlift in the early 1980s (not all of the refugees were prisoners)
simply cede guantanamo bay back to cuba. "forget" to empty guantanamo bay out first. voila, new, "friendly" landlords
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
The public will "lose a bit more control over the conduct of this nation's foreign policy to unelected, politically unaccountable judges," he added.
Now, correct me if I'm wrong, aren't Judges supposed to be insulated and protected from the political system by (1) not being held accountable for untainted, but bad, decisions (2) not be part of the election process since that would mean that they would then rule in whatever way would best protect their jobs?
How in the WORLD would a chief justice of the supreme court not understand that?
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Actually, it's more than that. It isn't a restriction on an otherwise-unlimited government, it's a grant of powers to an otherwise-powerless government.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy isn't known for his judicial modesty. But for sheer willfulness, yesterday's 5-4 majority opinion in Boumediene v. Bush may earn him a historic place among the likes of Harry Blackmun. In a stroke, he and four other unelected Justices have declared their war-making supremacy over both Congress and the White House.
[Anthony Kennedy]
Boumediene concerns habeas corpus â" the right of Americans to challenge detention by the government. Justice Kennedy has now extended that right to non-American enemy combatants captured abroad trying to kill Americans in the war on terror. We can say with confident horror that more Americans are likely to die as a result.
An Algerian native, Lakhdar Boumediene was detained by U.S. troops in Bosnia in January 2002 and is currently held at Guantanamo Bay. The U.S. military heard the case for Boumediene's detention in 2004, and in the years since he has never appealed the finding that he is an enemy combatant, although he could under federal law. Instead, his lawyers asserted his "right" â" as an alien held outside the United States â" to a habeas hearing before a U.S. federal judge.
Justice Kennedy's opinion is remarkable in its sweeping disregard for the decisions of both political branches. In a pair of 2006 laws â" the Detainee Treatment Act and the Military Commissions Act â" Congress and the President had worked out painstaking and good-faith rules for handling enemy combatants during wartime. These rules came in response to previous Supreme Court decisions demanding such procedural care, and they are the most extensive ever granted to prisoners of war.
Yet as Justice Antonin Scalia notes in dissent, "Turns out" the same Justices "were just kidding." Mr. Kennedy now deems those efforts inadequate, based on only the most cursory analysis. As Chief Justice John Roberts makes clear in his dissent, the majority seems to dislike these procedures merely because a judge did not sanctify them. In their place, Justice Kennedy decrees that district court judges should derive their own ad hoc standards for judging habeas petitions. Make it up as you go!
Justice Kennedy declines even to consider what those standards should be, or how they would protect national security over classified information or the sources and methods that led to the detentions. Eventually, as the lower courts work their will amid endless litigation, perhaps President Kennedy will vouchsafe more details in some future case. In the meantime, the likelihood grows that our soldiers will prematurely release combatants who will kill more Americans.
To reach yesterday's decision, Justice Kennedy also had to dissemble about Justice Robert Jackson's famous 1950 decision in Johnson v. Eisentrager. In that case, German nationals had been tried and convicted by military commissions for providing aid to the Japanese after Germany's surrender in World War II. Justice Jackson ruled that non-Americans held in a prison in the American occupation zone in Germany did not warrant habeas corpus. But rather than overrule Eisentrager, Mr. Kennedy misinterprets it to pretend that it was based on mere "procedural" concerns. This is plainly dishonest.
By the logic of Boumediene, members of al Qaeda will now be able to challenge their status in court in a way that uniformed military officers of a legitimate army cannot. And Justice Scalia points out that this was not a right afforded even to the 400,000 prisoners of war detained on American soil during World War II. It is difficult to understand why any terrorist held anywhere in the world â" whether at Camp Cropper in Iraq or Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan â" won't now have the same right to have their appeals heard in an American court.
Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution contains the so-called Suspension Clause, which says: "The privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require
The problem, in this case, is the definition of "there".
The administration was trying to play funny games with the semantics. If they were held in the US, they'd certainly be "there". If they were held in Afghanistan, they'd be granted access to the Afghan courts, at least under whatever agreement we had with them. (We're trying to negotiate that same kind of agreement in Iraq right now, and they're balking.)
So... they took them to Guantanamo, where we have a weird perpetual lease where the Cuban law doesn't apply either. The administration thought it found a chunk of the planet where no rules whatsoever applied but was under our control.
The Court here is saying that that's rubbish, and I agree with them.
I wonder if they can move them to a battleship somewhere in international waters, and see if that counts. Probably that's already been settled, or they'd have tried it already.
I'm still shaking my head in disgust over a "warring talking heads" commentary on Canada's CTV network last night on this one. On the left, a Canadian professor who'd taught at Harvard. For the right, some guy I regret not catching the name of, from the conservative Hudson Institute. If it weren't the umpteenth time I'd seen it, I'd call it a classic example of the kind of brazen lying I've come to expect of these "think tanks".
/. to decide what you'd call a guy who'd lie about the content of your constitution to encourage and support the breaking of it.
I'll skip details on the other ways the guy embarrassed himself to any thinking audience - he tried maligning the Canadian's credentials at American law until the guy mentioned teaching at Harvard, for instance.
But towards the end, he actually said that the American constitution provides an exception to "for the Executive to suspend Habeas Corpus in time of WAR or insurrection" (emphasis mine). It doesn't. And there's no way a professional at that level made that big a mistake.
The framers chose all their words carefully, and it says:
http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html
Section 9 - Limits on Congress
The privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it.
INVASION, not War. What do Invasion and Rebellion have in common? Only then do you have entire armies on American soil harming its public. Only when you'd have to give whole armies habeas corpus can you suspend it. If you have few enough enemies to manage with a court system, they all get the court system.
I guess I'm steamed because it was just the night before I learned the stat that not only did 70% of Americans at one point believe Saddam personally set up 9/11, but 80% of those supporting the Iraw war did so because of that belief. Which means that terrible damage can be done to America, not to mention hundreds of thousands of innocents, by lies such as the one I heard, espoused on TV, last night.
I leave it to the Americans on
Oh, yeah, and one other part of the lie, one in support of their endless reaching for Executive power: the exception to habeas corpus is for the CONGRESS, not the Executive. The Executive can't suspend it at ALL, not unless Congress passes a law allowing it. The Executive simply can't break the law, period. Not under the Constitution.
If you can keep it.
That acronym bothers me; whenever i see it i think of "scrotum."
Then again, that's what i think of when i see our president anyway, so i guess it works.
It's been established for a helluva long time that the Constitution does apply to foreigners on American soil. The police are still bound by due process, even if the suspect is an Englishman or from North Korea. The Gitmo trick (and the unknown number of secret prisons) was to claim that the foreign detainees were not on American soil, so any Constitutional obligation was removed. SCOTUS has dispensed with that pathetic notion and finally stated that where there's smoke there's fire; in other words, if a detention center on foreign soil is still run by the United States, the detainees should have the same right to habeus corpus as if they were within US borders. This is a victory for liberty.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Sure they've been there 6 years, but how long until the government just moves them to a different base where the laws aren't applicable? That way, we can keep them for another 6 years!
Give a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day. But light a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
I wish I could digg your comment up.
s/by/but/
They didn't 'grant' them anything. Habeas Corpus is considered an unalienable right (...Life, Liberty, Pursuit of Happiness... anyone?). They merely affirmed that the law was struck down because it unconstitutionally tried to remove a right they have, by nature of being.
War isn't about who's right. It's about who's left.
The idea of not torturing someone until they confess -- quaint, really. He wants a fair trial? Oh, how cute. Thinks we're being unjust in keeping him in jail for years without charging him with anything? Aww, poor baby.
History will judge this administration, and us for not speaking out against it. And history will not be kind.
Several highly simmilar cases have come before the supreme court and all were very difficult decisions. The two most important ones were President Lincoln indefinitely detaining without trial citizens and press who spoke in favor of the confederacy. Unlike to day, where there is no declaration of war, Lincoln thought the consitution gave him the right to suspend Habeous. But the supreme court said it only applied in zones of conflict not the rear. And even under times of duress the constitution could not be switched off. Today's supreme court said almost exactly the same thing in the summary.
Then FDR also created the concept of "enemy combatants" for handling people who were spies captured inside the US boarders. While he should have treated them as Spies under war common law, instead he wanted their trials publicly suppressed and created a special tribunal outside the jurisdictions of any state but on US soil. The supremes had to argue about it. The argument was that clearly the US legal system can try people crimes so why not let it. And it would set a bad precedent for removing habeous for people captured outside war zones.
The book "In time of War" covers this an it's a great well written read. I recommend it highly.
I thought the following quote captured one aspect of the issue:
"But the real problem is the interminable detention period, which has no reasonable judicial excuse. The dissenters are quite right that America has offered a quite generous set of procedural protections for enemy combatants. But these are mocked when a detainee is an indefinite prisoner with indefinitely incomprehensible status. The problem is not the legal process but what happens when the federal government holds that process, at its whim, in open-ended abeyance. The federal government still gets a lot of leeway, and the benefit of the doubt, from the Court, especially in wartime. But ours is so nonobviously wartime, and the Bush administration has been so lax, opaque, and seemingly quite pointless in its interminable detention of a wide range of variably important prisoners, that todayÂs ruling seems to me to confirm the wisdom of both the majority and the dissent. I suspect the ruling will, if anything, cause most of these detainees to actually be tried, which would be nice, but not released, which would not be. And that strikes me as not only nice but just."
link
A good question is where does McCain stand on obeying the Constituional restrictions faithfully. Here's two articles from Reason Magazine (libertarian bent):
Longer and Shorter
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
How do we know that they're the government's enemies? You're assuming that because they're there they deserve to be there. Me, I'd kinda like there to be, you know, evidence... that whole pesky due-process thing. I'd rather not be wasting government money and what little good-will we have left in the world holding people when we can't even reasonably say that they are a threat.
...) sieze an American. They say that for, national security reasons, they can't reveal why they are imprisoning him, or provide any evidence that this person deserved to be imprisoned. We only have their word. Is that ok? Thats what we're doing right now, and it needs to stop.
Here's a little thought experiment. The British (or Germans, or Japanese,
Straw man arguments are lies.
What scares me more is that the ruling was 5-4 instead of unanimous.
0x09F911029D74E35BD84156C5635688C0
Considering the Constitution of the United States was written largely by the same group who had written the Declaration of Independence, I think it is a difficult argument that the claims against the King would be allowed a pass for a new George.
The Declaration of Independence states that certain rights are endowed upon men by their Creator and unalienable. Among those are Life, Liberty, and pursuit of Happiness.
The charges against King George which justified the revolution included, "He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power" and "For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences".
The preamble to the Constitution itself lists one of the reasons for its ordination as to "establish justice".
Article III section 2 states that the judicial power of the Supreme Court and the inferior courts extends to people including "a state, or the citizens thereof, and foreign states, citizens or subjects".
The 5th Amendment provides for indictment by grand jury and due process of law. It makes an exception for those serving in the military during war or public danger, but enemy combatants whether on the field of battle lawfully or unlawfully are not serving in our military.
The 6th Amendment requires that one be informed of the charges, to be confronted by witnesses against him, to have the power to subpoena witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel. No exception for military or maritime conditions are made in this Amendment.
Considering all of these facts, and considering that the founders who wrote and supported the one document were the writers and supporters of the other, I find it difficult to believe that anyone could seriously question the legal status of people being held as criminals indefinitely under the power of the United States.
The government specifically denied that these people were POWs. If they had been POWs, they could have been held until the end of hostilities with the countries in which they were captured. Being held as criminals, though, they have no fewer rights than American citizens under the US Constitution from what I can tell.
There's nothing I've read in the Constitution which says that non-citizens under the government's jurisdiction are to be treated differently from citizens in matters of criminal law. In fact, while the Constitution at one time allowed the historic fact of brutal slavery and racial subjugation, the Articles and the Amendments make clear distinctions in many cases between the words "citizen" and "person", and most of the protections are for the more generic "person". Now slavery is properly banned by the Constitution. Foreign parties accused of crimes should not be treated any differently than citizens, or what have we learned?
While I certainly agree with you, I do have the feeling they're just going to shuffle them into the custody of other countries without so many inconvenient rights and just drop by for info as they need it.
Kind of like how the US would spy on British citizens of interest while they did the same to the US, and then share the info. Got around the constitutionality of wiretapping citizens... Until we decided to cut out the middle man.
Even people that believe in pre-destiny look both ways before crossing the street.
were appointed by Bush.
Anyone at all surprised by that?
"in time of war" Which goes into the secret history of Hitler's deployment of Terrorists in the US by submarine, at a time when we were not at war with germany.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
I'd say that it's actually a bit of both. IMHO, the constitution (of the US, or the rough equivalent in other countries) seems to be a set of parameters or boundaries for interaction between the government and its citizens.
300 people found with machine guns, bombs, suicide vests, trying to murder civilians and US troops and captured instead of killed. Not enough evidence for you? Dig up the bodies in Iraq and Afghanistan that they murdered and do autopsies on them and then give those 300 people a fair trial.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
It is far preferable to have a court who can see both sides of an argument. Far, far preferable than any ideologically uniform court that rubber-stamps whatever agrees with its own outlook(s), and rejects anything that does not.
Believe it or not, the court had to square existing policy with law and constitution. This doesn't exactly mean that each decision (especially including this one) is a simple choice of kittens versus cannonfire. There is no such thing as simple when you make a decision here - knowing that said decision is damned-near permanent, and will have reverberations that you can't even hope to contemplate.
Given all of this, the split decision is IMHO a sign of at least one branch of government being very healthy and sane.
Can't say the same for the other two, unfortunately...
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
It's a fairly simple equation. If at any point the administration admits that the detainees have rights then they have branded themselves war criminals.
While not perfect, and sometimes it takes decades to resolve, history shows us that the US populace does not tolerate their leaders taking this kind of liberty with the truth and ignoring the spirit of the constitution, if not the letter.
I'm fairly confident that Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld are going to be as fondly remembered as Nixon and Kissinger. The sad part of course is that the abuse will continue until morale improves.
XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
Actually, you've hit the crux of the matter. The only mechanisms allowing for the US to hold anyone, weither within or without the US, are the geneva conventions, or the constitution. This administration was declaring that it did not have to follow either. This decision only hammered down that there are, and continue to be, only two legal mechanisms for US forced, weither military or civilian, can hold anyone, and that is through either the geneva conventions or the constitution, and that this administration has to decide which of them will apply.
You are right, they should not pick and choose which rules apply and don't. So, remind the president of that today, and have him either a) fully apply the geneva convention or b) fully apply the constitutional provisions for courts. If you can find me another, legal mechanism for holding them, please, inform me and the SCOTUS, as so far, none has been presented.
Karma Whoring for Fun and Profit.
Since you are obviously an ignorant savage that doesn't understand the Constitution may I suggest strongly you learn the concept of "jurisdiction" as in "having jurisdiction over", the concept of negative rights, due process, applicable treaty law in this context (Geneva Convention), geographic extent of the law as relating to jurisdiction, and then what will trouble you is NOT the ruling. What will trouble you is that we have 4 (4!!!!) Supreme Court Justices that DON'T understand 1st year law and should be asked to resign forthwith. A pity that as a rule-of-law man we can't just grab them and hang them for treason.
The idea that this debate should be a matter of politics vs. morality scares me more than any terrorist act to-date.
There's a reason that I believe Bush is the most successful terrorist in the world.
If we behave like Al Qaeda, how can we call ourselves the "good guys"?
Obviously, the procedures for soliers in the field are different from the procedures for dealing with street criminals. How did we deal with war in the past? I'm sure we didn't worry about "due process" with the Nazis, but niether did we hold them indefinitely. Shoot them, try them, or release them.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
Just reading over the first few comments isn't surprising. I'll shake my head in dis-belief at the liberal nut jobs who will rush down to defend people who would kill their children in a moment if given a chance. Osama promised to use our courts system against us and we have helped him. "Whoever has stolen our wealth, then we have the right to destroy their economy. And whoever has killed our civilians, then we have the right to kill theirs." - bin Laden's 'letter to America' You drive a car? Heat your house? You are a justified target in this war.
The Constitution doesn't give us rights. The government doesn't give us rights. We have rights, inalienable rights, that come from "the Creator", whatever that is. The creator is a mysterious, unspecified entity, but it is not the Constitution or the government.
We, the people, create a government to protect those rights. In the USA, we (our forefathers) wrote a Constitution that our representatives explicitly agreed to support and defend. That Constitution creates a government from nothing, that protects those rights.
Those rights are inalienable. Even when the government fails to protect them, we still have those rights. But unless they're protected, we might not have the freedom to exercise them. That is why we create that government, which has no other power or even existence other than as we create it under the Constitution.
Americans aren't magically different from any other people. All people have the same inalienable rights. But what Americans have that is different is an American government that protects those rights. Foreigners have their own governments. It's up to them to protect their rights with their governments. Often they do not. But though it is in America's interest to help everyone we can to protect their rights, it is not automatically America's government's obligation to do so, unless Americans so instruct it. Even when we do, America is obligated to merely help those people free themselves , so they are free to create their own governments to protect their own rights.
That is what is fundamentally wrong with the Iraq War. Wrong with any occupying American government abroad. It's what was right with the US conversion of Japan and Germany from their tyrannies after WWII: we worked for several years to free those people, who then created their own governments.
But though we're not obligated to free anyone but ourselves, though our government is not obligated to protect anyone's rights but our own, our government is never free to violate those rights. The US government has no powers to violate any rights, except temporarily, according to explicit due process, and only when necessary to protect the rights of other Americans - like when jailing criminals, even suspending their rights to vote, freely travel and associate, and even to express themselves.
Americans in foreign lands have reduced protection of our rights by our government, as a matter of practical fact, but not from any change in our rights themselves. Foreigners in foreign lands have foreign governments that factor into the US ability and obligation to protect their rights, which is minimal.
But no one under control of the US, in US territory (including soverign military territory like Guantanamo) can see their rights infringed in any way.
Sometimes that happens. Sometimes the people in the government break the law, violate the Constitution. The Constitution of course has the remedy: prosecution and jail time, even impeachment. The Constitution isn't just some theoretical philosophy, but the only instrument which creates legitimate government power. And its power does not differ in application to anyone on US soil (with the sole and irrelevant exception that a US president must have been born American).
There shouldn't have been any question that Habeas Corpus must apply to everyone in US custody. But of course the 4 dissenting "Justices" in this case also installed George Bush as president. These people are part of a blatantly, flagrantly anti-American conspiracy among themselves to destroy America and everything it stands for.
Everyone knows it. Lots of us say it. But only far too few of us have the courage and integrity to live it. And we, the Americans with a clear conscience, want to bring these evildoers to justice.
The Constitution. Dodging a bullet today that should never have been fired, that should have seen millions of Americans jumping to take the hit. The closeness of this call is just one 87 year old man away from making a total mockery of America as "the land of the free, the home of the brave."
--
make install -not war
Yeah Baby.
The "citizens" are protected in some ways by the Constitution and "people" in other ways. The rights to speedy trial, indictment, to know your charge, to the counsel of an attorney, to face your accusers, and to subpoena witnesses in your defense are guaranteed to people, not just citizens.
We invaded Iraq, and seriously pissed off a lot of people. Does that count?
On a more serious note, would you happen to know how sending people to trial would interfere with public safety? Is it that there'd just be so many that it wouldn't be possible to schedule a trial for everyone within the allowed time limit?
Then they should be treating them like POWs, who still get habeas corpus, and holding them as such.
Or as non-POWs, as defined in the Geneva Treaty, which *also* gives them habeas corpus.
There's a big difference between giving them full protection under American law and having to provide evidence to *someone* that your *suspected* terrorist is not some random guy who ticked off the wrong informant.
Did anyone else first misread the acronym in the title as "SCROTUM"?
You see? We're holding them because they're Al Qaida members. Our proof that they are Al Qaida members? Well, that's super secret stuff, but rest assured that we wouldn't be holding them if they weren't.
Of course, my entire post up until now was tongue in cheek. I'm amazed that this senator thinks that just because we happen to lock someone up it automatically means that they *MUST* be a member of Al Qaida and that anyone looking to set up trials for the people locked up just wants to set terrorists loose on American streets. Those in the opposition seem to see this as a Black and White issue. They seem to believe that our only options are 1) lock up anyone we suspect of being a threat no matter how flimsy the evidence or 2) let terrorists run around our streets blowing everything up. It is like they can't conceive of the possibility of actually gathering evidence on the people we seize and finding out whether they are *really* terrorists via a court of law where a third party (the judge or a jury) will decide what the truth is. Is it possible that a trial will set a terrorist free? Yes. But I'd rather set terrorists free by accident than purposefully keep an innocent man imprisoned with no legal recourse.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
[The US Constitution] isn't a restriction on an otherwise-unlimited government, it's a grant of powers to an otherwise-powerless government.
And me without mod points. Damn.
Very well said, students in school should be forced to repeat this statement until they understand what it means.
Necessity is the mother of invention.
Laziness is the father.
This will force the government to either release the enemy combatants or release the details of their intelligence gathering. I can understand why some would be opposed to being forced into this dilemma. Still, rights are guaranteed for a reason -- it's naive to think that a government will never abuse its powers, whether knowingly or incompetently.
/. opinion, quite legitimate and important to our safety. But that's the price we have to pay for oversight.
I agree that prisoners need a hearing, but this will have negative consequences for our intelligence and military communities' efforts -- many of which are, contrary to the typical
In amongst all the FUD, craziness and bullshit that I read about in news articles (especially here on /.), it's good to know that there's still some common sense in someone's head. Especially if they have a position of power.
If creativity is the field, copyright is the fence.
I look for the NeoCons to assassinate a Supreme Court Justice or two, then retry the case.
I am the unwilling control for my Origin.
I'll give this a try:
>First, why does the U.S. Constitution apply to foreign nationals captured and held in places that are not the U.S.?
It doesn't. It limits what the US Government can do, here or anywhere else, just as it always has. The location is irrelevant: all that matters is that the US Government only has powers that the Constitution specifically grants it, and holding people indefinitely without charges are not among those powers.
>Second, will Al Qaeda reciprocate?
Dunno. It's completely irrelevant. Robbers don't operate under the law: that doesn't mean that we get to shoot people who we think might be robbers.
>Also, how do you fight a war under rules that were designed for domestic law enforcement?
According to laws? If the laws need to be changed, here's an amazingly revolutionary idea: you CHANGE THEM. You don't just do whatever it is you want and wave your hands and say "well, we had to!" because that's not law, that's dictatorship.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
1) Earier Supremes say it's okay for Bush to deny Habeous in US criminal courts so long as an alternative is provided that is substanially simmiar to the habeous right to contest incarceration.
2) congress provides an alternative tribunal system that fulfills this requirement
3) Said new tribunal turns around and refuses to hear any Habeous claims because it decrees the prisoners have no Habeous rights. (WILD!)
4) Today's court ruling reverses that saying they do have habeous rights.
The question then is Does it go back to the Kangaroo court or to a real crimminal court for hearing of habeous claims. I think this is the point of contention.
Also here's a link to a longer slashdot post that talks about this:
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
I completely agree. Unfortunately a lot of talking heads in the Boston area (especially hosts on WTKK 96.9FM) are aghast at this decision and ranting and raving about it - I can picture Laura Ingraham in particular foaming at the mouth. They think the constitution should apply only to protect us, not to keep us in check when dealing with foreigners.
Of course, any reasonable person would agree it is wrong to imprison anyone without a) an accusation and b) a fair trial. If they are indeed "terror" suspects then they ought to be accused and tried, and if they did have a hand in planning, facilitating, or directly financing the 9/11/01 attacks they should be executed.
If they had no part in it in any way they should be set free, regardless of who their friends or relatives may be. This holds true even if they sympathize with the terrorists, because simply having an opinon or even outright hating someone or wishing them dead is not a crime.
The minute we begin to persecute thought crime, the minute the citizens of the USA ought to be taking up arms to strike down tyranny, per the first and second amendments.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
But the fucked up thing is that it is American soil, because it's a fucking military base. The government's trying to have it both ways here.
www.isoHunt.com
I was wondering what the supporters of the detention practice would think if Americans were captured and brought to detention facilities in a foreign country or it's territories; and at those facilities, the detainees were forced to confess through duress or even torture. They are branded "enemies" and treated as prisoners in war.
Oh, wait. They already do that--except we call it kidnapping. The difference is we know they are the evil ones, right? (Well--we don't behead them on video so that makes us less evil).
It's funny how the current administration's practices parallel the rise of the Nazis in the early 20th century. Well, not funny "ha ha" but more like funny "uh oh."
It all starts with removing freedoms. First for some but, inevitably, everyone. The Enabling Act and the Patriot Act are eerily similar.
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
These prisoners already have legal protections as enemy combatants under military trial as required by the court itself, legislated by Congress, and signed by the President. After all of these legal and representative steps were taken, the Supreme Court directly contradicted it's own stance. From the dissent:
"A mere two Terms ago in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld... four Members of today's five-Justice majority joined an opinion saying the following: "Nothing prevents the President from returning to Congress to seek the authority [for trial by military commission] he believes necessary."
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"Turns out they were just kidding. For in response, Congress, at the President's request, quickly enacted the Military Commissions Act, emphatically reasserting that it did not want these prisoners filing habeas petitions."
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"What the Court apparently means is that the political branches can debate, after which the Third Branch will decide."
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"What competence does the Court have to second-guess the judgment of Congress and the President on such a point? None whatever. But the Court blunders in nonetheless. Henceforth, as today's opinion makes unnervingly clear, how to handle enemy prisoners in this war will ultimately lie with the branch that knows least about the national security concerns that the subject entails."
Even people that believe in pre-destiny look both ways before crossing the street.
Take no prisoners.
It is not the job of SCOTUS to be safe and responsible. It is the job of SCOTUS to knock down unconstitutional laws.
The masses are the crack whores of religion.
Read the dissenting opinion.
Today the Court strikes down as inadequate the most generous set of procedural protections ever afforded aliens detained by this country as enemy combatants. The political branches crafted these procedures amidst an ongoing military conflict, after much careful investigation and thorough debate. The Court rejects them today out of hand, without bothering to say what due process rights the detainees possess, without explaining how the statute fails to vindicate those rights, and before a single petitioner has even attempted to avail himself of the law's operation.Bolding mine. How would anyone know if they've tried to use the courts if they haven't had access to them in the first place? And saying that Habeas Corpus isn't a "time-honored legal principal"?
Amazing, isn't it?
Quotes taken from here.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
It has nothing to do with the fact that they're foreign nationals, nor that it happens "abroad". The federal government has no powers that the constitution does not grant. They can't do anything "abroad" nor to foreign nationals without constitutional power. It's not as though they have infinite power outside our borders "just because".
The consitution says, "The privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it." This specifically states that unless there is rebellion or invasion, the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended. There is no rebellion or invasion in progress, therefore, the federal government, both the executive and legislative branches, has no power to suspend the writ of habeas corpus, which is the power of the judicial branch to review any and all detainments, jailings, or imprisonments.
There's nothing in the consitution that states that the executive and legislative branches can operate internationally, but the judicial branches cannot review international actions. The three branches of government are co-equal. I hate this recent distaste for judges by conservatives who want to reinterpret the laws of the land to let their idiot of a president do whatever they want. The judges are doing their duty to interpret the law. The fact that they're not elected by popular vote is BY DESIGN and should not be used to try to make their *co-equal* role seem less important.
The constitution doesn't apply to a particular location. It applies to a particular federal government, regardless of the location. The consitution says, the government cannot restrict habeas corpus, it doesn't say, it cannot restrict habeas corpus on US citizens. Habeas corpus isn't a right of American Citizens defined affirmatively in the consitution, instead, the federal government is prohibited from suspending the right period, with no other conditions. Currently, the government is claiming the power to suspend the right of habeas corpus for the people at gitmo. The constitution says, NO, you cannot suspend that right. Doesn't matter who. Doesn't matter where.
As far as your argument of "will Al Qaeda reciprocate"? Do we decide our standards of behavior by the enemy's standards of behavior? For example, the enemy punishes us by attacking civilians, so why don't we attack civilians aligned with their cause or civilians whom they claim to represent and fight for? Would that be the right thing to do? It's really sad to me that people don't understand the *reason* we're the good guys is the fact that we're willing to fight based on principles, and that Americans have been willing to die for those principles for as long as this nation has existed. Fools who would give up those principles in a heartbeat for security, fools who would disgrace all those who fought and died fighting the right way, when we could have won faster by fighting the wrong way, those people don't understand what it means to be an American. If more Americans have to die to defend the constitutional principles that make us who we are, then at least they die as Americans, rather than reducing themselves to the level of the terrorists. By giving up our principles and violating our constitution, we let the terrorists win, because we let them take away who we are and we let them take away what we believe in.
I prefer to believe that we can beat these people, that we can chase them down and kill them, without violating our principles and without giving up who we are. I'm willing to accept that there is a greater risk that there might be more terrorist attacks, and that my city could be bombed, and that I could lose loved ones in this battle, if it means that we stay true to our American principles and we fight like the good, strong, and moral people that we consider ourselves to be, and I consider anyone who is unwilling to accept the additional risk involved with sticking to our principles to be a coward and to have no claim to patriotism, and have no understanding of what America is and why we're the greatest nation on Earth.
Sure, some of them are. I guarantee you there's some people in Gitmo who did some absolutely horrible things and truly deserve to be there. And they deserve to rot away in prison or even face the death penalty if it is applicable.
But there are a lot of people being held in Gitmo under nothing more than suspicion. And until now they had no right to habeas corpus, which meant they could rot there for years and years with no recourse at all.
"Work is the curse of the drinking classes." -Oscar Wilde
With out a doubt some of the detainees are Al Qaida. But it's also very clear from the testimonies of many who've been detained without charge for years before being released without explanation, that many are also not Al Qaida; were not involved in any military action, and should never have been sent there in the first place.
Given that the U.S. military and government are not prepared to give these people fair justice. A court of law is totally the right choice in a modern, civilized western world.
Sheesh, people. The Constitution applies to the AMERICAN CITIZENs that make up the Executive Branch, including the Army (of which the Chief Executive is also the Commander in Chief).
Are you going to argue that you can kill a Canadian on US soil because he has no rights under US law? That's ridiculous. The laws prohibiting actions do not apply based on the victim.
What makes this case special is that POWs are covered by treaty. POWs are not held for criminal actions; they are held to prevent them from participating in the war. The treaties (chiefly the Geneva Convention) state that holding POWs until the end of hostilities is OK, as long as you treat them right.
The problem is that Bush and his SCOTUS pets want to treat the detainees as POWs in the sense of American law not applying to them, but also as "enemy combatants" so that the G.C. does not apply. The SCOTUS decision is basically saying that Bush cannot invent a new status to weasel his way out of the law. Either the detainees are POWs, and have rights under the law, or they are criminal suspects and they have a different set of rights under the law.
If Bush would just call them POWs, this whole debate would be moot. But he wants a double-standard so he can ignore the law.
Second, will Al Qaeda reciprocate?
Why would Al Qaeda reciprocate? How do you know any of the people held at Guantanamo Bay are Al Qaeda members?
No evidence has been presented in a court of law to suggest that they are.
If there is evidence, let's try them, examine said evidence, and deal with them according to the rule of law.
Who the fuck calls it that?
why does the U.S. Constitution apply to foreign nationals captured and held in places that are not the U.S.?
The Constitution describes and limits the powers of the US Government in this case, not foreign nationals. If the government chooses to imprison a person, it must charge that person with a crime and prove their guilt in court. No law gives the government the power to imprison people indefinitely without cause.
but not the right to vote in U.S. elections (yet), to bear arms, or the responsibility to pay U.S. income taxes
What the hell are you talking about? The law states specific requirements for voting, carrying a concealed weapon, and paying taxes. It does not state specific requirements to be eligible for a trial.
will Al Qaeda reciprocate?
Until the imprisoned have a trial, you have no reason to believe that they are or ever have been associated with al Qaeda. I understand if you have a difficult time being objective about this. People should be angry at terrorist attacks. At the same time, you have to be able to think rationally and realize that if these people are guilty, then we should be able to demonstrate that in court first and lock them away afterward. It's a straightforward process that protects innocent people from being detained by mistake. Why would you not want to protect the innocent?
how do you fight a war under rules that were designed for domestic law enforcement?
What makes you think that the imprisoned persons at Guantanamo were captured in war? Many of them were apparently captured by the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. We paid them for the prisoners. Doesn't that strike you as a situation with a tremendous potential for abuse? Don't you think that we should review the evidence that those prisoners were actually combatants to avoid imprisoning the ones that weren't?
The Magna Carta is a part of what makes the West the West. It's where we got some of our earliest notions about law.
A lot of other nations (you know who I'm talking about) who don't have the Magna Carta in their history still haven't quite grasped a lot of the concepts of modern jurisprudence.
They tend to be places that lock you up indefinitely for overly political speech, or stone you to death in a public place for not having the "correct" notions about God.
I'd say the Magna Carta has had an enormous bearing on US law - hardly a footnote.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Cynical Idealist
What if we were at war with Britain? See how that changes the situation?
Terrorists and any other human who willingly takes another humans life, does not have a soul and therefore, is not a person. They should all be executed swiftly, without question. If another person has the intent to, or has damaged another persons life to the point of non-recovery or death, the individual(s) should be executed. Fuck their "rights" they have no rights. They threw their rights out the door when they decided to commit the senseless crime. Kill em' all. What is the point of having them around? Just fucking kill them.
-Sean SCALIA: No. To the contrary. You think â" Has anybody ever referred to torture as punishment? I donâ(TM)t think so.
STAHL: Well I think if youâ(TM)re in custody, and you have a policeman whoâ(TM)s taken you into custodyâ"
SCALIA: And you say heâ(TM)s punishing you? Whatâ(TM)s he punishing you for? ⦠When heâ(TM)s hurting you in order to get information from you, you wouldnâ(TM)t say heâ(TM)s punishing you. What is he punishing you for?
You can't take the sky from me...
> I guarantee you there's some people in Gitmo who did some absolutely horrible things and truly deserve to be there. ...some of whom are probably wearing American uniforms.
Four Supreme Court Justices disagree with you. I don't.
Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it. --Mark Twain
Tell this to the guy who was kidnapped, flown to Afghanistan, and Tortured for 5 months because he happened to have the same name as a suspected terrorist.
In 2003, Khalid El-Masri, a Kuwait-born citizen with German nationality, was detained by Macedonian agents in the Republic of Macedonia. While on vacation in Macedonia, local police, apparently acting on a tip, took him off a bus, held him for three weeks, then took him to the Skopje airport where he was turned over to the CIA.
El-Masri says he was injected with drugs, and after his flight, he woke up in an American-run prison in Afghanistan containing prisoners from Pakistan, Tanzania, Yemen and Saudi Arabia. El-Masri said that he was held five months and interrogated by Americans through an interpreter. He declared that he had been beaten and kept in solitary confinement. Participating in some of these interrogation sessions was an officer of the German foreign intelligence service (Bundesnachrichtendienst or BND) using the pseudonym "Sam", who has reportedly been identified by al-Masri as Gerhard Lehmann. Lehmann served on the UN Mehlis commission into the Rafik Hariri assassination before he was withdrawn in early February 2006, possibly to prevent the repercussions of his identification.[39]
Then, after his five months of questioning, he was simply released. "They told me that they had confused names and that they had cleared it up, but I can't imagine that," El-Masri told ABC News. "You can clear up switching names in a few minutes." Khalid el-Masri had allegedly been confused with Khalid al-Masri, wanted for contacts with the Hamburg Cell involved in the September 2001 attacks.
Khalid el-Masri was then flown out of Afghanistan and dumped on a road in Albania, from where he made his way back home in Germany. Using a method called isotope analysis, scientists at the Bavarian archive for geology in Munich subsequently analyzed several strands of his hair and verified his story. During a visit to Washington, German Interior Minister Otto Schily was told that American agents admitted to kidnapping El-Masri, and indicated that the matter had somehow got out of hand. Masri was held for five months largely because the head of the CIA's Counterterrorist Center's al Qaeda unit "believed he was someone else," one former CIA official said. "She didn't really know. She just had a hunch."
Consider: A U.S. security contractor is taken prisoner on Iraqi soil and held as an 'unlawful enemy combatant' (not part of the U.S. army, no uniform, etc.). On what basis could the U.S. argue for his release, trial, or Habeas Corpus hearing?
1. The constitution governs the behavior of the government wherever it chooses to act. The constitution states for instance that treaties entered into by the US and ratified will have the same power as the law of the land. This is why enemy POWs whether they are held in the US or abroad by our military have the privileges of the Geneva Convention. What gives them those rights is not the Geneva Convention itself but that the constitution compels our government to act in compliance with its treaty obligations, which include the Geneva Convention.
The government does not get pick or choose which parts of constitution it does or does not uphold. That is an Orwellian nonsense perpetrated by the current (and a few previous) administrations that attempts to create a terrorism related loophole in the constitution. There isn't one.
2. What Al Qaeda, or any given enemy of ours does or does not do is irrelevant to US law.
3. This is the way you fight a war legally (yes, there are laws of war) - if you pick up a terrorist on foreign soil trying to kill Americans, you hold them as POWs. So you either have a POW (in which case you hold them for the duration of the war and grant them all the Geneva Convention rights) or you have (in case the crime was either conspired / committed on US soil or the said accused was extradited from abroad) to try them in a US court. There is no third category of a detainee allowed under US law, regardless of the myriad (il)legal fantasies of this administration.
Roberts is complaining about Judges setting policy. The legislature and executive are supposed to conduct the nation's foreign policy. The Judicial is supposed to interpret laws and judge actions. Judges are supposed to be constrained by laws not public opinion. If Judges are constrained by neither, then we have a problem.
I'm glad that at least one branch of the Federal government has enough grounding to make a decision in favor of America's founding principles - that all men are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights. It's always been a struggle, and there have always been people who wanted to deny those inalienable rights to some Men: slaves, Native Americans, Chinese, women, and so on. Every time we pass a law or make a judgment that "yes, these people have inalienable rights too, and America protects those rights", we become a better nation, and perfect the ideal that was laid out in the Declaration of Independence.
The answer is real simple. Outsource it to the Cubans.
1) They need the money.
2) They do not have habeas corpus. You can be interned forever with no trial. So it does not violate any of their laws.
3) We will not have to move the prisoners very far.
4) They have a WELL trained security force. Just ask their civilian population.
There you go. Every thing a growing dictatorship needs.
No hour on a horse is ever wasted. Winston Churchill
Oh! My Heart - Its Bleeding...all over these forums!
Extremism is bad...so why is a 5-4 decision really so terrible for everyone?
No.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Both were given standard trials eventually and both were found guilty. Can't you even read the wikipedia posts you link?
Try reading the Constitution. It differentiates between those parts that apply to all people within the jurisdiction of the US (which are really phrased as defining the powers of the federal government) and those parts that apply to citizens.
It's worth noting the underlying foundation for this decision, which is well researched and described in the actual opinion. Specifically, the Court researched the history of the writ from the time of it's introduction into the legal system as a means to enforce the guarantee against illegal imprisonment granted in the Magna Carta. The decision continues this analysis through the subsequent years of legal evolution in England and eventually to the United States. Looking at the U.S. laws, the Court spends considerable time outlining its interpretation of the Constitution's wording, including why the writ was one of the only rights included in the Constitution, which as many have mentioned is actually designed to grant the government power not grant the people power.... Additionally, the Court calls into focus the issue of the pendulum like swing of government power, calling out this particular period of time as a era of overzealous application of power in the pursuit of security. Finally, the Court also indicates that this is a new situation, a situation without precedent. As such, they have created a new precedent based on their research into this issue. The new precedent is specific and founded on the accepted principles of law as established over the last ~800 years. On a personal note, I'm relieved and gratified to see that our Constitution has once more shown itself to be a well written and robust document. I wish many more years of peace and prosperity to this country, and I can only hope that other countries around the world eventually share an equal quality legal framework. Our system of government and law, while not perfect, is proving itself to be quite remarkable.
Like trees blowing in the wind.
Note: I meant persecute before any grammar nazis respond. Unjust prosecution is persecution. My hating Bush or wishing you'd just choke on a pretzel and not have anyone there to help you does not make me a criminal. Passing a law which prohibits my holding a low opinion of our worst president ever would be unjust.
I have a problem with hate crimes, by the way. What violent crime is not rooted in hatred to begin with? If you hate blacks, jews, whites, gays, or whatever, and assault or murder one based on that, you've committed assault or murder. If you hate women and you rape one, you've committed sexual assault. Hatred should be treated as merely the motive supporting prosecution of the criminal charges; not be a crime in and of itself. So, I suppose we already have laws which allow persecution on the books.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
What, you're saying that we need to stay in Iraq so we can do the Marshall Plan thing there? We've been doing it since the beginning of the occupation, and it's pretty much been frittered away. The schools and hospitals mostly got contracted out to incompetent or corrupt people who never finished or did a sloppy job; the few that actually got built were destroyed by insurgents. Despite American attempts to beef up the infrastructure, it's actually worse than it was under Sadam, with most of the electrical grid down most of the time.
I could go on, but you get the idea.
It's amazing how many "STAY THE COURSE!" people don't know about this.
If we were at war with Britain then our troops would be uniformed, troops would be captured in combat, the Geneva conventions would be respected, and then they would be released when the war was concluded. There would be little doubt as to why they would be held, because we would know they were soldiers fighting with Britain.
Civilians that are not wearing uniforms would probably be put through their civil system, like members of the IRA were. Which is exactly what we should do.
But its a moot point because we're not at war with anyone. No formal declaration of war was made. We have no stated enemy, and thus we have no way of knowing who qualifies as a solider, or when the conflict ends. Thus we should have to prove that person is a combatant, or has committed some other crime.
Ben: That's not a mouth that's RECTUM!
Han: Chewie get us out of here!
There is no right to feel safe thru security vaudeville at the expense of everyone's freedom, privacy and tax money.
while (sig==sig) sig=!sig;
It's all a bit fuzzy. Your government appears to be reserving the right to pick up and intern anybody they fancy of any nationality in any country and declare they don't have to tell us why, and don't have to let the interned people go at any time.
That's one of the thing that really worries a lot of us. We don't trust your government, so we generalise and say "we don't trust the USA or its people". That's sad and not very healthy.
Even the top people on the losing side of World War 2 got trials and lawyers. You are saying that the people in Guantanamo Bay have carried out significantly worse acts than the people who stood in the Nuremburg trials?
Wow, this can mean anything. And Bush & Co. understand this. This is way to vague and the people who wrote this are to blame. Invasion? 9/11 could fit the description if you interpret the rules the right way. And guess what, that's exactly what is happening.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power lost.
China violating rights is no excuse for us to do so.
I just wanted to reply and thank you for the well articulated response. I still don't agree with the Supreme Court's decision on this issue, but your explanation of the rationale from which it could be seen as a positive one was much appreciated.
This is an important point I want to address. The US is happy to point the finger at others countries and condemn "human rights violations" yet somehow when we are the culprit there are suddenly excuses for why it is okay. Everyone deserves to be treated ethically, whether by your own government or someone elses. Only when the US can claim no guilt in this regard can we go around using that as a banner for interfering in other countries' governments.
Support a true independent artist - Leila Lopez
There was already a procedure for this. Their country of origin can petition our government for their release. This is a time honoured system during time of war. We *have* released people out of GITMO using this procedure. The problem is that some of the people there don't have a nation that will fight for them because their country of origin doesn't want them either.
As far as the innocent goes, this is exactly why the Geneva conventions wrote things they way they did. They didn't want people fighting without uniforms because it caused innocent people to get caught in the cross fire. We are fighting an enemy that doesn't care about that, and we are to blame?
I know some people are complaining about the guy that got caught up by accident, but the prisoner this whole thing was fought over was intimately tied to Bin Laden.
It is an amazing overstepping of separation of powers. The constitution prevents civilian courts from interfering in anything military. This was done on purpose. People complain about Bush overstepping, but the SCOTUS way, way, way over stepped.
We invaded Iraq, and seriously pissed off a lot of people. Does that count?
On a more serious note, would you happen to know how sending people to trial would interfere with public safety? Is it that there'd just be so many that it wouldn't be possible to schedule a trial for everyone within the allowed time limit?
Many, if not most of the detainees at Gitmo are from Afghanistan and have never been to Iraq. I understand that you may have strong feelings about Iraq, but keep in mind that not everything terrorism related has to do with Iraq.There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
I think yer a dumbass. When america holds "enemy combatants" in their own prisons, a law must be applied to them. If they're POWs, then international, and if we are holding them, then yes, our own laws should apply. You can never at anytime take away all laws and say they're a special case. This leads to effectively making up your own shit as you go. Last time i checked the president didn't have special dictator powers that can make up his own country and enforce whatever cockamainy laws he sees fit.
I'm sure it's just lazy headline writing, but I think it's important to point out that the Supreme Court did not "grant" habeas corpus to Gitmo inmates -- it ruled that they have that right, ie that they have always had it, even though the government denied it.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
Isn't the US supposed to be the good guy?
It has been a long sad stretch of years for America that will probably be remembered alongside the days of McCarthyism. Our government has held people for years without charge or trial, quibbled technicalities over what is and is not torture, and tapped the phones of US citizens without warrant. In foreign policy and negotiation we have repeatedly been among the first to raise the threat of war, and marched that road alone on faulty premises. This decision is a faint glimmer of hope that the scales may tip back towards the American ideals of due process and freedom. However, it is also a warning of the importance in choosing our next commander and chief. It will only take one Supreme Court nomination to tip the scales back in the wrong direction for a very long time. This is a reminder of how much is truly at stake in November.
It's "We the people of the United States", I don't see any mention of anyone other than that. So if your not a US Citizen the constitution does not apply to you, End of Discussion!
they just wanted to get on with their lives
But, they HAD lives to get on TO. That's not true in the middle east - the vast majority of the population lives in poverty, and in even worse, in Iraq, they don't even have basic security. Anybody can be killed at any time.
When you have large disaffected populations, you create a ripe stomping ground for nefarious personalities to indoctrinate them to their 'causes'. Why does your life suck? It's because of the evil Americans! Kill the infidels!
We're the new Jews; we just have bigger guns. (Well, the new Jews are also the new Jews, and THEY have bigger guns too, thanks in large part to us.)
paintball
Note the "good" guys:
John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Stephen G. Breyer
vs. the "bad" guys:
John G. Roberts Jr., Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr.
Let's hope the "good" guys maintain their majority.
You must be a Slashtard.
They are esy to spot, pocket protector, thick rimmed glasses and a 3rd graders understanding of the US Constitution which does not extend any rights to foreign combatants
Well the Supreme Court just in effect handed these men their death sentences as they will get handed back to their home countries for custody and "debriefing". The food wont be as good nor the manners as nice, no well kept Korans handled by white gloved Marines and some may even go free but most will never see the light of day and if they do it will be with the 1 good eye and arm, leg they have left...maybe
At least thats what I am hoping anyway
We critize countries like China for not giving their citizens certain rights, but we will not give their citizens (or anybody's citizens) rights.
Maybe we can criticize now.
And sadly most non-citizens know the constitution better than you...
I don't want terrorists to have US constitutional rights. Kill 'em all.
What I want though is to first FIGURE OUT WHO IS A TERRORIST AND WHO IS NOT.
Just because the executive branch SAYS they are a terrorist doesn't mean they are actually a terrorist. And in fact, quite a few of the Gitmo detainees seem to quite obviously NOT be terrorists, but just in the wrong place at the wrong time.
So what I want is for ACCUSED terrorists to be given a trial, and then all the ones found guilty can rot in Gitmo or be shot as appropriate.
But what I do NOT want is for our government to be able to grab random people and toss them in prison for as long as they feel like - even if they do tricky things like put the prisons in other countries. Because if its OK for our government to do it, then its OK for other governments to do it, and that would crimp my travel plans.
paintball
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
McClatchy reports the outrage the decision has caused on the right, with one senator calling for a Constitutional amendment "to blunt the effect of this decision."
I am not a Yanqui but I thought these senators were supposed to defend the Constitution. When does this sort of thing become treason?
And if they are terrorists, not only can they challenge Habeaus Corpus in the federal courts, but the government could have them tried in the same courts and punished if found guilty on evidence. I'm sure there are a lot of people who would love to sit on some of those juries. I would.
Trial by jury was seen as such a foundational right by the founding fathers that it is mentioned in the body of the Constitution itself and not as an amendment. It's there because American juries had an alarming tendency to be very independent of the government of his majesty in the days before independence. From it came the principle that juries can even rule on the law itself and not be challenged. Just Google "Jury Nullification".
But what an opportunity! If they are terrorists and have murdered Americans, let's bring 'em to justice! But if they're there with no evidence to hold 'em and no way of getting out. . . guess who's going to get a lot more egg in their face?
JC: "Who do You think the princes of this World tax? Their children? Or someone else's children?"
Peter: "Someone else's children."
JC: "Thou has rightly answered"
"This will force the government to either release the enemy combatants or release the details of their intelligence gathering"
No, it won't. Courts handle cases touching on sensitive information routinely, via a variety of mechanisms in a variety of contexts. There's no reason procedures can't be devised that protect secrets but still maintain constitutional protections and evidence standards.
Besides, the negative PR generated by the abandonment of our own principles at Gitmo has real negative consequences too, and I find it hard to imagine these are not greater than whatever "benefit" we get from it.
While I certainly agree with you, I do have the feeling they're just going to shuffle them into the custody of other countries without so many inconvenient rights and just drop by for info as they need it.
This all is really a situation that isn't going to be ultimately decided by the courts, but by the 22nd amendment. When Bush gets replaced by McCain or Obama, all of this stupidity will end. Neither of them is going to attempt to move people to foreign countries.
It is nice that the Supreme Court gets to go on record as saying this is bullshit before Bush is tossed from office though.
I just hope that when some more time has passed and the new administration reigns in on the propaganda that the NEXT administration has the opportunity to try the members of this administration for the crimes they have committed.
paintball
I can't speak for all Americans but I'm afraid that one day a fascist government will take over and our Constitutional rights will be eliminated. I hope that day never comes. Oh, wait...OK, I hope it's over with soon.
There is a long-standing theory that once you set the military to a task, you must remove civilian oversight if you are going to achieve success. When you are talking about violent (or potentially violent) confrontation, you get a lot of emotions and philosophies telling you very different things about what is and isn't acceptable. Be that as it may, you are also staring in the face of cruel necessity, in circumstances where failure to act quickly can ensure defeat (and a lot of death and suffering because of it). So there can be some real disastrous consequences to having civilian involvement in military decisions.
However...
Here we are not talking about deciding where to strike and how much force to use. Here we are talking about deciding whether or not a POW is even an enemy. Furthermore, we are doing this on our own territory (not in the middle of an active battlefield). I think, under the circumstances, civilian involvement is not only warranted, but should be required.
The opponents of this decision keep emphasizing that we are "at war" and that this is a military decision, so we should just butt out. This is a gross oversimplification of the situation, however. Furthermore, we are only "at war" in the most technical of senses; in the opinions of many, the only reason we are even still at war is so that certain interested parties can say "we are at war" whenever they want to get away with something of which their people disapprove.
So, I don't buy the "at war" defense in this case, both because we are arguably not "really" at war, and even if we were the issue is one of determining, in friendly and controlled territory, whether or not a prisoner is an enemy (rather than what should be done with someone who we know, as a fact, is already an enemy).
I approve of the supreme court's decision. I have an issue with the opponents to it...they are either stupid or have ulterior motives (or both).
take no prisoners
But:
But look, you've actually read the Bill of Rights, right? Can you please identify where, in the Preamble to the Bill, or in the actual text of the Sixth Amendment, it says "this only applies to citizens?"
Or there's Wikipedia...
So when I say that the Magna Carta still has a bearing on modern judicial matters, don't assume I mean you don't have to read anything else.
(Side note: IANAL.)
To forestall this possibility, Michael Chertoff, then-head of the criminal division of the U.S. Department of Justice, directed the prosecutors to offer Lindh a plea bargain, to wit, Lindh would plead guilty to two charges: â" serving in the Taliban army and carrying weapons. He would also have to consent to a gag order that would prevent him from making any public statements on the matter for the duration of his 20-year sentence, and he would have to drop any claims that he had been mistreated or tortured by U.S. military personnel in Afghanistan and aboard two military ships during December 2001 and January 2002. In return, all other charges would be dropped.
Lindh accepted this offer.
Yes, he was ransfered to the civilian courts the day before the Supreme Court was set to take up his case, and tried for charges unrelated to what they initially accused him of.
He was still held for years without charges.
The Constitution grants you the right to a speedy trial, not a trial "eventually", when the administration runs out of stalling tactics.
When did al Qaeda sign the Geneva Convention? When did they abide by it? (Like wearing uniforms.)
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
What part of their legal reasoning do you disagree with?
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
"Now THAT'S ITALIAN!"?
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
Speaking of the Combatant Status Review Tribunals.. Since being enacted (after the previous SCOTUS case, Hamdi vs. Rumsfeld), they have reviewed a large majority of the detainees to determine their status. So far, 38 of them have been outright cleared as not being enemy combatants after all, and several of those have been released.
That is 38 wrongfully-detained, innocent people that, until the admin was literally forced to do otherwise with them, were going to be held indefinitely--without review, without trial, without anything.
Bear that in mind the next time someone questions whether there should be any judicial review over detainments, instead of just trusting Shrub & Co. that they've got "real bad people".
I think this is one of the basics of constitutional law everywere. The law is bounded _mostly_ by area not citizenship. If it were simply bound to citizenship, foreigners would have either a great advantage over locals (not pay taxes, drive as fast as they want, etc.) or disadvantage (could be killed for nothing) and would keep away.
Scalia went hunting with Cheney days before a suspect ruling in Cheney's favor. The man is dirty and should be impeached. Roberts is a party hack disguised as a judge but that's not a valid reason for removal.
You want to amend MY country's Constitution so that you can lock people away with a complete lack of oversight?! If this were to be passed, that would be another nail in the coffin of our freedom.
Because Casio watches were being used to build IEDs, people owning such watches were routinely turned over to the US forces for bounty. I couldn't tell you how many of them are at Gitmo today, but I fail to see how allowing them to explain the circumstances to civilian judge would endanger anyone. Although it might boost Casio's reputation for building highly reliable watches.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Try getting your information from sources that don't say the US government was being the 9/11 attacks.
Sure the post had the basis of truth, however here are 3 of the many lies, do a little research to tear the rest apart.
1) He was stopped because of the name AND because the Macadonian border guards though the passport was a forgery. At one point the German government also said it was a forgery.
2) His hair only showed that he had malnutrision, something the US government admits because El-Masri took part in a mass hunger strike. During that strike they had to finally perform force-feeding to prevent death(part of what was has been classified as torture). Testing the hair cannot back up other parts of the story but it sure sounds scientific when making up a story.
3)Gerhard Lehmann works for the BKA not the BND. Also numerous people and documents prove that he was not in Afghanistan.
Is if the same people watching the Bushies will watch Obama as closely.
For more political bullshit that could be read about in a million other forums.
I've seen bumper stickers saying that the driver thought they'd never /miss/ Nixon.
I personally hope that Bush &c *are* tried as war criminals, by us. We don't need that blot on our national reputation.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Second, will Al Qaeda reciprocate?
The question is not whether Al Qaeda will reciprocate the same rights our country grants.
The question is whether Great Britain, Germany, Brazil, China, Japan, Russia, Egypt, Canada, Mexico, etc, will reciprocate. Because if THEY will reciprocate, then we sure as hell better stop locking people up without charges lest the rest of the world follow our lead and start locking up our citizens.
paintball
Try getting yours from a source that doesn't also bring you "American Idol", "The Simpsons" and "Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader?".
Heres my sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_rendition_by_the_United_States#Examples_and_specific_cases
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/03/AR2005120301476.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6316369.stm
Wheres yours?
Just how much of Cuba does the US Constitution now affect?
The most troubling thing is that we have dismissed torture, and revoking of due process, and unchecked government surveillance, all under the assumption that it's ok, because "we're the good guys". Before we caught Saddam, anything we did in Iraq was justified because "we're better than Saddam".
Maybe I'm getting off on a rant, but it seems to me that, when you believe that you are incapable of doing wrong, then that is when you are most likely to do the worst things you are capable of. And, I would never trust someone who said "we're better than Saddam Hussein", because, with a country that truly cares about human rights, you would never need to make that comparison. If you were Jewish, would you stay at a motel that advertises "we're better than Auschwitz and that's an acceptable goal", or would you expect more than that? We should be competing to be the best, but we're now happy to not be the worst.
(I'm not talking about legal precedent. I'm just talking about what the law SHOULD be)
You didn't address his real question. How exactly does this decision endanger the public?
The fact that you posted the same joke twice in two minutes or the fact that it was moderated +5 Funny both times?
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Sure, 2001-09-11 qualifies as an invasion -- but 1) I think the danger to public safety posed by habeas corpus needs to be a fact proven to the public (or at least to congress), not a fiat of the administration and 2) that was over six years ago, and I'm not about to succumb to "they're everywhere, cells infiltrating our cities, we're at orange again!" sort of fearmongering. A state of neverending invasion? I'm not buying it.
But I don't think "Bush & Co." really care exactly how their actions are justifiable from a constitutional point of view -- they just know they're right. "We're at war. These are (probably) captured enemy soldiers. Must detain & interrogate, because if one American life is lost that indefinite detention and waterboarding could have saved, then we have betrayed our country. (P.S. It's not torture when we do it, because we know we're the good guys.)" The amazing thing is that they have four supremes who agree with this line of thought, but of course they were very carefully vetted.
Your comparison fails due to it's extreme nature. I understand your intent but such exaggerated comparisons are not useful for discussion.
Personally, I haven't followed the issue close enough to have an informed viewpoint.. what have these detainees been subjected to that German POWs in the USA (or any other) during WWII weren't? Specifically, what violations exist of the Geneva Convention?
It's Soviet ex-patriates that are making these comparisons.
They are FAR from extreme.
All you have to do is look back to the 50's and the McCarthy hearings to realize that.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
What a great way to start a day. I know I'm not an American, but the decision of restore Habeas Corpus to Guantanamo detainees are great news for me and I'm sure many people have feel like a heavy weight has been lifted from our hearts.
The fact that the US suspended Habeas Corpus is still something I find hard to believe. US has been a country i used to see with the highest admiration for their freedoms and their common sense, and it saddens me to see when fundamental rights are taken away. And so i feel very glad when they come to their senses and restore them back.
As many people have already pointed, this will not mean Guantanamo detainees will be released, specially in the streets of US, this only means a detainee can challenge their detention in court.
This is what Habeas Corpus is about, the right to ask "why am i detained?", "what are the charges against me?"
I know there may be times in which a nation faces a crisis in which Habeas Corpus may be suspended for the actual self-preservation of the nation, but US is not at risk of be destroy by the "terrorist". I believe (and i apologize to the Americans as a foreign talking about their country, this it's only my personal opinion) that their current government it's more of a risk to their rights and principles than this "terrorist" has ever been.
Do you believe lied to and mislead by the recruiter is "willingly"? I checked with a Navy recruiter some years back and was lied to on several occasions in regards to internet access, how jobs are selected, whether you had a choice between land/ship assignments and a few other things. A friend of mine recently joined the Navy and cleared all of this up for me as far as what he's learned inside. There is a slight chance that the rules have changed since then, but I'm personally rather doubtful. Recruiters will lie through their teeth to try to get you to join.
(rot13) rpbzbab@tznvy.pbz
I guess you'd have to go to the fair and balanced source. Try this link: http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/06/13/mccain-guantanamo-ruling-one-of-the-worst-decisions-in-history/ You could get the whole article there, but the link says it all.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
I know you ladyboys here on Slashdot love this SCOTUS decision, but there are a lot of real Americans who don't. These Americans want retribution for 9/11. I know it is hard to believe, but we are in a war (a low grade one) and we want to win. We want to destroy Al Quaeda.
I have an idea for a new game: "Plot of a Kafka novel, or American policies".
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
He rants that we will have lawsuits about diet and magazines.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwlA3crnYbo
And this guy want to be President?
Unfortunately, such bases are a bit of extraterritoriality that I don't think anyone has ever answered the question of. In the past, American military bases on foreign soil have been used as a sort of a sanctuary for US citizens (at least members of the military) who have broken local laws (for a recent one: http://www.wsws.org/articles/1999/mar1999/ital-m06.shtml ). So, my opinion is that you can't have your cake and eat it too. If US military bases can, in effect, act as extraterritorial facilities (rather like an embassy), then they are in fact bound by US law, and in that case, detainees of such bases are protected by US law.
Unfortunately, what this will encourage more of is rendition; passing off suspected terrorists to countries with, shall we say, much looser rules about how suspects are treated and interrogated. That's a much different battle.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Wow, I never realized the acronym SCOTUS was used to refer to the Supreme Court. So, I read the title and started imagining a secret "shadow" organization that although sounds evil did something good for Human Rights etc. This is, of course, because "scotus" (or "") is the ancient Greek (with some use in modern Greek) for the word "darkness". Therefore "SCOTUS" sounded like a great name for a secret organization (preferably an evil one), although not as amusing as "KAOS" (from Greek "chaos" which is the opposite of "organization").
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
It's more than your personal belief. Habeas corpus was enshrined into law by the Magna Carta eight centuries ago and is incorporated very deeply into the law of every western nation and a good number of the rest as well.
Yes. If you have to take a hundred thousand invading or rebel soldiers prisoner you probably don't have the judges to give them all a hearing within 24 hours or whatever it is. Rather than let them all go, you take a little (a LITTLE) longer, but you still treat them nicely in the meantime.
This specifically states that unless there is rebellion or invasion, the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended.
Well, Many of the natives of Afghanistan and Iraq see US 'occupation' as an invasion. Perhaps Bush thought that was sufficient.
Now we no longer have to listen to all those idiots who keep saying, "It's OK, because the constitution doesn't apply to foreigners." Which is not only untrue, but kind of beside the point.
Oh well, I'm sure they'll find something equally stupid to say.
Maher Arar is another case. He was deported from the US to Syria where he was held and tortured for a year. Then suddenly released without charge. The people responsible for his initial detention within CSIS (Canadian counterpart to CIA) and the RCMP (counterpart to FBI) have not yet been identified nor punished for their role. Not only did they cause this to happen, but they kept leaking biased info to the media during the inquiry that cleared his name.
As a side note: the "el-" vs. "al-" is just a dialectical thing in Arabic. The proper classical Arabic is "Al-" meaning "The". El-Masri means "The Egyptian". In all of the Arabic speaking countries, it would be Al-, except for Egypt and Morocco where the local dialect reverts it to "El-".
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You're correct - defending the detainees will cost taxpayer dollars.
However, the war against terrorism is fought with more than just bullets. The war is also a war of ideas, between two disparate ways of life; between a theocratic caliphate on one side, and government of the people, by the people, and for the people on the other.
Giving our enemies due process of law costs money which could instead buy bullets or predator drones. Like interesting decisions, there are trade-offs which need to be weighed. In this instance, I think the benefits gained in the "war of ideas" outweigh the monetary cost.
I'd like to suggest one more point that contributed to the success of rebuilding Germany: 5) Before WWII Germany was the centre of of global scientific, technological and engineering innovation (Read "Hitler's Scientists" if you have any doubts about this) They also built up a significant industrial base prior to WWII. Granted this industrial base was mostly smashed to bits and a lot of their smart scientists got stolen away by the allies, but they still had enough skilled people left, and a past track record of industrial success to look back upon as they tried to rebuild their country. When people talk about turning Iraq into a thriving democracy, it often conjures up images of prosperity that are extremely unrealistic given how much of a mess Iraq had been under Saddam (and even before) and the fact that Iraq lack the manpower and skills to pick themselves up like the Germans did.
Thank you.
I guess they didn't serve it to the prisoners till after they were released. After all eating Haggis is a Scottish test of bravery.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
"will Al Qaeda reciprocate?"
No, but others, not yet so totally pissed, might consider that maybe they don't need to join Al Qaeda.
Bush's Pet Lawman: Nice ruling, too bad it doesn't matter.
"I'm disappointed with the decision, in so far as I understand that it will result in hundreds of actions challenging the detention of enemy combatants to be moved to federal district court. I think it bears emphasis that the court's decision does not concern military commission trials, which will continue to proceed. Instead it addresses the procedures that the Congress and the president put in place to permit enemy combatants to challenge their detention."
He said the Justice Department would comply with the ruling while studying the decision and "whether any legislation or any other action may be appropriate."
In other words: "Sure, yeah, great ruling, but we're still putting them in our Kangaroo Courts. Oh, and you Dems? Get ready to be forced to "compromise" and make this all legal in retrospect, just like how we're trying to force you to let us get away with warrantless wiretapping."
Also, as an aside: Anyone else find they had to disable the dynamic discussion stuff to be able to read this page or post on it? It was locking Firefox up here.
I agree with those who call for applying the Geneva Conventions to these guys!
(ie, they take up arms and don't fly under the banner of an official state -- under the convention, they can be lined up and shot -- especially those who masquerade as civilians, like the shoe bomber or others)
Oh, jeebus lord christ, don't start rambling probabilities while defending the essential rights of those who went on a religious holiday to Afghanistan in, say, 2001, and happened to be captured by the US military while being 100% innocent of any wrongdoing. That probability is likely to be situated somewhere on the ocean floor.
Whatever...
I am so sick of historical revisionists that want Roosevelt to climb out of his grave and an announce a Declaration of War. Congress authorized the Executive branch and the Pentagon and that was that. These are the same pinheads that didn't bother to stand up and vote for someone that understood how war works. These are the same pinheads that would say we telegraphed our intentions to our enemies if they sneak-attacked us.
Ok, smartypants. Who is the enemy and what is their governing body?
If we win the war, from whom should we seek a surrender?
DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
This is certainly good news, but when do we get real elections where our votes are counted?
Thanks in Advance, Supreme Court!
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
We are not at war with Iraq.
Maybe we could have some rules that made more sense if our government wasn't secretly detaining people all over the world illegally.
I mean, the situation is clearly fucked up from the get go.
I heard from a returning marine that on occasion they would just take a "detainee" out into the middle of the Atlantic and toss him overboard to avoid paperwork.
I mean, where do you want to begin fixing the fascism that we are living under?
Do you know who killed JFK?
Thanks in Advance.
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
Exactly. This government exists because we allow it. Without that hermetically sealed piece of paper in Washington D.C., the government is not allowed to exist because we didn't let it exist.
Always keep in mind that these government officials, who most often are erroneously called "leaders", are public servants. They serve us and our desires (or at least I like to think so). Their job -- their purpose -- is to enact the peoples' will.
Not sure if you meant to reply to me, but personally, I feel that most of this is BAD KARMA. State Department before 1990's WARNED Congress that Belfast, London, Beirut, etc. were COMING to the USA. Not a matter of IF, but WHEN.
As long as state powers conduct expeditionary missions, set up military bases overseas, hijack oil fields, sell arms to those having no business with them, allowing it's religious organizations to "spread the word of God" to foreign lands and then not reign them in, but instead send troops to protect megaphones offending indigenous peoples... well, what the hell CAN people expect.
9/11 didn't happen out of sheer evil, or hatred for 'merkuns out of jealousy. Those terrorists were like bees in a hive that was struck. Struck through decade after decade of imperialist or nationalist or economic strike and blow. After decades of propping up illegitimate regimes, after destabilizing local elections, after selling arms to local insurgents or revolutionaries or others only to have blowback haunt the larger powers. Then, selling out or cutting loose the very instruments, leaving them to fend for themselves, only to be killed, or their families killed, too.
No, this is all about bad karma coming home to roost. Nothing more, nothing less. And that make part of the problem ANY citizen who fails to vote, votes badly, or votes for tyrannical assholes who thing only THEIR god is THE one, and who run amok, pissing off others who create stateless, ad-hoc, hard-to-track, assymetrical fighters, and then have the nerve to call cowards people who don't have nukes, don't have bunker busters, don't have satellites, no Masters-of-the-Universe intel agencies, no vast, deep arsenals of troops and weapons...
Well, we can sum this up by saying, "It's complicated. We're talking about reckless, destructive, greedy, myopic, selfish, jealous, petty, vindictive, shameless humans jockeying for power, unwilling to compromise, unwilling to assent to a higher cause over the long run..."
(needs a valium or something...)
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
I think the government brought this on themselves by dragging their feet so long with the military tribunals. If they had brought them swifty to some kind of court this wouldn't have come to pass.
Up until now I honestly thought that the constitution provided rights only for American Citizens. Similar to why it was so desireable to be a roman citizen, because of the rights that it brought you. However reading all this I guess I have to reconsider that.
What worries me about this ruling is if all the bill of rights apply to non citizens when does that begin. Will our soldiers be forced to mirandize prisoners of war? Will they have to start following rules of evidence in the middle of battle, bagging and tagging evidence?
I have to kind of agree with the dissenting opinion in that the court should have outlined what rights they felt applied and at what point do they come in effect otherwise they are seriously tying the hands of our military.
(Sorry about the AC post but I already modded on this thread)
This is a good ruling - GTMO was not effective. Detaining terrorists based on solid evidence in open court will go a long way to satisfying the whole world that America is acting properly.
Hopefully this ruling will force the (next) administration to come up with another strategy to handle terrorists, one that is more effective in the short and long term. Perhaps the tactic is much different than the course of action right now.
Effective, experienced, well-funded, resourceful police departments in Afghanistan and Iraq would be able to detain those people there under their laws and prosecute them domestically. This may be the impetus required to spur the funding of these policing organizations that are so crucial for the preservation of law and order in these fledgling democracies.
I'm glad you can't.
Nothing personal, I'm just against making this site more Digg-like. We have enough Ron Paul spam here as it is.
To add to the chorus of replies, Habeas corpus for non-citizens is crucial in a way that welfare and voting rights are not.
Think about it for a moment. If habeas corpus is reserved for citizens, then what happens when a US citizen is arrested and falsely accused of being a non-citizen. How can said US citizen prove that he is a citizen, without habeas corpus?
The Court's majority opinion is quite clear about this. The Nazi prisoners were not under the jurisdiction of the USA; they were under the joint jurisdiction of the Allied powers, which were temporary military occupiers in Germany, an independent state whose sovereignty was not contested, and which had a functioning government and courts. These prisoners were also provided with legal counsel and the opportunity to answer the charges against them in adversarial legal proceedings/
The Guantanamo prisoners are under the sole jurisdiction of the USA; the USA has full jurisdiction over Guantanamo Bay, which has no courts or authorities other than the USA military. The prisoners haven't had anything resembling legal proceedings against them; they're being held while the government investigates and decides whether to press charges. The prisoners also aren't provided with proper legal counsel--only with "advisors" that aren't bound to things like client-attorney privilege. The prisoners lack the ability to confront witnesses, and so on.
The "declaration of war" bits are irrelevant. In fact, the language of Court's opinion doesn't seriously pursue any denial that the US is engaged in a war against terrorism. (They do point out that if this is a war, it's one of the longest in the nation's history.) The whole point is that the government's power over people under its jurisdiction is not absolute, whether they are citizens or not, or whether they're being held in a state of the union or in an overseas military base that's de facto ruled by the USA and nobody else.
Are you adequate?
The story in the parent post has flaws.
1) It does not mention the fact the the authorities believed his passport to be false. So they didn't detain him just because of his name.
2) The hair analysis only showed that the subject suffered malnutrition, which is no surprise given that he commited a hunger strike.
I am not saying that something wrong wasn't committed by the CIA. It is just that posts with important flaws should not be at +5.
Since you're imagining: imagine how the soldier feels about his leg being blown off by the land mine this kid planted.
You're one sick puppy...
You want to kill terrorists, but ... what is a terrorist? The gitmo detainees are mostly caught in afghanistan. Last time I checked, it wasn't part of the US. This means that any US solder who grabs an Afghan and takes him with him is actually kidnapping a person from his own home land. If these people then try to prevent that and shoot at the US soldiers, also because, oh what a strange thought, they see the US soldiers as _invaders_ (take it from their POV), are they suddenly terrorists? By what definition? They fought against the government? No, they _WERE_ the government. They fought against the US soldiers? Of course they did, the US soldiers barged in and bombed the crap out of them.
Did the above text make you angry? If it did, re-read it and think about what the US soldiers are doing in various countries across the globe and more importantly: what the effect is of these soldiers doing their job there: the local population, will they ever live in peace? How can that be, if they can be picked up by any random US soldier and be deported to gitmo without a trial and probably be tortured (according to the definition of torture used by the rest of the world)?
The US had to do something after 9-11. They crushed the taliban government in afghanistan. However, looking back, one can only conclude that that action was just an act of rage, as fighters who aren't tied to one particular country, are hard, if not impossible, to fight, sadly enough. Holding people for 6+ years, torturing them on a regular basis, denying them any trial, but above all: kidnapping these people from all over the world as if you are entitled to do so, these are actions of a country which has no clue what to do with the power it has.
It's dangerous to label people as 'terrorists' and because of that labeling to punish them with a very harsh sentence, e.g. killing them. The point is that by doing so, you 1) declare yourself as the country who is in charge of declaring who a terrorist and 2) by killing the person, you're declaring yourself also the country who's in charge of executing the sentences given to these people.
Using that logic, it's the same as bin laden saying: 1) I declare myself entitled to declare any american a criminal who has to be shot and 2) I declare myself entitled to execute that sentence, so I'll go after every american and shoot him/her.
Because... why wouldn't an american soldier crushing everything there possibly was in afghanistan and iraq be a terrorist in the eyes of the people living there? Of course, a western citizen would say: "that's absurd, they can'tbe a terrorist", but why would a person who defends his country against the US invaders be all of a sudden a terrorist?
Never underestimate the relief of true separation of Religion and State.
Your post contains inaccuracies and should not be at +5.
I see that you got your story from the Wikipedia article. I have deleted the Masri case from that Wikipedia article, and left only the link to the main Masri article. I have not carefully compared the main Masri article to the section about Masri in the article you read, but I did see inaccuracies in that section while I saw no inaccuracies in the main article. And when I edit Wikipedia, my opinion is
If it is badly written, and looks false, delete it. I do not need proof of lack of quality to delete it. On the contrary, those who want it here need to prove it is good.
... that the ruling was *too hasty* and hence was a distortion of the constitution.. not 'open and democratic' enough for his taste.
Of course, this is the same Scalia who thinks that waterboarding is not torture.
Alas, Scalia is a fuckwit.
-Leo [less posting at 4am sans coffeh]
--- See you at the Tannhäuser Gate.
It seems he can!
The point is to establish US "credibility", the same way that Tony Soprano worries about his credibility. The point was, they had this dictator in an oil-rich country, and he stopped following orders.
It was a cluster-fuck from Gulf 'War' I. The US did a great job of giving Saddam the impression that the wouldn't give a shit if he rolled into Kuwait. Saddam most likely thought that nobody in Washington would give a shit.
Thefirethistime.com
The plural form of "anecdote" is "anecdotes", not "evidence".
Enforcers? The police are generally concerned about matters of criminal or regulatory law. Soldiers are generally concerned about the law of war. They are separate bodies of law, the purpose, standards, and requirements tend to be quite different. We are treading a dangerous path if we are going to start confusing them or blurring the distinctions.
Then treat them as prisoners of war. That comes with its own set of rules, of course.
You got that almost right. War comes with its own rules, and you get certain protections and privileges if you obey the rules, ie the Geneva Conventions. Real POWs, lawful combatants, can't be held liable for killing your soldiers in battle (if it is according to the rules), can't be interrogated beyond their name, rank, date of birth, and service number, have to be paid a wage by your side while in captivity, have to be given the chance to prepare their own food (which means access to knives, cleavers, etc.) are free to send and receive mail, you must notify the other side that you have captured them, and other requirements. That is if you are at war and obey the rules - you don't get to pick the ones you like. Al Qaeda and their ilk don't obey the rules, so they are unlawful combatants, and don't qualify for the protections and privileges of the Geneva Conventions. The convention itself lists the rules to qualify. (Do you think those privileges and protections make sense to extend to Al Qaeda? Can't question them? Have to notify on capture?) That doesn't put them into the civilian legal system, it leaves them subject to the law of war but in jeopardy for their unlawful conduct under the law of war.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
In the two years since then I have read all the CSR Tribunal transcripts.
I can assure all of you that they absolutely do not support the Bush Presidency claims that the captives were all terrorists -- or even that they were all combatants.
The "Summary of Evidence" memos prepared for the 558 captives who had a CSR Tribunal convenened on their behalf absolutely do not support the claim that more than a few dozen captives were "captured on the battlefield" -- for any meaningful definition of "battlefield". And, for those who were captured on a battlefield, my take is that at least half of them were merely the innocent civilian bystanders who lived near an attack, and were left behind when the actual combatants had gotten away scot free.
The CSR Tribunal process was very seriously flawed in several important ways.
There was no mechanism to refute or confirm the captive's alibis. One captive, Abdul Matin, faced the allegation that he had been the Taliban's intelligence chief in the large Northern city of Mazari Sharif. He testified that he had been a refugee in Pakistan during the entire period the Taliban was in power. Further, he testified that he had been a high school science teacher in Pakistan, at a real high school, not a Madrassa. He had to sign in every day. And his time sheets for the seven years he worked there would document that he was in Pakistan, not Mazari Sharif.
His Tribunal told him this alibi was irrelevant because -- wait for it -- he could have traveled to Afghanistan to serve as an intelligence chief during his summer vacation.
His story was not exceptional. It was typical.
Does this make you feel safer?
Another extremely disturbing flaw was that almost all the captives faced more allegations, and more serious allegations, during their first and second annual Administrative Review Board hearings. Those allegations were withheld from the captives during their CSR Tribunal -- thus giving them no opportunity to refute them. ARB hearings weren't authorized to overturn a CSR Tribunal determination that a captive was an "enemy combatant"
Some poor captives were able to offer completely satisfactory rebuttals during their ARB hearings of the allegations that had been withheld from them during their CSR Tribunal. The officers must have agreed with my assessment that their rebuttals were completely credible, since they didn't ask any questions related to the allegations. Instead the transcripts record truly Kafkaesque conversations where the officers said (paraphrasing):
Another deeply inadequate aspect of the CSR Tribunals concerned the definition of a combatant.
According to the Geneva Conventions a veteran is not a combatant. A veteran is a civilian. Period. Unless he takes his varmint rifle down from above his mantelpiece, and takes some pot-shots at you.
But CSR Tribunals considered some captives "combatants" if they had fought against that Soviets during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s. Some foreign captives were classified as combatants because they had been conscripted back in their home countries.
Afghanistan
The officers in the CSR Tribunals were specifically ordered to take the allegations at face value, without regard to how farfetched they were. The captives were guilty, unless they could prove themselves innocent.
And since many of the allegations they had to refute were classified, were withheld from them, it is not surprising that so many captives failed to establish that they were not enemies. The surprising thing is that any of the captives established they were not enemies.
all these posts are utterly lacking in legal knowledge and intelligence.
just because you disagree with a policy doesn't mean you can shoe-horn a law or legal principle like habeas corpus to agree with your policy preference. (well, unless you have 5 justices who think you can)
the dissenters are correct as a matter of law and legal history. the majority has a weak argument as a matter of law, but they're doing what they and you think is "right".
that may be within your view of the proper role of a judge, and that's fine, but don't pretend like the dissenters are crazy or what not. they just think that their role is a limited one, and that the legal history of habeas corpus does not support the majority decision. that is pretty much clearly correct, as a matter of law and legal history.
did anyone here even read ANY of the opinions? the majority opinion was 70 pages long, so i'm guessing not...
Also don't forget the trend of corporatism where government interests and corporate interests start to feed off each other and support each other. (No-bid contracts, military contracts, etc...)
Your line of argument is very similar to an article I wrote about the rules of war that Americans must impose on themselves: How America Fights. Even though I suspect we come from rather different political camps, there can be a lot of agreement on issues of principle.
One small quibble I would have with your argument, however, is that you have not fully represented the the dissenting opinion in this case. What the dissenters are most objecting to isn't about the issue of habeas corpus itself, but about the separation of powers between the courts and the other two branches of government. The supreme court is now placing itself above the other branches by requiring the military to justify it's decisions to a federal judge.
"We receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us" - Faraday
What makes your quote over the top is its very negative, accusative tone; the impossibility of proving your statement about conspiracy one way or another (a "conspiracy among themselves"), and the fact that you are talking about Supreme Court justices, and they are due at least some modicum of respect because of their office.
Other than this little bit, I would say your article is both insightful and interesting, and well-deserving of the plus points.
"We receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us" - Faraday
Oh, so it's all true, except the part about the people actually doing it being to blame.
What do you think a "conspiracy" actually is? Do you think it has to be some kind of smokefilled secret room, filled with guys with eyepatches? Or just the ongoing discussions among a group of judges of how to defy the Constitution (like where it requires letting Florida determine its own Electoral Votes according to its own state legislature and courts, or where it unequivocally prohibits Congress suspending Habeas Corpus without rebellion or invasion).
The Constitutional crisis in America has become undeniable, because it's destroying America, now in advanced stages. But it seems there's still some denial left to go around, especially when assigning personal responsibility for the specific acts that are destroying us. When those people, whose offices deserve respect when faithfully executed, violate their offices repeatedly, consistently, and in coordinated discussion with each other, those destructive acts so betray our expectations of them that little respect is due, except the honest and accurate assessment of their guilt.
That is what I delivered. 20% of mods think that's "trolling". Even if they disagree, they don't bother to do so. They just anonymously try to suppress the point they don't like. Because they're guilty, too, having voted for the larger group of guilty people carrying out the destruction, who were installed by the smaller group of guilty people I pointed out. That's not trolling. But modding it as such is trollModding.
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make install -not war
Iraq was self governing itself under Hussein. This is the best part of 40 years.
There was no reason to destroy the bureaucracy only because they were members of the Baht Party, anybody that was not named in human right abuses should have been used in the reconstruction of the country.
As anybody that has lived under authoritarian regimes knows, membership of varied bodies becomes a necessity if you want to advance your career or just make a living.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
You guys in the US regularly jail and even execute people that have not reached adulthood when they committed a crime.
No wonder some of you think imparting Bush's "justice" on a child is entirely justifiable.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
It is precisely because they are suspected terrorists that they should receive the protection of the US Constitution to its fullest extent.
Doing otherwise just puts you at the same arbitrary, lawless level as the terrorists.
If you think Terror is the right tool to combat Terror, well, good luck with that, but frankly does not seem to be working.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
What worries me about this ruling is if all the bill of rights apply to non citizens when does that begin. Will our soldiers be forced to mirandize prisoners of war? Will they have to start following rules of evidence in the middle of battle, bagging and tagging evidence?
I have to kind of agree with the dissenting opinion in that the court should have outlined what rights they felt applied and at what point do they come in effect otherwise they are seriously tying the hands of our military.
I realize this is way too long after the fact to allow for the possibility of response, and I'm sorry, but I think that today's post by Glenn Greenwald puts many of the concerns raised by this post in perspective. He's writing on the topic of former administration lawyer John Yoo's defense of their policies on prisoner rights:Here's what George Bush said he thinks about the way he can violate the Constitution despite the courts saying he can't. Short version: "I got away with it, didn't I?"
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make install -not war
... violate their offices repeatedly, consistently, and in coordinated discussion with each other,... There's simply no way you can know any such thing, unless you yourself are one of the Supreme Court justices in question. How do you know what the justices have "coordinated" among themselves? In what possible way is a dissenting justice "violating" their office?There's a line between being "mad as hell and not taking it any more", and accusing other people of things you cannot possibly prove. If you cross it, people will call you out on it.
"We receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us" - Faraday