He's made history. He's a beacon of hope to many and he's made one of his first orders of business to create fair conditions for suspected terrorists? That's right, Obama is working to ban some terrorist interrogation procedures and close Guantanamo Bay Prison.While hardworking Americans lose their jobs at astonishing rates and house values drop at even more astonishing rates, catering to the rights of terrorists is something that could've been a little further down on his list.
The moment America lets its guard down with regards to terrorism, is the moment America opens itself up to further violence. It would be akin to coming up with lighter sentences for drunk drivers and then wondering why the rate of drunk driving skyrockets.
The death penalty is still legal in America. We still execute our own people for murdering one person, yet President Obama wants to make certain that terrorists are being treated with fairness and respect.
No average citizen actually knows what goes on in Guantanamo Bay Prison, but as uncertainty and fear continues to fill our nation, the last faction of people who should be protected at this time in our history are terrorists.
36 comments:
All people deserve respect and dignity - until proven guilty. Torture doesn't prove anything other than someone will say anything to avoid pain. It should be easy to prove these folks did something.
Seems like I recall from Obama's speach him saying:
"On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.
As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations."
I'm sure he did a few other things on his first day on the job. I know he made some things happen woth lobbyists.
Are you going to attack him or support him and let him to his job?
I'm going to question my leader like a good, free American should.
What does he plan to do with detainees once he closes G.B.? He has no plan. We put these people back on the field and they will kill our soldiers or our citizens.
Why the hell is he giving respect and dignity to terrorists? You may feel differently if someone close to you was killed in Iraq or on 9/11.
He did do a few other things on his first day...capping the salary of his senior aides. A nice gesture, but...it's hardly those folks that are draining the economy. I'd like to see a cap on the salaries of our elected officials.
I can't agree with you more on teh salary cap.
I guess the terrosit thing is that in America - where people fought for our freedoms and right - a man is inoccent until proven guilty. That has nothing to do with torture. Someone has to be the bigger man. I can't imagine putting them back on the street and most countries won't take them. We'll find a better place out of the limelight.
Also, I do know both someone that died during 9/11 and more than one in Iraq.
He isn't closing GB for 1.5 years, by the way. Plenty of time to figure things out.
They don't live by our Constitution, so they shouldn't be given the same rights as are given by it. We need to do whatever we need to do to keep ourselves safe.
Sounds like he's running before he learns to walk. I genuinely think he should know the details of the plan before he reacts. It's unstable and unwise to make such a knee-jerk decision in the first two days of office.
I couldn't disagree with you more. Obama has a clear plan. He wants to close the camp within a year, but wants every case carefully evaluated. If the person is found to be guilty, they can be put on trial in an ethical manner. If they are innocent, they should be let go.
The US was considered a laughingstock with that torture camp, and rightfully so. We showed a clear double standard. We say in this country that everyone should have a right to a fair trial and are innocent until proven guilty. We looked like hypocrites by keeping that place open. We should be an example to the rest of the world, not fall in lockstep with the degenerates.
Everyone should be treated with fairness and respect in a court of law until proven guilty. Period. That is the basis of any respectable judicial system. If they are found in a court of law to be guilty of terrorism, yes, lock them up.
There are no doubt terrorists being house at Guantanamo, but just as we assume that to be true, we must also assume innocent people are also being caged. To lump them in with terrorists is irresponsible. We should expect more of ourselves than that.
Neither you or I know what goes on at Gitmo. I leave it in the hands of people with intelligence that I am not privvy to. I'm certainly not going to get in the way of an organization (CIA) that is keeping me safe.
America has been in danger since 9/11. You may have hated George, but he didn't allow another terrorist attack on our soil on his watch.
If Obama starts playing by the rules with terrorists, they'll be the ones laughing at us just before they destroy us.
I'm not getting in the way either. Do either of us know the full story? Of course not. But many reports have said that while there are indeed legit terrorists housed there, there are also innocent people trapped. That is just not right, pure and simple.
I refuse to believe that a just judicial system and fighting terrorism are mutually exclusive. Closing Gitmo is far from playing by the rules of terrorists. It's playing by the rules of a world leader and a sense of decency.
Wait a minute: on the one hand you say it is your right and obligation to question the president and then you say you trust government to keep us safe, even though you don't know whatis going on in Gitmo? Make up your mind.
This is America. We need to act like it. I'm sick of our government successfully making a large percentage of the population afraid. That's why the republicans are no longer running the executive branch. Gitmo is not who we - Americans - are.
What evidence do you have that Bush protected us? Just because something did not happen doesn't mean anyone did anything to prevent it from happening.
It is you who are afraid and your emotion of fear is clouding your reality. I for one don't want to live in fear and don't want all the civil liberties our country was founded on to be taken away so I can live in a little less fear.
When we change our behavior because of the terrorists their agenda has been fullfilled. Go study the subject.
Fear makes us hide. But Hope: it brings a promise of a brighter tomorrow.
Update at 11:27 a.m. ET. "Consistent with our values":
The president said the orders he signed mean that "the United States intends to prosecute the ongoing struggle against violence and terrorists ... in a manner consistent with our values and our ideals."
Update at 11:26 a.m. ET. A third executive order, as the Associated Press writes:
Created a task force that would have 30 days to recommend policies on handling terror suspects who are detained in the future. Specifically, the group would look at where those detainees should be housed since Guantanamo is closing.
Update at 11:23 a.m. ET: Obama said a second executive order states that interrogations done by U.S. personnel will be conducted under procedures prescribed in the U.S. Army Field Manual. That means, he said, the U.S. will not torture those people it is holding.
That's leadertship. That's America. I fyou don't like it go chose another country to live in that you think does things better. I'd be curious to know where...
Are you joking? I've put up with 8 years of the constant complaining of liberals, independents, and Democrats. You've endured a few days. Deal with it.
I can question my leaders and have to rely on them to keep me safe. We have no other choice. They have all the information. It's their job. I have no power or information to make decisions and execute them. But, I will question them when I believe it's warranted.
If anyone respects this country, it's someone like me. Through good and bad, I've always appreciated what I have here. I would never leave...even if I don't agree with all the government's decisions.
Three days! Now you know how I, and all the conservatives, have felt for eight years. It's annoying to have people constantly putting down the government, isn't it? I give Obama credit for some of his decisions, but I won't sit back and chant "Yes We Can" while decisions are made that I find questionable.
I can respect my government, trust it, and disagree with it.
The only difference between liberals/Democrats and me is that I will respect Obama and I will realize that he is trying to do the right thing. That's more credit than any one of you gave George Bush.
If I ever said (outloud) that someone should leave the country because they didn't agree with the government, my deepest apologies. I can tell you that that statement boiled my blood. I should be able to disagree with and still love my country.
I never heard you questioning Bush, Cheney and that bunch like you have been the new administration over the past few days. Ever.
As far as your boiling blood, my comments was directed at your fears and trust that government will save us, which is in conflict to and contrasts with the values our country was based on: "As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals." I can’t agree more with that statement.
We either do things based on our ideals and values or we don’t. The very fact that I don't know what goes on at Gitmo is disconcerting, especially when they aren’t managing even in accordance with the U.S. Army Field Manual. We either use our laws, the Geneva Convention (International law) or the Army guidelines. We have been doing none of the above. It’s no wonder other nations see the US in more of a negative light; we don’t practice what we preach.
Time to boil your blood again: if you think there is another country that more closely matches your values why wouldn't you want to live there? Many moved to Canada when they didn’t agree with and didn’t want to go to Viet Nam. That’s a time period you should have live through; it would certainly have given you a different perspective the world in times of crisis. The closest you have actually experienced as an adult is the 2000 recession and 9/11. It’s no wonder you see things they way you do. I grew up practicing how to get under my desk at school in case of a nuclear attack and watching my father get called in to work in the Air Force base in the middle of the night when alerts were called.
I will not live my life in constant fear and I will not give up the liberties my country stands for and treat people bad because I am afraid. Because I am not afraid.
I questioned George Bush. I didn't agree with every one of his decsions. I didn't need to jump down his throat, though, because there were plenty of bandwagon hippies to take care of that.
Not too many are questioning Obama. They're too busy basking in the glow of an illision. Just trying to snap you all out of it. It wasn't needed for George.
You certainly aren't going to question the man you'll follow aimlessly to the ends of the earth. A few of us still have our feet on the ground and I'm equal to the task.
Anonymous said: "That's leadertship. That's America."
So far our leader has managed to never speak in absolute terms about anything, including his new interrogation policy.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123267082704308361.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
yes, i realize its an opinion piece, but the author makes the point better than i could.
So Obama scored points with France (yay!) by ending torture, which i understand, but i don't understand why it was necessary for him to let the world and our enemies know that we would handle prisoners in accordance with the US Army field manual (which is an unclasified document and widely available to the aspiring terrorist - nice!) It doesn't make sense to say that we will be a kinder, gentler America, but then leave the door open to going back to using the harsher techniques anyways! Come on man, make an ACTUAL decision.
Ah, a friend in politics.
You are absolutely right...why don't we just tell the terrorists exactly what we will do so they can train themselves to deal with interrogation as they take breaks from building bombs.
It's obvious that Obama doesn't have military experience. Sure wish John McCain could handle this one.
Barack has his strong points, but military isn't one of them.
So if I understand the last two posts, we should torture people we SUSPECT of being terrorists until they break down and tell us what we want to hear, regardless of the truth. Is that how you would want to be treated because the Patriot Act allows our government to treat ANYone that way - including you and me. This approach harkens to the puritan witch trials of our formative years as a country.
All it takes is for me to put the right bug in the right person's ear for you to be sent to Gitmo as well. If suspects don’t have the basic rights our forefathers fought for you don't either. Doesn’t that frighten you just a little bit? Take a moment to read George Orwell’s 1984. We are creating Big Brother.
As far as Obama having a military background, what is militaristic about how the terrorists operate? They don’t attack us with armies. What they did is figure out how to cause the most terror with their actions. If a few people die, that is just a bonus. The finest military organization in the history of the world has in 8 years been unable to capture the head of the terrorist organization we have supposedly been after all this time. We must really suck!
Or is it that this terrorism thing is not a military operation? We can't send armies, cruise missiles, and bombers in to stop terrorists. That approach hasn't worked so far and there is no reason to think it will work in the future. We have to be smart to win.
We were successful during the first Gulf War because it was carefully planned and executed. The big difference is that we had a coalition that included most of the rest of the world, united together. Moreover, we were fighting a true army with troops on the ground and planes in the air. And we used all sorts of other, more sophisticated tactics besides just brute military force. We need to make friends with all the countries that dislike us and won’t support us as they did in the Gulf War. So yes, it is important that France is once again our friend.
We are in trouble if we are the common enemy to other countries and ideologies. We are also in trouble every time word gets out that we tortured a suspected terrorist because that knowledge is used to recruit, train and incite even more terrorists.
We would learn from the pest control industry. They don’t bomb your house like the old days, trying to kill everything. They are much more sophisticated. It is much like how you get rid of ants in your house. The more you kill, the more the queen breeds more to take their place and you end up with even more ants than you had when you started. The way to get rid of them is to offer food the workers take back to their queen which kills the queen. The result: no more ants being produced. It’s the smart way, not the shock and awe method but much more effective.
It is indeed a sad thought when you consider that more people have lost their lives through wars and other methods over the centuries due to religious beliefs than any other reason. The terrorists hate us primarily because of religious differences. Europe spent nearly a thousand years on the crusades to eradicate the Muslim influence in the world and replace it with Christianity. The Jews have been fight over the Palestinian state since the time of Moses. Getting rid of Jews was the impetus behinds Hitler’s philosophy during WW II. Ethnic cleansing is a euphemism for the impact of religious intolerance. Race relations have nothing on religious relations.
So, either we believe in the ideals and laws of this country or we don’t. If we don’t believe in them we should change them. We are honest and true to our principles or we selectively enforce a different set of rules when it suits us. We need to decide to treat other people with respect or not. The only way I know to earn respect is to give respect.
By the way, I think the following from your WSJ article is pretty clear: Effective immediately, the interrogation of anyone "in the custody or under the effective control of an officer, employee, or other agent of the United States Government" will be conducted within the limits of the Army Field Manual.
Anything else in the article regarding possibilities in the future is conjecture until something changes.
How do you suppose we stop the terrorists? They aren't normal people. You don't kill them with kindness.
I hate war. I hate death.
But, seriously, you think we can make friends with people who, not only don't have the same moral code as we do, but don't have a moral code AT ALL?
I don't want to torture people. But, I'd rather us beat answers out of one mass murderer than lose thousands of more lives on American soil.
What is your solution? What is Obama's solution for that matter? We can't tuck our tail between our legs and hide. That tactic will not work with people like this.
See, it's all or nothing with you. Look at the color gray that is spread all in between.
So your answer is to grab people we suspect of being terrorists for some reason and beat the crap out of them? I don't get it. I haven't heard any realistic solutions from you other than we must keep Gitmo and we must torture suspected terrorists. Have you ever heard the term rendition? What is that happened to your or one of your family members?
Hey J: the Wall Street Journal has a good record of predicting the future. Here's a prediction they made in '07:
“Illinois Senator Barack Obama’s announcement this week that he’s likely to enter the Presidential race adds a dash of glamour and excitement to the Democratic field. But all of his media attention doesn’t change the basic truth of the 2008 primary contest: The race is between Hillary Rodham Clinton and everybody else.” -The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board, Jan. 18, 2007.
Do'h!!
I'm quite certain that we don't just grab people off the streets. Certainly, they are terrorists, have assisted terrorists or have given the government probable reason to hold them.
If they are terrorist, then yes...beat the crap out of them if you must to save the lives of innocent people.
What's your solution? Shall we all have a group hug? I guarantee you'll get a knife to the gut during our warm embrace.
Why do I feel like you're sticking up for terrorists just to spite me??!!!
You're as bad as Obama...stick up for terrorists and kill the unborn. Doesn't this sound the least bit peculiar to you?
I'm not sticking up for terrorists, to spite you or otherwise. Can you please tell me where I can pick up a handy dandy terrorist-meter so I can detect who to beat the crap out of without due process?
I've been very clear on my position and you choose to gloss over what I have repeatedly said about standing behind our constitution and the laws there to protect us. Inoccent until proven guilty, things like that.
It appears that Bill Clinton was actually the first president to keep us safe. Read on...
_______________________________
The newest fear-mongering campaign from the Right and the media
The latest fear-mongering campaign in the U.S. -- this one devoted to scaring Americans that they will be slaughtered if Guantanamo is closed and Terrorism suspects are brought into the U.S. for real trials -- is now in full swing. The New York Times today prints a front-page article claiming that a detainee released from Guantanamo last year has now become "the deputy leader of Al Qaeda’s Yemeni branch" (it's always amazing how bureaucratically structured Al Qaeda is alleged to be and how well we can discern the structure: "Deputy Leader, Yemen Branch"; do they have business cards and organizational charts?).
But the real fear-mongering is focused on all of the attacks that American communities will suffer if we imprison dangerous Terrorists inside the U.S. rather than in Guantanamo. House Minority Leader John Boehner wants you to be frightened: "I think the first thing we have to remember is that we're talking about terrorists here. Do we bring them into our borders?" GOP House Minority Whip Eric Cantor warned: "Actively moving terrorists inside our borders weakens our security. Most families neither want nor need hundreds of terrorists seeking to kill Americans in their communities." The always frightened Wall St. Journal Editorial Page shrieks that any place that houses Al Qaeda Terrorists will become a "target" for attack:
The military base [at Ft. Leavenworth] is integrated into the community and, lacking Guantanamo's isolation and defense capacities, would instantly become a potential terror target. Expect similar protests from other states that are involuntarily entered in this sweepstakes.
National Review's Jim Geraghaty spent all day yesterday fantasizing about all the scary things that could happen if we have Al-Qaeda Terrorists in our communities (near nuclear facilities and airports!). Former Bush aide and chief speechwriter Marc Thiessen warned yesterday in The Washington Post that if there is a Terrorist attack on U.S. soil, Americans will blame Obama because he stopped torturing and closed Guantanamo, and Democrats will be "unelectable for a generation." Today, at National Review, Thiessen, citing yesterday's Executive Orders, declared Obama "to be the most dangerous man ever to occupy the Oval Office." And yesterday, of course, The Washington Post's Fred Hiatt echoed the standard claim that our regular federal courts were inadequate to try dangerous Terrorists.
All of this is pure fear-mongering -- the 2009 version of Condoleezza Rice's mushroom cloud and Jay Rockefeller's "we'll-lose-our-eavesdropping-capabilities" cries. Both before and after 9/11, the U.S. has repeatedly and successfully tried alleged high-level Al Qaeda operatives and other accused Islamic Terrorists in our normal federal courts -- in fact, the record is far more successful than the series of debacles that has taken place in the military commissions system at Guantanamo. Moreover, those convicted Terrorists have been housed in U.S. prisons, inside the U.S., for years without a hint of a problem. Here is but a partial list of the accused Muslim Terrorists who have been successfully tried and convicted in U.S. civilians courts and who remain imprisoned inside the U.S.:
• Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, convicted, 1996, U.S. District Court (before then-U.S. District Judge Michael Mukasey) -- plotting terrorist attacks on the U.S. (currently: U.S. prison, Butler, North Carolina);
•
• Zacarias Moussaoui, convicted, 2006, U.S. Federal Court -- conspiracy to commit the 9/11 attacks (currently: U.S. prison, Florence, Colorado);
•
• Richard Reid, convicted, 2003, U.S. Federal Court -- attempting to blow up U.S.-bound jetliner over the Atlantic Ocean (currently: U.S. prison, Florence, Colorado);
•
• Jose Padilla, convicted, 2007, U.S. Federal Court -- conspiracy to commit terrorism (currently: U.S. prison, Florence, Colorado);
•
• Iyman Faris a/k/a/ Mohammad Rauf, convicted, 2003, U.S. Federal Court -- providing material support and resources to Al-Qaeda, conspiracy to commit terrorist acts on behalf of Al Qaeda (currently: U.S. prison, Florence, Colorado);
•
• Ali Saleh al-Marri, accused Al Qaeda operative -- not yet tried, held as "unlawful enemy combatant" (currently: U.S. Naval Brig, Hanahan, South Carolina);
•
• Masoud Khan, convicted, 2004, U.S. Federal Court -- conspiracy to commit terrorism as part of Lashkar-e-Taiba and Islamic jihad (currently: U.S. prison, Terre Haute, Indiana);
•
• John Walker Lindh, convicted, 2002, U.S. Federal Court -- providing material support to the Taliban (currently: U.S. prison, Florence, Colorado).
•
That's just a partial list. Both pre- and post-9/11, there are numerous other individuals who have been convicted in U.S. civilian courts of various acts relating to terrorism inspired by Islamic radicalism, including many alleged to be high-level Terrorists, who are now serving sentences inside the U.S., in U.S. prisons. Moreover, terrorists accused of being members of Al Qaeda and affiliated groups have been successfully tried in the regular courts of other countries -- including Britain and Spain -- and currently sit in those countries' regular prisons, without a whiff of a problem.
If it were really the goal of Terrorists to attack American prisons where their members are incarcerated and if they were actually capable of doing that, they already have a long list of "targets" and have had such a list for two decades. If U.S. civilian courts were inadequate forums for obtaining convictions of Terrorism suspects, then the above-listed individuals would not be imprisoned -- most of them for life -- while the Guantanamo military commission system still has nothing to show for it other than a series of humiliating setbacks for the Government. As is true for virtually every fear-mongering claim made over the last eight years to frighten Americans into believing that they must vest the Government with vast and un-American powers lest they be slaughtered by the Terrorists, none of these claims is remotely rational and all of them are empirically disproven.
UPDATE: The crime for which Omar Abdel Rahman was convicted and for which he's currently serving a life sentence in Colorado is the February 26, 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, of which Rahman was the alleged "mastermind." That terrorist attack took place just seven weeks after Bill Clinton was inaugurated, but after that attack -- to use the Beltway parlance -- Clinton kept us safe, for the rest of his presidency. No more foreign Terrorist attacks on the Homeland. It wasn't until Clinton left the Oval Office and George Bush became President were Islamic Terrorists able to strike the Homeland again.
Therefore, using the reasoning of Bush followers everywhere, this means that Clinton's counter-terrorism policies -- i.e.: trying accused Terrorists in civilian courts and incarcerating them in U.S. prisons -- have been proven to be extremely effective in keeping us safe (since, as any beginning student of Logic will tell you: if A precedes B, then it means that A caused B -- as in: A = "waterboarding, torture and GITMO," and B = "no Terrorist attack on U.S. soil from 2002-2008"). Using that same "logic": A = "trying Terrorists in civilian courts and imprisoning them in the U.S.," and B = "no foreign Terrorist attacks in the U.S. from February, 1993 through the end of the Clinton presidency."
We don't pick people off the streets. They must do something suspicious to be suspected.
Yes, they should be tried, but...letting them out or pretending like terrorists don't exist is not going to keep us safe.
Oh, and Bill Clinton was a little busy to care much about keeping the average American safe.
Had he not been messing around, perhaps he would've seen the signs of 9/11 (years in the making) and done something to help before the attack occured.
I'd rather George Bush have my back than Bill Clinton or Barack Obama.
""We don't pick people off the streets. They must do something suspicious to be suspected.
Yes, they should be tried, but...letting them out or pretending like terrorists don't exist is not going to keep us safe.""
___________________________
No one said we should let them out. I challenge you to find that expectation anywhere. And no one said we should pretend terrorists don't exist.
What I have said all along is that we use follow our own laws and due process or, if this is a military situation, follow international laws, the Geneva Convention or the Army manual. What we have been doing is criminal.
This is why I give you a hard time about seeing the gray area that exists between black and white. Based on your response you seem to think I feel we should let all the terrorists out. That is ludicrous and couldn’t be further from the truth.
And we do pick people off the streets in the form of arresting the wrong people due to a similar name or other fanciful thinking. I used the example of a Canadian fellow some time back who was pulled off a flight and sent off to another country for nearly two years of torture, only to be later released. You should watch the movie Rendition which covers this subject. In fact, I challenge you to do so if you are up to what you will see.
Our laws are there for the protection of everyone. We live in a country where you are innocent until proven guilty. You can't cherry pick when you want to enforce that law; otherwise it will be just like living under any dictatorship where you can be arrested and quietly put away or under a regime like communist Russia.
As for your comments in Bill - well, they are a little silly. If you want to argue that GW kept us safe you must also argue that Bill kept us safe with he same logic, so either put away the GW logic or accept the Bill logic - you can't have it both ways. As far as Bill’s peccadilloes, that behavior had nothing to do with what he did or didn’t see. If you want to start on that I’ll have to start on all the problems with gay priests and all the cover up that has come with those issues. You’d be better off to keep the lid on that can of worms as it is just an irrelevant as your Bill comment.
Who has your back is your choice. To me, it’s not about who has my back but who is leading us forward. If that is handled correctly I won’t need anyone to have my back.
This is a bad idea. Period. Okay, if you want to have interrogation tactics looked into, fine.
You can't possibly think that closing it is a good idea.
Good for you that you don't live in fear. Neither do I. I live in reality. We need to be realistic. We can't "make love, not war". The hippie days are long gone. There will be no group hug. We have to defeat or be defeated. These aren't human beings we're dealing with.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23yemen.html
I don't know how to make it any clearer. Go read the constitution. You obviously don't understand what the document, along with the bill of rights says. You want your cake and be able to eat it as well.
I am finished with this debate because it isn't a debate.
What does this have to do with the constitution? You want to give equal rights to mass murdering terrorists? Shall we give them the right to vote and collect unemployment too?
What does it matter to you if they keep Gitmo open? It can only benefit your safety.
Frankly, I'm amazed that you care so much when there's so much hurt and suffering going on with innocent Americans.
I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree, but I foresee a Gitmo cast-out ending up as the mastermind of a future attack. What we do right now can seriously impact our future.
It's time to make good decisions.
First of all, they aren't letting these people go. Second, you ask what this has to do with the constitution: you obviously need to read and understand the constitution before you get all political opinionated. The costinution and bill of rights has everything to do with due process, inoccent until proven guilty, etc.
You said: "I'm amazed that you care so much when there's so much hurt and suffering going on with innocent Americans." Innocent Americans is whio these laws also protect.
Just keep these poeple in prison but give them the due process our laws guarantee.
I'll save you some research. Here's what it has to do with the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the US Army Field Manual:
Preamble
The Preamble to the Bill of Rights:
Congress of the United States begun and held at the City of New-York, on Wednesday the fourth of March, one thousand seven hundred and eighty nine.
THE Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution.
RESOLVED by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, two thirds of both Houses concurring, that the following Articles be proposed to the Legislatures of the several States, as amendments to the Constitution of the United States, all, or any of which Articles, when ratified by three fourths of the said Legislatures, to be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of the said Constitution; viz.
ARTICLES in addition to, and Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, proposed by Congress, and ratified by the Legislatures of the several States, pursuant to the fifth Article of the original Constitution.
• Fourth Amendment – Protection from unreasonable search and seizure.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
• Fifth Amendment – due process, double jeopardy, self-incrimination, eminent domain.
No person shall be held to answer for any capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
• Sixth Amendment – Trial by jury and rights of the accused; Confrontation Clause, speedy trial, public trial, right to counsel
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district where in the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense.
• Seventh Amendment – Civil trial by jury.
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.
• Eighth Amendment – Prohibition of excessive bail and cruel and unusual punishment.
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Regarding the US Army Field Manual:
Interrogations during the 'global war on terror'
Release of the replacement manual in 2006
During the American war on terror the Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld issued "enhanced interrogation techniques" that went farther than those authorized in the Army Field Manual. The extended techniques stimulated debate, both within the Bush administration, and outside it. Various revisions of the extended techniques were issued.
Rumsfeld intended the extended techniques to be used only on the captives the United States classified as "illegal combatants." But extended interrogation techniques were adopted in Iraq, even though captives there were entitled to protection under the Geneva Conventions. General Geoffrey Miller, who was then the director of interrogation of detainees held in Guantanamo Bay, and some of his staff were sent to Iraq to help transfer their interrogation experience. Military Intelligence troops had been using extended techniques in Afghanistan, notably Captain Carolyn Wood. General Ricardo Sanchez, the CO of American forces in Iraq, after input from Miller and his team, and from Captain Wood, issued his own set of extended techniques.
U.S. military forces have been trained to follow a General Order known as the Code of the U.S. Fighting Force. [1] It provides in relevant part:
a. When questioned, should I become a prisoner of war, I am required to give name, rank, service number, and date of birth. I will evade answering further questions to the utmost of my ability. I will make no oral or written statements disloyal to my country and its allies or harmful to their cause.
b. When questioned, a prisoner of war is required by the Geneva Convention and this code to give name, rank, service number (Social Security number) and date of birth. The prisoner should make every effort to avoid giving the captor any additional information. The prisoner may communicate with captors on matters of health and welfare and additionally may write letters home and fill out a Geneva Convention "capture card."
c. It is a violation of the Geneva Convention to place a prisoner under physical or mental duress, torture or any other form of coercion in an effort to secure information.
As a General Order, violation of the Code is a prosecutable offense under various provisions of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Although intended to the duties of captured members of the U.S. military, the Code provides U.S. combatants with an understood definition of the rights of prisoners under the Geneva Convention. It is therefore understandable that members of the military, who are themselves subject to the occupational hazard of being taken prisoner, might resist political pressure to depart from the Geneva Convention's ethic of reciprocity regarding warring powers' treatment of those captured on the battlefield.
Detainee Treatment Act
On July 25, 2005 Senator John McCain — a POW and torture victim during the Vietnam War — submitted an amendment to a military spending bill, intended to restrict all US government interrogators from using interrogation techniques not authorized in the Army Field Manual.
On October 20, 2005 Vice President Dick Cheney met with McCain to try to convince him to agree that his amendment should only apply to military interrogators. Cheney wanted to continue to allow civilian interrogators, working for US intelligence agencies, to use more extended interrogation techniques. McCain did not agree.
McCain's amendment passed, and is now called the Detainee Treatment Act.
Plans to revise the manual to allow extended techniques
On April 28, 2005 Defense Secretary Rumsfeld announced that the Army would be revising the manual. The revised manual would have spelled out more clearly which interrogation techniques were prohibited.
On December 14, 2005, the New York Times reported that the Army Field Manual had been rewritten by the Pentagon. Previously, the manual's interrogation techniques section could be read freely on the internet. But the new edition's includes 10 classified pages in the interrogation technique section, leaving the public no indication about what the government considers not to be torture. [2]
On June 5, 2006 the Los Angeles Times reported that the Pentagon's revisions will remove the proscription against "humiliating and degrading treatment", and other proscriptions from article 3 of the third Geneva Convention.[3] [4] The LA Times reports that the State Department has argued against the revisions because of the effect it will have on the world's opinion of the United States.
In 2006 there was an ongoing debate over whether the interrogation section should be classified. The New York Times reported that the Pentagon was considering making the interrogation section public once again, but the Pentagon made no formal announcement of its intentions.
On September 6, 2006, the U.S. Army announced the publication of Field Manual (FM) 2-22.3, "Human Intelligence Collector Operations." The Army's news release stated that Field Manual 2-22.3 replaces Field Manual 34-52 (published in 1992).
You would think making the techniques public would potentially scare terrorists. The only good reason to keep it secret is to keep it from the American public. These are your protections under the law. Lose them at your peril.
I think you're frustrated because you don't think I "get" your point. I do.
I don't understand the ins and outs of the interrogation process and, by the way, neither do you.
If you read through the entry, I don't say "torture and kill 'em all".
I'm confused as to why he put this so high on his priority while so many other pressing issues affect actual Americans.
I think he put the cart before the horse and should've laid out a detailed plan so people like me didn't have to worry about what the hell they will do with terrorists who want me dead.
I believe in the constitution and, under no circumstances, do I want an innocent person to be held and/or tortured. But, in typical Obama fashion, he has no plan in place. He shoots from the hip. He needs to slow the hell down and work through these things before he starts "changing" the country.
I understand that we are a country that prides itself in the following of our constitution. I do as well. I am dismayed to hear (on more than just Fox News) that terrorists held and released from Gitmo are back on the field and planning their attacks.
They won't end up in OUR backyard due to simple geography. We aren't a state that terrorists would be inclined to target. But, I worry for fellow Americans.
Back to the point...I don't know why he put this at the top of the list. Let's help Americans who are in trouble before we help the suspected terrorists who are in trouble.
The closing of Gitmo requires serious thought, planning, correspondence with military officials, etc. etc.
I noticed at one of his inaugural balls, he sidestepped a soldier's offer to visit them in Afghan.
Interesting.
He wants to please his liberal voters, celebrities, and PACs who supported him...at the possible expense of our safety. This is NOT okay with me.
Is it okay with you? Can you concede that he should've had an outlined plan and met with military officials before making this bold and erratic move?
He hasn't closed anything yet - that is a year or more away. He is just beginning the process to right a serious wrong the country voted him in to right.
The previous administration a) tortured detainees, making it harder to prosecute dangerous terrorists; b) released bad guys while detaining good guys; and c) neglected to keep comprehensive files on possible terrorists who've been in U.S. custody for several years. As if the fiasco at Gitmo weren't hard enough to clean up.
I'm reminded of something John Cole said the other day: "The moral of this story is not the danger for Obama going forward with his Gitmo decommissioning, the moral is that when venal, shallow, small men are given unfettered power and authority, they do incompetent, stupid, and evil things."
And from teh Washington Post...it's a good thing he got started on it now:
Guantanamo Case Files in Disarray
Situation Complicates Prison's Closure
By Karen DeYoung and Peter Finn
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, January 25, 2009; Page A05
President Obama's plans to expeditiously determine the fates of about 245 terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and quickly close the military prison there were set back last week when incoming legal and national security officials -- barred until the inauguration from examining classified material on the detainees -- discovered that there were no comprehensive case files on many of them.
Instead, they found that information on individual prisoners is "scattered throughout the executive branch," a senior administration official said. The executive order Obama signed Thursday orders the prison closed within one year, and a Cabinet-level panel named to review each case separately will have to spend its initial weeks and perhaps months scouring the corners of the federal government in search of relevant material.
Several former Bush administration officials agreed that the files are incomplete and that no single government entity was charged with pulling together all the facts and the range of options for each prisoner. They said that the CIA and other intelligence agencies were reluctant to share information, and that the Bush administration's focus on detention and interrogation made preparation of viable prosecutions a far lower priority.
"The consensus among almost everyone is that the current system is not in our national interest and not sustainable," another senior official said. But "it's clear that we can't clear up this issue overnight" partly because the files "are not comprehensive."
Charles D. "Cully" Stimson, who served as deputy assistant defense secretary for detainee affairs in 2006-2007, said he had persistent problems in attempts to assemble all information on individual cases. Threats to recommend the release or transfer of a detainee were often required, he said, to persuade the CIA to "cough up a sentence or two."
A second former Pentagon official said most individual files are heavily summarized dossiers that do not contain the kind of background and investigative work that would be put together by a federal prosecution team. He described "regular food fights" among different parts of the government over information-sharing on the detainees.
A CIA spokesman denied that the agency had not been "forthcoming" with detainee information, saying that such suggestions were "simply wrong" and that "we have worked very closely with other agencies to share what we know" about the prisoners. While denying there had been problems, one intelligence official said the Defense Department was far more likely to be responsible for any information lapses, since it had initially detained and interrogated most of the prisoners and had been in charge of them at the prison.
"Fundamentally, we believe that the individual files on each detainee are comprehensive and sufficiently organized," Morrell said. He added that "in many cases, there will be thousands of pages of documents . . . which makes a comprehensive assessment a time-consuming endeavor."
"Not all the documents are physically located in one place," Morrell said, but most are available through a database.
"The main point here is that there are lots of records, and we are prepared to make them available to anybody who needs to see them as part of this review."
There have been indications from within and outside the government for some time, however, that evidence and other materials on the Guantanamo prisoners were in disarray, even though most of the detainees have been held for years.
Justice Department lawyers responding in federal courts to defense challenges over the past six months have said repeatedly that the government was overwhelmed by the sudden need to assemble material after Supreme Court rulings giving detainees habeas corpus and other rights.
In one federal filing, the Justice Department said that "the record . . . is not simply a collection of papers sitting in a box at the Defense Department. It is a massive undertaking just to produce the record in this one case." In another filing, the department said that "defending these cases requires an intense, inter-agency coordination of efforts. None of the relevant agencies, however, was prepared to handle this volume of habeas cases on an expedited basis."
Evidence gathered for military commission trials is in disarray, according to some former officials, who said military lawyers lacked the trial experience to prosecute complex international terrorism cases.
In a court filing this month, Darrel Vandeveld, a former military prosecutor at Guantanamo who asked to be relieved of his duties, said evidence was "strewn throughout the prosecution offices in desk drawers, bookcases packed with vaguely-labeled plastic containers, or even simply piled on the tops of desks."
He said he once accidentally found "crucial physical evidence" that "had been tossed in a locker located at Guantanamo and promptly forgotten."
From the time of King Henry VIII during the religious intolerance that sprang from Henry's wish for a divorce and all the horror that followed:
_______________________
William Roper: So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!
Sir Thomas More: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
William Roper: Yes, I'd cut down every law in England to do that!
Sir Thomas More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
Post a Comment