Despite the obstructionist tactics used by the Left, the Bush administration should have moved to begin war tribunals faster.
Were I arguing for the defense, I don't see how these guys can get a fair trial, especially being blocks from the scene of an American tragedy.
If it took four years to prosecute Zacarias Moussaoui. This circus will take years, cost tens of millions of dollars and give a forum to these bastards as they are paraded in and out of court. The families and friends of the 3,000 will be forced to relive this over and over.
This Obama Administration and AG Holder have set a catastrophic precedent for years to come.
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17 comments:
So you are saying that the constitution only applies to citizens?
Should we shed out place in the world as a country of rights and due process by going against the core foundations of our society?
The US constitution applies only to US citizens and residents. These men were captured on a foreign battlefield and are enemy combatants. They represent a movement, not a nation/state and therefore the US constitution nor Geneva convention applies.
When KSM and his conspirators perpetrated was not a crime - it was a terrorist act of war against the US and should be treated s such.
4:38, thank you for educating 1:42!
These scum should be left at Guantanomo Bay and tried there by a military tribunal. Since Obama took office, he continues to show his lack of tact, experience and judgment expected from a president. The overwhelming backlask against this decision of his has already begun.
i hope we lock you up and put you gitmo, 5:00. no due process, no problem.
frankly i think all the tea baggers belong there - they are subversive and dangerous to this country - more so than most terrorists.
WSP - General ignorance?
No one stated that there is no justice in a military tribunal. It's a different order of procedure.
Military tribunals (which includes a "legitimate trial") throughout history have produced guilty verdicts and acquittals. One doesn't have to look far to see that at Nuremberg, the tribunal had a variety of outcomes for the accused. You make it sound like the accused are walked into a court without representation, are pronounced guilty and then are taken out back and shot. Nothing is further from the truth.
I suspect that you and I differ in on a single item: you believe that the attacks of 9/11 were a civil crime and I view them as crimes against humanity tantamount to an act of war.
Geneva conventions are only extended to nations who abide by the conventions. The last time I checked, al Qaeda was not a nation, but a movement and is certainly not a signatory of the conventions.
The Bill of Rights invokes the term 'citizen' and 'we the people of the United States' as those covered by the Bill of Rights. It specifically states in Article IV, Section 2 that citizens of the US are entitled to the privileges and immunities set forth.
As for 10:40, I'm glad he'd lock up 5:00 without due process along with the 'tea baggers', as he so crudely states. Seeing that we are engaged in a debate over constitutional rights and such, to deny persons of his their amendment right and imprison them without due process is deliciously ironic.
Re: "Despite the obstructionist tactics used by the Left, the Bush administration should have moved to begin war tribunals faster."
I couldn't agree more.
I blame Bush for this fiasco.
He should have powered the Gitmo tribunals through and ignored all of the screaming and caterwauling of the left.
The terrorists would be dead and we'd not be having this conversation right now. (We'd be talking about how bad Bush was --- but the terrorists would still be dead and not in NYC)
When civilians are tried by military tribunal, under international law they must be afforded special category status. They must also be tried by a court that consists of international military jurists, as was the case under the Nuremberg trials which saw the Allies conduct the largest military-based criminal trail in the history of man.
The masterminds behind the 9/11 attacks could have been tried by the International Criminal Court at the Hague, but the US has not signed up to the convention that set in motion the ICC. Those nations that joined in the coalition to overthrow the Taliban and Sadam Hussein would be legally correct in demanding a place on the panel of jurists should a military tribunal take place. The outcome may not offer the desired result based on the international makeup of this tribunal.
We can not let emotions stand in the way of doing the correct thing in reference to putting those responsible for 9/11 on trial in a civilian criminal court. This is correct because the culprits behind 9/11 are civilians, not military personnel and most importantly they are terrorists. When you afford terrorists the right to trial under military tribunal, you put their crimes on a level that equates their crimes as military action against the enemy, the enemy in their eyes being the United States. By following this course of action you might also heighten the strength of their followers around the world and the cause that their actions were military based actions This would be wrong.
What the current administration has done by declaring that the masterminds behind 9/11 will stand trial in civilian criminal court in Manhattan for the murder of over 3,000 innocent victims is correct. Terrorists are criminals. They are not soldiers, they are not combatants, they are plain and simple criminals and they should be treated as such, without the fanfare of special attention being afforded to their crimes.
In Europe, numerous governments have been fighting terrorism using civilian-based criminal justice systems. Giving terrorists special category status is wrong and it brings a greater focus to the cause for which they commit their terrorist acts. During the 1981 Hunger Strikes in Northern Ireland, the IRA/INLA terrorists that died, starved themselves to death for POW (Special Category Status). At the time, the Regan Administration towed the line with the British Government, stating that the 10 men who died had committed murder, criminal acts and were therefore not to be treated as prisoners of war as they were not soldiers but common criminals.
This must be the same stance that we adopt here in the US in regards to the masterminds of 9/11 regardless of how hard it will be for those who lost husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, sons and daughters. To give these terrorists the recognition that they are different, and that their crimes are different from any other mass murderer would be wrong. We should not elevate their crimes to enhance their global profile but we should treat them like the rats they are and bring them before a jury of the men and women that they tried to destroy.
What greater way for us to say to these and any other terrorists that they may bring death and destruction to our land but they will always be caught and brought back here to answer before its people.
They should stand trial in New York as criminals and they should be unmasked by the people of New York for the criminals they are and the martyrs they are not.
2:13 - WRONG.
1) The US Supreme Court has agreed that the Military Tibunals as established in Guantanemo Bay for the purpose of trying those enemy combatants IS LAWFUL.
2) The Obama Administration WILL be having Military Tribunals for SOME of the enemy combatants.
If the Military Tribunbal is legal and will be used, then why isn't KSM, the confessed mastermind of the 9/11 terroist atttacks having a Military Tribunal?
If you are going to pick and choose which enemy combatants will be tried in civil court and which ones will be tried in a Military Tribunal, then wouldn't a rational person decide that the most serious ones be tried under Military Tribunal, with the more minor ones being tried in civil court?
The Obama Administration wants this circus for its own reasons - none of which have to do with Justice and none of which has the best interests of the United States foremost.
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Oh and here's a fun fact for everyone else reading this - other than 2:13...
The Obama Administration has decided to reclassify enemy combatants they want to try in civil court as "detainees" in an attempt to negate the Military Tribunal option.
Very cute.
10:12 - Why I am wrong? Everything you state has got to do with your distain for the current administration and nothing to do with what is the correct thing to do? What is your point in all of this other than trying to get a political view across?
1) The US Supreme Court has agreed that the Military Tribunals as established in Guantanamo Bay for the purpose of trying those enemy combatants IS LAWFUL.
The enemy combatants are not US citizens and are not on US soil and are engaged in an act of war... not engaged in a criminal act.
Reasonable people know that they should be tried in a Military tribunal.
No political posturing from me. You are just wrong, likely the victim of a well intentioned but misguided sense of relatavistic "fairness".
4:56 pm. That is where you are wrong! The decision of the US Supreme Court was wrong. The court’s decision came about as a direct result of the influence of the Bush Administration’s bullying tactics and the total disregard of all sections of the 3rd Convention of the Geneva Conventions (including all pertinent articles as they relate to the definition and treatment of enemy combatants.) On the one hand, the previous administration declared that all members of the Taliban and Al Qaeda were unlawful enemy combatants and in citing Ex parte Quirin, 317 U.S. 1, 37-38 (1942) as its guideline for doing so, the US Supreme Court mistakenly declared the lawful use of military tribunals. Then President Bush declared that those captured were members of a non-state actor terrorist group. No government has ever declared terrorists as combatants, either lawful or unlawful. A very confusing situation arose and nobody has addressed its need to be corrected.
My whole point is this, and it seems to have been lost on you as you are stuck on this whole “military tribunal” thing, when terrorists are afforded combatant status and are sent before a military tribunal, it legitimizes their cause. We must NOT legitimize their cause because if we do, then they have gained major recognition in the eyes of their collaborators and allies across the world. It will be very hard to put them to death because international law and our allies will not allow it. And before you start on about the fact that this is US issue, it is not! It is a global issue and the US has to be very mindful of its allies that are fighting side by side with it in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Intelligent people know that these terrorists must be treated as common criminals to show the world that they are not the martyrs that they say they are. They committed mass murder and they must spend the rest of their days in jail as common criminals or face the pertinent death sentence as allowable in the US justice system which is death by lethal injection and in very rare occasions death in the electric chair. Because if they are brought before a military tribunal and are found guilty, they can not be sentenced to death under the current terms of the civilian criminal death sentence. Under military law, they must either be hanged or shot by firing squad as is stated in the international rules of law as set by the Geneva Conventions governing the punishment of those responsible for the deaths of innocent civilians during attacks by enemy combatants which these guys are not.
So the end the conversation here, on my behalf, they are criminals and they deserve to be treated as criminals. Review the law, not only US law but international law if you want to comment further.
1:23am said it all. So, forget any opinion you may have individually - he has spoken (well documented, yet morally misguided IMHO).
Re: "The decision of the US Supreme Court was wrong."
Oh, OK, I understand, we are now allowed to pick and choose which laws we want to follow and which laws we don't want to follow?
Just exactly when did THAT law pass in this "nation of laws" called the United States?
"The decision of the US Supreme Court was wrong. The court’s decision came about as a direct result of the influence of the Bush Administration’s bullying tactics..."
Yeah, that Supreme Court is a bunch of pansies...
"Terrorism" is like calling a mouse, a chupacabra
Come forward from your 9/10 mentality. Terrorism is a state of mind created by someone or a group willing to alter others lives by paralyzing them with fear.
Do you remember going to the local malls after 9/11 and seeing military carrying weapons with live ammo? Just because we haven't had an incident that hit close to home in 8 years mean that a future attack is unlikely.
It is the tone set by the current WH that terrorism does not exist that opens the door to terrorists within our borders.
To paraphrase 1138, the Obama admin calls a jackal a lamb.
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