I noticed yesterday that the “military analysts” employed by the networks were not only helping the administration spin on Rumsfeld, but actually admitted on the air that they were giving the pentagon advice on how to handle the problem.
This post at TPM by Larry Johnson fills in the details of an ongoing propaganda effort that must be well known among the networks. Johnson prints a letter from his friend Pat Lang, who had been part of the arrangement for a while:
Over several months (this was in ’04) I attended meetings in the Pentagon and participated in conference calls with very senior officials (both military and civilian). The Pentagon meetings were well attended by a variety of retired generals, colonels, Navy captains and a few retired NCOs, all of whom were familiar faces from TV news. Most of them were cable people, and there was a disproportionate representation from Fox News as well as people who were both TV commentators and think tankers, mostly from AEI and Heritage. There were several retired four star generals present whom I had never seen on the tube, but who may have been off camera consultants.
The Defense staff always made their case for the correctness of the policies followed by the administration and handed out “talking points” as suggestions. The retired officers listened politely with clear skepticism on the part of quite a few. There was always an opportunity for Q&A and a lot of the questions were both polite and very pointed. Some of the questions were not well answered. This was the period of the emerging Abu Ghraib mess, and many of the officers attending were bitter and unhappy over what had been happening in that matter.
[…]
My impression was that the media consultant officers at these events wanted and needed the access provided in order to be secure in their retirement employment. The media companies obviously valued that. After all, most of them are commercial enterprises and cannot afford to have their rival companies granted such access if they are not. This creates a certain pressure on the retired military people involved to stay “on the reservation.”
Lang concludes that on the whole these retired officers try to do the right thing. Perhaps. But after the performance of General Shepperd on CNN yesterday, I think it’s pretty clear that some of them, at least, believe they are full members of the administration’s tribe — and if they were critical it was because they were having a rough time making Rummy’s case for him.
It would be very helpful if the public knew about these special briefings and knew especially that the pentagon was sponsoring these military analysts’ “fact-finding” trips to Iraq. Why isn’t this disclosed?
In recent years many states and cities have moved to overhaul lineups, as DNA evidence has exposed nearly 200 wrongful convictions, three-quarters of them resulting primarily from bad eyewitness identification.
In the new method, the police show witnesses one person at a time, instead of several at once, and the lineup is overseen by someone not connected to the case, to avoid anything that could steer the witness to the suspect the police believe is guilty.
But now, the long-awaited results of an experiment in Illinois have raised serious questions about the changes. The study, the first to do a real-life comparison of the old and new methods, found that the new lineups made witnesses less likely to choose anyone. When they did pick a suspect, they were more likely to choose an innocent person.
Witnesses in traditional lineups, by contrast, were more likely to identify a suspect and less likely to choose a face put in the lineup as filler.
Advocates of the new method said the Illinois study, conducted by the Chicago Police Department, was flawed, because officers supervised the traditional lineups and could have swayed witnesses.
But the results have empowered many critics who had worried that states and cities were caving in to advocacy groups in adopting the new lineups without solid evidence that they improved on the old ones.
“There are people who’d say it’s better to let 10 guilty persons free to protect against one innocent person being wrongfully convicted,” said Roy S. Malpass, a professor at the University of Texas at El Paso and an analyst for the Illinois study, who served on a research group on eyewitness identification for the National Institute of Justice in 1999.
“I’m fine with that when we’re dealing with juvenile shoplifters,” Dr. Malpass said. “I’m not fine with that for terrorists. We haven’t figured out the risk there.”
Setting aside the efficacy or non-efficacy of the ID method being discussed, which I cannot assess, I can’t help but be struck at how confident this Doctor is that he’s not going to be that one innocent person. How I wish people like him would be wrongfully accused so they could see how it might feel. Like so many law and order types it’s apparently too abstract for him to understand otherwise so he needs to personally experience it.
Blackstone’s ratio is not some silly bleeding heart notion — it’s a recognition that while the system cannot be perfect, you must make a moral decision as to which side it will err on. For crying out loud, terrorism is not some magic word that changes every tenet of western civilization.
But maybe we aren’t really about western civilization at all anymore. Maybe we are becoming more like Singapore, the wingnut dream:
If, in the event of effective crime prevention, a few innocent people are punished or a few guilty ones are over-punished, that would be a price worth paying.
And it’s so nice and clean, too. With good prices.
Nobody wants to let the guilty go free. But the state imprisoning innocent people belongs in a special circle of hell and it taints us all. Terrorism certainly does not excuse it. When a state gives up that principle and simply accepts that a certain percentage of innocent people will be imprisoned because it’s too difficult to sort them out from the guilty ones, it has lost its civilized moorings. Guantanamo says it all about where the US is on that.
In case anyone ever had the mistaken impression that the network “military analysts,” are any more neutral or non-partisan than the retired generals who have stepped forward to ask for Rumsefeld’s resignation, think again:
BLITZER: And this is just coming in to CNN right now. The Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has just wrapped up his meeting with retired U.S. generals who now serve as military analysts for the news media. Our own military analyst, retired U.S. Air Force Major General Don Shepperd, is fresh out of the meeting. He’s joining us now live from the Pentagon.
General Shepperd, thanks very much. How did it go? Tell our viewers how the defense secretary specifically responded to all these suggestions from other retired military generals that he stepped down?
MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD, U.S. AIR FORCE (RET.): Yes, very little, Wolf. Everybody expected the headlines out of this to be that the secretary says the following things and the focus of the meeting was very little on that. It came up from time to time, mainly from our own questions, but basically the focus was on how the war in Iraq is going, how it would have been different in the past if, and that type of thing. It was not about the retired generals’ controversy although the secretary is clearly distracted by and it worried about and it concerned about it. And he listened to a lot of things from the group.
BLITZER: Well, did anyone — any of the retired generals and admirals who were there, did any of them step up and offer criticism of the secretary of defense?
SHEPPERD: No, it wasn’t criticism of the secretary of defense. We basically offered our ideas about the fact of, look, the message is not getting out. If you say that we’re doing well in the war, what is the message for the American people? What is the next thing the American people are going to see in the way of an event they can see some progress?
And the answer was unanimous from both the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and also the secretary. It’s the formation of the Iraqi government. That’s the next important event and from there, the continuing training of the Iraqi forces. That’s the message, Wolf.
BLITZER: When you say that it was clear these calls from these retired generals for him to step down, including the commander of — the former commander of the 82nd Airborne Division, former commander of the First Infantry Division, both of whom served in Iraq, it’s weighing heavily on him, what does that mean? How could you tell?
SHEPPERD: Look, he has got to be concerned about this. His words — evidence concern, no question about that. But, basically, General Pace kind of picked up the ball on this and said, look, I don’t know where these guys are coming from. We had regular sessions.
The big generals, the combatant commanders, General Franks and the others, two chiefs of staff of the Air Force, two commandants of the Marine Corps, two chiefs of staff of the Army, two chairmen of the Joint Chiefs — all of these people made their inputs, voiced their concerns, we talked it out.
Then we all agreed on General Franks plan, that it was a good one. We all had a hand in this. The fact that people say they weren’t consulted was simply not true. They may not have had their own ideas accepted but they definitely were consulted and a lot of people had a voice on this.
BLITZER: How many general did he invite to this session today?
SHEPPERD: They weren’t all generals by any means. It’s the normal — the usual suspects you see on TV as analysts and read in the print media, as well, and hear on radio. There were 15 of us there. I think probably a group of 30 or 40 was invited. Just about the same size group we usually had. It’s been as low as 15 and as high as 30.
BLITZER: Was there any moment that really was a poignant or dramatic moment that stands out in your mind, General Shepherd? A moment of some tension or some humor, if you will?
SHEPPERD: Well, you know the secretary was really in a good mood, so was the chairman. These people are not troubled people. They are concerned people and they are concerned about what is going on. But our message to them as analysts was, look, you have got to get the importance of this war out to the American people.
The importance message is that this is a forward strategy. It’s better to fight the war in Iraq than it is the war on American soil. And further, the message needs to be imagine an Iraq, imagine Iraq under the control of Zarqawi with another conveyor belt combined for tourists, combined with oil, water and land and resources, imagine the effect of that. That’s a message that has to get out to the American people because the American people do not feel they are at war.
Both General Pace and also Secretary Rumsfeld basically said we have got to improve our message and improve our communication. We want to do that. This is a tough war. It’s going to be a long war in many places. It’s not going to be something that’s going to come out with a bow in the next year or two years.
I’m awfully glad the network “analysts” told the Secretary what he needs to do to “get the message out.” He certainly needs some professional advice. It just seems kind of funny that the analysts were retired Generals — who we are told ad nauseeum are not supposed to have opinions.
I’m actually surprised CNN was invited. Usually this administration just checks in with Roger Ailes and he passes the word to the relevant people.
If you didn’t get to see Little Lord Fauntleroy have a temper tantrum in front of the press today, do yourself a favor and check it out.
HENRY: Mr. President, you make it a practice of not commenting on potential personnel move.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Of course, I did.
HENRY: Calling it speculation.
BUSH: And you can understand why. Because we’ve got people’s reputations at stake. And on Friday I stood up and said I don’t appreciate the speculation about Don Rumsfeld. He’s doing a fine job. I strongly support him.
HENRY: But what do you say to critics who believe that you’re ignoring the advice of retired generals, military commanders, who say that there needs to be a change?
BUSH: I say I listen to all voices, but mine’s the final decision and Don Rumsfeld is doing a fine job. He’s not only transforming the military, he’s fighting a war on terror. He’s helping us fight a war on terror. I have strong confidence in Don Rumsfeld. I hear the voices and I read the front page and I know the speculation, but I’m the decider and I decide what is best and what’s best is for Don Rumsfeld to remain as the secretary of defense. I want to thank you all very much.
At which point he stomped off in a huff. Seriously.
This is particularly interesting in light of this amazing article in this week’s Prospect about the Cheney cabal:
Says one insider deeply involved in U.S. policy toward North Korea: “The president is given only the most basic notions about the Korea issue. They tell him, ‘Above South Korea is a country called North Korea. It is an evil regime.’ … So that translates into a presidential decision: Why enter into any agreement with an evil regime?”
I’m the decider! I yam, I yam! Evil, evil, evil.
Once again, I am stunned that the Republicans had the gall to foist this manchild on the United States of America — and that so many Americans accepted it for so long. There’s a lot of talk in the wingnutsphere about “Bush Derangement Syndrome” which says that we are all suffering form irrational hatred of Dear Leader. But it’s not accurate. Bush is just a spoiled, deluded little boy, pushed into a job that was obvious to any sentient being would be too much for him. My righteous anger is for the big money pooh bahs like Dick Cheney who would gamble with this country’s future by choosing a brand name in an empty suit for president. They proved that they can sell anything, I’ll give them that. But as with their other colossal marketing success and business failure, Enron, the sales job couldn’t cover the corruption and poor planning forever. Therefore, I blame the Republican Party more than little Junior. He’s just a pathetic loser who believed his own hype — responsible for his actions, of course, but not the mastermind.
From his little tirade today, it appears that he’s feeling like his authority is being questioned. That’s just funny. It took his this long to figure out that he’s not really in charge?
Responding to the odd, disturbing nature of the Father-Daughter Purity Ball, about which I posted below, PZ Myers says:
“Daddies of the world, keep your hands off your daughter’s sexuality, OK? Raise them to be independent and thoughtful and informed and able to make their own decisions, and then just trust them.”
That sounds like common sense to me. Girls pledging to their dads to stay virginal in ritualistic ceremonies just doesn’t seem like a healthy thing to do.
One of the commenters in the post below found pictures from one of the Balls. It’s striking how young many of these girls are, some look to be no more than seven.
Apparently, this is common. Here’s a testimonial from Generations of Light magazine:
“How can you measure the value of your eleven year old looking up into your eyes (as you clumsily learn the fox-trot together) with innocent, uncontainable joy, saying, ‘Daddy, I’m so excited!’ wrote Wesley Tullis in a letter describing his grateful participation. ‘I have been involved with the Father-Daughter Ball for two years with my daughters, Sarah and Anna. It is impossible to convey what I have seen in their sweet spirits, their delicate, forming souls, as their daddy takes them out for their first, big dance. Their whole being absorbs my loving attention, resulting in a radiant sense of self-worth and identity. Think of it from their perspective: My daddy thinks I’m beautiful in my own unique way. My daddy is treating me with respect and honor. My daddy has taken time to be silly, and even made a fool of himself, learning how to dance. My daddy really loves me!”
I can understand why the little girls would want to do this. It’s a chance to dress up and spend time with their father. If it were for another purpose, it might be sweet. But this is what that little girl is reading to her father from that card:
I pledge to remain sexually pure…until the day I give myself as a wedding gift to my husband. … I know that God requires this of me.. that he loves me. and that he will reward me for my faithfulness.
And this is what Daddy says in turn:
I, (daughter’s name)’s father, choose before God to cover my daughter as her authority and protection in the area of purity. I will be pure in my own life as a man, husband and father. I will be a man of integrity and accountability as I lead, guide and pray over my daughter and as the high priest in my home. This covering will be used by God to influence generations to come.
He’s the “high priest” in his home. Are we getting the picture?
I wondered in the earlier post about the lack of mother-son purity pledges. Commenter Llamajockey hits the nail on the head with this:
The truth is is that in most Red-State/Fundy households the Dad is just as obsessed if not more so with the possiblity of his young son being gay as with his daughter’s virginity. Therefore teenage males feel an acute pressure beyond their already out of control hormones to prove their heterosexuality. That is why athletic over anything resembling academic or intellectual, acheivement is so highly prized. It improves the young man’s standing in the eyes of the young females and reassures Dad his son can not be gay. However, with it comes a double edge, for the young man is now supposed to act the role of stud.
Virgin girls and studly boys. Can we all see the problem with this?
NOW did another one of its interesting shows on the South Dakota abortion ban last friday; it’s now available on the website if you missed it. They went deep into the forced pregnancy movement in South Dakota and once again, I was struck by the profound dishonesty of many of its leaders. You will see spin and gibberish that even Karen Hughes would be ashamed of:
HINOJOSA: MEET LESLEE UNRUH…SHE FOUNDED THE ALPHA CENTER IN 1984 BUT MOST PEOPLE NOW KNOW HER AS ONE OF THE MOST POTENT PRO-LIFE ACTIVISTS IN THE STATE…
UNRUH HAD AN ABORTION HERSELF IN THE 1970’S. AND WHILE SOME MIGHT THINK THAT BANNING ABORTION IS AN ATTACK ON WOMEN’S FREEDOM, UNRUH SAYS SHE WANTS TO BAN ABORTION PRECISELY TO PROTECT WOMEN’S FREEDOM.
UNRUH: This freedom, sexual freedom is costing women and their lives. Where’s the sexual freedom? There is none. Because those of us who have suffered through the abortion, we’re not gonna be silent anymore. We’re gonna speak up and we’re gonna tell the truth. Because abortion hurts women. Silent no more.
[…]
UNRUH: I’ve been that woman. There is no freedom after an abortion. You carry an empty crib in your heart forever. There’s no freedom.
HINOJOSA: And so, when you hear people saying, “Someone like Leslie is trying to actually take away women’s rights and taking away their freedoms–“
UNRUH: I’m giving women freedom. We are giving back the women what they really want. This is true feminism.
This woman is “giving” women back their freedom by taking away their right to abortion. She’s smiling, upbeat, cheerful and sunny — the all-American gal. And to me, she seems downright otherworldly. I don’t know what she’s talking about. She’s babbling incoherently.
It turns out that Unruh is more interesting than your usual forced pregnancy zealot. She’s also the prime mover of the state’s abstinence only education movement. Freedom is having no sex at all.
And then there’s this:
HINOJOSA: LAST FRIDAY NIGHT, YOUNG GIRLS FROM AROUND SOUTH DAKOTA CAME TO SIOUX FALLS FOR A SPRING BALL. THIS ONE IS CALLED “THE PURITY BALL” IT’S A YEARLY EVENT RUN BY LESLEE UNRUH’S ABSTINENCE CLEARINGHOUSE.
THE IDEA IS THAT THESE YOUNG WOMEN COME WITH THEIR FATHERS. TO CELEBRATE THEIR SEXUAL PURITY.
UNRUH:We think that its important for fathers to the be the first ones to look into their daughters eyes and To tell her that her purity is special, and its ok to wait until marriage.
HINOJOSA:IT MIGHT HAVE ALL THE TRAPPINGS OF A REGULAR PROM… BUT THIS ONE ENDS A LITTLE DIFFERENTLY.
GIRLS RECITING PLEDGE:”I make a promise this day to God…
HINOJOSA: THE YOUNG WOMEN HERE ALL MAKE A PROMISE TO THEIR FATHERS THAT THEY WONT’ HAVE SEX UNTIL THE DAY THEY GET MARRIED.
GIRLS RECITING PLEDGE:…to remain sexually pure…until the day I give myself as a wedding gift to my husband. … I know that God requires this of me.. that he loves me. and that he will reward me for my faithfulness.
You have to see it to believe it. They are all dressed up like prom goers, the dads in tuxes and the daughters in evening gowns looking all grown up. They dance, they laugh, they giggle. And then father and daughter stand up, holding each others hands, staring into each others’ eyes and the girls make these vows as if in a wedding ceremony.
As I watch it occurs to me that this is why they don’t have an exception for rape and incest. It’s one of the creepiest things I’ve ever seen.
You will notice that there’s no “mother-son” ceremony in which boys pledge to their mothers to stay pure until they give themselves as a gift to their wives. There is a Victorian impulse at work here that has nothing to do with fetuses. This is about women being autonomous, independent, sexual humans.
Here’s Unruh again. If you aren’t listening closely, the cadence of her speech makes it sound like she is perfectly reasonable. But she might as well be speaking in another language for all the sense it makes.
UNRUH: I think there should be no abortions in my state.
HINOJOSA: So to get to that point, you want to prevent unwanted pregnancies.
UNRUH: Yes.
HINOJOSA: And people might say, “Well, the way you prevent unwanted pregnancies is through contraception.”
UNRUH: No. It’s wrong. We don’t need, we don’t have a shortage of condoms in this country. We should not be worshipping condoms. Let’s start just telling the truth.
HINOJOSA: But when some people say that truth might be, Leslee, that by limiting the information, by limiting access to contraception, that you may– you may unintentionally be contributing to more unwanted pregnancies–
UNRUH: No. I think it’s– by “limiting” is all spin. Let’s quit making people think that everybody can go out there and just as long as they have a condom, they’re safe. They’re not safe emotionally. They’re not safe physically. Let’s just start telling the truth.
She might start by trying to make a persuasive argument instead of blurting out non-sequitors about “freedom” and “truth” without ever explaining why this is so. She’s full of snappy slogans, but she never honestly says what’s on her mind.
Once upon time we were all good and well-behaved, if plagued by demons and temptations within. You know, back in the day, when lynching was a spectator sport, children were worked to death in factories and mineshafts, and employers thought nothing of hiring goons to beat and kill workers who dared strike for safer working conditions and decent pay.
Then came the Fall, and with it moral relativism, post-modernism, Freudianism, Marxism, feminism, birth control, Roe v. Wade, situation comedies that make dad into a buffoon, and black people who expect to live in our neighborhoods and send their kids to our schools…whoops, did we say that last one out loud? We meant entitlements, the nanny state, and the culture of dependence brought about by Welfare.
And the poor little wimmin just don’t know what’s good for ’em. Leslie Unruh’s gonna set them free.
Update: Here’s a piece from USA today that is surprising good. And important.
Crooks and Liars has a story up about Michelle Malkin posting phone numbers of college students who protested recruiters on the UCSC campus. Predictably, her readers are harrassing them, as she knew they would.
But that’s not surprising. It isn’t even partisan. Remember this?
Conservative CNN commentator Tucker Carlson’s snide humor backfired on him — and his wife.
While defending telemarketers during a segment on “Crossfire” last week, the bow-tied co-host was asked for his home phone number. Carlson gave out a number, but it was for the Washington bureau of Fox News, CNN’s bitter rival.
The bureau was deluged with calls. To get back at him, Fox posted Carlson’s unlisted home number on its Web site. After his wife was inundated with obscene calls, Carlson went to the Fox News bureau to complain. He was told the number would be taken off the Web site if he apologized on the air. He did, but that didn’t end the anger.
In an interview with The Washington Post, Carlson called Fox News “a mean, sick group of people.”
Fox spokeswoman Irena Briganti said Carlson got what he deserved. “CNN threw the first punch here. Correcting this mistake was good journalism.”
Why would Malkin be held to a higher standard than the highest levels of the corporate rightwing media? Handing out private phone numbers is GOP SOP. On the right they call this “good journalism.”
I find myself feeling a little bit depressed today. It’s not the spectre of war with Iran, although I admit that scares the hell out of me. It’s this:
The Supreme Court rejected an appeal Monday from two Chinese Muslims who were mistakenly captured as enemy combatants more than four years ago and are still being held at the U.S. prison in Cuba.
The men’s plight has posed a dilemma for the Bush administration and courts. Previously, a federal judge said the detention of the ethnic Uighurs in Guantanamo Bay is unlawful, but that there was nothing federal courts could do.
Lawyers for the two contend they should be released, something the Bush administration opposes, unless they can go to a country other than the United States.
A year ago, the U.S. military decided that Abu Bakker Qassim and A’Del Abdu al-Hakim are not “enemy combatants” as first suspected after their 2001 arrests in Pakistan. They were captured and shipped to Guantanamo Bay along with hundreds of other suspected terrorists.
The U.S. government has been unable to find a country willing to accept the two men, along with other Uighurs. They cannot be returned to China because they likely will be tortured or killed.
[…]
Lawyers for Qassim and al-Hakim filed a special appeal, asking justices to step in even while the case is pending before an appeals court. Arguments at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit are next month.
Justices declined, without comment, to hear the case.
Bush administration Supreme Court lawyer Paul Clement told justices that there were “substantial ongoing diplomatic efforts to transfer them to an appropriate country.”
Clement said that in the meantime, the men have had television, a stereo system, books and recreational opportunities: including soccer, volleyball and ping-pong.
The detainees’ lawyers painted a different picture, saying that hunger strikes and suicide attempts at Guantanamo Bay are becoming more common and that the men are isolated.
“Guantanamo is at the precipice,” Boston lawyer Sabin Willett wrote in the appeal. “Only prompt intervention by this court to vindicate its own mandate can prevent the rule of law itself from being drowned in this intensifying whirlpool of desperation.”
I would say the US is at the precipice and the rule of law is breathing its last gasp. How can we have a system that operates this way and still call ourselves a country of laws? They are just making this stuff up as they go along.
Guantanamo is a vivid example of what happens when governments panic and make errors out of hubris, rage, greed and opportunism and refuse to right their wrongs after the fact. We have created a Kafka-esque nightmare that, unless we return to the rule of law very quickly, is going to be embedded in our system, ready to be exploited by any tyrannical figure who can trump up an emergency for political gain.
Don’t the Republicans see how dangerous this is? It isn’t a matter of partisanship. Any shallow reading of history shows that bad people can emerge from any movement, ideology, religion or party. That’s why we have the rule of law — so that our system doesn’t depend upon the good-will of whomever is holding the office.
The Talking Dog (who is also a talking attorney in NYC) has been interviewing various lawyers who defend Guantanamo inmates for some time now. He happens to have one up this morning featuring an attorney who represents a legal US immigrant Ali Al-Marri, who has been held in the same limbo as Jose Padilla for years. I’d never heard of him:
Jonathan Hafetz: Certainly, his case has received less publicity than Padilla, who is, of course, a citizen, whereas Al-Marri is a legal immigrant. The fact is, the government’s argument as a basis for holding him is the same as Padilla: that the entire United States is a battlefield in the administration’s “war on terror.” While the Hamdi case concerned a citizen engaged in hostilities on a foreign battlefield, thus far, the U.S. Supreme Court has not ruled on the legality of the government’s detaining a civilian arrested in the United States itself (and it avoided the opportunity to do so recently in Padilla’s appeal).
As to Ali’s case, the District Court Judge Floyd, the same judge who ruled in Padilla’s case, denied our motion for summary judgment but ruled the courthouse doors were open for Mr. al-Marri to challenge the government’s allegations. We are presently litigating Al-Marri’s entitlement to due process to challenge the government’s factual basis for those allegations, and demanding a hearing consistent with due process of law.
The Talking Dog: Is it not the case that this is a still-live case presenting virtually the identical issue as Padilla (which the Supreme Court just ducked)?
Jonathan Hafetz: Certainly, the issue is very much live, and presents a danger to us all insofar as the government is asserting the right to strip any one of us of all due process rights and constitutional protections. So yes, that is definitely still the case– Al-Marri’s immigration status as opposed to citizenship doesn’t change that.
He concludes with this:
Jonathan Hafetz: The United States of America, since its inception, has stood for the rule of law. The actions of our government associated with the war on terror– notably, the arbitrary deprivations of due process, in violation of the Constitution, laws and treaty obligations – have fundamentally jeopardized that. What has been done has undermined our standing in the world, and is not an effective use of our resources, either. We have been holding some men over 4 ½ years, without charge or trial or any notion of due process, and insist on our right to detain them for life, even though they have never been, and may never be, charged with crimes. The war on terror will doubtless present us with more challenges. One of those challenges should not be the sacrifice of the rule of law.
In my view, the very existence of these issues speaks to the fact that we are not in a war at all. If we were, we would be able to invoke the many laws that have been in effect for eons regarding warfare. This is something else. We need to figure out what it is, and act accordingly. Going down this road is going to destroy us much more quickly than bin Laden could have dreamed.
If you are interested in this topic, be sure to read all of the Talking Dog’s interviews with Guantanamo lawyers, linked at the bottom of his post. It may depress you, but you have to at least feel some gladness that there are lawyers out there willing to do this important work. After the government went after attorneys in the Stewart case, if would have been easy to walk away. They didn’t.
