update on my last post

[kierthos]

Bush to transfer, try terror suspects

This actually appears to be the lead-in article. Bush is having 14 suspected terrorist leaders transferred from secret CIA prisons to Gitmo. Then he wants to try them in the manner I mentioned earlier. (You know, getting a law passed to do what SCOTUS already said he couldn't do aka military tribunals, allowing hearsay evidence, and removing the defendant's right to remain silent).

It gets better. (well, worse, really)

His new proposal, to be sent to Congress, would withhold evidence from a defendant if necessary to protect classified information.

"Yeah, we have this evidence to present to the court, but we're not going to show it to the defendant, so there's no way he can mount a defense against it, but he's going to have to trust us, it shows he's guilty. Of everything. Including some stuff we just made up."

Now, don't confuse this with any sort of sympathy for terrorists. It's not. But we should not be undercutting the legal system in order to convict people on terrorism charges. I mean, how fucking easy does Bush want to make it to get a conviction? Is all their evidence so weak that he needs to do this to look even tougher on terrorism then he already thinks he is?

Mr. President, did you ever take a civics class? If so, what was your grade in it?

Comments

[the-corruption.livejournal.com]

...probably the same grade you got in U.S. History.

Otherwise you'd realise, in perspective, just how gingerly we're treating these foreign soldiers, as opposed to the treatment of Japanese-born americans during World War 2. Or how we treated american caputured while fighting for the German army.

Of course, being a student of Civics, you naturally realise that it involves citizens. Given that the US constitution and it's laws ONLY apply to citizens of the United States, foreign prisoners of war naturally have NO legal expectation of constitutioanlly protected rights. And since congress is too chicken-shit to pass laws regarding what should be done with these fuckers, seems like is being OVERLY generous as to provide SOME kind of trials for these people.

There are several US and international precidents for just shoving all these fuckers out into the common room and gassing them all to tortured death. Hell, I think tha'd be funny just to see the looks on everyone's faces here.

Of course, I still have a copy of the Nick Berg beheading video, so you understand I'm a bit compassionless towards these pigfuckers...

[kierthos.livejournal.com]

Did you miss the part up there where I said I had no sympathy for the terrorists? I don't. And I do want to see them prosecuted. But I don't want to see people who were just in the wrong place at the wrong time prosecuted for those same charges, and I don't want to see this become a mockery of a courtroom.

If Bush's plan goes through, it would allow hearsay evidence, which pretty much opens the door to anyone saying anything they want, with no substantiation to it at all. If they don't allow the defense/defendant to see certain evidence, then it means that they can have the flimsiest shit in the world, and the defense can't mount a credible defense against it, because they don't know what it is, or where it came from.

Yeah, you're right. The Japanese Americans were locked up, denied rights, and treated like crap. We're supposed to have learned something from that.

I'm not saying don't hold them in Gitmo. We've got to hold them somewhere, and I'm pretty sure if we were holding them anywhere else, just as many people would be bitching about that location insted of Gitmo.

I'm not saying release them en masse. I'm also not saying that we shouldn't prosecute them. But there is a difference between prosecution and persecution. Right now, Bush gives all the impression that he doesn't care how many laws or rights he has to violate to get a conviction on one or more of the Gitmo detainees. And that's wrong. And it sets a dangerous precedent.

[opheliareborn.livejournal.com]

Actually I thought some of the Guantanamo prisoners WERE Americans, but there I go, reading the news instead of just watching videos and making heated decisions. Those videos were intended to infuriate those who watched them and to stoke fires of hate. We need to being to overcome that reaction and be able to think clearly about this or it will degrade the fabric of our society. What sort of precedent does this set? If we truly want to be a bastion of freedom, we really can't pick and choose when and who we apply rules like the right to a fair trial.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not sympathetic to the terrorist's cause. And, while I have moments of fervently wishing we could nuke them all, logically I know we can't. We have to go slowly and think or we really will lose everything.

[kierthos.livejournal.com]

None of the ones on the list of names that were released by the DoD were United States citizens. The vast majority are from countries in the Middle East or near the Middle East.

Approximately 250 of the roughly 750 detainees at Gitmo have been freed or released to the custody of their home countries, and some of those that were released to the custody of their home countries were quickly freed as there was no evidence to justify their continued incarceration. Others have been held for years pending any sort of trial, or in some cases, even charges.

Then you have this:

Al Hakim, A'Del Abdu: Determind to be innocent, still detained.