http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/13/washington/13scotus.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/13/washington/13scotus.html

The sad thing is that the Minister of Justice already announced that as far as he is concerned this ruling by the supreme court is not binding him, nor the president. Despite the supreme court saying that the president has no authority to decide when the constitution does not apply. Apparently the minister of justice thinks that because -he- was not mentioned in that ruling it does not apply to him?


Eri

The sad thing is that the Minister of Justice
The United States does not have a Minister of Justice. We do have an Attorney General, who handles that position.

Actually, the sad thing is that some people have been imprisoned for five or six years without formal charges or trial.

Imagine being held prisoner for five years by people who hate you, without any idea if you will ever be released...

The US Court system loves to drag cases on for many many years. There is a saying, "Justice delayed is justice denied". I guess in the USA that's just the way it is.

Anyone who feels that some people are too "soft" on the inmates at Gitmo should remember that habeas corpus just requires the government to charge you with a crime. In other words, people have been held for more than five years without even being charged with a crime.

The only thing the Supreme Court ruled was that they now have the right to go to a Federal court and challenge their designation as enemy combatants. Yet according to some the right to actually go before a judge is somehow a threat to our nation.

The real threat to our nation is the disregard for the rule of law. Just like Vietnam ruined much of America's moral authority, Bush has done even worse. And 4 out of 9 Supreme Court justices didn't even think it was worth stopping him...

The Bush administration reasoned that they're prisoner's of war so they don't have to follow the rules until the war is over. But when exactly does the "War on Terror" end? I guess you could make the same sort of pronouncement for a "War on Drugs" and hold drug users for life without pressing charges or giving them a fair trial.

The Bush administration reasoned that they're prisoner's of war so they don't have to follow the rules until the war is over.
Actually, no. Prisoners of war (POWs) are granted rights which these "enemy combatants" do not have. POWs can not be tortured (or if you are Bush "enhanced interrogated"). POWs must be listed by name and the names given to the International Red Cross. The Red Cross has the right to visit them and make sure they are not mistreated. Many other rules are part of the Geneva Conventions. That is why Bush said they are not POWs, and not criminals, but a non legal name "enemy combatant", which Congress and the Supreme Court had the lack of balls to allow. So, in one sense, it is legal, but only in the USA, international law does not recognize it.
But when exactly does the "War on Terror" end? I guess you could make the same sort of pronouncement for a "War on Drugs" and hold drug users for life without pressing charges or giving them a fair trial.
Exactly. There is no end, ever, to the "War on Terror". That is one of the terrible things about allowing a president (any president) to declare something like that and allow them free reign. It is a "war" without end.

Whenever someone says something like, "Well, we are at war, so that it is ok to do xxx", I always wonder, how convenient for the government to declare war on a enemy which is unlimited in time and numbers, basically anyone who doesn't belong to a national army who attacks any American.

It wasn't even a case where the government said, "Ok, we are going to attack al-Qaeda and capture and kill them and then the war is over". Nope, it just happens to include al-Qaeda and EVERYONE else in the world who happens to hate America enough. It is literally impossible to capture or kill everyone in the world who is willing to kill Americans. Not only that, but every time you do capture or kill one, there is a chance that their relatives or friends are now pissed off enough to fight.

9/11/2001? Oh yeah, that's the day that Arab terrorists crashed hijacked airplanes into the American capacity for rational thought.

Oh, anyone who is interested, the case the Supreme Court ruled on was Boumediene v. Bush.

This is the case of Lakhdar Boumediene who has been held in Gitmo for more than six years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lakhdar_Boumediene is the link for him.

Actually, no. Prisoners of war (POWs) are granted rights which these "enemy combatants" do not have. POWs can not be tortured (or if you are Bush "enhanced interrogated"). POWs must be listed by name and the names given to the International Red Cross. The Red Cross has the right to visit them and make sure they are not mistreated. Many other rules are part of the Geneva Conventions. That is why Bush said they are not POWs, and not criminals, but a non legal name "enemy combatant", which Congress and the Supreme Court had the lack of balls to allow. So, in one sense, it is legal, but only in the USA, international law does not recognize it.


Even more so, by doing so Bush, and those who orchestrated or supported this are technically guilty of war crimes themselves. Or rather, it is even more complicated as a country can only declare war on another country. You can not declare war on a nebulous entity or a concept. However, the USA and its allies did (sort of) declare war on the Taleban regime of Afghanistan for aiding and protecting criminals who had just murdered a large number of American citizens and made plans to continue doing so. It is questionable if that support and sheltering those criminals is sufficient legal ground for declaring war (in as much as a country really needs a legal reason to do something like that). Once it declared war the USA was bound to the Geneva Conventions to which it is a signatory. Those conventions clearly state what its signatories are and are not allowed to do. They also clearly state that there are two categories of people involved in a war: civilians and soldiers, and it states how each group should be treated. These people who are held in Guantanamo Bay are either civilians, in which case they should be treated as any other crime suspect in areas that the USA army has effectively taken temporary juridical authority of the area. I can not remember if local or USA law should apply, but given that these people are suspected of planning to murder American citizens it is reasonable to assume that after being arrested by the American army they were extradited to the USA for trial. As such they should have received the same rights and protections that American prisoners have. If they were suspected of crimes in Afghanistan against Afghani they should have been tried according to local law (I think).
On the other hand, if these people are considered soldiers in the war between the Taleban and the USA then they are prisoners of war and should be treated as such in accordance with the Geneva convention.
Of course nobody is going to be able to tell the USA what it is to do (partly because countries do not have a great deal of control over each other and partly because nobody tells the one remaining superpower what to do).

What is a dangerous precedent though is that the president, the vice president and those appointed by them, have attempted to subvert both national and international law and when rapped on their knuckles for that tried wiggle their way out of the situation repeatedly (i.e. the first time they were told that denying prisoners in Guantenamo Bay the legal rights of either civilian or military prisoners is illegal according the USA constitution rather than accept that ruling they reworded things a little and ignored the supreme court. When corrected again two years later they did the same, and there is every evidence that this third correction of their misconceptions regarding the constitution is also going to be dismissed and the supreme court once again will be ignored. Since nobody is going to actually take them to task over it, it shows that a president can do as he damn well pleases. While Bush is on his way out, sooner or later another president will decide that 'for the greater good of the many civil rights of the few can be suspended'. Temporarily of course. Probably as temporarily as the war on terror.


Exactly. There is no end, ever, to the "War on Terror". That is one of the terrible things about allowing a president (any president) to declare something like that and allow them free reign. It is a "war" without end.


Which of course is exactly the point of it. Time and again has been shown that scared people are easily controlled, as are patriotic people. By posing a nebulous threat that can not be seen but that can strike at any moment they make people afraid. By declaring war on this 'threat' they invoke patriotic feelings (who is not for us is against us... quite a few doubters of Bush's rethoric have lost their jobs because of that). The result is that Bush got reelected when by all rights he should have been tossed out of office as a dismal failure after the first term. Had things gone slightly according to plan a new threat had emerged in the running up to the next presidential election to necessitate another republican president. They tried really hard with Iran, and only the complete mess that was made of Iraq has prevented that strategy from being successful (had they had a little more to show for all the money and deaths people likely would have been more willing to accept the 'threat' of Iran and the need to start a third war in the region. Conveniently geographically connecting the two already waged).


Eri

Thanks for correcting me, Fanra, I butchered the details. It has been awhile since I've heard the stories... I kind of burned out of the rage and shame they used to inspire in me.