This just in:
The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that President Bush overstepped his authority in ordering military war crimes trials for Guantanamo Bay detainees.
The ruling, a strong rebuke to the administration and its aggressive anti-terror policies, was written by Justice John Paul Stevens, who said the proposed trials were illegal under U.S. law and international Geneva conventions.
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This is a WAR.
These people are ISLAMIST TERRORISTS.
These are people who are NOT citizens of the United States.
They are not an Army and they DO NOT represent a NATION.
They do not wear a UNIFORM.
They swear an allegiance to a PHILOSOPHY and perhaps a smattering of religion.
These are people CAPTURED on a BATTLEFIELD in a time of WAR and are being DETAINED.
They are PRISONERS OF WAR.
We must realize: there is no way for an civilized country to conduct a war with another uncivilized country or, moreover, culture and/or philosophy without getting our hands dirty in some fashion.
Otherwise we shall not survive.
The bottom line of this ruling indicates that these people are nothing more than CRIMINALS and therefore they are subject to the same laws as YOU and ME, with all the rights and privileges extant.
Doing The Logical Extension:
Then, does that not mean:
ALL those we capture on the BATTLEFIELD are as a CRIMINAL arrested in any American city.
With all the rights thereto;
And then will not our SOLDIERS be EXPECTED now to ACT and THINK like American POLICEMEN?
And subsequently have to WORRY about being SUED or PROSECUTED in AMERICAN COURTS (and NOT military courts or with the UCMJ applied) as a result of one too many rounds fired, unnecessary wounding, or even “assault with a deadly weapon” for even HAVING BEEN FIRED UPON?
This is absolutely INSANE.
We have taken the first major step to absolutely ENSURE that one or more of the following events WILL occur on sovereign AMERICAN soil:
— The detonation of a dirty bomb;
— The detonation of an actual nuclear device;
— The release of some biological weapon(s);
— The release of some chemical weapon(s);
Not to mention how this will affect our soldiers on foreign soil.
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The entire culture we are fighting respects but one concept: STRENGTH.
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We are of sufficient strength and worldly power that the only way to suffer a national defeat is from WITHIN.
And the Islamists KNOW this.
The US Supreme Court has, essentially, sentenced any given number of Americans to DEATH.
I am so disappointed in our country and our system at this moment. I am ashamed.
And frightened for our future.
BZ
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Additional thoughts an hour later:
Though an incredibly complex decision and I am certain hordes of lawyers are poring over it now, the majority opinion appears to be procedural, thinking that Congress ought to be authorizing military commissions.
Perhaps the next logical step would be to do precisely this.
Absent that, I see nothing more than everyone being simply set free. And that is, on its face, so totally, incredibly wrong.
Will Congress have the mindset to help us triumph and prevail? Knowing, of course, that Congress will be off for the bulk of the summer?
And how much will we have to parse this opinion?
Actually, it is worse than even that… by juxtaposing al Qaeda into the Geneva Convention framework, the Supremes have made all terrorist organizations into ‘legitimate’ non-Nation States. So, what once covered the honorable means of raising a flag and declaring a Nation and fighting for your new way of life now *also* covers terrorists who do none of that.
Where do we send our Ambassadors to these New Nations?
But we are lucky in that by having no recognition by Congress or the Executive, the Supremes get to be the adjudication authority on each and every trial! Article III, Section 2 does that and Congress can give that to no other until a full framework of law is put in place. 9 tickets to Guanatanamo for the Solons of the Court.
I hope they like Halal food…
AJ: yes, they would be “non-nation” states. Unaffiliated by nothing more than a PHILOSOPHY.
I slap my forehead at the extent of the insanity considered here. I am almost beyond words, though the words literally flowed upon my first hearing this.
I had some secondary thoughts. I am trying to place my feet back on terra firma despite the shock.
BZ
Mr. Z – I was already calling this upcoming season ‘The Summer of Our Discontent’ due to the actions of Congress and the President. Now We the People have a Trifecta, with the SCOTUS making Foreign Policy absent the Executive and the Legislative…
Illegals, amnesty, slavery zones, Congress expanding its priveleges, Congress not backing National Security, the President not securing the borders, the President not enforcing the laws (secrecy, immigration, amongst some few), Pork fat dripping from each bill going through Congress, Federal money cycling into personal and familial organizations and arriving as kick-backs, no policy on the GWOT, no comprehensible foreign or domestic or energy policy, ports of entry controlled by Red China, the NG sitting on its butt not allowed to actually enforce the border but just hang out there, and now the SCOTUS making rulings that affect the Nation by fiat.
And Hurricane season has only been going on for less than a month, parts of NOLA are still waterlogged with a re-elected idiot at the helm…
Are we sure this is 2006 and NOT 1774? Or 1786? Actually, 1786 is probably much, much closer…
Only one Shay away from that.
I like the trend lines in Iraq.
The trend lines for the US are bad and getting worse… much worse…
Yeah, upon hearing this some of my words were flowing too! I can’t type them here.
Even many of the Dems are up in arms over this. Guess who’s running this country? The Supreme Court. @#$%!+#@%&! and then some!
Sorry, I’m too pissed off to be any more intelligent at the moment. I feel like BZ, only unable to express myself that well at the moment.
I was pretty pissed off when I heard about this too. It has been a mixed bag from the Supreme Court lately. There have been some good rulings and then crap like this. Unbelievable!!!!
This is totally unbelievable, but answer me this. What jurisdiction does the SC actually have over these people if they are not technically being held on mainland USA soil, or is this by extension?
ABF – The SCOTUS ruled previously that some laws over the Executive can be enforced on rented property overseas… but that must wholly apply to US Citizens and some general conduct within such places. Guantanamo is barely under that for its small Civilian cadre and the entire Military zone there is under the UCMJ… which the SCOTUS *also* found wanting, even though that IS passed by Congress and agreed to by the Executive.
In just a few paragraphs the SCOTUS have ruled so poorly that they now appear to be throwing out Military Law for operations conducted by the Military against terrorists because they are *not* members of a Nation State… while in the next breath saying that such individuals are due all the entitlements of the Geneva Conventions which are ONLY given to those under Nation States and the US has NOT signed the 1977 change to the Conventions allowing terrorists to fall under the Conventions.
As Treaties have the same level as the Constitution, but may only clarify and not amend it, and by categorically rejecting terrorists as entities able to fall under the Conventions, the SCOTUS is now ruling that IT can decide that issue against the Executive and the Legislative and make that treaty interpretation for itself.
This is the Trifecta, and we are a poorer Nation for this happening and pushed to a brink of chaos. We do not have the backbone politically to call things as they actually ARE nor stand up FOR the Nation and the Republic. We the People have become beholden to the Federal Government that has grown mighty and forgotten that its purpose is to ‘Serve and Protect’… not ‘Administer and Reign’ as a Roman Imperial Government.
AJ: And as you so lucidly write, I cannot help but think of a future book written by some historian: “The Rise and Fall of the American Empire.”
Not because we were NOT strong, but because we DECIDED to eviscerate ourselves from within.
BZ
Thanks AJ … it is a sad situation indeed … 🙁
This is war, and the SCOTUS has their heads so far up thier asses that they can’t even see they are destroying this great nation from the inside out. the ACLU must be celebrating. Makes me sick.
Mr. Z – The book will more properly be entitled: “Forgetting Franklin and the Loss of the Republic of Free People”
“A Republic, madam, *if* you can keep it.” – Benjamin Franklin to a woman asking what sort of Government had been born of the Convention.
Thank you, Mr. Franklin, your warning is as fresh today as 1787.
And I am sorry that We do not honor that fair warning and so stand at peril for the loss you told Us about.
Cry not for the loss of the man. But cry heavily that we do not heed his wisdom still.
Sue: welcome aboard to the BZ site, it’s the first time I’ve seen you and please, come back and visit! And I am with you — I am certain the ACLU is laughing its collective ass off — much to our dismay and chagrin.
I can only hope, everyone, that this is but the first page in a long book that does not simply begin and end with:
“There once was a country called the United States. It was a Great Experiment. It ended.”
BZ
I had no idea that I could respect Clarence Thomas any more than I already did, until I read his dissent. Talk about an unsung hero. Why isn’t black America more proud of this guy?
John: for the same reason no black is admired if they even remotely hint of a GOP or conservative aroma — by blacks.
Only the Victim Pimps, More Pimps and Poverty Pimps get the play. It keeps them in bidniss and ensures generational dependence on Big Government which, of course, Big Government LOVES.
Nothing exceeds like excess.
BZ