Supremes rule on Gitmo

[Rick Lee]

Oh, and if I had my way, we'd interrogate them until they had nothing left to tell us, capture and kill their wives and kids, film it, show it to them and then bury them alive. No point in killing a terrorist who may have valuable intel until they've been squeezed like a lemon. I have no problem whatsoever with torture and believe we should do whatever it takes to extinguish al Qaeda, not play nice, wring our hands and worry about world opinion. Taking the so-called high-road does not earn us any love around the world and certainly doesn't make the terrorists play nice.

[imcarthur]

Let’s see here . . .

They were picked up by agents of a foreign country in a foreign country invaded by a “Coalition” of foreign nations without sanction from any international body. Their ‘guilt’ is based on evidence from CIA/Army Intelligence/Foreign Intelligence services (who are ALWAYS right of course & are of course also agents of said foreign country) in a time of "war".

Does the evidence not matter? Guilt until proven innocent? As an American or any ardent fan of democracy, are you comfortable with that?

When would you be uncomfortable?

Ian

[DARISC]

Originally Posted by JayG

Perfectly said. Any country over there would have gotten the info out of them and shot them.

Do you think the U.S. should do the same?

[pwd72s]

I feel for the guys in the military...they will be ordered to fight under new rules.

[DARISC]

Originally Posted by pwd72s

I feel for the guys in the military...they will be ordered to fight under new rules.

? What new rules?

[m21sniper]

Originally Posted by Jeff Higgins

What I'm trying to say is that we have not done a good job of adapting those laws to the current situation. We need to do that.

We are facing an enemy that was never envisioned, that could not possibly have been considered when our current laws and rules governing how we deal with them were written. We are applying outdated laws to a new threat. The Supreme Court absolutely must judge our actions against those laws until we give them new ones to judge us against. They don't (or at least should not) make those laws themselves. We have a separate process to do that.

I just don't know that i agree. 18th Century Pirates (many of whom in the East were muslim) were absolutely as cold-blooded throat cutting killers in their day as terrorists are today. Hell, they defined the term.

The US constitution was written in a time rife with the recent and fresh memory of high piracy, so IMO, people like terrorists were certainly considered. And it was also written in the aftermath of the removal of a tyrannical yoke, so the Constitution WISELY erred on the side of limited governmental powers.

Whatever threat terrorists are, they pale in comparison to that of one's own gov't.

The founding fathers took all this into consideration, they were no dummies.

[pwd72s]

Originally Posted by DARISC

? What new rules?

As if they were fighting citizens of the USA, entitled to the rights provided under the Constitution...in other words, new rules saying they can't fight as military, but must fight as policemen...

[DARISC]

Originally Posted by m21sniper

I just don't know that i agree. 18th Century Pirates (many of whom in the East were muslim) were absolutely as cold-blooded throat cutting killers in their day as terrorists are today. Hell, they defined the term.

The US constitution was written in a time rife with the recent and fresh memory of high piracy, so IMO, people like terrorists were certainly considered. And it was also written in the aftermath of the removal of a tyrannical yoke, so the Constitution WISELY erred on the side of limited governmental powers.

Whatever threat terrorists are, they pale in comparison to that of one's own gov't.

The founding fathers took all this into consideration, they were no dummies.

Excellent, keep it coming!

[m21sniper]

ROE should remain unchanged.

[pwd72s]

Originally Posted by m21sniper

ROE should remain unchanged.

I wouldn't hold my breath on that. Instead of warriors, the military will be expected to become "arresting officers".

[Rick Lee]

Originally Posted by imcarthur

Let’s see here . . .

They were picked up by agents of a foreign country in a foreign country invaded by a “Coalition” of foreign nations without sanction from any international body. Their ‘guilt’ is based on evidence from CIA/Army Intelligence/Foreign Intelligence services (who are ALWAYS right of course & are of course also agents of said foreign country) in a time of "war".

Does the evidence not matter? Guilt until proven innocent? As an American or any ardent fan of democracy, are you comfortable with that?

When would you be uncomfortable?

Ian

I don't know the demographics of all those in our custody, but I doubt the majority of those we captured in Afghanistan are Afghans. I have no problem with our meting out severe punishment to foreign fighters in whatver country we caught them. Natives of those countries we've invaded should be interrogated harshly and then handed back to their governments for punishment, which will always be far worse than anything we would dish out.

I wouldn't apply any aspect of our so-called justice system to foreign terrorists. I don't care about teaching lessons or furthering justice. I want the threat neutralized with a zero rate of recidivism. This bull$hit about guilt or innocence or rehabilitation is what we reserve for domestic criminals. Terrorists needs to be snuffed out permanently.

[MRM]

The standards used in Gitmo were judged to be human rights abuses and against international law when the Soviets were doing the exact same things to our agents and people we were alligned with. Now that we're doing it, all of the sudden it's ok. The SC made the right decision. The country will be the stronger for it. The world will be better off because of it. If they're terrorists, they won't be able to make it past the preliminary hearing. If not, they shouldn't be in jail.

Have you heard about the people in Gitmo who were 1) mentally ill and not a threat, just picked up by accident; 2) mentally retarded, and not a threat and just picked up by accident; 3) foreign workers who were not terroists but were picked up because the Americans were offering cash bounties for foreign fighters and any foreigner was good enough back then; or 4) foreign nationals picked up by accident because of mistaken identity. Yes, the US has detained and released all of the above from Gitmo.

I can't believe I agreed with something Sniper said. Either I'm wrong or the blind pig just found a truffle.

[Shaun @ Tru6]

Damn that stupid Constitution is always getting in the way.

why is the Right hellbent on destroying our country? I'm glad someone, 5 citizens really, had the power, balls and the conscience to squash this aspect of the Republican Insurgency.

[Rick Lee]

Originally Posted by MRM

Have you heard about the people in Gitmo who were 1) mentally ill and not a threat, just picked up by accident; 2) mentally retarded, and not a threat and just picked up by accident; 3) foreign workers who were not terroists but were picked up because the Americans were offering cash bounties for foreign fighters and any foreigner was good enough back then; or 4) foreign nationals picked up by accident because of mistaken identity. Yes, the US has detained and released all of the above from Gitmo.

Have you heard about the several hundred detainees we've released over the last seven years, having determined they were either no longer threats or wrongfully detained? Have you also heard about the handful of those we released being recaptured on the battlefield still fighting our troops?

[cairns]

My world is empty without you babe.

Oops wrong thread.

Sorry.

[MRM]

You are have posted here before that you would torture the Gitmo detainees deliberately as punishent or some percieved deterence, even after they had no intelligence value. You have also posted that you would prefer to torture and/or execute all the Gitmo detainees to get at the bad ones, without caring whether some innocent got caught in the crossfire. I disagree and the Constitution is on my side. To misquote justice Renquist, who is not at all a shrinking liberal, surely it isn't too much to ask of the government to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt before jailing a man for the crime.

There have indeed been one or two Gitmo detainees who were released and captured later. Perhaps three, to be fair. As you point out, several hundered have been released. I guess our system of capturing and detaining people in Gitmo isn't so perfect if the president assured us only the "worst of the worst" were in Gitmo and we released so many hundreds of Gitmo detainees. Even under the current system innocent people are being released. So if they are, what does the government have to fear from the warm light of some sunshine on the detentions of the rest? You, to prevent the possibility of some guy coming back to fight the US later (why would a former Gitmo have a grudge against the US after being flown gagged and tagged for 30 hours and then held in solitary for five years, have against the US?) would prefer a secret sytem of detetion that apparently lets out guilty people but detains at least some innocents. Your way is moraly wrong, it is legally wrong by US standards, it is legally wrong by international standards, and it is bad strategy and worse policy. Habeus hearings are the best protection to ensure that the guilty are kept and the innocent are freed.

Next time an American gets captured and treated the way we treated Gitmo detainees, and to our complaints the bad guys point to Gitmo as their precedent, I suggest their blood is on your hands.

[m21sniper]

Originally Posted by Shaun 84 Targa

Damn that stupid Constitution is always getting in the way.

why is the Right hellbent on destroying our country? I'm glad someone, 5 citizens really, had the power, balls and the conscience to squash this aspect of the Republican Insurgency.

Republican presidents appointed some of the judges that ruled in favor of the GITMO defendants. In case you didn't know.

[svandamme]

Originally Posted by Rick Lee

Let me see here - non-U.S. citizens, captured on foreign battlefields, out of uniform, not belonging to any military of any nation state, allegedly deliberately targeting civilians, supposedly having declared war on the U.S. and not physically on U.S. sovereign soil. Many were apprehended based on tips from rival warlords, or neighbours who they had an ongoing civil dispute with, or quite simply because the fingerman could use some of the tipdollars...

i corrected it for you

[JayG]

Originally Posted by DARISC

Do you think the U.S. should do the same?

No, I but I dont think we should validate their parking tickets either.

[Shaun @ Tru6]

Originally Posted by m21sniper

Republican presidents appointed some of the judges that ruled in favor of the GITMO defendants. In case you didn't know.

Of course I know, quite a while ago. and they have responded to the recent Republican Insurgency in this country. Though a little late, the terrorists have been stopped.