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Audacity of Truth
Spinsational:
"We were so busy just getting stuff done and dealing with the immediate crises that were in front of us that I think we lost some of that sense of speaking directly to the American people about what their core values are and why we have to make sure those institutions are matching up with those values."
-Obama, explaining recent Democrat losses, 1/20/10
Velvet Lair- The sexiness of winning the battle of good versus evil January 26, 2010
- Ever wonder why? January 12, 2010
- The decision to bench Peyton Manning: Right or wrong? December 28, 2009
- Is my dad turning into a metrosexual? November 24, 2009
- My “Things To Do For Christmas” list November 23, 2009
Holder: If KSM somehow is not convicted, he will still not be released – may be sent to Bagram
So much for trying to demonstrate to the world the “fairness” of our justice system:
Facing a wave of critics warning of the risks of putting Mr. Mohammed on trial, Mr. Holder bluntly asserted that “failure isn’t a option” when asked during a Congressional hearing whether Mr. Mohammed and other key terrorist suspects will be convicted. Acquittals, claims of asylum and even judicial orders freeing them won’t result in releases, he asserted.
“If there is not a successful conclusion to this trial, that would not mean that this person would be released,” Mr. Holder bluntly told the Congressional hearing, referring to Mr. Mohammed – the self-proclaimed planner of the Sept 11, 2001, suicide hijackings.
“What if a federal judge orders the Department of Justice to release Khalid Sheikh Mohammed?” Texas Republican Senator John Cornyn asked. “Will you defy that order?”
Mr. Holder made it clear that by moving Mr. Mohammed to a prison offshore – such as Bagram in Afghanistan, where hundreds of detainees are held – a release order could be circumvented.
“We have taken the view that the judiciary does not have the ability necessarily to certainly require us to, with people who are held overseas, to release them,” he said. “It’s hard for me to imagine a set of circumstances, given the other things that we could do with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed” that would result in him being freed,” the Attorney-General said.
“Under the regime we are contemplating … the ability to detain under laws of war, we would retain that ability,” Mr. Holder added, meaning anyone freed by the courts could simply be returned as an enemy combatant to indefinite military detention.
Mr. Obama, a former law professor, denied he was interfering with Mr. Mohammed’s right to a fair trial. “I’m not prejudging it,” he said in a televised NBC interview. “I’m not going to be in that courtroom. That’s the job of the prosecutors, the judge and the jury,” he said.
Like I said this morning, this so-called “trial for justice for the 9-11 victims” is a pretense for this administration. If their whole point in this trial is to demonstrate to the world that we have a “fair and just” system, then proclaiming KSM guilty and deciding his punishment before he’s had a trial – and suggesting that even if he isn’t found guilty that he will still be held and possibly sent to Bagram is certainly unlike any “fair and just” system I’ve ever heard of. Essentially, Holder is saying, “If we don’t like the verdict, we still have options for keeping him in custody.” Huh??
All the options he put on the table in the event of a not guilty verdict for KSM are options he should have taken advantage of instead of going the route he’s chosen to with this farcical show trial.
Really. Wake me up when amateur hour is over in this WH!
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In other words, in an effort to get the world to see just how fair our system of justice is Mr. Holder has just told the world that the verdicts (“failure is not an option”) are as assured as those for the trials of the five hikers in Iran, or the leaders of the latest Iranian revolution Duh-1 didn’t want to get involved in because he didn’t want to upset the apple cart.
While we’ve every reason to be confident that a guilty verdict is going to happen (specifically, KSM’s non-coerced confession), the AG shouldn’t have said this. He should have said something like, “Senator, I do not view the possibility of KSM’s acquittal as sufficiently within the realm of possibility that we need seriously entertain that contingency.”
But if the trial is not meaningful, there is little point to having it — either for the reason that I think we should (respecting our national ideal of due process) or the reason that ST identifies (making a spectacle of our great fairness to gain diplomatic currency).
Transplant? They will walk. Improper collection of evidence, that is what will be used to dismiss the whole case. Not to mention they were never mirandized and only received legal counsel several years after questioning began. Then there is the endless venue change appeals, and the total impossibility of seating an unbiased jury, and where are we going to find a jury of their “peers” to begin with?
This is one of the stupidest things a Democrat has ever done. And that is a WHOLE lot of stupid.
I’m not so sure that your first paragraph is correct, Hotel. KSM offered an uncoerced confession before any “enhanced interrogation techniques” were used, and Miranda has been effectively emasculated already as to U.S. citizens accused of ordinary crimes whenever a credible claim of “exigent circumstances” can be offered. So I think the government has a very good shot at getting that evidence admitted.
“A jury of your peers” means a jury of U.S. citizens who have not been convicted of felonies. An “unbiased” jury cannot be found anywhere in the world in the sense that all six billion people over the age of 18 alive today had a profound emotional reaction to 9/11. As to the jury’s bias, we don’t know what defense KSM would offer on his own behalf so it’s impossible to say whether anyone would pre-judge his claims or not. And yes, there will be a lot of appeals that will frustrate people. But so what? That’s what happens with home-grown thugs, too.
I am thinking that despite the fact that you’ve set a very high standard, your second paragraph is correct.
I spent a lot of time and intellectual energy earlier today in another thread on this very blog, arguing that we should give this b****rd a fair trial because due process is one of our highest national ideals, because we are better than “them,” because making the government do the right thing even when we’re dealing with the worst of the worst is the pinnacle of what makes us a free people. But now, AG Holder flushed that entire concept down the toilet by telling the world that this is going to be just a show trial anyway. There’s nothing really at stake here after all.
If what we really want to do is hold this guy forever without having to deal with the criminal justice system, then we should classify him as a prisoner of war and be done with it. Since this “war” will never really be over, that will let us detain him until he dies, and the only functional limit it really puts on us then is that we can’t torture him, which we shouldn’t be doing anyway.
Once again, I don’t see how this circus doesn’t set a president or numerous presidents for the rest of the citizenry of the Country in the future.
They are ignoring “our” laws with a wink and a nod, just to bring these terrorists here to put the previous administration on trial.It’s blatant and unforgivable,I truly hope these buzzards get whats coming to them for their absolute lack of concern for their fellow citizens.
I’m trying to apply logic to this whole mess and I can’t. If I understand what is happening… we are a Nation that has a superior justice system, whereby we try people with the assumption of their innocence and righteously give them their day in court…except if we think they might get off? Holder and Obama are idealogue morons and are dangerous to the rest of us. The only way we get rid of these incompetent left wing nutjobs is to get rid of Obama in the next election. I sure hope the rest of the world won’t be too upset. My “wet” dream is that Obama has to show the Palins around the White House when this is all said and done in 2012 because it appears she’s the only one with the common sense, true leadership ability, and the courage to say and do what the rest of us expect, and someone that actually loves our country and doesn’t despise it to the point of exposing it to danger and ridicule to the rest of the world.
P.S.: I hope Michele Bachmann or Mitt Romney have to listen to Joe Biden’s stories about shopping at Lowe’s or Home Depot while he bought a left handed pipe fitter while they escort him out the door of the Vice President’s mansion into the custody of the men in the white suits and a butterfly net. I hope they’re respectful while they stand at the door listening to him try to convince the “escorts” how his Administration was FORCED to spend trillions we didn’t have and tax businesses to the point they couldn’t survive so that we could save our economy. I hope the men in the white suits are kind to him. He seems harmless enough and not a bad guy really.
TL wrote: “But now, AG Holder flushed that entire concept down the toilet by telling the world that this is going to be just a show trial anyway. There’s nothing really at stake here after all.”
TL: I really admire that are you are able to see the truth of it notwithstanding your political leanings. That takes a lot more openmindedness and integrity than one normally encounters on a political blog.
I’m afraid Holder’s decision is motivated not just by a desire to demonstrate to the world America’s decency and sense of fair play, but as a way for Obama to put Bush-Cheney on trial without having to do it himself. IOW, KSM’s legal team will serve as the de facto prosecutors in a fake war crimes trial against the Bush Admin. Plenty of red meat there for the left and no need for Obama to get his hands dirty.
TL, welcome to our side on this issue. Hate to say it but … I Toldjah So
I sure am glad that Home Land Security hasn’t gone all “Patriot act” on this guy. From the dust up the left was giving President Bush, you would have expected this guy to just “disappear” under some of the “top secret” clauses of the Patriot act.
I say we should have given into KSM’s request to martyr him. Let him be heralded as a martyr, and let us be done with this over the top expensive show trial. Just how much money is this going to cost the Chinese again?? – Lorica
Sorry, ST – but if we let you sleep until Amateur Hour ends, well… you’d lose the 8-5, you’d get foreclosed on, you’d starve … lots of bad things happen when you sleep for three years straight.
Ditto what CB says in comment#8. And contributing this regarding Holder’s agenda. From Michelle Malkin:
Didn’t we demonstrate to the world that we have a “fair and just” system when the jury released OJ Simpson back into the wild?
CB, ST — Thanks. I try to approach all issues from a principled point of view and try to truly be (as The Atlantic magazine too often fails to be) of no party or clique.
Here, I agreed from the very start of our discussion yesterday that using KSM’s trial to put the Bush Administration on trial (whether directly or through the proxies of defense attorneys) would be an inappropriate use of the criminal justice system. I advocated, and never objected to, the use of a closed-door military tribunal for the guy. Where we disagreed was whether the Constitution requires due process all or whether we were granting it just to be nice.
And if the KSM trial were going to be a meaningful, genuine judicial procedure, then I’d stand by my arguments from yesterday. What I wrote then, I wrote before I knew that the government intended to simply ignore a verdict that it didn’t like. So until and unless there is either a retraction from Holder or an override from Obama, this whole KSM thing is a plain farce — it’s better to have no trial at all than a show trial.
Now, could I talk any of you into signing on to the idea of calling the guy a POW?
TL, welcome to a really good blog, and you’ve helped make it that way. Thank you.
CB, very insightful, and probably spot on.
And TWoPolitics, the world saw that trial and knew immediately that our system of “fair and just” justice has nothing to do with justice. If it did, approximately 1/3 – 1/2 of the rapes wouldn’t happen due to repeat offenders and/or people out on bail waiting for trial on a similar charge.
…..and justice for all! These clowns are a regular comic act! We certainly don’t need the president and attorney general exposing anymore of their version of the American Criminal Justice System! Where did these guys come from?
Let’s see, Duh-1 stated he “didn’t have all the facts” but made a judgment about the professor’s arrest a few months ago.
Now he’s got all the facts, including sensitive, classified material (that some suspect he wants our declared enemy to have), yet he wants to parade the poor pig’s butt down Manhatten to a clown’s circus so the world will see how “just” we are?
What’s wrong with this picture? Kinda sounds like Tehran or Beijing to me.
TL, I’d be happy to call KSM a POW (Wow – how’s that for Acronym Overload?) if he met the criteria. That would be, for instance, if he had worn a clear uniform, carried arms openly and had not targeted non-combatants. That’s three violations of the requirements of the Geneva Accords (to which they don’t subscribe anyway), and only One violation is enough to get you cast out from their protections.
That’s why, during The Bulge, our men were catching German troops in U.S. uniforms and, rather than taking them prisoner, would shoot them as spies. And those Germans did NOT target non-combatants.
KSM and his ilk are unlawful combatants, which means that, under the Accords, they can be shot without trial, they can be tortured for information (I’m not talking waterboarding, but REAL torture here), whatever. They no more fall under its jurisdiction than you do if you get a parking ticket.
Please note – I am NOT saying torture is fine, or that we should engage in it. I’m just saying that they receive no POW protections from it.
KSM should have been shot as soon as we had all the actionable information we were gonna get from him. Keeping him alive has only proven to be a disaster. He probably never should have made it to Gitmo – and I’ve heard firsthand from some folks in the know that our boys are gonna be much more likely to not take prisoners already, much less if the NYC trial becomes the circus we’re afraid of.
Well, let’s run with that. I understand that you’re distinguishing between our moral duties and our legal obligations; I have no problem with making such a distinction. So let us set aside the question of what moral obligations are imposed upon us as KSM’s jailors.
What if, today, November 20, 2009, one of the guards at Gitmo walks into KSM’s cell and unloads his entire clip into KSM’s face? Would that be an illegal act? Under your theory, there is nothing in the Geneva Accords that would prohibit that. Fair enough. But is there any law at all that does? Are you saying that KSM’s cell at Gitmo is an extension of the battlefield upon which he was originally captured six and a half years ago?
Even if you answer that question “yes,” I don’t think that gets our hypothetical guard out of the legal woods. I certainly understand that on a battlefield, the finely-parsed rules lawyers talk about in peaceful, air-conditioned civilian courtrooms are not typically much of a consideration. I’ve ample comfort with the idea of relaxing legal standards based on exigent circumstances, and combat is among the most exigent circumstances imaginable. But even in a live-fire battlefield against an “irregular opponent” as opposed to an enemy soldier as defined by the Geneva Accords, one of our soldiers is still not entirely free from legal restrictions on what he can do. He may not, for instance, kill a fellow American soldier with impunity. (I’m thinking of a murder rather than “friendly fire”.) If one of our soldiers were to do such a thing, there would be a legal consequence; he would be court-martialled for murder and maybe even treason.
So I can’t wrap my head around the idea there is simply no law of any kind binding our conduct in this situation, that the only rule that applies at all is what Breaker Morant called “Rule 303.” With the same intensity that you all won’t concede the point that the Constitution does not afford KSM any rights, I cannot concede the idea that our government lacks some kind of legal restraint on the arbitrary exercise of raw, violent power. If that restraint is not found in or derived from the Constitution, I’d be interested in your opinion on where else I should search for it.