Question
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General Government, Politics & Law
MUST we bow at the feet of Liberal Defeatists? HELL NO!
By MARK SHERMAN, Associated Press Writer Thu Jun 12, 7:53 PM ET
WASHINGTON - In a stinging rebuke to President Bush's anti-terror policies, a deeply divided Supreme Court ruled Thursday that foreign detainees held for years at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba have the right to appeal to U.S. civilian courts to challenge their indefinite imprisonment without charges.
Bush said he strongly disagreed with the decision — the third time the court has repudiated him on the detainees — and suggested he might seek yet another law to keep terror suspects locked up at the prison camp, even as his presidency winds down.
Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the 5-4 high court majority, acknowledged the terrorism threat the U.S. faces — the administration's justification for the detentions — but he declared, "The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times."
In a blistering dissent, Justice Antonin Scalia said the decision "will make the war harder on us. It will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed."
Bush has argued the detentions are needed to protect the nation in a time of unprecedented threats from al-Qaeda and other foreign terrorist groups. The president, in Rome, said Thursday, "It was a deeply divided court, and I strongly agree with those who dissented." He said he would consider whether to seek new laws in light of the ruling "so we can safely say to the American people, 'We're doing everything we can to protect you.'"
Kennedy said federal judges could ultimately order some detainees to be released, but he also said such orders would depend on security concerns and other circumstances. The ruling itself won't result in any immediate releases.
The decision also cast doubt on the future of the military war crimes trials that 19 detainees, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other alleged Sept. 11 plotters, are facing so far. The Pentagon has said it plans to try as many as 80 men held at Guantanamo.
Lawyers for detainees differed over whether the ruling, unlike the first two, would lead to prompt hearings for those who have not been charged. Roughly 270 men remain at the prison at the U.S. naval base in Cuba. Most are classed as enemy combatants and held on suspicion of terrorism or links to al-Qaeda and the Taliban.
Some detainee lawyers said hearings could take place within a few months. But James Cohen, a Fordham University law professor who has two clients at Guantanamo, predicted Bush would continue seeking ways to resist the ruling. "Nothing is going to happen between June 12 and Jan. 20," when the next president takes office, Cohen said.
Roughly 200 detainees have lawsuits on hold in federal court in Washington. Chief Judge Royce C. Lamberth said he would call a special meeting of federal judges to address how to handle the cases.
Detainees already facing trial are in a different category.
Justice Department spokesman Peter Carr said Thursday's decision should not affect war crimes trials. "Military commission trials will therefore continue to go forward," Carr said.
The lawyer for Salim Ahmed Hamdan, Osama bin Laden's one-time driver, said he will seek dismissal of the charges against Hamdan based on the new ruling. A military judge had already delayed the trial's start to await the high court ruling.
It was unclear whether a hearing at Guantanamo for Canadian Omar Khadr, charged with killing a U.S. Special Forces soldier in Afghanistan, would go forward next week as planned.
Charles Swift, the former Navy lawyer who used to represent Hamdan, said he believes the court removed any legal basis for keeping the Guantanamo facility open and that the military tribunals are "doomed."
Guantanamo generally and the tribunals were conceived on the idea that "constitutional protections wouldn't apply," Swift said. "The court said the Constitution applies. They're in big trouble."
Human rights groups and many Democratic members of Congress celebrated the ruling as affirming the nation's commitment to the rule of law. Several Republican lawmakers called it a decision that put foreign terrorists' rights above the safety of the American people.
The administration opened the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to hold enemy combatants, people suspected of ties to al-Qaeda or the Taliban.
The prison has been harshly criticized at home and abroad for the detentions themselves and the aggressive interrogations that were conducted there.
At its heart, the 70-page ruling says that the detainees have the same rights as anyone else in custody in the United States to contest their detention before a judge. Kennedy also said the system the administration has put in place to classify detainees as enemy combatants and review those decisions is not an adequate substitute for the right to go before a civilian judge.
The administration had argued first that the detainees have no rights. But it also contended that the classification and review process was sufficient.
Chief Justice John Roberts, in his own dissent to Thursday's ruling, criticized the majority for striking down what he called "the most generous set of procedural protections ever afforded aliens detained by this country as enemy combatants."
Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas also dissented.
Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, David Souter and John Paul Stevens — the court's more liberal members — joined Kennedy to form the majority.
Souter wrote a separate opinion in which he emphasized the length of the detentions.
"A second fact insufficiently appreciated by the dissents is the length of the disputed imprisonments; some of the prisoners represented here today having been locked up for six years," Souter said. "Hence the hollow ring when the dissenters suggest that the court is somehow precipitating the judiciary into reviewing claims that the military ... could handle within some reasonable period of time."
Scalia, citing a report by Senate Republicans, said at least 30 prisoners have returned to the battlefield following their release from Guantanamo.
The court has ruled twice previously that people held at Guantanamo without charges can go into civilian courts to ask that the government justify their continued detention. Each time, the administration and Congress, then controlled by Republicans, changed the law to try to close the courthouse doors to the detainees.
The court specifically struck down a provision of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that denies Guantanamo detainees the right to file petitions of habeas corpus. Habeas corpus is a centuries-old legal principle, enshrined in the Constitution, that allows courts to determine whether a prisoner is being held illegally.
The head of the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, which represents dozens of prisoners at Guantanamo, welcomed the ruling.
"The Supreme Court has finally brought an end to one of our nation's most egregious injustices," said CCR Executive Director Vincent Warren. "By granting the writ of habeas corpus, the Supreme Court recognizes a rule of law established hundreds of years ago and essential to American jurisprudence since our nation's founding."
Bush has said he wants to close the facility once countries can be found to take the prisoners who are there.
Presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama also support shutting down the prison.
By MARK SHERMAN, Associated Press Writer Thu Jun 12, 7:53 PM ET
WASHINGTON - In a stinging rebuke to President Bush's anti-terror policies, a deeply divided Supreme Court ruled Thursday that foreign detainees held for years at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba have the right to appeal to U.S. civilian courts to challenge their indefinite imprisonment without charges.
Bush said he strongly disagreed with the decision — the third time the court has repudiated him on the detainees — and suggested he might seek yet another law to keep terror suspects locked up at the prison camp, even as his presidency winds down.
Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the 5-4 high court majority, acknowledged the terrorism threat the U.S. faces — the administration's justification for the detentions — but he declared, "The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times."
In a blistering dissent, Justice Antonin Scalia said the decision "will make the war harder on us. It will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed."
Bush has argued the detentions are needed to protect the nation in a time of unprecedented threats from al-Qaeda and other foreign terrorist groups. The president, in Rome, said Thursday, "It was a deeply divided court, and I strongly agree with those who dissented." He said he would consider whether to seek new laws in light of the ruling "so we can safely say to the American people, 'We're doing everything we can to protect you.'"
Kennedy said federal judges could ultimately order some detainees to be released, but he also said such orders would depend on security concerns and other circumstances. The ruling itself won't result in any immediate releases.
The decision also cast doubt on the future of the military war crimes trials that 19 detainees, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other alleged Sept. 11 plotters, are facing so far. The Pentagon has said it plans to try as many as 80 men held at Guantanamo.
Lawyers for detainees differed over whether the ruling, unlike the first two, would lead to prompt hearings for those who have not been charged. Roughly 270 men remain at the prison at the U.S. naval base in Cuba. Most are classed as enemy combatants and held on suspicion of terrorism or links to al-Qaeda and the Taliban.
Some detainee lawyers said hearings could take place within a few months. But James Cohen, a Fordham University law professor who has two clients at Guantanamo, predicted Bush would continue seeking ways to resist the ruling. "Nothing is going to happen between June 12 and Jan. 20," when the next president takes office, Cohen said.
Roughly 200 detainees have lawsuits on hold in federal court in Washington. Chief Judge Royce C. Lamberth said he would call a special meeting of federal judges to address how to handle the cases.
Detainees already facing trial are in a different category.
Justice Department spokesman Peter Carr said Thursday's decision should not affect war crimes trials. "Military commission trials will therefore continue to go forward," Carr said.
The lawyer for Salim Ahmed Hamdan, Osama bin Laden's one-time driver, said he will seek dismissal of the charges against Hamdan based on the new ruling. A military judge had already delayed the trial's start to await the high court ruling.
It was unclear whether a hearing at Guantanamo for Canadian Omar Khadr, charged with killing a U.S. Special Forces soldier in Afghanistan, would go forward next week as planned.
Charles Swift, the former Navy lawyer who used to represent Hamdan, said he believes the court removed any legal basis for keeping the Guantanamo facility open and that the military tribunals are "doomed."
Guantanamo generally and the tribunals were conceived on the idea that "constitutional protections wouldn't apply," Swift said. "The court said the Constitution applies. They're in big trouble."
Human rights groups and many Democratic members of Congress celebrated the ruling as affirming the nation's commitment to the rule of law. Several Republican lawmakers called it a decision that put foreign terrorists' rights above the safety of the American people.
The administration opened the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to hold enemy combatants, people suspected of ties to al-Qaeda or the Taliban.
The prison has been harshly criticized at home and abroad for the detentions themselves and the aggressive interrogations that were conducted there.
At its heart, the 70-page ruling says that the detainees have the same rights as anyone else in custody in the United States to contest their detention before a judge. Kennedy also said the system the administration has put in place to classify detainees as enemy combatants and review those decisions is not an adequate substitute for the right to go before a civilian judge.
The administration had argued first that the detainees have no rights. But it also contended that the classification and review process was sufficient.
Chief Justice John Roberts, in his own dissent to Thursday's ruling, criticized the majority for striking down what he called "the most generous set of procedural protections ever afforded aliens detained by this country as enemy combatants."
Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas also dissented.
Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, David Souter and John Paul Stevens — the court's more liberal members — joined Kennedy to form the majority.
Souter wrote a separate opinion in which he emphasized the length of the detentions.
"A second fact insufficiently appreciated by the dissents is the length of the disputed imprisonments; some of the prisoners represented here today having been locked up for six years," Souter said. "Hence the hollow ring when the dissenters suggest that the court is somehow precipitating the judiciary into reviewing claims that the military ... could handle within some reasonable period of time."
Scalia, citing a report by Senate Republicans, said at least 30 prisoners have returned to the battlefield following their release from Guantanamo.
The court has ruled twice previously that people held at Guantanamo without charges can go into civilian courts to ask that the government justify their continued detention. Each time, the administration and Congress, then controlled by Republicans, changed the law to try to close the courthouse doors to the detainees.
The court specifically struck down a provision of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that denies Guantanamo detainees the right to file petitions of habeas corpus. Habeas corpus is a centuries-old legal principle, enshrined in the Constitution, that allows courts to determine whether a prisoner is being held illegally.
The head of the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, which represents dozens of prisoners at Guantanamo, welcomed the ruling.
"The Supreme Court has finally brought an end to one of our nation's most egregious injustices," said CCR Executive Director Vincent Warren. "By granting the writ of habeas corpus, the Supreme Court recognizes a rule of law established hundreds of years ago and essential to American jurisprudence since our nation's founding."
Bush has said he wants to close the facility once countries can be found to take the prisoners who are there.
Presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama also support shutting down the prison.
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Answered We are TOAST
Because McSame, too dumc to pick up the 'Michelle Obama' joke from a questioner who had been educated at Princeton and Harvard, responded that ot's "tough" to be be proud of America. Yes, that what McSame said during the town meeting... that for him it's tough, tough to be proud of America.
http://www.jedreport.com/2008...
http://www.democraticundergro...
http://digg.com/2008_us_elect... -
Answered NO WAY ..How could smart people do such dumb things?
I do not usderstand how they could make such a ruling. These people are prisoners due to the threat of the people of our country America. They should be held under military law like it has been in every other conflict that has occured in our history. They are not American citizens and do not deserve the same rights as American citizens do. They sure did not care about our laws or rights when they were terrorizing us. They did not care about our laws or rights when they were killing our people. Now all of a sudden we are suppose to give them the same rights that we have as citizens because it is the politically correct thing to do. Bullshit. I am sicking of being Politically Correct. They are considered POW. I do not feel sympathy for these people they are prisoners due to the fact that they are seen as a threat to the American people and unless there is proof they are not than that is were they should be. I am sick of us having to be all nice and sweet. It is called war for a reason and in war there is no being nice. -
America stands by its Constitutio. True and patriotic Ameriams are proud to uphold the American Constitution. No person can be thrown into a prison for 8 months without reasons for the charges. Only Communists detain prisoners without indication of charges. McSame must have, for 5 1/2 years of living in Hanoi Hilton, learned up Communist tactics of throwing people into prison without charges. McSame upholds the Communist philosophy and ideology to use against America's Constitution. Shame on Mcsame, and not surprising since McSame was born outside US soil and homeland and is only created a natural born citizen to be given the opportunity to run as a Presidential candidate by the mere fluke of a law!
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How can those POWs be seen as a threat when no charges have been officially addressed to them? Besides our Constitution covers the rights of ALL People in America. If McCain, born on a Military base can be considered a natural born American citizen, then those POWs on America's Gitmo base are also considered as the People in America within our Constitution. Who gives you the right to betray our American Constitution?
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I believe the reason McCain was born on a military base was because his father was serving this country and was an American citizen trying to protect the rights of everyone. As for me betraying the Constitution I am not. I just think it is crap that all of sudden we want to be Politically Correct we sure were not worried about being Politically Correct in any other conflict we have been in.
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Answered None of the above
Nazis who were caught red handed were given more rights than these "detainees". Why has it taken 7 years to get these human beings to trial. If there is so much damned evidence against them why have they not been exectued yet!? My guess is this will all get fixed when we get the neo con nazis out of the White House and get human beings in there. -
Answered None of the above
The "enemy combatants" held at Gitmo are POW's!!
I am sick of the PC liberal media making up euphamisms to make it all sound so pretty.
POW, POW, POW, that is what they are and as such are MILITARY prisoners that should be handle as such by the UCMJ (military laws).
This is just a license to kill upon sight. Oh well, it is cheaper.....
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Answered NO WAY ..How could smart people do such dumb things?
This is a good example of very brilliant people having no common sense at all unless they want this country to go down the drain. We're drowning in political correctness, our rights are being taken from us one by one, the country is being dumbed down to the lowest denominator by our educational system, our politicians are corrupt at best, and now terrorists who have vowed to destroy us are given the same rights as our citizens. If Obama gets in and puts more insane liberal judges on the Supreme Court, the process will be completed. -
Republican politicians and judges aren't immune from mistakes and insanity. Where in the constitution does it say that our rogue enemies who play by no rules and wear no uniform are covered by our rights?
What a farce -- these animals live better in our jails than in their own country and better than many of our own citizens do. No wonder they think we are fools. -
Please, what has radical Conservatives done for this nation other than create pea-brained, shallow and programmed robots out of simpletons, naive and gullible red-necks and the trash of society, influence the leadership of America into failure after failure against other nations, clean our American shops and markets out of Made-in-America profucts for our daily use and instill corruption into this nation so as to allow a boom of Baron Robbers? Even their so-called fight against pork is such kogwash, when clearly we are seening that even Sen Elizabeth Dole is imitating her husband, Bob Dole (known nororiously as the King of Pork) is promising the delivery of pork to the voters of NC to try to get re-elected!
One only has to look at the recent ads of the recent ads for Sens. Mitch McConnell (Ky.), Elizabeth Dole (N.C.) and Norm Coleman (Minn.), to see that these GOP incumbents highlight their ability to work across party lines to deliver PORK to their respective states. Yep, only the American DUMB, DUMBER and DUMBEST can be so easily fooled by the Conservertive Repugs that Repugs are fighting against Pork Delivery!
http://www.washingtonpost.com... -
Well, as simple, naive, gullible red-neck trash, I suppose I should be insulted but I'm sorry, I have to laugh instead because you have just described one of the main Democrat groups except maybe for the redneck part, just substituting ghetto for redneck. If you think I'm going to defend Republican radicals, or any politician for that matter, you're barking up the wrong tree. They're all, along with Democrat politicians, the same -- corrupt power- and money-grubbing nest featherers (with a few exceptions, of course). The ones from either side with pork projects should be thrown out. That's one thing I like about McCain.
Answered NO WAY ..How could smart people do such dumb things?
This is a good example of very brilliant people having no common sense at all unless they want this country to go down the drain. We're drowning in political correctness, our rights are being taken from us one by one, the country is being dumbed down to the lowest denominator by our educational system, our politicians are corrupt at best, and now terrorists who have vowed to destroy us are given the same rights as our citizens. If Obama gets in and puts more insane liberal judges on the Supreme Court, the process will be completed.