June 30, 2006

THEY DESERVE THE SAME TRIALS PAST POWS GOT:

Ruling Leaves Uncertainty at Guantánamo (TIM GOLDEN, 6/30/06, NY Times)

As the Supreme Court prepared to rule on the Bush administration's plan to try terror suspects before special military tribunals here, the commander of Guantánamo's military detention center was asked what impact the court's decision might have on its operations.

"If they rule against the government, I don't see how that is going to affect us," the commander, Rear Adm. Harry B. Harris, said Tuesday evening as he sat in a conference room in his headquarters. "From my perspective, I think the direct impact will be negligible."

The Defense Department repeated that view on Thursday, asserting that the court's sweeping ruling against the tribunals did not undermine the government's argument that it can hold foreign suspects indefinitely and without charge, as "enemy combatants" in its declared war on terror.

Posted by Orrin Judd at June 30, 2006 9:40 AM
Comments

Slightly OT, OJ, but if the NYT is so willing to do great harm to this nation's security by its blabbing about the SWIFT program (among other things), why are so many of us still using NYT information in blogposts?

Not singling you out, OJ, as too many bloggers and National Review do the same thing.

Posted by: Brad S at June 30, 2006 10:01 AM

It didn't do any damage and such programs shouldn't be secret.

Posted by: oj at June 30, 2006 10:06 AM

You aren't going with the latest lefty trope on this issue, are you? You know, the one that states SWIFT was in the public domain way before last week?

Posted by: Brad S at June 30, 2006 10:30 AM

Orrin going with a lefty trope just to get a rise out of the readers of this blog? No! I am shocked, *shocked* that would happen. Say it ain't so!
(smirking)

Posted by: Bryan at June 30, 2006 10:43 AM

Getting back on topic, as far as I can tell, the practical effect of the SCOTUS ruling is that detainees won't even get military tribunals. They'll just stay detained until we win the WOT. Am I wrong?

Posted by: Bob Hawkins at June 30, 2006 11:17 AM

Bob:

Congress may go back and try to smack the Court for sweeping aside the law it passed last year regarding Gitmo (that appears to be part of the Kyl/Graham strategy). But with Tom DeLay gone, such stripping of jurisdiction may not happen. One practical impact may be that future captured terrorists get interrogated at Diego Garcia or in Greenland or in Israel, without anyone knowing where they are.

Posted by: jim hamlen at June 30, 2006 11:31 AM

Secrecy is always counter-productive.

Posted by: oj at June 30, 2006 11:33 AM

Brad:

No, I'm going with the conservative one that it should have been.

Posted by: oj at June 30, 2006 11:35 AM

When these leaks happen, I always have the feeling they were orchestrated by our dumb bunny president and that whatever the leak was about has already been discarded and some new process put in its place leaving the leaker and the media looking very foolish.

Posted by: erp at July 2, 2006 7:56 AM
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