Thursday, June 12, 2008

Admin is too conservative

even for this supreme court.
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29 comments:

Mr roT said...

These are the same reputed fascists that think we are bound by the Geneva Conventions in how we treat ununiformed combatants that mix in the population.

6/12/2008 1:02 PM
Pepe le Pew said...

You're just mixing your libido with politics again. just because uniforms turn you on doesn't mean the GC shouldn't apply to those that don't wear them.

6/12/2008 1:47 PM
Mr roT said...

Read the GC instead of GQ and Advocate.

6/12/2008 1:49 PM
Tecumseh said...

Pepe has trouble reading actual laws or conventions he cites, so let me try and help him. Here are some relevant passages from the Geneva Conventions:

Article 44(3) states:
"In order to promote the protection of the civilian population from the effects of hostilities, combatants are obliged to distinguish themselves from the civilian population while they are engaged in an attack or in a military operation preparatory to an attack. Recognizing, however, that there are situations in armed conflicts where, owing to the nature of the hostilities an armed combatant cannot so distinguish himself, he shall retain his status as a combatant, provided that, in such situations, he carries his arms openly."
Article 44(7) then states:
"This Article is not intended to change the generally accepted practice of States with respect to the wearing of the uniform by combatants assigned to the regular, uniformed armed units of a Party to the conflict."

The emphasis on uniforms is quite clear in the GC -- at least to a non-pinko-addled mind.

6/12/2008 2:01 PM
Tecumseh said...

BTW, Pepe, how would Mohammed Atta -- who hid a boxcutter to board a plane at Logan, and then proceeded to use that concealed weapon to seize the plane and crash it into the WTC on 9/11 -- be protected under your reading of the GC as a lawful combatant? Just curious to see Gallic razor-sharp legal thinking in action.

6/12/2008 2:21 PM
Mr roT said...

Hang on, AI. Let's assume Atta were caught here in the US. What then? It's normal court of law. Battlefield in Afgh is different than the Westin in Copley Sq.

Suppose as another hypothetical that Atta's boss was found holed up in NYC somewhere, or just for argument's sake in the big new mosque going up in Boston.

Those guys would go to regular court, then likely Federal court and then to hang in Federal prison.

6/12/2008 2:25 PM
Pepe le Pew said...

What does atta have to do with this ? THis is about the handling of people who have been emprisoned seemingly indefinitely by the military based on obscure internal criteria with no independent oversight.
It is rather universally accepted, on the other hand, that atta is guilty. Now I understand you would enjoy doing unspeakable things to him but, being in a civilized society, we normally assume the high road and try to not emulate the behavior of our enemies.

6/12/2008 2:39 PM
Tecumseh said...

Both JJ and Pepe missed my point. It's not a question whether Atta was guilty or not -- of course he was. And it's not a question what punishment he should have been meted were he caught alive. The point is that he was an enemy combatant out of uniform -- thus, not protected by the GC. In fact, he was a spy/saboteur/killer for an enemy organization, send on a mission to wreak havoc here. As such, he, or people like him, if caught (either in the US or overseas), should not be tried in a "normal court of law", like JJ wants. Rather, they should be subject to military justice -- much like those German saboteurs caught in WWII in NYC, who were summarily tried by a military tribunal, found guilty, and hanged. That's the way to do it, all very much according to the US Constitution and the Geneva Conventions.

6/12/2008 2:56 PM
Mr roT said...

AI, no way. The issue is where they are. If they are caught in the US, then it's different than if they're picked up in the battlefield. This should be obvious.

The NYPD can't pick you up and then ship you off to Egypt. The military can do that to people they sweep up in battle.

6/12/2008 4:37 PM
Mr roT said...

Pepe, it's not about being nice to people, much though you think we should be to everyone.

6/12/2008 4:38 PM
Pepe le Pew said...

The NYPD can't pick you up and then ship you off to Egypt.

Didn't they actually ship some guy who crossed the canadian border over to syria a little while back? the supreme court wouldn't even hear the case,

6/12/2008 5:06 PM
Mr roT said...

Canada shares a border with Syria? That explains a lot.

6/12/2008 5:14 PM
Pepe le Pew said...

they got those things called airplanes that allow you to send someone across the world more quickly than you on your burro, mari.

6/12/2008 5:42 PM
Tecumseh said...

I don't know about the NYPD, but the NY office of the FBI can: see here and here. As I said, the German spies were caught in DC and NYC, tried before a military commission (on instructions from FDR himself), and then executed (Homer nods: on the electric chair, not at the gallows).

Of course, there were a couple of shysters who tried to argue like JJ that the trial should be held in a civilian court, but the Supreme Court sided with moi, in Ex parte Quirin. Powwww!!! Where is my VCP?

6/12/2008 6:13 PM
Tecumseh said...

For Pepe's benefit (he has trouble reading original texts), here is an excerpt from that 1942 Supreme Court decision: The spy who secretly and without uniform passes the military lines of a belligerent in time of war, seeking to gather military information and communicate it to the enemy, or an enemy combatant who without uniform comes secretly through the lines for the purpose of waging war by destruction of life or property, are familiar examples of belligerents who are generally deemed not to be entitled to the status of prisoners of war, but to be offenders against the law of war subject to trial and punishment by military tribunals.

6/12/2008 6:16 PM
Mr roT said...

We were at war with a country (called "Germany", AI) when those guys got nabbed. Behind lines without a uniform and you're fucking shot. I agree.
What country of Atta's were we at war with, now?
Why don't you read Taranto at least instead of going off half-cocked and trying to be Scalia or something.

6/12/2008 6:22 PM
Tecumseh said...

I don't need no Taranto to make up my mind of this. I'm going by the original laws governing these situations.

We are not at war, JJ? I got news from you: it's called the War on Terror. And it started with the bombing of the WTC back in 1993, the bombing of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the bombing of the USS Cole, etc, etc -- and, essentially, a declaration of war by Binnie on behalf of AQ (a fatwa on the US, if you wish), sometimes in the late 1990s. So, OK, it's not a declaration of war between sovereign states -- but so what? It's still war, and people are still dying as a result. Where in Quirin does it say the enemy combatant got to be from a state that has declared war on the US? One more time, it simply states: an enemy combatant who without uniform comes secretly through the lines for the purpose of waging war by destruction of life or property. Sounds clearcut to me, unless you can find some penumbras in there somewhere.

6/12/2008 6:31 PM
Mr roT said...

Legally we were not at war when the Atta plans were going down. We are talking about the law, aren't we?

6/12/2008 6:41 PM
Mr roT said...

You're the one with the penumbras. What lines might the law be referring to?

6/12/2008 6:42 PM
Pepe le Pew said...

...subject to trial and punishment by military tribunals

ai - there have been no trials. that's the problem. who isn't reading here ?

6/12/2008 6:44 PM
Mr roT said...

Pepe, probably you don't want to consider military tribunals adequate. They're about like veterinarians in Westerns. When they come upon a sick horse, any sick horse, the answer is always to shoot the beast.

Also, if you would be satisfied with mil tribs, then this SC ruling is overkill. This human excrement picked up on the battlefield is going to be penned in Federal District Court close to your house and tried as if he were some guy got here legal and held up a gas station.

I hope you don't get hurt in the crossfire when his buddies try to get him out.

6/12/2008 6:56 PM
Tecumseh said...

JJ, JJ -- you don't pay attention to what I say. Bin Laden (the boss of AQ) declared war on the US in August 1996. Binnie's Fatwah was titled "Declaration of War against the Americans Occupying the Land of the Two Holy Places". What part of the title you don't understand? Or is it unclear that August 1996 comes before September 2001?

6/12/2008 7:56 PM
Mr roT said...

So what AI? When did Congress declare war on whatever bin Laden is? Why don't you read what someone who knows something about law says? Read Volokh or something.

6/13/2008 4:54 AM
Tecumseh said...

We don't need Congress to declare war to a have a bona-fide enemy to fight, JJ, and you know it. Just in case you forgot about it, there was something called the Vietnam War, in which more than 50,000 Americans were killed fighting NV and VC commies, without Congress having declared formal war (there was just the Tonkin Resolution, but that's not it). So, if Charlie came to the US in 1968, and started setting bombs under the Brooklyn Bridge or something, he woulda not been an enemy combattant out of uniform? Gimme a break! Just stop diggin, and raise the white flag on this.

6/13/2008 8:18 AM
Mr roT said...

Point to relevant legal decisions.

6/13/2008 8:29 AM
Tecumseh said...

Don't go shyster on me, JJ! At any rate, I quoted at length above from the relevant Supreme Court decision -- it pertained to WWII, but how was this different from the Vietnam War, from a legal viewpoint?

6/13/2008 12:48 PM
Pepe le Pew said...

I hope you don't get hurt in the crossfire when his buddies try to get him out.

assuming this guy did anything. And there have been enough people locked up at guantanamo who turned out to be innocent to question the process as a whole. Without oversight, this is banana republic justice.

6/13/2008 4:32 PM
Mr roT said...

AI, legally, there are worlds of difference between WWII, VietNam, and the WOT. Don't act like you don't know.

6/14/2008 6:05 AM
Tecumseh said...

Whatever legal differences there may be between those various wars, that in and of itself does not justify the totally boneheaded and idiotic Supreme Court decision in favor of the Binnie Boyz (and their groupies), and against you and me. Don't act like you don't know.

6/14/2008 10:24 AM

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