Time to Kiss Habeas Corpus Goodbye

The BBQ Pit
381

[QUOTE=Starving Artist]
Or even more to the point, can you imagine the Right Wing reaction if 9/11 had happened on Clinton’s watch and he responded to it with the same impotency he displayed in regard to the hundreds of other American lives that were lost due to terrorist attacks on his watch?
[/quote]

Hundreds? How do you get “hundreds”? Are you counting th OK City bombing? If so, how was the respons to that “impotent”?

Unlikely. I think an invasion of Afhanistan was inevitable after 9/11/01 no matter who was president. An invasion of Iraq, OTOH, was not.

382

[QUOTE=Hamlet]
There are currently thousands of people, many of them bad, evil men, who are being detained by the US military, either in Iraq, Afghanistan, or Guantanamo.
[/QUOTE]
How many is “many” ? As mentioned here :

We don’t appear very careful about who we lock up and abuse. How many innocents are we allowed to imprison and brutalize to “protect” ourselves, before we are the bad guys ? I say we are already past that point; we have done far more harm than the terrorists we use to excuse our every evil.

383

[QUOTE=John Mace]
Hundreds? How do you get “hundreds”? Are you counting th OK City bombing? If so, how was the respons to that “impotent”?
[/quote]
It’s just over a week since SA responded to a post where I summed up those numbers. Excluding OKC, 54 Americans were killed in the major terrorist attacks of the 1990s - the first WTC bombing, Khobar Towers, the Embassy bombings, the Cole. Make that 72 if you include “Black Hawk Down.”

And if we want to continue to discuss this tit-for-tat about whether Clinton or Bush was more the suxx0r in their response to terrorism, guys, how’s about if we return to that thread? It’s only been dormant for a week, it’s only into its third page so it’s still not a lot to catch up on, and it already contains a wealth of information.

Let’s keep this one about the implications of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 with respect to habeas corpus and detentions of indefinite duration.

384

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
Wonder what my reaction would be if, SA having abandoned trying to make this case a week ago in a thread where the subject was the comparative responses of Bush and Clinton to terror, decided to bring this subject up again in a quite different thread?

I’d be pretty damned pissed, is the answer.

If you want to discuss habeas corpus and the potential for indefinite detention under the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that Congress just passed, hang around.

If you want to discuss Bush’s and Clinton’s responses to 9/11 and other attacks by ObL and other terrorists, I would ask you to kindly find another thread for that; you could even resurrect the one from a week ago. This thread’s stayed remarkably well-focused for over seven pages; we’ve even stayed away from the manifold other issues raised by the new Act, and let the GD thread cover that ground.
[/QUOTE]
Is it your position then, that once a hijacking comment made by a leftie around here, and intended to cast aspesions upon what he suspects would be the Republican response to a hypothetical that he himself has posed, it should be allowed to go unchallenged?

Not gonna happen, pal!

Further, at the time of night there were only about two or three of us hanging around and none of us seemed to be interfering with a discussion of the OP.

I would suggest you take your junior mod hat and castigate jayjay for his/her post rather than me for responding to it. Of course this would require you to find fault with one of your own; are you up to it?

:rolleyes:

385

[QUOTE=John Mace]
Hundreds? How do you get “hundreds”? Are you counting th OK City bombing?
[/QUOTE]
No, I’m not counting OKC. I have to leave right now but I’ll try to find substantiating information when I return. I may be wrong, and perhaps I’ve conflated instances that occured under other administrations but I don’t think so. Given that I don’t have time to research it now, and that a poster I have regard for such as yourself appears to doubt the amount, I will momentarily retract my statement regarding “hundreds” of victims until I can substantiate it.

386

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
Let’s keep this one about the implications of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 with respect to habeas corpus and detentions of indefinite duration.
[/QUOTE]

Good idea.

BTW, it’s “teh suxx0r”, not “the suxx0r”. :slight_smile:

387

[QUOTE=Starving Artist]
Is it your position then, that once a hijacking comment made by a leftie around here, and intended to cast aspesions upon what he suspects would be the Republican response to a hypothetical that he himself has posed, it should be allowed to go unchallenged?

Not gonna happen, pal!
[/quote]
His hypothetical was germane to the topic of the OP; yours wasn’t remotely in the ballpark. You want to challenge his hypothetical by contesting it directly, go right ahead. You want to instead challenge it by bringing up an unrelated hypothetical that IYHO scores points for your side, then not that it matters much, but my opinion of you goes down the tubes.

But since that unrelated hypothetical is precisely the subject of a debate we were having a little over a week ago, take this debate back there and I’ll join you.

Maybe you’re confusing chatrooms with message boards?? Pity, given how long you’ve been on this message board. People will respond to recent posts in a thread whenever they get back to the thread. So when you post to a thread hardly matters. We’ve all seen instances where a newbie follows a link to a long-dead thread, and responds to a post as if it had just been posted an hour ago.

Ah, so asking a favor of someone is junior modding, now?

Well, so much for trying to use moral suasion on a hopeless, well-reamed asshole. I thought you were attempting to turn a new leaf of sorts in that other thread; it sure didn’t last long. I’m not terribly surprised, of course, but one can always hope. The vilest offender, and all that. Guess that’s just as hopeless as using logic with you.

388

[QUOTE=John Mace]
Good idea.

BTW, it’s “teh suxx0r”, not “the suxx0r”. :slight_smile:
[/QUOTE]
You’re right, of course. :slight_smile:

Guess I’m not very fly for a white guy. :wink:

389

Give it up, lost cause and all that. Standard shtick is:

Other thread posters: Now, your citation of that event isn’t on point because…

Starving Artist: Clinton Clinton Clinton whiny liberals Clinton!

OTP: No, in fact that’s not correct, cite.

SA: Clinton Clinton Clinton Clinton usual suspects Clinton Clinton Clinton!!

OTP: Look, that’s just bollocks, cite cite. Now, as to the OP’s contention that…

SA: CLINTON CLINTON USUAL SUSPECTS CLINTON CLINTON WHINY LIBERALS CLINTON CLINTON EVERY RIGHT-THINKING AMERICAN KNOWS CLINTON CLINTON CLINTON!!!

OTP: Oh, good grief. Look, cite cite cite cite cite! And besides, it’s completely off-topic. Now will you respond with some facts or STFU?

SA: Well! It’s useless arguing with people who won’t open their minds to the truth, and anyway I have to run off now.

OTP: :rolleyes: All right, back on topic, I don’t agree that such policy decisions should be…

390

Even better, “teh suxx0rz.” But that’s neither here nor there.

391

[QUOTE=EddyTeddyFreddy]
Give it up, lost cause and all that. Standard shtick is:

<Highly readable, pretty defensible, not particularly charitable caricature of an argument with SA snipped>
[/QUOTE]
Maybe you could coax him into sensibility with some nice pie, ETF.

:smiley:

392

Pie, schmie. All weekend I’ve been grabbing brief Dope breaks in between mass quantities of HORRIBLE DULL proofreading of transcripts with WITNESSES WHO SHOULD BE STAKED OUT ON FIRE ANT HILLS and I am NOT in any way feeling charitable. Not even remotely gruntlable, let alone gruntled. I stumble across a Pit thread which, mirabile dictu, actually STAYS ON TOPIC and at an elevated level of discourse, too, for multiple pages, until…

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

Why am I shouting, you say? Because I can’t reach through the pages to STRANGLE THE YAMMERMOUTH WITNESS WHO WILL NOT ANSWER A YES OR NO QUESTION IN LESS THAN THREE WALL-TO-WALL PARAGRAPHS OF SEMICOHERENT BLATHER!!!

{pant pant pant}

This is not a good time to annoy me.

393

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
His hypothetical was germane to the topic of the OP; yours wasn’t remotely in the ballpark. You want to challenge his hypothetical by contesting it directly, go right ahead. You want to instead challenge it by bringing up an unrelated hypothetical that IYHO scores points for your side, then not that it matters much, but my opinion of you goes down the tubes.
[/quote]
I’m sorry, but I don’t see how a hypothetical posing the question and answer to likely pubbie reaction to a Clinton request for more power is germane, but my hypothetical response to the effect that he wouldn’t have even tried is not.

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
But since that unrelated hypothetical is precisely the subject of a debate we were having a little over a week ago, take this debate back there and I’ll join you.
[/quote]
The problem there – and why I didn’t take it to the other thread – is that the people seeing the inflammatory post I was answering would not have seen my answer to it had I posted it in the other thread.

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
Maybe you’re confusing chatrooms with message boards?? Pity, given how long you’ve been on this message board. People will respond to recent posts in a thread whenever they get back to the thread. So when you post to a thread hardly matters. We’ve all seen instances where a newbie follows a link to a long-dead thread, and responds to a post as if it had just been posted an hour ago.
[/quote]
Sorry, but I don’t see why I should be expected to let inflammatory (and IMO, barely germane) posts go unanswered because someone might post an answer to my response to it. (Remember, I’m not in agreement with you that jayjay’s post was any more germane to the OP than mine; therefore, I don’t feel that my answer to his post was anymore out of line in this thread than was his/hers.)

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
Ah, so asking a favor of someone is junior modding, now?
[/quote]
Perhaps if it had been asked in such a way as to have appeared that you were actually asking a favor, it wouldn’t have seemed you were. Your request came off more like a castigation and an order. FWIW, I think of you as being a pretty good guy and I don’t go out of my way to be rude to you. Generally speaking, I rarely get rude with someone on a personal level unless they get rude with me first. Had your request come off more as your asking a favor, I would have been more likely to have responded to it in that way.

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
Well, so much for trying to use moral suasion on a hopeless, well-reamed asshole. I thought you were attempting to turn a new leaf of sorts in that other thread.
[/QUOTE]
No, not a new leaf; just the acknowledgement that you were trying to engage in a more level-headed conversation than I originally thought. (See? Even here I’m not being rude despite the fact that you called me an asshole with absolutely no prior obscene provocation toward you on my part.) :slight_smile:

394

[QUOTE=EddyTeddyFreddy]
Give it up, lost cause and all that. Standard shtick is:

Other thread posters: Now, your citation of that event isn’t on point because…

Starving Artist: Clinton Clinton Clinton whiny liberals Clinton!

OTP: No, in fact that’s not correct, cite.

SA: Clinton Clinton Clinton Clinton usual suspects Clinton Clinton Clinton!!

OTP: Look, that’s just bollocks, cite cite. Now, as to the OP’s contention that…

SA: CLINTON CLINTON USUAL SUSPECTS CLINTON CLINTON WHINY LIBERALS CLINTON CLINTON EVERY RIGHT-THINKING AMERICAN KNOWS CLINTON CLINTON CLINTON!!!

OTP: Oh, good grief. Look, cite cite cite cite cite! And besides, it’s completely off-topic. Now will you respond with some facts or STFU?

SA: Well! It’s useless arguing with people who won’t open their minds to the truth, and anyway I have to run off now.

OTP: :rolleyes: All right, back on topic, I don’t agree that such policy decisions should be…
[/QUOTE]
Oh, horseshit! (A topic with which you are most familiar, to be sure!)

First, I hardly ever post criticisms of Clinton except as a rebuttal to someone else’s pro-Clinton post.

Second, I don’t believe you can find a single instance where I continually (or even occasionally) persist in Clinton-bashing hijacks despite repeated efforts to get a thread back on track.

Third, I don’t believe you can find even one instance in my entire posting history where I contend that it’s useless arguing with people who won’t “open their minds” to my POV. On the contrary, this type of behavior is what I get all the time around here and it’s always amusing to me how so many of you around here interpret your inability to get me to come around to your way of thinking to my being a Bushbot, dumbass, or other insulting epithet.

Forth, I do have a life outside this board and I have occasion to leave discussions here that have nothing to do with whatever is going on in a thread. If I say I have to leave, I have to leave, and I resent your implication that I routinely bail from arguments by coming up with some excuse to leave.

And fifth, I see from your post to kaylasdad99 that you are pissed off about something else entirely and that that is what seems to have set you off on me. I’ve seen this before when you turned on me quite harshly after Bush’s reelection, despite the fact that a mere twenty minutes earlier you had posted a very sweet and appreciative post regarding a post I made expressing my sympathy to Kerry voters and acknowledging their pain and dissapointment as I had felt the same way earlier in the day when Kerry was being reported as the likely winner. I said I felt no inclination to gloat and offered my sympathies. You were very appreciative and said so, then twenty minutes later you decided to overreact and to something I said in another thread and took my head off in a totally uncharacteristic way simply because you were pissed off about the election.

Now, I still think of you as a good person and one with many admirable qualities, but the once sterling impression I had of you has become…well…not so much so, I’m afraid.

395

Keep this up and Zoe’s going to have to come along and remind us again what a great guy you are when you aren’t being a complete dickhead, Starving Dickhead.

396

[QUOTE=Starving Artist]
The problem there – and why I didn’t take it to the other thread – is that the people seeing the inflammatory post I was answering would not have seen my answer to it had I posted it in the other thread.
[/quote]
Good. They’ve seen it here. Now, if you have anything further to say about the responses of Clinton or Bush to the threat of terrorism, I would request that you say it in another thread.

To continue to argue about it in this thread is to continue to demonstrate stubborn assholishness.

Wow, you’re stubbornly trying to hijack this thread, but not using dirty words.

David Broder and Richard Cohen would applaud. But as for me, I have said all I’m going to say to you in this thread. You are not posting here in good faith.

397

[QUOTE=Hamlet]
A rather simplistic reading of the case isn’t it? Hamdan also dealt with the issue of the availability of habeas to the Guantanemo prisoners in light of this administrations first attempt to deny judicial review of its actions in the Detainee Treatment Act. While the majority specifically did not hold that the jurisdiction stripping act of Congress violated the Constitution, the UCMJ, or the Geneva Convention (“We find it unnecessary to reach either of these arguments. Ordinary principles of statutory construction suffice to rebut the Government’s theory—at least insofar as this case, which was pending at the time the DTA was enacted, is concerned.”), they saw this coming.
[/quote]

They saw it coming, and did not issue any guidance on it. If you are now contending that it’s inevitable they will find the current scheme violative of the Constitution, the UCMJ, or the Geneva Convention, I will be quite surprised.

Don’t throw my past up at me. Much of what I believe today is the result of working that side of the system. I ardently believe in the necessity of someone being a zealous advocate for all the accused, no matter their situation, but you’ll notice that I no longer believe I am the right “someone” to do it. My position now stems friom what I believe the wisest course for our country is in light of the present world situation.

OK. I understand that, and I think that’s a very defensible position to hold. It’s reasonable and it’s fair. I disagree with you, though – I think you’re wrong and it’s not a bad idea. It’s a necessary idea in view of the enemy and the tactics that enemy is capable of using against this country. The Constitution is not being violated, and, moreover, the Constitution is not a suicide pact. You see a slippery slope here, and I don’t.

Now, I fully admit that I may be wrong. If the next few years show dramatic erosions into civil rights domestically as the result of these “inroads,” then I will have been in the wrong here. But I don’t believe that will happen. I view these as necessary and reasonable steps that will not remain in perpetuity.

398

[QUOTE=Bricker]
… I view these as necessary and reasonable steps that will not remain in perpetuity.
[/QUOTE]

Which brings us to issues of trust. I believe, as I’ve stated before, that the Constitution works because it was devised by men who didn’t trust each other any further than they could be tossed, one-handed.

As a for instance, Lincoln, who famously abrogated parts of the Constitution. Was he trustworthy? A man of conscience, who used power and sought more power only as a matter of necessity and urgent need. Depends on what kind of man he was, doesn’t it? The kind of man who would sit up all night signing presidential pardons for private soldiers he had never met, men who had no power or influence to offer. A man who urged clemency for our brother citizens, returned to us as former enemies.

Reluctantly, I would trust such a man, I would accept his justification of necessity, and, more importantly, I would accept the temporary nature of the emergency, that such a man would not yeild to the temptations of power. A high standard, to be sure, the temptations of power have seduced many a man, friend Bricker, even such paragons as you and I.

You call for us to place the same degree of trust in these men who lead us now. You offer us to place Bush and Co. on the same pedestal, as worthy of the same trust as Lincoln. You sure about that?

399

[QUOTE=elucidator]
Which brings us to issues of trust. I believe, as I’ve stated before, that the Constitution works because it was devised by men who didn’t trust each other any further than they could be tossed, one-handed.

As a for instance, Lincoln, who famously abrogated parts of the Constitution. Was he trustworthy? A man of conscience, who used power and sought more power only as a matter of necessity and urgent need. Depends on what kind of man he was, doesn’t it? The kind of man who would sit up all night signing presidential pardons for private soldiers he had never met, men who had no power or influence to offer. A man who urged clemency for our brother citizens, returned to us as former enemies.

Reluctantly, I would trust such a man, I would accept his justification of necessity, and, more importantly, I would accept the temporary nature of the emergency, that such a man would not yeild to the temptations of power. A high standard, to be sure, the temptations of power have seduced many a man, friend Bricker, even such paragons as you and I.

You call for us to place the same degree of trust in these men who lead us now. You offer us to place Bush and Co. on the same pedestal, as worthy of the same trust as Lincoln. You sure about that?
[/QUOTE]

As long as the 22nd Amendment remains in place?

Yes.

400

[QUOTE=elucidator]

Reluctantly, I would trust such a man, I would accept his justification of necessity, and, more importantly, I would accept the temporary nature of the emergency, that such a man would not yeild to the temptations of power. A high standard, to be sure, the temptations of power have seduced many a man, friend Bricker, even such paragons as you and I.

You call for us to place the same degree of trust in these men who lead us now. You offer us to place Bush and Co. on the same pedestal, as worthy of the same trust as Lincoln. You sure about that?
[/QUOTE]
This, to me, is the crux of the matter. Putting aside the legal merits of the legislation, we have to ask ourselves: Would we be comfortable with such powers being vested in our most despised and feared political opponents? Would any such narrowing of rights and expansions of government’s reach be safe in such hands?

Right now, it’s primarily the left/Democrats wary of the Bush administration having such powers. Would the right/Republicans feel comfortable with these powers being wielded by an administration of, say, Hillary Clinton, Howard Dean, Nancy Pelosi, Dem-demon of choice?

“Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Doesn’t matter which side happens to be in control at any moment, they’re all vulnerable to the temptations of using convenient means for the ends they perceive to justify them.

On preview: With due respect, Bricker, the two-term limitation on the presidency is irrelevant to the conditions under which this country’s government may detain, interrogate, and hold indefinitely or dispose of the persons of those it defines as enemies, or to what the definition is of individuals subject to such powers.