Obama Welcomes Osama In Civilian Courts
After Obama spoke out in support of the recent Supreme Court ruling, he has now found himself in a position in which he must continue to speak out of ignorance, lest he be called a flip-flopper (again). Yesterday Obama compared the Supreme Court ruling granting enemy combatants habeas corpus rights to the Nuremberg Trials, despite the fact that the Nuremberg trials were conducted by military tribunals similar to the ones the Supreme Court ruled inadequate. This led to many Conservatives, myself included, to argue that enemy combatants will no longer have an incentive to abide by the laws and customs of war as they would now have even more rights than those granted by the Geneva Conventions.
Today Barack Obama’s foreign policy advisor has followed up on that argument by stating unequivocally that we are correct. Although Rudolph Hess was tried via a military tribunal during the Nuremberg trials, Obama’s foreign policy advisor believes that Osama Bin Laden should be allowed to appeal his case to U.S. civilian courts.
Barack Obama’s foreign policy advisers said Tuesday that Osama bin Laden, if captured, should be allowed to appeal his case to U.S. civilian courts, a privilege opposed by John McCain.
Responding to questions from The Examiner, Sen. John Kerry and former White House counterterrorism czar Richard Clarke said bin Laden would benefit from last week’s Supreme Court decision giving terrorism suspects habeas corpus, the right to appeal their military detention to civilian courts.
On Monday, Obama applauded the civilian prosecution of terrorists prior to the attacks of September 11, 2001.
“In previous terrorist attacks — for example, the first attack against the World Trade Center — we were able to arrest those responsible, put them on trial,†he told ABC. “They are currently in U.S. prisons, incapacitated.â€
As we have seen in the past, Obama’s history is a little hazy as Andrew C. McCarthy reminds us today:
In point of fact, while the government managed to prosecute many people responsible for the 1993 WTC bombing, many also escaped prosecution because of the limits on civilian criminal prosecution. Some who contributed to the attack, like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, continued to operate freely because they were beyond the system’s capacity to apprehend. Abdul Rahman Yasin was released prematurely because there was not sufficient evidence to hold him — he fled to Iraq, where he was harbored for a decade (and has never been apprehended).
But let’s assume incorrectly, for argument’s sake, that everyone was brought to justice in that case. What about Khobar Towers, Sen. Obama? After Iran and Hezbollah, perhaps with al-Qaeda’s assistance, killed 19 members of the United States Air Force, the Clinton administration responded with … a criminal investigation. The result? No arrests — in fact, no indictment was even filed until 2001.
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has been under indictment by the Justice Department even longer than bin Laden. He was first charged in 1996, in connection with the so-called “Bojinka†plot to blow up American airliners as they flew over the Pacific (one Japanese tourist killed during a dry run). The plot was also found to include plans to assassinate President Clinton and Pope John Paul II.
So what happened? Because criminal prosecution is incapable of dealing with the likes of KSM — a highly insulated foreign jihadist operating from terror safe havens sprinkled across the globe — he remained free to plot murder and mayhem for years, finally masterminding 9/11.
KSM was apprehended only after the Bush administration changed strategy and started regarding terrorists as what they are: wartime enemies, rather than in possession of Obama’s suggested “criminal defendants†status.
Our criminal justice system may very well be the best in the world, but it is far from imperfect. The same justice system that recently acquitted R. Kelly despite his actions being on video tape should not be placed in charge of prosecuting a known terrorist such as Osama Bin Laden.
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So the right wing should decide who gets to be tried and who doesn’t… Where does one draw the line? Why even have trials, why even have habeas corpus, when we could just send whoever we want to Guantanamo… What’s the difference between Guantanamo Bay and the Soviet gulags against which this government inveighed so passionately throughout the decades-long span of the Cold War?
But of course that’s exactly what our forebears envisioned… A government that pretends to justice and equality, claims to uphold the rule of law, but rewrites the law or creates loopholes and exceptions whenever it sees fit. What a joke the title of this blog of yours is… Constitutionally Right… How dare you quote in full on this blog the document whose subversion and diminution you so ardently espouse? This is the height of hypocrisy.
P, stop pretending the detainees had no right to question their detention. They had access to legal counsel as well as military tribunals the same as any other combatant (legal or illegal) would have. Never in the history of this country have we granted enemy combatants access to civilian courts… not even during the civil war.
Possibly the most dangerous man on the planet is NOT Osama, it is Obama! Give terrorists constitutional rights in American court rooms, lets just give them the key to the city too! Washington D.C. that is, they can have the place!
Jun 17th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
[...] Obama is suffering from a pre 9/11 mindset and electing him will undoubtedly lead to a reinvigorated Al Qeada. Instead of catching Osama Bin Laden, Obama will be inadvertently helping him. [...]
Jun 18th, 2008 at 3:35 pm
[...] Question: How will Obama react to this considering his support for criminal prosecution of terrorists, as opposed to military prosecutions? Sphere: Related ContentIf you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS [...]