An Empty Amendment

Washington Times ^ | 9 November 2005 | Washington Times Editorial

[concretebob]

A bipartisan group of senators has attacked the president's intention to veto any legislation that includes Sen. John McCain's so-called anti-torture amendment. They claim that failure to make clear U.S. interrogation policy tarnishes not only our international standing, but also subverts the very idea of America.

[BufordP]

Oops, sorry! Big difference between written and verbal correspondence. No audible/visual cues.

[maica]

*L*

[concretebob]

Treating enemy combatants and suspected terrorists as if they are common criminals deserving of all the protections of the American judicial system is dangerous.
The presumption of innocence is important in the criminal context -- indeed, it is one of the foundations of our legal system.
But in a war in which our enemy doesn't wear uniforms, doesn't fight under a foreign flag, and targets civilians as a primary military strategy, we cannot afford to confer on the enemy the same rights and protections we grant ordinary criminals or even military adversaries in a traditional conflict.

[BufordP]

...at no point have I ever insinuated that any nation-state has given Constitutional rights to their enemy...

Where did I say you did?

By the same token can you find any war in modern history where a nation or alliance of nations was combatting an international terrorist organization that has sprung its head in countries in every region of the world. Comparing what is going on today with what happened in the past will do no justice in trying to remedy this situation we are facing today.

Another non-sequitur. We're debating the treatment of prisoners and detainees.

Call it idealism but I call it the reality of the winning the hearts in minds of the Arab street and Muslim world which is necessary in winning this war. If you attempt to fight the war in simply rounding up terrorists as we find them and holding them indefinately we are just going to have to keep building more and larger installations to hold them.

Now you've introduced a "debatable" point. I disagree that we subordinate the tools that are necessary to defending national security and fighting an enemy to "world view". "Making nice" with the Muslim world is not worth one let alone 3000 American lives. Most of the Muslim world hated us long before we started waging this war. "Making nice" costs lives. "Lives" trump "world view". You also need to show me where all the wonderful things this country has done for the world in the past has amounted to a hill of beans with respect to "world view".

...but rather as a question of us all being hypocrites. Why put Saddam on trial and give him due process of the law and not do the same to the rest of the terrorists that we catch...

The war against Saddam is over. Just like the Nuremberg Trials, at the succession of war you can begin whatever proceedings you deem appropriate. But the war against the terrorists continues. I refer you back to my "Making nice" link above.

... Exemptions to the law do no justice to our cause or what we stand for as a nation.

Again, you want to apply the "law" to foreign nationals/enemies for actions committed, not on our soil, against our soldiers? Or even ON our soil against American civilians? They should get special dispensation for successfully crossing the border? I don't see how American law is germane.

POWs, only with respect to being captured by us, are lucky only to be detained and NOT prosecuted criminally. You do NOT (normally) prosecute a soldier for fighting against a perceived enemy even if that enemy is us. At the succession of war we normally just let them go. The big problem here is how long do we detain them because when can we say, "The war against terror is over"? We don't throw up our hands and say we don't know how to deal with this so let's introduce them into our criminal justice system and start giving them "due process". Open Pandora's Box because we're essentially too weak to handle "world view".

One more thing. I don't discount your education and your fine reasoning skills. I don't credit myself as being a genius. But you are 19 and have a lot of trial-and-error experiences ahead of you that you won't learn in school. The difference between you, me and the rest of the old farts here on FR is this: we were 19 once, but you have a long way to go to, in my case, 48.

Right now your mind is wide open just pining to soak up every idea you can fit into your head. And that's good. But by the time you reach my age a lot of that information will be thrown out as tried-and-failed useless garbage.

We've been making nice to the world for centuries and it got us 9/11.

[ZULU]

We don't need it.

We didn't have it in WW1 or WW2 and we certainly don't need it now.

These people are the modern day equivalent of pirates or more virulent and vicious. Pirates were after boty, these villains want to murder people - any people - at any cost, including their won deaths.

I'd gladly break every bone in their bodies if it would prevent another massacre of innocent citizens or save American soldiers.

Our adoption of such a policy in no way will ameliorate their behavior, and as far as wolrd opinion is concerned, it matters not a whit.

Once again, that demon McCain proved what a vacuous media whore he has become. The man is a total disgrace and a loose cannon.

[BufordP]

Excellent points.

[BufordP]

My bad. All references to "succession" in post 105 should read "cessation".