Posted on 05/07/2006 6:17:09 AM PDT by xjcsa
May 7, 2006
BY MARK STEYN SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST
"America, you lose," said Zacarias Moussaoui as he was led away from the court last week.
Hard to disagree. Not just because he'll be living a long life at taxpayers' expense. He'd have had a good stretch of that even if he'd been "sentenced to death," which in America means you now spend more years sitting on Death Row exhausting your appeals than the average "life" sentence in Europe. America "lost" for a more basic reason: turning a war into a court case and upgrading the enemy to a defendant ensures you pretty much lose however it turns out. And the notion, peddled by some sappy member of the ghastly 9/11 Commission on one of the cable yakfests last week, that jihadists around the world are marveling at the fairness of the U.S. justice system, is preposterous. The leisurely legal process Moussaoui enjoyed lasted longer than America's participation in the Second World War. Around the world, everybody's enjoying a grand old laugh at the U.S. justice system.
Except for Saddam Hussein, who must be regretting he fell into the hands of the Iraqi justice system. Nine out of 12 U.S. jurors agreed that the "emotional abuse" Moussaoui suffered as a child should be a mitigating factor. Saddam could claim the same but his jury isn't operating to the legal principles of the Oprahfonic Code. However, if we ever catch Mullah Omar or the elderly Adolf Hitler or pretty much anyone else we're at war with, they can all cite the same list of general grievances as Moussaoui.
He did, in that sense, hit the jackpot. We think of him as an "Islamic terrorist," an Arab, but he is, in fact, a product of the Western world: raised in France, radicalized in Britain, and now enjoying a long vacation in America. The taxpayers of the United Kingdom subsidized his jihad training while he was on welfare in London. Now the taxpayers of the United States will get to chip in, too.
On the afternoon of Sept. 11, as the Pentagon still burned, Donald Rumsfeld told the president, "This is not a criminal action. This is war."
That's still the distinction that matters. By contrast, after the 2005 London bombings, Boris Johnson, the Conservative member of Parliament, wrote a piece headlined "Just Don't Call It War." Johnson objected to the language of "war, whether military or cultural . . . Last week's bombs were placed not by martyrs nor by soldiers, but by criminals."
Sorry, but that's the way to lose. A narrowly focused "criminal" approach means entrusting the whole business to the state bureaucracy. The obvious problem with that is that it's mostly reactive: blow somewhere up, we'll seal it off, and detectives will investigate it as a crime scene, and we'll arrest someone, and give him legal representation, and five years later when the bombing's faded into memory we'll bring him to trial, and maybe conviction, and appeal of the conviction, and all the rest. A "criminal" approach gives terrorists all the rights of criminals, including the "Gee, Officer Krupke" defense: I'm depraved on account of I'm deprived. If you fight this thing as a law enforcement matter, Islamist welfare queens around the world will figure there's no downside to jihad: After all, you're living on public welfare in London plotting the downfall of the infidel. If it all goes horribly wrong, you'll be living on public welfare in Virginia, grandstanding through U.S. courtrooms for half a decade. What's to lose?
It's a very worn cliche to say that America is over-lawyered, but the extent of that truism only becomes clear when you realize how overwhelming is our culture's reflex to cover war as just another potential miscarriage-of-justice story. I was interested to see that the first instinct of the news shows to the verdict was to book some relative of the 9/11 families and ask whether they were satisfied with the result. That's not what happened that Tuesday morning. The thousands who were killed were not targeted as individuals. They died because they were American, not because somebody in a cave far away decided to kill Mrs. Smith. Their families have a unique claim to our sympathy and a grief we can never truly share, but they're not plaintiffs and war isn't a suit. It's not about "closure" for the victims; it's about victory for the nation. Try to imagine the bereaved in the London blitz demanding that the Germans responsible be brought before a British court.
Agreeing to fight the jihad with subpoenas is, in effect, a declaration that you're willing to plea bargain. Instead of a Churchillian "we will never surrender!", it's more of a "Well, the judge has thrown out the mass murder charges, but the DA says we can still nail him on mail fraud."
And, even if the defendant loses the case, does that mean the state wins? Here's an Associated Press story from a few weeks ago recounting yet another tremendous victory for the good guys in the war on terror:
"A Paris court fined the terrorist known as 'Carlos the Jackal' more than $6,000 Tuesday for saying in a French television interview that terror attacks sometimes were 'necessary.' The 56-year-old Venezuelan, whose real name is Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, was convicted of defending terrorism. The court did not convict him for expressing pleasure that 'the Great Satan' -- the United States -- suffered the Sept. 11 attacks, saying those comments were his personal reaction."
That's right, folks. The French state brought a successful hate-speech prosecution against Carlos the Jackal, albeit not as successful as they wanted:
"Prosecutors asked for a fine four times larger than the $6,110 penalty imposed. But the judges said they did not see the need for a higher fine because Ramirez's comments referred to the past and aimed to justify his own actions. Ramirez, dressed in a red shirt and blue blazer, kissed the hand of his partner and lawyer, Isabelle Coutant-Peyre, during the judgment."
Coming soon to a theater near you: The Day of the Jackal's Hate-Speech Appeal Hearing.
Copyright © Mark Steyn, 2006
bttt
Thanks for the ping! Steyn coins at least one new word per article, and "Oprahfonic" justice system is winner!
You forgot the pork entrails.
We better re-read it and NOT forget it.
"On the afternoon of Sept. 11, as the Pentagon still burned, Donald Rumsfeld told the president, "This is not a criminal action. This is war.
That's still the distinction that matters. By contrast, after the 2005 London bombings, Boris Johnson, the Conservative member of Parliament, wrote a piece headlined "Just Don't Call It War." Johnson objected to the language of "war, whether military or cultural . . . Last week's bombs were placed not by martyrs nor by soldiers, but by criminals."
Sorry, but that's the way to lose. A narrowly focused "criminal" approach means entrusting the whole business to the state bureaucracy. The obvious problem with that is that it's mostly reactive: blow somewhere up, we'll seal it off, and detectives will investigate it as a crime scene, and we'll arrest someone, and give him legal representation, and five years later when the bombing's faded into memory we'll bring him to trial, and maybe conviction, and appeal of the conviction, and all the rest."
In the meantime thousands, millions can die, because in criminal prosecution you only try them AFTER they already committed their horrendous acts.
I have served on many juries in many different states. I've moved around a lot, and I always get picked for juries, for some reason.
From my experience, I can tell you that the most important thing to have on a jury is a natural leader. Most female people are so Opraphied they can't think rationally, and juries often tend to be heavily female. Blacks on the jury often have very negative attitudes towards the entire judicial system; Hispanics vary, but the women among them are often charismatics who believe that "God says we shouldn't judge anybody." I once heard a judge tell a jury that they weren't sentencing someone to Hell; they were just deciding whether or not he had done the crime.
This is the important thing. Most juries do not impose the sentence and are only there to decide whether the accused is guilty (that is, has committed the crime) or not. If you are going to be a leader on a jury, you have to focus on the basic issue: did he do it or not?
All of the juries I have served on have reached a verdict, generally but not always finding the defendant guilty of the main charge, often finding him not guilty on other charges - which are backup charges that are harder to prove - but it only happened because there was somebody on the jury who could list the charges, list the evidence, explain the charges and ask the judge for clarification if necessary, and focus on the primary question.
Jurors go into a case thinking that it is their duty to say whether the person is a "good" person or a "bad" person and to determine the punishment. It is up to them to decide only whether the person did the crime, and in most cases, the penalty phase is outside of their scope.
"Maybe he's suggesting we model "terror justice" after Franco's military tribunals which followed the Spanish Civil War? What?"
You need to read up on military tribunals and US history.
I don't believe I do.
But, Franco's military tribunals were far more efficient than Lincoln's or FDR's. Less time between the bench and the firing squad (or garrote). :-)
I suspect he might wish to do something very close to that. Steyn could easily make the case for doing so, and incisively so.
But, there are thorns on that bramble bush, I think.
Jose Padilla, a U.S. citizen, was held for three years as an "enemy combatant" in a military prison before charges were finally brought against him. To my mind, the justification was sound enough. The government wanted whatever information he could provide about an imminently ongoing conspiracy to do terrorism within the country. Bringing charges would have entitled him to a lawyer, and any mediocre lawyer would tell him, "keep your mouth shut."
Still, he is an American citizen and he, like John Walker Lindh, were entitled to their rights as American citizens. For me, that's a presumption of fact.
Moussaoui, on the other hand, is not an American citizen. Because he never hid his ill intent toward us, I would feel no sympathy for the deliberate omission of respecting his civil rights. Quite the opposite.
What I would like to see from Steyn, and I suppose from the rest of us, including me, is some clarity about distinctions. I.e., who exactly would be subject to these military tribunals or their substitute forms? If it is me, potentially, I'm absolutely against them. If the "persons of interest" are non-citizens, I'm a bit more open to it -- with some cause for alarm still attached.
You are correct, this is NOT a war.
Concerning the 9/11 sneak attack, 15 of the 19 enemy soldiers came from SAUDI ARABIA.
The other 4 enemy soldiers came from EGYPT.
If this were a real WAR, we would have put the shock and awe first to Saudi Arabia, then Egypt....not IRAQ!!!
The Republicrat/Demican ELITES think the whole of America is too stupid to recognize real war...unfortunately, they are right/
" The disturbing thing about our present judicial system is the dearth of jurors with analytical thinking skills."
I am not disturbed or the least bit surprised...the real issue is the dearth of Americans with analytical thinking skills. Perhaps it is a result of the PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM focusing on feel good, self-esteem building, multi-cultural diversity is our strength rather than mathematics, science, formal logic and REAL AMERICAN HISTORY!
Home school your precious loved ones unless you want them to also lack "analytical thinking skills."
Once Jihad Jihnny Lindh was not only spared from summary execution as a traitor, but was referred to as a "confused young man" or somesuch by our President, it's hard to make the case that anyone else should be executed.
Both Lindh and Moussaoui violated basic laws of war and have no rights under the Geneva Convention.
Since we're not interested in properly punishing terrorists or traitors (i.e. summary executions), there is no reason for anyone out there to play by the normal rules of war. We're still not serious about fighting terrorism.
"Concerning the 9/11 sneak attack, 15 of the 19 enemy soldiers came from SAUDI ARABIA.
The other 4 enemy soldiers came from EGYPT."
===
BUT THOSE COUNTRIES DID NOT SEND THEM.
Iran and Iraq are the state sponsors of terrorism.
Correction:
"Iran and Iraq WERE the state sponsors of terrorism."
Iraq isn't anymore, but Iran still is.
I just love Mark Steyn.
You are right, Mecca and Medina (both in Saudi) sent them!
Besides, link me up with the FACTs on your statement.
Thanks for posting it.
You mean you don't believe that Iraq (under Saddam) and Iran ARE sponsoring terrorism? There are huge amounts of info on that out there.
You mock others' analytical thinking and yet you are unaware that we are at war and that Al Qaeda was originally formed to overthrow the Saudi government.
Rave on.
There are huge amounts of info on that out there
Then you should have no problem linking me up with the FACTS, right?
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