Posted on 01/29/2009 4:25:31 AM PST by Leisler
Mr. Barack Obama presented a fine picture at his inauguration. He exhibited the degree of gravitas appropriate to the office of President of the United States. It is a pity then that his inaugural speech contained at least one significant historical error, one on which he seems to have justified his first executive decision.
It was in the part of the speech in which he sought to distinguish himself from his predecessor over Guantanamo Bay. He followed this by his first executive decision, which is to suspend action on the prosecutions at Guantanamo.
His difficulty is that it is not worth the bother to have the accused, including the alleged mastermind of the Bali bombing, prosecuted in the US criminal courts.
If they are not tried by military commissions, he might as well let them go. His problem is that intelligence advises they will then be just as likely to engage in more terrorism. The evidentiary and procedural safeguards which have been built up in the American criminal justice system in recent years would make prosecution in the American courts pointless.
That is why President George W Bush went down the military commission path.
The part of his speech which contains the historical error states: “Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations.”
The suggestion is that during the War of Independence, the Founding Fathers developed the Bill of Rights. That at least is how talk back radio interpreted this sentence. What else could he have meant about the Founding Fathers being “faced with perils we can scarcely imagine”?
Apart from unjustly maligning the British – the thirteen colonies were the freest colonies the world had ever seen - this is just not so. The Founding Fathers did nothing of the sort.
The War of Independence ended in 1783. The draft of the Bill of Rights was not introduced until 1789, six years after the conclusion of the war. Surely the vast team of advisors who wrote the speech were aware of this?
When it became clear that a union of all the thirteen colonies could not be achieved because of suspicions about the power of the new federal entity, the Constitution was amended by what is now called the Bill of Rights. This is made up of the first ten amendments to the American Constitution. The amendments were introduced in 1789, six years after the War of Independence ended. They were finally ratified in 1791.
The only reason for the Bill was that without it there would have been no United States. It had absolutely nothing to do with protecting individual freedoms during the War of Independence. So who slipped this fiction into the inaugural speech?
Based on the British Bill of Rights, the American Bill of Rights was not even intended to bind the thirteen colonies, now the thirteen states, or to create individual rights. It was only intended to restrain the new federal entity.
The Bill of Rights was certainly not intended to play the role the courts have subsequently given it. But that is another issue.
I would not make that assumption knowing what the education system is like in the liberal universities these writers likely attended.
B. Hussein had flubbed the historical facts by the 3rd sentence of his inaugural address. He claimed 44 people had taken the oath. Only 43 have been sworn in.
He wrote the speech himself so he has no excuse.
This is the NEW History (sorta like New Math) where timelines aren't important. Like FDR going on Television in 1929 to calm the Citizens after the Stock Market Crash.
Harvard education.....
But....we were told that Barry is a Constitutional scholar, and everyone knows a Constitutional scholar would never be dumb enough to make that kind of mistake......
That's a very myopic view given that the Bill of Rights made a distinction among federal, state, and individual rights, and that all Amendments, except the first one, reaffirm individual rights at the State and Federal levels (and now, also local governments). Clearly, the 10th Amendment validates my argument.
The 10th Amendment: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
The 10th Amendment does more to protect individual rights than any other Amendment. Of course, it doesn't guarantee that despots like Obama won't abuse them.
Just like the christian delivering the invocation inserting the Islamic name Issa for Jesus.
Just one degree of separation from the truth makes it a lie. And Satan rejoices at everyone else doing his work for him.
Which was a surpassingly stupid thing to do. By inventing this whole 'enemy combatant' category out of thin air, Bush was forced to do something that appeared judicial to deal with them. Instead he should have called them what they are - prisoners of war. Then we could keep them literally forever and there is nothing anyone could do about it.
Un uniformed individuals, not belonging to a military organization, wearing civilian cloths, fighting amongst civilians have no rights at all. It is, and we have done, and in my opinion proper to, if so desired, be summarily shot on capture.
The Geneva conventions allow this.
I would of ordered, and done this as President.
But we didn't. Instead we invented this quasi-legitimate status that left us wide open for being bitten. Which we have.
I do not believe you can blame Bush. Any person that was president would have been faced with the conundrum of what to do with a non-national group of religious fanatics attacking the continental United States.
There was no legislation covering what to do in the scenario mentioned. There was no established status that dealt with foreign terrorists attacking the U. S. The only recourse would be to wait until legislation was passed that dealt with that scenario. Unfortunately he didn't have the luxury of waiting on congress. Perhaps he did make a mistake, but under the circumstances he did what he had to do.
You may not like the status he gave them but you have got to give him credit. There have been no terrorist attacks in the U. S. since 9/11. For that fact, I give him a well done.
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