Obama wins the right to detain people with no habeas review

Few issues highlight Barack Obama's extreme hypocrisy the way that Bagram does. As everyone knows, one of George Bush’s most extreme policies was abducting people from all over the world -- far away from any battlefield -- and then detaining them at Guantanamo with no legal rights of any kind, not even the most minimal right to a habeas review in a federal court.

Back in the day, this was called "Bush's legal black hole." In 2006, Congress codified that policy by enacting the Military Commissions Act, but in 2008, the Supreme Court, in Boumediene v. Bush, ruled that provision unconstitutional, holding that the Constitution grants habeas corpus rights even to foreign nationals held at Guantanamo.

So congratulations to the United States and Barack Obama for winning the power to abduct people anywhere in the world and then imprison them for as long as they want with no judicial review of any kind...when Obama went to the Senate floor in September, 2006, to speak against the habeas-denying provisions of the Military Commissions Act, this is what he melodramatically intoned:

" As a parent, I can also imagine the terror I would feel if one of my family members were rounded up in the middle of the night and sent to Guantanamo without even getting one chance to ask why they were being held and being able to prove their innocence. . . .

By giving suspects a chance -- even one chance -- to challenge the terms of their detention in court, to have a judge confirm that the Government has detained the right person for the right suspicions, we could solve this problem without harming our efforts in the war on terror one bit. . . ."

Maybe Greenwald ought to look at his fellow lefties to find the answer. They went from daily hysteria to near silence once Obama was elected. Obama catches suprisingly little grief from his left on these issues. Except that it’s really not surprising, since the outrage was mostly a posture for tactical political purposes (also because it was fun to howl along with the rest of the pack). Victor Davis Hanson has the best analysis. He says Obama shewdly saw through the left’s cynicism. Obama knew he could get away with basically carrying forward Bush’s policies, because he knew the left didn’t really mean it. A few did, like Greenwald, but most knew, on some level at least, that Bush’s policies were sensible and put in place for the right reasons. And now that Bush isn’t there to keep them in permanent hysteria mode, most of them have settled down. So Obama has a free hand.

"By giving suspects a chance -- even one chance -- to challenge the terms of their detention in court, to have a judge confirm that the Government has detained the right person for the right suspicions, we could solve this problem without harming our efforts in the war on terror one bit."

Really ..?? Under what American Citizenship passages of the Constitution do people think this is possible. Those picked up on foreign soil are not necessarily American citizens, and they are, therefore, NOT entitled to the priviledges of citizens. People don't get it .. WE ARE AT WAR!!!!!

Right you are CyberAnt. These are enemy combatants. They are trying to kill American soldiers and our Allies. If Obama truly worked for the CIA from 1981-1984, then he knows the value of intel. He learned that “don’t ask, don’t tell” does not simply refer to gays in the military. The fact is, we are being held to a standard by the left that our opponents are not held to. I do not hear the left demanding rights for prisoners from our enemies, for soldiers and civilians, who’s heads are cut off, or prisoners by way of abduction, or murder by human vest bombing of civilians, because they would be ignored by the enemy, who simply wants YOU dead, and will gladly kill themselves to accomplish that goal.
The SCOTUS realizes that we have the right to arrest military prisoners and have them tried by a Military court, and that civilian courts have no juristiction in Non-US citizen cases where terrorism is not involved.
Of course, Obama spins and distracts. What he says is that he would hate to wake up and see family members arrested and taken away without legal redress.

Interesting that his own aunt has lived illegally in the US for 12 years, lived off of free housing, and food, and welfare. Yet she miraculously is pardoned and can stay in America. I wonder what process she went thru, and how Obama was involved?/sc

For this to be accurate, he would have to be a hostile enemy (is this tacit admission?) for his statement to have relevance. He is causing people who don’t really “pay attention” to react emotionally to incorrect interpretations of what is actually happening...Typical Obama.

Fact is, it was not Bush, it was “Congress and Senate” who agreed, and Bush was the President at the time. Just as they re-approved the war in Iraq, under the war powers act, every 90 days from its inception, by funding it. They blame anyone but themselves, knowing full well, that what was done was necessary. They howl to the electorate, and wail against Bush for the sole purpose of their re-election, and nothing more. During this Obamanation, we are finally waking up, and realizing that we have to change the nature of representation in Washington to reflect OUR vision of America’s future, not THEIRS, and that they represent US not special interest groups.
Conversely we are learning to let the Military do its job, and make our legislature listen to the people, then maybe, just maybe, we might actually start to win the War on Terrorism, and get our country back on the right track again.
By the way, has Obama proffered his Birth Certificate yet?
No? So much for TRANSPARENT government. Just a lying Bastage, nothing more.

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