This is all a red herring to distract us from something else, because this bill does NOT do what its detractors are saying it does. Here’s some information I posted on a friend’s Facebook profile last night. He happens to be a Ron Paul supporter, and he was in hysterics over this law.
First Post: I don’t know the details, but I’m reading the final bill passed by the House and Senate conference committees and submitted to the president, and this is what it says in section 1022:
(b) APPLICABILITY TO UNITED STATES CITIZENS AND LAWFUL
RESIDENT ALIENS.—
(1) UNITED STATES CITIZENS.—The requirement to detain
a person in military custody under this section does not extend to citizens of the United States.
(2) LAWFUL RESIDENT ALIENS.—The requirement to detain a person in military custody under this section does not extend to a lawful resident alien of the United States on the basis of conduct taking place within the United States, except to the extent permitted by the Constitution of the United States.
Second Post (posted after he rebutted by saying that my first post was only about section 1022, but that 1021 was the section that allowed for the indefinite detention of US citizens):
I see this in section 1021, James:
(b) COVERED PERSONS.—A covered person under this section is any person as follows:
(1) A person who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored those responsible for those attacks.
(2) A person who was a part of or substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners, including any person who has committed a belligerent act or has directly supported such hostilities in aid of such enemy forces.
And this...
(e) AUTHORITIES.—Nothing in this section shall be construed to affect existing law or authorities relating to the detention of United States citizens, lawful resident aliens of the United States, or any other persons who are captured or arrested in the United States.
So, hysterical ranting aside, it appears that to be covered by the Counterterrorism aspect of this law allowing for indefinite military custody, a person has to have “planned, authorized, committed, or aided” the events of 9/11/2001, or harbored those responsible, or been a member of al-Qaeda or the Taliban or provided support or assistance to them, and this does not apply to cititizens or lawful resident aliens of the United States.
What am I missing?
Additional Post (after much argument back and forth): From MotherJones - a very left-leaning website:
So what exactly does the bill do? It says that the president has to hold a foreign Al Qaeda suspect captured on US soil in military detention—except it leaves enough procedural loopholes that someone like convicted underwear bomber and Nigerian citizen Umar Abdulmutallab could actually go from capture to trial without ever being held by the military. It does not, contrary to what many media outlets have reported, authorize the president to indefinitely detain without trial an American citizen suspected of terrorism who is captured in the US. A last minute compromise amendment adopted in the Senate, whose language was retained in the final bill, leaves it up to the courts to decide if the president has that power, should a future president try to exercise it. But if a future president does try to assert the authority to detain an American citizen without charge or trial, it won’t be based on the authority in this bill.
So it’s simply not true, as the Guardian wrote yesterday, that the bill “allows the military to indefinitely detain without trial American terrorism suspects arrested on US soil who could then be shipped to Guantánamo Bay.” When the New York Times editorial page writes that the bill would “strip the F.B.I., federal prosecutors and federal courts of all or most of their power to arrest and prosecute terrorists and hand it off to the military,” or that the “legislation could also give future presidents the authority to throw American citizens into prison for life without charges or a trial,” they’re simply wrong.
Additional Post: The only sections I find relating to this in the law are sections 1020 and 1021, and then some information in the following sections relating to the review process. I do not see anything like what is being discussed in the blog James linked. There CERTAINLY is nothing in this law that allows indefinite detention of US citizens or anyone captured on US soil. I think the section on authorities that I posted from section 1020 defers to previous law as a determination as to whether someone can be detained. That’s what Mother Jones is talking about up above when they say that this bill “leaves it up the courts to decide...” That’s a far cry from saying that this bill allows the indefinite military detention of US citizens or those caught within US borders.
And also, when it comes to the whole indefintie detention without a trial thing, I can see how mortifying it can seem with our current administration but if we are being truly frank and honest with ourselves, in the aftermath of 9/11, when many members of this community had the same kind of rage Americans had following Pearl Harbor, this is something we would have supported for those who arent US citizens or legal aliens, caught plotting to harm us in another nation. They would have been totally on board with in and in fact they often were-the Patriot Act and the AUMF act of 2001 are not too terribly different from this current bill.
“A person who was a part of or substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States...”
Too much latitude for interpretation here. What are associated forces? What kind of hostilities?
OWS is a loose association that was hostile at times. Will they still get due process if they reconvene and become violent?
I’ve seen how with this administration has worked their way around laws or reinterpret them. Bottom line, I don’t trust this president, this congress to do the right thing. If Obama signed something, it has a purpose and it’s not good for the country.