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To: Mike4Freedom
"Invented the status of "enemy combatant" making all US citizens subject to arrest and indefinite detention without judicial intervention, charge or trial. This eliminates everyone's due process rights guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment."

Patently untrue. You should be ashamed for saying such things.

Enemy combatants are routinely rounded up during wars and held without trials, without attorneys, and without the protection of POWs. The Geneva Convention states that enemy combatants are those spies and/or sabotuers who are caught on the battlefield without internationally recognized military uniforms or military ID tags. Such people can, per the 1947 Geneva Convention, be SHOT ON SIGHT or given any other battlefield justice deemed appropriate by their captors.

That's hardly Bush "inventing" anything.

During WW2, FDR faced a similar problem to what Bush faces today. In 1940, Adolph Hitler had sent letters and placed ads worldwide calling on all true Aryans to return to the Reich to fight for the Fatherland. More than 1,000 U.S. citizens answered Hitler's call to arms, all of whom were killed or captured on the battlefield during WW2 after the U.S. entered the war. None of those enemy combatants were given attorneys or trials, either, save for 8 of them who were caught on U.S. soil (they were brought back here by German U-Boats) wearing civilian clothes with no military ID's.

Those 8 were given military tribunals, and at least 5 of them were executed without appeal.

Again, this is hardly something that Bush has invented. See Taliban Johnny fighting U.S. troops in Afghanistan or dirty bomber Jose Padilla getting caught here on U.S. soil.

49 posted on 02/02/2004 3:00:57 PM PST by Southack (Media bias means that Castro won't be punished for Cuban war crimes against Black Angolans in Africa)
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To: Southack
or dirty bomber Jose Padilla getting caught here on U.S. soil.

Yes, about our friend Jose-How do you know he had plans to do a dirty bomb? Did a jury of his peers look at the evidence and find him guilty? No, all that happened is that John Ashcroft and George Bush said so. He has been in jail for 19 months and counting with no charge or trial. If that precedent stands, then some future president (maybe Hillary) could decide that FReepers are enemy combatants and round up the bunch of us.

57 posted on 02/02/2004 3:06:25 PM PST by Mike4Freedom (Freedom is the one thing that you cannot have unless you grant it to everyone else.)
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