Free Republic

President Obama told human rights advocates at the White House on Wednesday that he was mulling the need for a “preventive detention” system that would establish a legal basis for the United States to incarcerate terrorism suspects who are deemed a threat to national security but cannot be tried, two participants in the private session said.

Obama told human rights advocates at the White House on Wednesday that he was mulling the need for a “preventive detention” system that would establish a legal basis for the United States to incarcerate terrorism suspects who are deemed a threat to national security but cannot be tried...

To understand the Bush administration's preference for military detention over criminal prosecution -- and the dangers of its approach -- compare the case of American Taliban John Walker Lindh with those of Jose Padilla, the suspected dirty-bomb-plotter who was arrested after flying into Chicago; and Yasser Esam Hamdi, the Louisiana-born Saudi Arabian captured in Afghanistan. The Bush preventive detention system has been implemented with little regard for the law. Lindh will probably spend 17 years in federal prison after pleading guilty to bearing arms for the Taliban. That's pretty harsh, but it's a lot less than the life sentence Attorney...