America: Kiss Your Rights Goodbye

In case you've been living in a hollowed out stump (or, you've been arbitrarily declared an "enemy combatant" and indefinitely detained without the right to contact any portion of the outside world):

http://www.iht.com/articles/78764.html

Well, how much farther can we go? The FBI has greatly stepped up it's *ahem* "surveillance" as of late, breaking into homes, planting bugs and wiretaps and listening into conversations. We've been indefinitely detaining people who are "suspects" (read: of middle-eastern and south american descent). Now, Bush and his crew are salivating over a special "court" to arrest, try, and sentence "enemy combatants". Basically, you would be labeled an enemy combatant. Next, you would be secretly arrested and detained. The government may or may not ever mention to the outside world that they've arrested you, and, if no one else ever notices, you might even just disappear forever (remember "unpersons" from 1984?).

The regular courts would basically have their hands tied and be unable to free you (if they ever became aware of what even happened to you - which would require a voluntary fess-up of the government). You would see no lawyer, family, etc. You would not retain the rights you are offered by the Constitution, even if you are an American citizen. If you are innocent, you are ****ed. No lawyer, no court, no nothing. You are presumed guilty, and you are ****ed.

I am now officially more afraid of the United States Government than I am of these "evil-doers" they claim to be protecting me from. I do not feel safe from them, I do not feel safe from my government, but frankly, I would rather have to come face to face with the terrorists than this regime.... excuse me now... it seems I need to be vaporized. One of you will be assigned to the "correction" of this record I have written here....

We must fight the evil-doers, no matter where they hide, Afghanistan, Iraq, N. Korea. Any who will join us, please follow, those who do not, prepare to die. Feel free to change sides at any time. Remember: WAR IS PEACE.

You must sacrifice some of your rights for safety. Let us take what we need so that you need not live in fear of the evil ones. Remember: FREEDOM IS SLAVERY.

You must trust us when we tell you we know the truth of the matter, but we can't trust you to share it. Remember: IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.

I normally only enjoy conspiracy theories for what they are 99% of the time: paranoid delusional entertainment. For the first time in my life, I fear that the conspiracy, whether intentionally evil or naively well-meaning, is real.

Bugs, phone taps, arrests of suspected villians - doesn't effect me not one bit, I have absolutley nothing to hide. Nobody that abides by the rules and laws of the nation should not be concerned.......

Do you feel this is a bad thing?

Eh.. you're missing the point. The government is supposed to be set up with checks and balances to protect against abuses of power. They are attempting to eliminate the checks and balances.

Once a person is named "enemy combatant", that would pretty much be a death sentence. What if they're labeled that improperly? My father is on file in the FBI's archives because he did research on Cuba during his college years. He's not a communist and he's definitely not one to attempt any harm against the U.S. Yet, he's on file just because he wanted to write a term paper on Cuba. What if these folks get a bunch of data gathered and mistakenly label someone enemy combatant, secretly arrest, detain, and try them? No lawyer, no rights, no family. This person is jailed / executed as a traitor in error, and no one knows about it, or, more likely, no one can stop it because the power this sort of thing grants is near absolute.

They will arrest SUSPECTS based on gathered evidence, but think about it: without a lawyer to defend them, why does the government need to worry about gathering more evidence? It's all circumstantial and hearsay? So? The shmuck has no lawyer, he can't fight it. He has no rights, so maybe they won't even try him to hear his defense!

Besides, even if Bush and his group are well-meaning, that doesn't mean that some lunatic down the road won't bend this out of control. If the president can label people enemy combatants, then a new president can easily surround himself with confidants in the cabinet, label all his personal and political enemies combatants, secretly arrest and try them, and, as long as his buddies in the cabinet keep their traps shut, no one will ever find out what happened.

It's this simple: NO branch of government should EVER hold absolute power in ANY matter. It's dreadfully important that they be able to check each other because of this one simple (and unfortunate) rule of life:

There's almost NO ONE you can trust to do the right thing unless someone else is watching to make sure that's what happens.

One mistake during the intelligence gathering (and we all know how well those bozos in the FBI and CIA have done over the past few years...) and it's all over for some innocent shlub just because he got labeled "enemy combatant" and was stripped of the rights these numbskulls in our government claim to be protecting. Whether you like the current government or not, NEVER trust them to do the right thing on their own. They are human, and humans are EASILY corrupted by power.

Oh, and by the way, the FBI has had to break BACK into at least one person's home recently because they were tapping the wrong folks. And at least one other time the "intelligence" they gathered proved to be entirely futile as the people weren't doing anything wrong. I read two reports in the Washington Post (or, maybe it was Atlantic Monthly) about two successfuly missions that netted spies. 2 out of 4 ain't a real good score....
And that quote absolutely turns my stomach... that's part of the reason ~6 million innocent people died in the Holocaust.
Nazis: Here Jew, you have to wear this star!
Bystander: (Turns, walks away) It doesn't affect me! None of my business!
Nazis: Jew! Shut down you shops!
Bystander: Well, I'll have to go somewhere else, but it's not really my problem! Don't get involved!
Nazis: You Jew! Get on the train!
Bystander: I have to think of my own safety! Best to keep quiet...
Nazis: Bastard Jewish child! You are mutton to these hounds!
Bystander: ...How could I do anything to stop it...

It DOES affect you. Terrorist or not, American's are supposed to have rights. Best to TRY the terrorist in a fair trial, convict them based on evidence, and seek the maximum possible penalty (which, as far as I'm concerned, should be death), not to condemn ANYONE without a trial. Think about it, it DOES affect you. You COULD be labeled an enemy combatant. No matter how remote the possibility - it is possible. At that point, although you have always been a law-abiding citizen, you will have lost your rights, your family, your freedom, and probably your life. I will NOT throw away my rights in the name of protection from a bunch of smoke and mirrors ghosts. Over 3000 innocent people were murdered in one day on our soil because of our beliefs in freedom. We should be fighting to PROTECT freedom, not fighting to destroy it. My government is attempting to steal that freedom from me piece by piece. I would rather die fighting a suicide bomber on an airplane than have to live in the constant shadow of a watchful government.... but hey, maybe that's just me.

Ctb,

I will have to agree that the loss of due process leaves me quite concerned. I think you are right that now is the time we should be holding freedom dear, and not just rolling over every time government gathers in another reign of power. That is why I vote Libertarian every chance I get .

>>It's this simple: NO branch of government should EVER hold absolute power in ANY matter.

You are absolutely right. And no branch does, even now. Even the so-called liberal enlightened European nations regularly wield more power over their citizens than any U.S. administration ever did.

Mind you, I am not at all happy with the concepts that are being tossed around. Seems like it will invite all kinds of small abuses of power, although I doubt large ones.

But, to say you would feel safer in the hands of the "other guys" leaves me in disbelief!! Are you talking about Iraq? Saddam Hussein? Is Bush encouraging his secret service guys to rape and torture dissidents? Is he dropping nerve gas on small towns in Idaho? Are there public hangings of newspaper writers who disagree with his foreign policy? Come now; I encourage you to connect with reality. If our "regime" were as bad as the other guys, you would probably right now be soiling your pants in fear, listening for the heavy tread of boots outside your door, simply for writing the above post.

You think I'm kidding? I was just listening to an interview with a former Iraqi man who is a member of the "Iraqi Congress" here in the U.S. (Essentially a group of people trying to encourage the U.S. to help them reclaim Iraq from Hussein). He was somehow accidentally released from an Iraqi prison and managed to escape Iraq. How did he get there in the first place? He was sitting around with family and close friends, in the privacy of his own home, and someone made a small joke about Saddam Hussein. That's it!!! Somehow, word of this joke found it's way to the wrong people, and half his family was imprisoned and tortured. He still has a brother in prison even now.

Compare that to the U.S., where our presidents regularly laugh off even the most insulting of jokes, which are often printed full-page in national media. In fact, I would argue that Bush and Papa Bush were some of the best sports around for welcoming comedians who poked fun at them.

It's not Bush I worry about, but the lesser-known figures working behind the scenes who want to have their fingers in everything. They are the ones who I think will abuse power to their own ends. But even so, it will be nothing like Hussein, Stalin, Hitler, et al...

There's an old saying: Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

The problem with punitive, indefinite and clandestine justice is that it is too much power with not enough oversight. Who are the people who wield this power and who do they answer to?

Justice delayed is justice denied. Is our legal system so weak that we have to move people to Cuba so they can be held indefinitely without a trial? Bugs, phone taps and arrests of suspected villains are all valid actions to fight crime and terrorism. But they should be actions that are defendable in a public court of law.

After years of preaching to the rest of the world about democracy and justice, the message we're currently sending to the world is not that we're tough on terrorism. Its "Do as we say. Don't do as we do". The moment something bad happens and threatens our charmed way of life, we're willing to chunk legal safeguards out the window so we can feel safe again. Believe me when I say there will always be someone ready to take those freedoms away from you if you're willing to give them up. Anytime anyone anywhere in this world tells you they are going to grab more power in order to "protect you", the hairs on the back of your neck should stand up.

This thread reminds me of an incident that occurred in Afghanistan when we were helping the Northern Alliance. The NA commanders would call in US airstrikes on Al Qaeda positions. So one NA commander called in an airstrike on the position of another NA commander that he was having a feud with. It didn't happen because someone on the US side verified the validity of the request. The point is that there is always some creative thinker with an axe to grind that will tweak a system of power for their own benefit or to punish someone they don't like. Its the oversight that prevents this kind of abuse.

rycamor-

I don't mean living in other countries like Iraq (blargh, too much sand anyway), the point is that I would rather come face to face with a terrorist who made it onto home soil than give up the legal system the way the administration is pushing for. The problem seems to be that the country has become an overwhelming glut of sniveling pansies. They don't want to defend themselves from these terrorists so they cower in fear of them and just nod and whimper whenever the government says they can give them more protection if they give up a little more freedom.

Besides I don't think the government can stop them no matter HOW much freedom we give up. They've failed miserably to this point. It would appear Bin Laden is alive, Al Quaeda is doing well (they're just more mobile), Afghanastan is again left in a heap of rubble where terrorists of all kinds are flourishing... they're failing. It's the war on drugs, the war on poverty, all over again.

In the end it's always going to come down to a lunatic on a plane with a knife vs. anyone with the guts to stand up and fight him.

And you're absolutely right - I don't think Bush is SMART enough to pull off a full power grab, and I doubt that's the intention of this thing, but people like Ashcroft scare the living hell out of me. He sits back and does a lot of things that are never scrutinized in the public. The media is generally ignoring what he does right now to focus on Bush... Ashcroft is a very dangerous man when it comes to America's ideals and I think we, as American people, really need to get up and shut him down before he can do anymore damage. My greater fear is that this is a BIG step in the wrong direction for justice. It wouldn't take much imagination down the road to expand this to other parts of the legal system that wouldn't involve terrorism. Plus, even if ALL of the people involved in this are well-meaning now, it leaves the doors WIDE open to abuses of people later who are NOT well-meaning (although, I think the big thing here behind the scenes is people trying to make names for themselves and get promotions).

I don't actually quite agree with the complaints leveled against Guantanamo Bay. The people there were enemy operatives that were captured in battle, fighting the U.S. They are POWs, yes, but I don't see anything wrong with keeping POWs for intelligence purposes as long as they're not being outright abused and/or tortured. These people are being fed, clothed, sheltered, and we're even making provisions to meet their religious needs, so fooey on them - if they were better soldiers maybe they wouldn't have been caught. However, I think as soon as it's determined that someone is of no intelligence value, they ought to be scheduled to be sent back right away (after all.. we ARE paying for all this here in America.. just like murderers, rapists, child molestors, etc... ought to just execute the bastards after 3 appeals and be done with it.. it irritates me to no end to know that I'm helping to pay for food, shelter, clothing, and even recreation for people who rape and murder children and are going to be on death row until they die of natural causes ... but that's another thread ).

Hmm...

This is almost funny in a way. This is one of the many reasons why our founding fathers fought the war for independence.

Eclipce

Who did we declare war on? How do we know when we've won and the war is over? Who is going to negotiate for their release?

I'm just being argumentative here. I wouldn't want any of these guys living in my neighborhood and I'm not having trouble falling asleep each night knowing they're jailed down there. But since the so called "war on terrorism" could last forever, I think using this as a reason for holding a person in jail, indefinitely without any rights, visitors or accountability to any outside entity just has a bad smell about it. Try them as terrorists. Have a war crimes tribunal. But don't unilaterally lock someone in a box indefinitely.

Unfortunetly with the "war" on terrorism, there is no defined enemy. Therefore, there is no defined beginning or end. Much like a mobius . As I see it, there won't be anymore epic battles in the future. There will be only skirmishes, strifes, and secret attacks. The days of the well-drawn battlefield or dying, adn may be for hundreds of years; escpecially with "hackers" and "cyber-terrorism" popping up of the next few decades.

So, there will be no more Ceasars, Napoleans, Alexanders, or Pattons, only shadows.

This situation realy gets me angry with the US.

>>In fact, I would argue that Bush and Papa Bush were some of the best sports around for welcoming comedians who poked fun at them.

Of course there is the quote by BWB

"there ought to be limits to freedom" in response to a site lampooning him.

>>The people there were enemy operatives that were captured in battle, fighting the U.S.

Not correct. The two Aussies there were both unarmed when captured. One was on holiday in Pakistan, his home country. Hicks was trying to escape to Pakistan by bus. The US signed the Geneva convention but refuses to honour it.

Imagine for one minute that this was a US prisoner in say Vietnam or Iraq? Would the US be quiet about the violations of their rights? NO!

The difference between the good guys and the bad guys in this type of war is the RULE OF LAW. The current US administration has decided to ignore this rule in favour of an easy solution.

If the US has proof that Australian citizens in other countries have commited a crime return them to Australia for trial.

>> Who did we declare war on? How do we know when we've won and the war is over? Who is going to negotiate for their release?

This is the point. A year on and they are still there. When will it end? Surely the US can not hold them for ever?


Remember John Walker Lindh. He has been tried. Know the names of the two Aussies or two Britons who have been in Camp-X ray for over a year now? They are yet to be charged let alone allowed other rights including legal representation, family visits or conditions required by the Geneva convention. You try living in a wire cage 2m * 2.5m under 24/7 light and sound for a year.
Recently their lawyers brought a case before a US court trying to get them access was thrown out as the judge said that she did not have juristriction.

Compare that to the case of the Russian programmer Dmitry and his company Elcomsoft who is in a US court for selling software in Russia that a US company did not like.

Look at the International Court that was recently set up. Why did the US demanded 80 of the 78 (yes 80 of 78) signatories sign a waver to their citizens?

Strangely hicks comes from the same small suburb in Adelade that our only SAS KIA.

Two interesting links:

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/14/opinion/14SAFI.html
(William Safire, a classic right-wing Republican kind of guy, is very uneasy with the Homeland Security Act)

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/28432.html
(In which a concerned citizen calls Admiral Poindexter...)

I'm not so concerned about the "rights" of the people who want to run around jihading the rest of the world back to the stone age, but my real concern is the effect on the law-abiding citizen. If any of you saw "Enemy of the State", you know what I mean. (By the way, I saw an interview with the directors of that movie, and they claimed that every scary technology they used in that film was actually only the declassified stuff from the Freedom of Information act. Who knows what the real stuff is?)

The thing that really frustrates me is would-be "elites" who believe it is their obligation to make the decisions for the rest of us simple citizen_sheep. This is not just a U.S. phenomenon, by the way.

And, if I tried, I could not have come up with a creepier logo for Adm. Poindexter's Total Information Awareness webpage. (it's one of the most unsettling things I have seen all week. Brr...)


I hear ya, Jpenn, and part of me wants to believe everything will be OK, and we good folk can just go on with our lives without worrying about it. But, history is not on our side, here. Government never relinquishes a power that was only granted only for temporary use, because of Situation X. In fact the U.S. national income tax itself was meant to be a temporary thing, just to get us through WWI, and proponents argued that we had nothing to worry about, because no one would ever get taxed more than 5% of their income, and the system would be halted as soon as the war was over. That has now become one of the most feared institutions in our country.

You see, just by saying these things, I am branding myself as a libertarian kind of thinker. In Mr. Poindexter's world, these words I write here should be filed away, because this rycamor character has some odd thoughts. Oh, don't worry. We will never use this against him...

There has to be a solution, but I don't think that is it. Ironically enough, so far, some of the most successful parts of the war on terrorism have been fought by private citizens taking some initiative. I think further: every American should be trained in self-defense, and legitimate use of weapons. Think about it: an armed, prepared, private citizenry? Isn't that what won this country its freedom in the first place? Terrorists would quake in their boots. It would cost a lot less than the elaborate schemes our government is trying to implement now, and the end result would probably be a good deal more successful, as well as a good deal more American.

Hmpph... well... OK... calming down... now...