07-08-2009, 01:49 PM
quote:James, I really don’t think we’ll know the truth for years to come. The US Supreme Court said that the detainees have the constitutional right to challenge their detention in US Courts. That basically means the US Constitution and the protection it provides still prevails. Essentially the US Supreme Court rejected the United States of America becoming just like the Taliban.
Originally posted by james weatherford
Is it really lack of evidence that has prohibited charges going to court?
I thought it had something to do with their alleged status as "enemy combatants" and their alleged "crimes" being committed somewhere else.
quote:That’s true but there have been enough of this secret evidence that turned out to be false, that the judicial system is starting to question if any is real. Remember, no evidence has to be submitted except to say we have evidence. Now if some foreign government ever did that to us, we would practically drop a nuke on them. But when we do it, somehow it magically becomes all right if we wrapped it in red, white and blue. This type of justice system is what we are condemning in Iran, N. Korea, China, etc, but we accept it of ourselves?
Originally posted by mdd7000
Isn't another part of the issue being that some of the evidence, if revealed, will then show the enemy how we obtained such evidence, meaning that secret methods and personnel would be exposed?
quote:Nobody is saying they get the same rights as Americans. What people are saying and the US Supreme Court agreed, they have the rights our Constitution grants everyone, citizen and non citizen. If we don’t want them to have the rights, change the Constitution.
Originally posted by centipede
There is talk of giving these "detainees" the same rights as Americans. How nuts is this?
But I have to ask, why are we so afraid of putting them on trial? Why are we not demanding that these trials be held so the world can see our democracy at work? We are trying to ram it down everyone’s throats, we throw it in everyone’s face, and we want to have other countries emulate us. We are proud of our system of equal and fair justice, but we act like Kim Jong Il behind a cloak of secrecy when we could shine high a top the glory of our country!
quote:But that’s the whole point. As it stands, we are about 30 innocent to every 1 that may be guilty. But how do we know they are guilty? Just because some body that was paid a bounty said they are terrorist?
Originally posted by centipede
The notion of letting 10 guilty go free in order to save one innocent does not apply to WAR, and most people do not want the possibility of WAR being deposited at our feet with people who are "no more than suspects".
The concept is we are becoming just like those countries we condemn. What is different between what we are doing and what China is doing in how they handle the judicial process. If a person is guilty, put them on trial, find them guilty, and execute them if found guilty. That is what America is about, not some secret Military Junta style circus with secret evidence. Why not ask Iran or North Korea to run the tribunals? If we continue along the lines of secret courts and evidence, we need to shut our mouths when other countries do it.
quote:Unfortunately we really don’t know where some came from. By the US taking control, we made them ours. Even though some detainees are innocent due to mistaken identity or were turned in just to collect our bounty, the hysteria (just like your reading here) have branded them guilty and other countries don’t want them either for fear of similar hysterical reaction. Most of our allies won’t take them because they ended up in bitter political battles with the US over their innocent citizens being grabbed without due process. France, and the UK are two examples of allies who had dozens of their citizens kidnapped by the US. When their innocence was finally determined, those countries had to fight the US to let their innocent citizens be returned. Now they are so bitter that they will not help us. Some were enemies of Al-Quida and the Taliban and were turned in to collect American bounty money. How can we release those innocent people back into their community after what they suffered at our hands? We literally made anti-americans out of innocent people. We have to find someplace that will take them; that was something we didn’t consider when we had untrained individuals paying bounties for warm bodies.
Originally posted by Wao nahele kane
why wouldn't they just ship them back to where they picked them up from? I guess I'm missing something here.