Legalities

"It seems that most people have misconstrued what it means to be free. Freedom is not a right, but a privilege."

Um, no DonteS the "privilege not a right" argument applies to legally driving a car, not torture.

The Declaration of Independence says "We hold these Truths to be self evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness — That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed."

The governed of our country have long held that torture is illegal, from George Washington's specific orders not to abuse British POWs in the Revolutionary War, to the prosecutions of Japanese soldiers after WW11 for waterboarding, to advocating for and signing the Geneva Conventions, to demanding communist nations live up the Helsinki Accords which did more to free Eastern Europe than any unused cruise missile ever did.

Even George Bush said last summer, "I do believe there is an Almighty, and I believe a gift of that Almighty to all is freedom."

You go on to say, "I see no reason why we should extend our rights and freedoms as Americans to terrorists and foreign enemy combatants. They surely will not honor the Geneva Convention and other honored codes of conduct."

By signing the Geneva Conventions we made it recognized US law. Adhering to them is not just an option it's a legal obligation. Adhering to the laws of war is one of things that separates us from and makes us better than terrorists.

We won't beat Al Qaeda by being as barbaric as they are anymore than we beat the Soviets by being more ruthless than they were. Ask yourself who propped up illegitimate governments in Europe that tortured and murdered dissidents during the Cold War. How did that work out in Poland, East Germany, and the rest of the Warsaw Pact countries in the end?

People all over the world used to look to the US as an example of a government that respected the rights of man. Not anymore. If we want to end the terrorist threat to this nation then we have to go back to being the good guys, to being a nation others look up to and aspire to be like, not just fear. It's not just good governing principles or some namby pamby legal obligation you don't think is justified, it's how we win, it's how we've always won.

>Um, no DonteS the "privilege not a right" argument applies to legally driving a car, not torture.

Posted by: markg8 | Apr 2, 2008 1:25:13 PM

What I said was,"Freedom is not a right, but a privilege."

In terms of honoring the Geneva Convention, I believe Tom has already addressed that concern very well.

But I thought that when you are president that you can do whatever you want to do regardless of what the law says. I mean that is what Bush does anyway...and he should know with all the experience he has with disregarding the law and getting away with it.

Donte I cut and paste your passage exactly. There is no difference.

As for Tom I think he should go read the Army Field Manual. It explicitly bans beating prisoners, sexually humiliating them, threatening them with dogs, depriving them of food or water, performing mock executions, shocking them with electricity, burning them, causing other pain and a technique called "water boarding" that simulates drowning.

Hardly any foreign occupations of hostile countries have ever been successful but no foreign occupation of even a compliant country can be successful unless it wins the respect
of the occupied by respecting their rights. You can pretend that degrees of abuse make a huge difference and should just be shrugged off as pranks, hazing or even worse a normal cost of war but again that position is not only morally repugnant it is counter productive.

Might I also remind you that most of our soldiers in our own revolution, the original minute men, wore no uniforms. Evidence has shown that huge numbers of detainees have been wrongfully detained.
I.E. they were not enemy combatants of any kind.

Markg8, I'm glad that we live in a society where we can openly debate issues such as this. I think alot of Americans don't appreciate the fact that we live in a free and open society which affords us such luxuries.

To your latest comments, considering that you are unhappy with this situation, what are your plans to "right the ship" so to speak? I can understand your criticisms, but what actions will you personally be taking to work towards a constructive solution?

Donte in answer to your question electing more and better Democrats.

why bring our country down to that level
we like to talk a big game but when it comes down to it we dont back it up. we will be know better then them if we use the same tricks they do

How low our great country has sunk. Shame, shame, shame.

Our country's moral high ground has evaporated due to this evil administration. And we will never get it back. Nothing really separates us now from the very enemies we fight. Now there is only one step from using these rules on "enemy combatants" to using it on American citizens. The precedent has been set. Impeach this administration!

DonteS: I can't believe this... "Freedom is not a right, but a privilege?" I'll bet you consider yourself a "good Republican," too, huh? Ten years ago, we would have excommunicated Republicans from the party for uttering something like that. The founders are probably spinning in their graves hearing an American say such a thing.

The Constitution lays out GOD-GIVEN RIGHTS to us, and it restrains the government from taking those rights away. Freedom of speech, for example, is not a "privilege." Freedom from unreasonable search and seizure, for another example, is not a "privilege." These are RIGHTS, entitled to everyone. We call them the Bill of Rights, not the Bill of Privileges.

These rights are guaranteed by defense of THE CONSTITUTION. That's why our government officials and members of the military take oaths to defend THE CONSTITUTION. That is their primary duty. The founders understood our rights are most threatened by the government--not a foreign enemy.

We do not enjoy "privileges" bestowed upon us by a benevolent king-like government that's gracious enough to allow us to live our lives. We do not have "privileges" that can be taken away by the government in the name of security. Such a system is exactly what our founders were fighting against when they waged the Revolutionary War.

Sometimes I wonder how many Americans slept through their high school civics class...

We have a president with absolutely no respect for the laws, and legislators that do nothing but support his tyranny. Shouldn't be too much of a surprise when you realize they are purchased and sold before you have a chance to vote for any of them.
The system is rigged.. don't fool yourself that you have any freedom.

290 More days of this totally corrupt administration and then BUSH will be on the turnip truck heading out of Washington and back to Crawford, Texas.. And not a day to soon.

Don't depend on Hillary to do anything about this. She voted to give George Bush the authority to go to waR saying I will take him for his word. She backed a man who stole the election in 2000, so where is her experience? We indeed need a new change and not another dynasty. Dynasty's belong in China not the USA. Our vets just announced in Washington DC, that they have a citizens arrest warrant for Bush and Cheney as War Criminals. This is big and you won't hear it from the networks. Go to the people...Internet from now on. No more networks. They lie.

The National Lawyers' Guild has called for the disbarment of John Yoo, the former Justice Department attorney who authored the notorious "torture memorandum," used to justify the illegal imprisonment and maltreatment of prisoners held by American military authorities as "unlawful combatants." Yoo, currently on the law faculty of the University of California at Berkeley, is guilty of "complicity in establishing the policy that led to the torture of prisoners," said Guild President Marjorie Cohn, who condemns Yoo as a war criminal. The Guild, the nation's biggest public interest bar organization, is also demanding that the law school, known as Boalt Hall, fire Yoo, and that Congress repeal a law that purports to give him and other torturers immunity from prosecution.

The document, which Yoo presumes to refer to as a memorandum of law, is an object lesson in legal bootstrapping. The most sweeping pronouncements–for example, that Constitutional due process of law does not apply to people held captive by the military–are supported by no authority whatsoever, and a substantial proportion of the citations in the 80 pages of text are to opinions from Yoo’s own Office of Legal Counsel and not to cases that ever came before the courts.

When there are citations to actual cases, these are steeped in deception, with only a pretense of responsible legal reasoning. The overall presentation seems intended to obfuscate rather than illuminate. Yoo relies principally on a 1942 case that was unprecedented at the time (wartime, officially, pursuant to a congressional declaration) and that hasn’t ever been followed by the Supreme Court. He cites a work from 1612 for the proposition that people who don’t obey laws aren’t entitled to their protection, and he cites opinions from the Israeli Supreme Court laying out what is and isn’t cruel and unusual punishment

I'm glad that we live in a society where we can openly debate issues such as this. I think alot of Americans don't appreciate the fact that we live in a free and open society which affords us such luxuries---DonteS

My fellow US Citizen...maybe just a minor play of words to you, but the ESSENCE of OUR US CONSTITUTION is to establish the fact that our freedom is not a LUXURY status...the underlying principles of our freedoms are UNALIENABLE Rights...this is our birthright...and the Declaration of Independence does not state that these rights are just to be applied to US..."We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed...The first step to winning the "War on Terror" is to apply these principles to all people of the world...this has always been the reason for OUR country's greatness...I would rather that other nations aspire to our version of freedom than to despise us for our tenacity and creativity in pursuing the demise of our "Enemies"...

"Leading critics like Marty Lederman believe that the memo released today is directly responsible for the abuses...at Abu Ghraib"

With particular respect to Abu Ghraib, do you believe that Lederman has warrant for this opinion?

Consider:
(1) Is there evidence that the abuses at Abu Ghraib were purposeful (in the sense of attempting to extract intelligence), rather than being for the amusement of the perpetrators?

(2) You report that the Cabinet considered and authorized particular techniques against particular high value detainees, that the interrogators did not feel that they had a free hand to do whatever they thought necessary, but sought detailed and particular approval.

(a) Do you believe there is evidence that the President or his Cabinet gave the keepers or interrogators of the lower value detainees in Abu Ghraib (or their immediate chain of command) a free hand?

(b) Alternatively, do you believe there is evidence that, absent positive direction from the President or his Cabinet, the Army relied on the memos to give the eventual abusers a free hand?

(c) Do you believe there is evidence that the abusers themselves were aware of the memos and considered themselves to have a free hand?

(3) Do you believe that Marty Lederman has the sources and evidence to answer the questions above definitively in the positive?

Unless you can answer both questions (1) and any part of (2), or question (3) affirmatively, then you cannot say that Lederman has adequate warrant for his opinion.

Lederman has attracted many with his substantive criticism and moral outrage - much of that outrage being fully warranted. But moral outrage alone cannot make the Yoo memo "directly responsible" for Abu Ghraib, nor, alone, can it hang the abuses committed there round the neck of the Bush administration as acts of positive direction or even permissive indifference.

I say all this because if, assessing him as a source, you cannot conclude that Lederman has warrant for a particular opinion, then you ought not to publish that particular opinion of his as an expert assessment. And even if you do not publish it as an _expert_ assessment, is it proper to publish _any_ opinion which you cannot conclude has adequate warrant without placing it in a context that identifies its limitations?

It is easy to believe those who are openly willing (in certain circumstances) to countenance acts of inhumanity to be guilty of particular acts of inhumanity. That does not mean, howevever, that the ordinary rules of source assessment, evidence, and warrant cease to apply.

Nathan: Yes, there was testimony that (1)unidentified civilian interrogators at Abu Ghraib requested (2a) that the military guards "soften up" certain detainees who were subsequently in the presence of the purported CIA civilians without the military guards being present. The requests of the "civilians" were not countermanded by the guards' chain of command, so there is every reason to suppose that the "civilians" were there on someone's orders. (2b) Neither you, nor I, nor anyone else can roam around in a prison without authorization. So yes, there was an objective; and yes, the criminals in the White House relied on the chain of command to isolate themselves from the dirty work. (2c) The guards probably did not invent the hooded electrical wire torture, but they may have improvised some of the sexual abuse because they had a willing female participant. It is a certainty that the guards had no knowledge of high level memos, and they testified about what they thought they were doing. (3) I believe, but I do not KNOW, that Marty Lederman has sources to affirm your three suppostitions. So yes, our outrage is more justifiable than a warrantless wiretap.