Kipling's poem The White Man's Burden is often assumed to be about the British Empire, but it was in fact addressed to the United States, then beginning its global ascendancy following the Spanish-American War.
A century later, its lines -"The blame of those ye better, the hate of those ye guard" - seem eerily prophetic. According to our YouGov poll, even many Britons regard America as malign, although they remain fond of individual Americans.
Of course America occasionally deserves criticism. Like every country, it puts its own interests first, sometimes hypocritically. George W. Bush's decision to impose tariffs on imported steel, while preaching commercial liberalisation, is an example.
Ditto the outrageous one-sidedness of the extradition treaty that allows the American authorities to whisk British subjects away without presenting prima facie evidence, but allows no reciprocal action against IRA gunmen in America.
This is, of course, how all superpowers behave. A hundred years ago, it was Britain that resisted supranationalism, and America that constantly demanded international arbitration. But the fact that other nations would do the same if they could get away with it means little to America's critics.
Americans find themselves damned either way. If they remain within their own borders, they are isolationist hicks who are shirking their responsibilities. If they intervene, they are rapacious imperialists.
Indeed, many of their detractors manage to hold these two ideas in their heads simultaneously. Yet a moment's thought should reveal that they are both unfair. In Yugoslavia, America did everything it could to encourage Europe to act.
Only when European passivity was leading to mass slaughter did Washington intervene - benignly and decisively. (Even the most virulent anti-Americans struggle to explain what possible strategic interest there was in Kosovo.) It is a similar story when it comes to Iran.
For a decade, American policy-makers left it to the EU to defuse the nuclear threat from the ayatollahs. Now, with their tactic of constructive engagement in ruins, the Europeans instinctively look to Washington for protection. But you can bet that they will howl with protest if it becomes clear that such protection is best afforded through the deployment of force.
To dislike a country as diverse as America is misanthropic: America, more than any other state, contains the full range of humanity between its coasts. What binds its people together is an ideal encoded in America's DNA.
Conceived in a popular uprising against autocratic government, the United States has a natural sympathy with self-rule, personal freedom and representative government. To this day, it is guided by the Jeffersonian ideal that decisions should be taken as closely as possible to the people they affect.
The EU, of course, is founded on the opposite principle, that of "ever-closer union". No wonder its peoples sometimes resent their more successful cousins.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/03/2006 17:07 Comments ||
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#8
methinks he doth protest too much...
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/03/2006 17:38 Comments ||
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#9
A (male) friend of mine told me that salmon was the only color pink a manly man could get away with wearing. Therefore, no matter what color pink he has on, he should insist that it's "salmon".
A Dictator's Scribe - The Man Who Invented Fidel: Castro, Cuba, and Herbert L. Matthews of The New York Times, by Anthony DePalma
By Ronald Radosh
The late New York Times journalist Herbert L. Matthews is now an almost forgotten name, except, perhaps, among journalism students and those who remember the earliest days of the Cuban Revolution. It was Matthews who, while covering Cuba for the Times in February 1957, got the scoop of a lifetime. Fulgencio Batista, Cuba's authoritarian ruler, had announced that Castro and his small band of rebels had been killed by Batista's troops three months earlier. Not trusting the official sources, Matthews sought out the truth. Claiming to be a tourist, he penetrated Batista's military lines and made a harrowing journey through the jungle on foot, eluding government troops and eventually holding his now-famous rendezvous with the young revolutionary.
Matthews's front-page story altered the fortunes of Castro and his beleaguered rebels. Opponents of Batista's regime smuggled copies of the banned paper into Cuba, and within a short time Cuba's people learned that Castro had not been defeated, and that he had more troops and followers than anyone had believed. For Americans, the story offered proof that conditions in Cuba were not as stable and calm as Batista had claimed, and that the charismatic young bearded guerrilla fighter was the new democratic hope for a nation tired of tyranny. Castro, after all, had told Matthews he sought only democracy, and was not interested in power for himself. Smitten by Castro, Matthews saw him as a heroic future liberator, a man whose cause he could make his own; Matthews would not just write a newspaper story, but help to make history.
Nor was this the first time that Matthews saw himself as the chronicler of activist heroes. In the 1930s, biographer Anthony DePalma points out, Matthews was a supporter of Mussolini, whose invasion of Abyssinia he backed and whose Fascist armed forces he extolled. By 1936, the civil war in Spain was the new hot story, and -- moved by the valiant effort of the defenders of Madrid against Franco -- Matthews switched his allegiances and wrote accounts meant to awaken the sympathies of American readers to the Republic's cause. His stories won him the lifelong friendship of the American Communist volunteers who fought Franco in the so-called Abraham Lincoln Brigade.
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#2
In other words he was a crypto-communist (let's remember that teh FBI identified only a hundred of the eight hundred agents mentionned in teh small part of the soviet traffic the FBi was able to decipher.
I know it from the fact he supported the Spanish Republic. Because this was no longer a democracy (in case it ever was) and its governemnt had not been democratically elected. I will pass over the fact that none of its formations supported democracy be it the anarchists, the communists or the socialists who unlike everywhere else in Europe had not renounced to establish a dictatorship supposedly of the proletariat. In fact the only thing who separated Spanish socialists from communists was the question of subordination to Moscow
I will pass over how when the right had been elected in 1933, riots and threats impeded it to lead the governement, I will pass over the failed attempt of a leftist coup in 1934. In early 1936, there were new elections and the left basing on the first recounts (ie the big cities whare it had majority) proclamied itself winner and rioted so violently that the leaving government members fearing for their lives resigned and handled power to the Popular Front coalition before the recount was ended. Then the leftists stole the ballot boxes everywhere where recounts were still not finished (ie in zones whree they would have probably lost). In fact the Republic never published the definitive results.
And then the left began to govern and militants of right wings partys were being assassinated. Then Calvo Sotelo the leader of one of the opposition parties was assassinated while only luck preserved two other in what appears as a coordinated attempt of decapitate the opposition. Two days later the army raised. Now I am not saying th coup had not been in gestation for weeks before I only highlight the fact thet the sitation was:
-The opposition parties had no hope of ever returning to power through elections since the left would cheat like it had done in February (BTW the Socialist leader had told: we will remain in power forever) or would be rioted out of power in case they would ever win like in 1933
-Soon or later the pro-government death squads would kidnap and kill them like for Calvo Sotelo (or socialists would openly declare dictatorship and then it would be the police but on a larger scale)
Now about the rebels. Contrary to legend set by Mr Matthews and others, most rebels werfe not fascists. The Falange (Spanish Fascist Party) was only a tiny part of them. The remainder was either for a truly democratic republic, constitutioanl monarchists or requetes (ie partisans of traditionalist non-Constitutional monarchy) plus catholics aggravated by religious perseecution. However the coup failed and degenrated in civil war. This favored a general Franco who was not even in the original junta but who happened to have bty far, more troops than any other rebel general. It also favoured those who could count on support (ie money and weapons) from outside ie Falange and Communists respectively, plus teh fact that the massacres ion both sides favoured the hard liners (again Falange and Communists).
But I repaat in 1936 the rebels are not a fascist movement (Falange would grew later but even in 1939n it was only one of componet in an alliance of rebel movements that Franco played one against the other).
Also the Republican governnt sent all of Spain's gold to Moscow as a payment in advance for Soviet war supplies. Of course when German and Soviet relations began to warm (several months before the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact) the Soviets alleged the Sapnish government had outspent its credit, kkept the gold and stopped shipping arms to the "Republicans".
Now what can we think about a guy who propagandizes for a regime who was in fact a dictatorship and who had given all the country's gold to Stalin?
#3
Don't forget the NYT's Raymond Bonner, who in the 1980s tried to do for the FDR and FMLN in El Salvador what Matthews did for Fidel and the 26th July Movement in Cuba back in the 1950s.
The Reagan State Department exerted much pressure and got Bonner booted out of El Salvador before that rat fink could do his evil deed.
If anyone doubts that the most serious threat to American security is the lack of fundamental loyalty on the part of significant segments of our population beginning with members of our intelligence and military agencies (egged on by irresponsibile leaders of the Democratic Party and the media), one has only to read this item from Reuters in today's news.
Apparently some officials in the Pentagon, concerned that the White House might take action against Iran have leaked classified information to the press (which the press, of course, is all to eager to publish for our enemies to view). This particular tidbit of damaging information is that America actually doesn't have the military ability to destroy Iran's nuclear capabilities. If this information is true, it is invaluable intelligence to the fanatics in Teheran. If it is not true, why would anyone leak it, since leaking it only encourages Iran's nuclear ambitions?
The leaking of this information is espionage -- as clearly defined by America's espionage laws. It provides extraordinarily valuable informaiton for the enemy and at one time would have been considered treasonous and prosecuted. Of course the government is unable to prosecute traitors anymore, it can't even monitor terrorist communications from abroad without having half the country's political actors in an uproar.
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#1
This one looks like a spin-off from Hersh's brainfart.
Posted by: Captain America ||
07/03/2006 1:23 Comments ||
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#2
No what they will result in is a Civil War.
Problem is most of these fools don't understand where their food, water, and power really comes from. Thety a re to "important" and removed from that knowledge, They don't know they are less than a day way from starting to starve if the food stops flowing into their cities and suburbs that the water literally could stop and turn where they live back into a desert, that the power they take for granted comes from some place else.
Some place that is much more patriotic than they are. Places where being well armed is a fact of life. Something for all you Coastal people to think about. Something for you New Yorkers and "Beltway" types to think about. I think lots of non coastal and non "urban" folks have about reached their limit.
#3
I have a family member who is consumed with a frothing case of "Be the Gone Satan BDS. Plus I know others who have it too - It's basically THE religion inside the Beltway and of those who proudly call themselves liberals today. Bush is their Satan. To understand them, think of a religious fanatic on a soapbox telling you to repent because Satan is near.
There are many of these people in the pentagon and cia. Fewer in the military, but they are still there.
To a person, these people are usually very intelligent but were taunted as children. Fat, four eyes or some other such thing that made them subject to ridicule as children. If you ask, you will always find that is true. Someone was mean to them and they are still nursing the hurt.
In the good ol' days of America's heyday, as they got older, they would go to church and learn to forgive. But not today. Liberalism gives them another option - blame. It's not their fault. It's someone elses fault. But whose is it? It's Bush's fault. The culture of blame has made the middle east a &(*&hole for the past 2,000 years and they have brought their culture of blame to us.
#4
"Half the difficulties of the war in Iraq stem from the interal war that liberals like Rich and the leaders of the Democratic Party have conducted against the Iraq war from its inception."
Half? More like ninety percent. If America showed unity and resolve, we would not be experiencing even a tiny fraction of the resistance we're seeing in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"A divided nation is a weak nation and everyone -- friend as well as foe -- knows it."
"Divided" is putting it far too kindly. The truth is, the entire Democratic Party, along with its paid propagandists in the media and its Leftist indoctrination cadres in our schools and universities, is rooting for the Islamist enemy and working actively, by every means available, to undermine America's efforts to defeat it. That isn't "divided": what it is, is providing the enemy with a Second Front.
When our enemy reads the output of our subversive "Fourth Estate" and listens to the asinine pronouncements of charlatans like Kerry, Kennedy, Feingold, Pelosi and Murtha, the ONLY rational conclusion he can come to-- and he doesn't have to be terribly bright to figure it out-- is that Osama bin Laden was absolutely, positively, 100% right about us: we in fact do NOT have the patience, resolve and determination to wage a protracted struggle against Islamic imperialism and sooner or later, if they will but harass us long enough in Iraq and Afghanistan, we will lose heart and give up just as we did in Beirut and Mogadishu.
If fact, at this point our enemy could reasonably conclude that OBL's only real mistake was to make the simple rookie error of attacking America in the opening months of a Republican administration that enjoyed a congressional majority; had he waited until the Democrats were in charge, he would have gotten exactly the result he was aiming for in his 9/11 attack: full American withdrawal from the Middle East, and a complete cessation of support for Israel.
"The opposition to this administration and this war is the most disgraceful in the history of this nation."
True enough; but frankly, I think what is damn near as disgraceful is the complete failure of the Bush administration to comprehend that it has TWO enemies waging war on America simultaneously: Islamic imperialism, and our own domestic Left-- and that they are openly, blatantly colluding. That failure, I fear, is going to get a lot of us killed in the coming years.
"Let's hope these betrayals don't result in another 9/11. Or worse."
Such hopes are pure folly: they will result in MANY more 9/11's; and those attacks will probably be perpetrated with nuclear weapons supplied by either North Korea or Iran, or both.
I'm convinced we cannot defeat the Islamist enemy without first crushing the Left. And I mean CRUSH. Until we take that step, everything we are doing is just wasting lives, money and time.
(Sorry for the length of this comment; but this needed to be said.)
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/03/2006 8:04 Comments ||
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#5
I agree with your conclusion Dave. Though I disagree that we can "crush" them. We aren't at the civil war point yet and real fighting (not verbal) between families isn't going to happen anytime soon.
What we need to do is stop allowing the MSM, universities and hollywood shows stop making these people believe that their self-destructive cause and blame game is "the right way". In the end, these people are sheep. They do and say what they do and say because they want to be cool. In their mind, they are better than your ordinary working joe who goes to work, church and lives a productive life - that's boring! They are special. And they are special because the MSM tells them that they are smart and that they understand whatever it is the MSM and their university teachers want them to "understand". And everyone else is stupid because they don't believe what the MSM and their teachers at the universities tell them to believe.
What we need to do is stop the flow of money from foreign sources that corrupt our state department, media and universities that breeds this self-destructive self-righteousness.
#6
The problem is the boomers like Keller and Sulzberg. What we need to do is wait about 15-20 years and the boomers will start to drop like flies, allowing the adults to take over. The other alternative is that the terrs do something so big that the boomers are ignored. Either way, the boomers got to go.
#8
"I'm convinced we cannot defeat the Islamist enemy without first crushing the Left. And I mean CRUSH. Until we take that step, everything we are doing is just wasting lives, money and time."
How do you propose we crush them? Someone here, a few days ago asked why the Right could not organize to marginalize the Left on all levels of society. The reply he received was a nearly incoherent ramble about meme's and memery!
Face it "The People" will have to solve this problem, and that will mean bloodshed, most likely covert.
You still have to find Patriots willing to do the deed, willing to sacrifice their freedom and even their lives. Where are you going to find them? Are you ready to join the fight? Huh? Obviously our elected representatives are too chicken shit to do their jobs.
#9
Problem is most of these fools don't understand where their food, water, and power really comes from.
Which proves that the left is incapable of learning from Katrina and New Orleans. In their own little world, they are blind to their environment, to real world behaviors, and the effect their behavior elicits upon others. Which is why they keep poking the 900 pound gorilla.
#10
"I agree with your conclusion Dave. Though I disagree that we can "crush" them. We aren't at the civil war point yet and real fighting (not verbal) between families isn't going to happen anytime soon."
I'm not sure what you're disagreeing with, here. I didn't say, anywhere, that we "can" crush them; I said-- rephrasing a bit-- that crushing the Left (which I define as thoroughly negating their influence on our society, whether by political means, or by legal action, or by physical force) will prove to be a necessary precondition to victory against an ideologically-motivated enemy like Islamic imperialism.
And nowhere did I claim that "we're now at the civil war point"; hell, most of America is too damn busy placidly watching sitcoms and "reality TV" shows for any such thing.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/03/2006 9:16 Comments ||
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#11
"Either way, the boomers got to go."
I am a BOOMER, dipwad! And I am probably a LOT further on the right than you are. And I would say that a significant segment of the Boomer demographic are more centrist or conservative than not.
The problem is the DAMN hippy contingent. Either way, time for some serious wet work, or as .com would have said: "We need Hunter/Killer teams!".
#15
And I would say that a significant segment of the Boomer demographic are more centrist or conservative than not.
I'm a boomer also, and this point is where we disagree in what may appear to be a minor but in fact is a major point. While a significant segment of the Boomers may not be LLL, the vast, overwhelming majority of the Boomers who hold the reins of control in media, academia, religion, and the law are full bore '68er LLL. They are the ones making the policies with which the majority of the people disagree. If that weren't the case, you wouldn't be talking about insurrection.
#16
Find the leakers and have them shot. And if the reporters do not help find the leakers then have them jailed forever for contempt.
The President MUST act now - start probing the CLintonista holdovers who are so disloyal to the nation as to give away its secrets for political gain. Get the Attounrey General and the military & intelligence Inspectors General rolling on this NOW.
Make the leakers knwo there is no more free lucnh. Cowards that they are, after the first is hung the rest will shut up.
#17
Other than the outrage lets look at the leak. First, to think we do not have the capability to knock out ALL of their nuke sites is flat silly. Folks we could turn the whole planet into a parking lot, Iran is just a small spot. Two or three nights and they would be back living in the stone age. So why the leak?
Probably planted to see what some of our allies and other countries would do or say. Or something even be as simple as a leak to influence a vote on a supplemental for more aircraft or missles.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
07/03/2006 9:51 Comments ||
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"...overwhelming majority of the Boomers who hold the reins of control in media, academia, religion, and the law are full bore '68er LLL."
I won't argue with that! That's where the DAMN hippies focused their efforts. And now it is time for us to do something about it.
I know what I think it is going to take, but I'm not going to say it here. Needless to say, it's sinktrap material.
#19
actually - I was agreeing with you. I just was musing about your comment that they need to be crushed and thinking about how nearly impossible that will be considering the fact that our press and university nistitutions have a near stranglehold on the national dialog.
I didn't mean to imply that those were your thoughts - just taking one step further.
#21
I just was musing about your comment that they need to be crushed and thinking about how nearly impossible that will be considering the fact that our press and university nistitutions have a near stranglehold on the national dialog.
This is why we are approaching the civil war point. Executive branch agencies and judiciary branch penetrated, civility in ruins, full blown hatred of America on the Left, spineless legislative branch. Doesn't leave to much room to move.
#22
We've been moving towards a civil war for quite some time. The left hates America and in some weird pathological manner they don't grasp that their desire to break down America is self-destructive to one of the most free and prosperous societies that is known to man. They are like adolescents that hate their parents. They feel comfortable hating them but entitled to live under their roof and accept their care.
That's what's wrong with those types of Boomers. They are stuck in an adolescent mindset. They can't grow up because if they do, they have to look in the mirror and say - gosh, I grew up. I'm old now. They spent their youth believing that "old and established" was bad. They can't let go of it. Like spoiled jet set children of millionaires, they can't quite grasp that once you lose it, it's gone. That's why they support the idea of a nanny state, it allows them to think that mommy will, as always, make sure it all turns out ok.
I'll let you know when and if I feel like shooting at my siblings. That's probably a good indicator of when it will begin. I'm nowhere even remotely close to that.
#23
"They are like adolescents that hate their parents. They feel comfortable hating them but entitled to live under their roof and accept their care."
Theory: these are people who watched too damn much Sesame Street when they were little and are really, really PISSED that the real world didn't turn out to be anything like Big Bird said.
Just a theory...
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/03/2006 12:15 Comments ||
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#24
lol, Dave D. I shudder to think what (tomorrow's) generation who grew up on Barney the dinosaur will be like ("I love you, you love me, we're a happy family...").
Posted by: BA ||
07/03/2006 13:31 Comments ||
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#25
"...Barney the dinosaur..."
Oh, God... I hadn't thought of that. LOL!!
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/03/2006 14:00 Comments ||
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#26
I have a theory that dominant cultures decline because at some point they turn over the upbringing of their kids to servants. I read somewhere that while you get your name from your father, you get your culture from you mother. When 90% of your kids' time is spent with servants, then 90% of the values they absorb are going to be from the servant class. With the advent of women in the workforce and daycare, most kids these days are being raised by servants of one sort or another.
#27
Not the Hippys. It's the Socalists and Communists. That leaves out most of the "Hippys" These are people ideologically driven. Want to see it fully in action look at Germany and the EU. They run the show. They occupy the organs of government. These 68'ers are not the Hippys, they just had at one time Hippy trappings. A real Hippy would never be caught dead in a suit, these people are happy to wear the most expensive ones they can afford.
#29
Just a fine point - but Boomers did not grow up on Sesame Street. Andy of Mayberry, Father Knows Best, Gunsmoke, The Wild, Wild West, Batman, Captain Kangaroo. No Sesame Street.
#30
I have several friends who did in-home daycare to earn some extra money while their children were young. They all went to much more prestigious universities than I (I went to the state school my father was associated with, because with four kids in four years, that was what we could afford), and most had had prestigious jobs before deciding to stay home with their babies. Come to think of it, my mother's housekeeper's children went to more prestigious universities than I, too. And of the four au pairs I had while living in Germany, two had bachelors degrees, the third a master's, and the fourth subsequently went on to get her MBA. That "servant class" thingy is a bit of a muddle, and has been for a while.
#31
I know a lot of friends who have Mexican nannies with 8th grade educations. What kind of values will those kids get? Not that they'll be poor values ethically. They just won't necessarily get the values that their parents would want them to have to succeed. And being half Mexican and all, I know that I wouldn't want my kids to have the values of a campesino. They wouldn't really be set up for success.
by James Taranto, Wall Street Journal's "Best of the Web"
Have you noticed a theme in the press's coverage of last week's Hamdan v. Rumsfeld decision? If not, consider these examples:
"The Supreme Court on Thursday repudiated the Bush administration's plan to put Guantanamo detainees on trial before military commissions, ruling broadly that the commissions were unauthorized by federal statute and violated international law. . . . The decision was . . . a sweeping and categorical defeat for the administration."--New York Times
"The Supreme Court yesterday struck down the military commissions President Bush established to try suspected members of al-Qaeda, emphatically rejecting a signature Bush anti-terrorism measure and the broad assertion of executive power upon which the president had based it."--Washington Post
"In a sharp rebuke of President George W. Bush's tactics in the war on terrorism, the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday struck down as unlawful the military tribunal system set up to try Guantanamo prisoners."--Reuters
"The Supreme Court rebuked President Bush and his anti-terror policies Thursday, ruling that his plan to try Guantanamo Bay detainees in military tribunals violates U.S. and international law."--Associated Press
"The Supreme Court on Thursday sharply rejected the Bush administration's use of military commissions to try suspected terrorists, eliminating a central pillar of the president's anti-terrorism strategy. In a blunt dismissal of President Bush's claim that he had unfettered authority to try enemy combatants captured in the war on terror, the court ruled 5-3 that military trials of detainees at the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba violated domestic and international laws."--Chicago Tribune
All of these stories go well beyond the facts to engage in editorializing, portraying the ruling as not just a legal defeat for the administration but a "repudiation," "rebuke," "sharp rejection," etc.
But several serious analyses of the Hamdan decision--including our own on Thursday and David Rivkin and Lee Casey's, which appeared Friday in The Wall Street Journal, suggest that there is less to it. Justice Anthony Kennedy declined to join his four liberal colleagues in the most sweeping aspects of their opinion, and even that opinion left many issues unaddressed, so that the court's actual decision was narrower than much of the press coverage suggests.
Why were reporters so eager to portray this as a great defeat for the Bush administration? Partly because of anti-Bush bias: In at least some of the news stories--especialy Linda Greenhouse's Times piece, which we quoted extensively on Friday--it is clear that the reporter is happy with the result. And partly because of a bias in favor of a dramatic narrative.
It's true that some conservatives agree that the opinion was a "rebuke." They believe that it is an unwarranted infringement on executive power, just as liberal commentators see it as a victory over the evil George W. Bush.
That's fine. Commentators are entitled to their opinions. But reporters are not, and they would better serve their readers if they simply explained what the ruling said and refrained from tendentious characterizations of its significance.
Posted by: Mike ||
07/03/2006 15:56 ||
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#1
Then there's the real editorials. The site is paid-only, so here is a typed transcript from the Albuquerque Journal's editorial page, B2, 2 July 2006, Col. 1.
Court Exercises Check on President's Power
A White House overruled by the U.S. Supreme Court may be too close to the case to see the 5-3 decision as anything but a setback. But it is one of the more clearcut victories of the war on terror since the Taliban were routed from power and Osama bin Laden was driven into hiding.
The court decision may be a victory, but there is no way it can be interpreted by anyone as being a victory for the US. A victory for the Islamists, sure.
It seems that when the war on terror is not under attack from the press, it is under attack in the courts. The latest attack on the lawfare front is the Supreme Court's decision siding with human rights groups and lawyers for Salim Ahmed Hamdan, an admitted bodyguard of Osama bin Laden. By a 5-to-3 vote, the Supreme Court has halted the military commissions, claiming they were not authorized by Congress. Some of the justices have even opined that they are arguably against the Geneva Convention. The Supreme Court ruled on this case despite the fact that by passing the Detainee Treatment Act in December, 2005, Congress had clearly indicated that federal courts did not have jurisdiction to rule in this case.
Three previous lawfare cases have gone to the Supreme Court, and set the stage for this ruling. All three involved terrorists that were captured on the battlefield and detained at Guantanamo Bay. The first case, Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, was filed by a detainee who was captured while fighting for the Taliban against the United States government. The case was initially dismissed by lower courts, but in a Supreme Court ruling that was issued within two months of the Abu Ghraib scandal's emergence on the public stage. The 4th Circuit was overruled, and the detainees were permitted access to U.S. courts.
A similar case, Rasul v. Bush, centered on claims that the detainees were wrongfully imprisoned. Lower courts ruled they did not have jurisdiction over the case, citing Johnson v. Eisentrager, a case involving Nazi war criminals. However, in a decision released the same day as Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the captured terrorists, finding that U.S. courts did have jurisdiction over Guantanamo Bay.
A third case, involving "dirty bomb" suspect Jose Padilla, was also heard. In this case, though, the Supreme Court found for the Department of Defense on a technicality. Padilla recently was charged in a regular criminal court on various conspiracy charges relating to al-Qaeda plots in the 1990s. This has been challenged in court as well.
The end result is that Congress and the Administration have to regroup in the face of a Supreme Court decision that not only defied Congress, but which also has shown far more consideration for the terrorists than it did for their would-be victims. In essence, human rights groups now have openings for the next round of lawfare. At this point, the courtroom seems to be a battlefield where al Qaeda is scoring major successes. Already some critics are casting an eye towards what the Supreme Court's ruling means for the NSA's monitoring of terrorist communications with people in the United States. The court's ruling on the Geneva Convention could also add new rounds of cases.
This lawfare, if unchecked, could lead to successful attacks down the road. These attacks will owe their success to the lawfare waged by human rights groups, which will not take any responsibility for such contributions. Worse yet, any efforts by Congress and the Administration to check the lawfare will apparently be swept aside by an Imperial Supreme Court.
by David Rivkin Jr. and Lee Casey, Wall Street Journal
A useful antidote to some of the MSM spin and gloating we've been hearing.
The Supreme Court's decision in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, invalidating for now the use of military commissions to try al Qaeda and associated detainees, may be a setback for U.S. policy in the war on terror. But it is a setback with a sterling silver lining. All eight of the justices participating in this case agreed that military commissions are a legitimate part of the American legal tradition that can, in appropriate circumstances, be used to try and punish individuals captured in the war on terror. Moreover, nothing in the decision suggests that the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay must, or should, be closed.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Mike ||
07/03/2006 08:01 ||
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Read the whole exchange at the link. This just can't be allowed.
The 4/1 SPPT Team was traveling back from Salman Pak to Camp Rustamiyah along EFP alley (RTE Pluto South) on Sunday May 14th about 5:15pm in a 3 vehicle convoy. About 3 miles from Camp Rustamiyah, the first Humvee was hit by a massive roadside bomb called an EFP. The bomb blew the HUMVEE into the air and created a giant cloud of debris, dirt and pavement.
We stopped as fast as we could and when the smoke cleared enough, we could see the first HUMVEE had been completely blown off the road and was lying upside down in a ditch. To make matters worse it was also on fire. The rest of the team tried to free the driver and vehicle commander from the wreckage but the frame of the HUMVEE was bent and the door would not open. The two soldiers in the front were trapped inside the burning vehicle and died.
We could only pray that they were already dead from the EFP blast and did not burn to death. We tried to pull the front doors off with a winch and a tow strap, but the burning ammunition inside the wreck started to explode and the entire vehicle caught fire and blew up. The gunner was pulled from the wreckage and was severely wounded with shrapnel wounds from the spalling.
Continued on Page 49
#2
Some Commander needs to have his ass handed to him. Our volunteer Soilders fight as they do because we take care of them. Someone has lost sight of this and needs to be put out on the pointy end of the spear so they remember it.
#3
If this is real, it's an outrage. But are we sure it's real, or some jerk just cooking up a "denial of service" job on military communications channels? If it were real, it wouldn't be long before you would run out of soldiers willing to stick their necks out only to get kicked in the @$$. Anybody have another more direct source to back this up? The whole thing smells like an urban legend. But if it isn't, this "policy" is doomed to self-destruct, and maybe even take the brass who cooked it up along with it.
Posted by: grb ||
07/03/2006 3:29 Comments ||
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#4
If some of Rantburg's military types would check out the source and tell us if it rings true? It looked full of jargon to me, but I've no idea if it's real jargon or not. I'm also suspicious of someone who describes himeself as a winner of the prestigious Peabody Award, and of a professional newsman who continued the self-description with the phrase, "... a protégée's of the late Col. ..."
#5
The source is Soldiers for the Truth. Gives you a hint. Before anyone goes off half cocked [there's an arty term for you], think Al-AP or Al-Reuters. Verify first.
#6
This is just crap. It rings of old 1980's fearmongering. IF it did happen, it only happened one. Todays combat teams are hardened and would have taken matters into their own hands. The decision makers would be beaten to a pulp by the team.
This whole article is suspect.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
07/03/2006 9:34 Comments ||
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#7
From what I've seen SFTT is very quick on the trigger and always eager ready to lambaste the brass. That doesn't mean they're always wrong, but generous portions of salt are usually called for.
David Hicks's supporters are in denial about the nature of his actions, writes Gerard Henderson.
IT'S all but official. The United States, on George Bush's watch, is not a fascist state, despite what some Bush critics allege. The decision of the US Supreme Court in Hamdan v Rumsfeld, handed down last week, shows that the rule of law still prevails in the US democracy. In Hamdan's case, by a majority of five to three, the court found against the Bush Administration's attempted use of military commissions to try detainees held at Guantanamo Bay who have been charged with crimes.
The majority comprised Justices John Stevens, David Souter, Ruth Ginsburg, Stephen Breyerand Anthony Kennedy. Stevens, Souter and Kennedy were appointed by Republican administrations. Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito delivered dissenting opinions. All three were also appointed by Republican administrations.
This is not the first time the Supreme Court has found against the Bush Administration. Bush is an authoritative President, but even at a time of war he is limited by the US constitution.
Salim Hamdan's case has uncertain implications for South Australian-born David Hicks, who has been held at Guantanamo Bay for more than four years. As is often the case in the US legal system, this matter has dragged on for far too long, partly due to delays caused by legal actions taken by defendants and partly due to a slow prosecution process. Unfortunately, an unintended result of Hamdan's case may be to further delay legal action against Hicks and others.
As the Labor frontbencher Nicola Roxon warned on Friday, "the last thing we want to do is to turn someone like David Hicks into a martyr".
Already there is considerable support for Hicks in Australia from those who maintain he has been denied due process. This is an informal group which includes many lawyers and journalists and a few academics along with some politicians. Among the latter group, Hicks's cause is most frequently annunciated by the minor parties (Democrats, Greens) and independents, but some Labor MPs are also vocal on the issue.
In his chapter in Coming to the Party (MUP, 2006), Barry Jones argues that the ALP should embrace the Hicks cause (among others), lest it appear to be "safe, simple, bland". It is not clear how such a position is consistent with the point made by Jones on television on Sunday that Labor's essential task is to win more seats in such states as Queensland, Western Australia, NSW and South Australia - especially since the first two states are more sensitive than most to national security issues, in view of their relative isolation. There are not many votes in proclaiming the rights of someone who is alleged to have trained with al-Qaeda.
Certainly, Hicks is entitled to a fair hearing in the US in accordance with legal process. What's more, there is evidence his incarceration is unduly harsh. But this is no reason to go into denial about Hicks's actions, which have directly led to his predicament.
Interviewed on ABC TV's Lateline on Friday, Major Michael Mori - Hicks's US military lawyer - said his client "hasn't injured anyone" and "is not a killer". How does he know this?
Ironically, the case against Hicks is spelt out in The President Versus David Hicks, which aired on SBS TV in 2004. The film's directors, Curtis Levy and Bentley Dean, went out of their way to present the case for Hicks, but the tactic backfired due to the decision to quote some of Hicks's letters to his father, Terry Hicks.
In August 2000 Hicks told his father of his time training with the Islamist terrorist group Lashkar-e-Toiba on the Pakistan side of the Kashmir line of control: "Every night there is an exchange of fire. I got to fire hundreds of rounds There are not many countries in the world where a tourist can go and stay with the army and shoot across the border at its enemy, legally." Hicks was not firing at bats. If he did not kill or injure anyone, it can only be because he missed his targets.
Elsewhere Hicks said he was "officially a Taliban member", advocated the implementation of "strict Islamic law" including the "death sentence" and "all Islamic punishments", proclaimed the need for "an Islamic revolution", railed against "the Western-Jewish domination" and celebrated beheadings in poetry: "Muhammad's food you shall be fed/To disagree, so off with your head."
There is a tendency among some Western commentators not to take self-proclaimed revolutionaries seriously. In a sense, revolutionaries, including those of the Islamic genre, deserve more respect. The events in the US of September 11, 2001, and in Britain on July 7 last year indicate that Islamist revolutionaries - whether on tourist visas or citizens - are intent on destroying Western and Muslim societies. The details are set out in The 9/11 Commission Report and the Report of the Official Account of the Bombings in London on 7th July 2005. Since then there have been serious allegations of planned terrorist attacks on Canada and New Zealand.
In recent times, juries in Australia have found Faheem Khalid Lodhiand Joseph "Jihad Jack" Thomas guilty of terrorist offences under the new legislation introduced after the events of September 11.
Jack Roche pleaded guilty to terrorist offences under the previous legislation. Others have been charged and are awaiting trial. Lex Lasry, QC, maintained that Thomas was the victim of a "trophy trial". After the jury had found the accused guilty of accepting funds from a terrorist organisation, Justice Philip Cummins dismissed Lasry's assertion. The judge said "al-Qaeda was not a charitable organisation; it was not a travel agency".
In a recent plea for Thomas on ABC Radio National's Perspectives program, Anna Sande said her friend "was a young man in the wrong place at the wrong time, but not for the wrong reasons". A jury thought otherwise. Sande raised concern about Thomas's mental health and the costs that his parents have endured in supporting his legal defence. The former is a matter of real concern. Yet the latter could be resolved by well-off lawyers and other professionals taking the hat around to assist the Thomas family.
As with Hicks, the supporters of Thomas would have more credibility if they openly acknowledged that training or associating with al-Qaeda is a serious matter.
Gerard Henderson is executive director of the Sydney Institute.
Posted by: john ||
07/03/2006 18:05 ||
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#1
his time training with the Islamist terrorist group Lashkar-e-Toiba ...
There are not many countries in the world where a tourist can go and stay with the army and shoot across the border at its enemy, legally."
The Pakistan Army and the Lashkar-e-Toiba operate as one organization...
Posted by: john ||
07/03/2006 18:11 Comments ||
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#2
Bush is an authoritative President, but even at a time of war he is limited by the US constitution.
George is a pansy compared to what Lincoln did and the people built a temple in their captial to him. Not to mention put his likeness on its common currancy.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
If anyone doubts that the most serious threat to American security is the lack of fundamental loyalty on the part of significant segments of our population beginning with members of our intelligence and military agencies (egged on by irresponsibile leaders of the Democratic Party and the media), one has only to read this item from Reuters in today's news. 
