Disappointing Ruling
Supreme Court Rules: Bush Overstepped Authority In Plans For War Crimes Trials At Guantanamo
Things sure have changed since the days of FDR.
More on this story as it develops…
Update: It appears Jusctice Anthony, in another stunning display of bipolar disorder, sided with all the liberals on the court. “Trial by military commission raises separation-of-powers concerns of the highest order,” Kennedy wrote in his opinion. Funny. I don’t remember miltary tribunals being a problem in any of the past wars we’ve had. In fact, if these types of tribunals are wrong, then why have them for our own troops?
This decision doesn’t effect our ability to keep terrorists (I don’t consider them “combatants”) at Gitmo. It deals more narrowly with the types of trials some of these slime can have. But, make no mistake, the Supreme Court is continuing a major infringement on the president’s executive powers in a time of war.
Update II: If you’re interested in a more liberal perspective of this decision, look no further than USA Today’s On Deadline. I guess Daily Kos fans read USA Today, too.
Update III: Kathy makes an excelent point: “This ruling is the prime example for why we must continue with Republican majorities.” I wrote similar sentiments at Falcon’s Crest.
Kim Priestap at Wizbang! has a lot more.
Posted by Falcon
June 29th, 2006 at 10:39 am
Notice how it falls liberals vs. conservatives. Proving yet again, there is no difference between the left and right when it comes to terrorism.
I’m extremely disappointed. Terrorists are covered under the geneva convention? A lot of nonsense. They’re essentially saying, “Sure, they’ll chop off the heads of our soldiers, but remember — we’re the bad guys. We deserve it. They’re still lawful combatants, because we forced them to do it by invading their lands.”
I look forward to reading Scalia’s dissent. I’m sure he’ll have harsh words for the terrorist-sympathizers.
June 29th, 2006 at 10:48 am
Rory, I’ll give you three guesses as to who the fifth vote was. Yep, Justice Kennedy. That guy has got to go!
June 29th, 2006 at 10:50 am
Kathy,
Exactly right. If we kill them on the battlefield, we don’t have to go through this crap!
There are no reasons to take prisoners in the GWOT.
June 29th, 2006 at 10:54 am
This ruling is the prime example for why we must continue with Republican majorities. These whackjob liberals on the court couldn’t make a Constitutionally legal decision if it was written for them by Jefferson himself.
June 29th, 2006 at 10:55 am
If we can’t have war trials, then don’t take them alive.
June 29th, 2006 at 11:02 am
I’d modify your comments with this, Kathy. Instead of “Take no prisoners” we should have a “Keep no prisoners” attitude: Capture them, extract valuable info, kill them.
Works for me.
June 29th, 2006 at 11:08 am
That’s what I was thinking the message was. Kill ‘em. Take no prisoners.
June 29th, 2006 at 11:58 am
I think you’re overreacting to the importance of this. The administration has to charge these people with a crime and bring them to trial. Is it the American way of justice to hold them forever without charges or a hearing? When you disagree with anyone it becomes a liberal conspiracy. The Justices, all of whom except 2 are our party’s appointees, interpret the Constitution and the laws. Congress specificly denied President Bush this power, so why blame the Supremes? The comments about simply killing them all really does us a disservice. These protections of persons arrested or detained is what sets us apart from the Islamic form of “justice.” Falcon, you state Justice Kennedy has to go. A judge should be evaluated on his whole record not on the ruling in one case. Kennedy is a Reagan appointee. However, I don’t want to rush to judgment either until I read the opinion. I thought they were wrong in Kelo and may be wrong in this case. I’ll need to analyze their review of the law before forming a definite opinion. I just think it’s wrong to overreact until we have all the facts–then let’s overreact like crazy
’cause I think most of these detainees really are terrorists. Obviously some were not because we released them. It just took an awfully long time to release them, which seems odd.
June 29th, 2006 at 12:12 pm
davidm - “Is it the American way of justice to hold them forever without charges or a hearing?”
Well, I dunno, davidm. Was it in the American way for Lincoln to suspend habeus corpus during the Civil War? How about FDR having miltary tribunals (and hangings) for German spys during WWII? How about shooting traitors and defectors during wartime? Those were all the American way.
This decision is nothing less than a judicial takeover of executive power. It doesn’t matter if Congress voted on this. Congress DOES NOT have the power to infinge on the president’s constitutional powers, either.
We may be overreacting a bit, david, but it’s because we’re MAD. This ruling stinks, buddy. That’s the bottom line.
June 29th, 2006 at 12:16 pm
david,
We’re just very disappointed. The congress will allow the military trials anyway, so this ruling, you’re right, doesn’t matter too terribly. What troubles us is the question of the geneva convention, and boldness of the liberal justices — yes, liberal; it doesn’t matter who appointed them, they are and have been for decades consistently liberal in their rulings — in thinking it applies to terrorists who might literally wipe themselves with the text of the geneva convention after doing a number two.
And for the record, I genuinely do not care if we hold people caught on the battlefield who ignore the rules of war until they die of old age, if that’s how long the war goes on. “The American Way”? I think the American way is putting the safety of the American people before the comfort of our enemies.
This court would have had a field day with Presidents we now consider our greatest, including Washington, Lincoln, and FDR. And that’s a fact.
June 29th, 2006 at 12:17 pm
Take a look at what Clarence Thomas thinks: Justice Clarence Thomas wrote a strongly worded dissent and took the unusual step of reading part of it from the bench _ something he had never done before in his 15 years. He said the court’s decision would “sorely hamper the president’s ability to confront and defeat a new and deadly enemy.”
The court’s willingness, Thomas wrote in the dissent, “to second-guess the determination of the political branches that these conspirators must be brought to justice is both unprecedented and dangerous.”
June 29th, 2006 at 12:26 pm
Falcon. Justice Thomas is correct.
let the Courts-Martials begin. They would have been better off under a tribunal (which would have had a Civilian Jurist as President of the Court) than to be judged by Military Officers and Senior NCO’s. If anyone expects them to get a better deal from our Officers who have been fighting them on the battlefield, they are mistaken.
And yes, the UCMJ does allow for the death penalty, which most of these terrorist will recieve.
June 29th, 2006 at 12:29 pm
David is simply bringing his legal expertise and calm to the discussion. My reaction to kill them - was over the top. However, the people released from GB have turned up on the battlefield in Iraq.
Hailey’s ‘Gates of Fire’ post discussed that somewhat - if you go to the link.
We release them and they go right back to killing us.
How many more protections are we going to lose because liberals feel more compelled to have concern for the killers rather than the intended victims?
June 29th, 2006 at 12:34 pm
Clarence Thomas may well go down in history as the least appreciated man of his times. He is brilliant, and I am ashamed of the way he is treated. I have two biographies of this great man, and am proud he sits on our High Court.
One of his greatest skills is listening. He almost never asks questions. When asked about this he said that if you wait you’ll hear the question you want answered, and if you’re sitting there formulating a question - you’re not listening - he’d rather listen than talk.
So for him to speak out on this issue is grave indeed.
June 29th, 2006 at 1:56 pm
The uniformed military is damned both ways. If we kill the terrorists on the battlefield in greater numbers than currently, we will have more “Haditha Investigations.” If we capture more terrorists, we will risk american lives to detain people that we can not interrogate per mccain and we have to put into a civilian court per stevens.
June 29th, 2006 at 2:57 pm
The commander at Gitmo says this ruling will have little effect on Gitmo itself, if anyone was wondering. (I did at first.)
I’m not certain what effect this ruling will have, because the guests at Gitmo will remain there. They just won’t go before a military tribunal. They’ll instead–maybe–go before a civilian court. Now, our liberal friends have twisted the word “torture” beyond recognition, but I would surmise, tongue-in-cheek, that that would be real torture!:mrgreen:
By the way, Fox News’ latest poll has Bush at 41%, joining Rasmussen which has had Bush back in the 40s for some time.
June 29th, 2006 at 3:45 pm
Yahoo has the whole opinion on-line now. I’ll read it and see how far the Supremes really went. President Bush will go back to Congress on the issue as of about an hour ago. I meant to suggest we look at why the SCOTUS ruled the way it did and see if the majority opinion is based upon a sound review of the law. I think a lot of SCOTUS opinions “stink”, but that’s our system. Is the opinion founded on a solid basis under the majority analysis? What laws were reviewed and what laws were ignored? Did the Court write the narrowest opinion possible (as they are supposed to do) or did they stray into dicta (discussion unnecessary for the conclusion reached)? No lower court is required to follow dicta. Are there separate concurring opinions? These are the types of things an atty/lower court has to analyze when reviewing a court opinion. I can’t jump to a conclusion based upon an AP story.
August 2nd, 2006 at 9:16 pm
jbhffg
gdfsgv fsdaf fafdsafas