I know he got a lot of time on the one count on which he was convicted, but IMHO the acquittals represent the failure of the policy of trying terrorists in civilian courts.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/11/17/ny.terror.trial/index.html?eref=rss_topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_topstories+%28RSS%3A+Top+Stories%29&v_t=client95_inbox
...that we can't hook up terrorist's testicles to car batteries and use what they scream out as evidence in a court room. Who knew the Founders were terrorist sympthizers when they wrote that pesky 5th amendment?
I think hearsay is different in a civilian trial but even in a military commission evidence gained from torture is not allowed.
Rule 304.
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/pdfs/Part%20III%20-%20MCREs%20(FINAL).pdf
-- Modified on 11/17/2010 9:50:25 PM
willy"Who knew the Founders were terrorist sympathizers when they wrote that pesky 5th amendment?"
If electricity had been invented it would have been used for interrogation, and ended many problems sooner.You are naive to believe the founding fathers wore panties around enemies.
You have my blessing to interrogate
terrorists to the best of your ability.
Jack Bauer 2016
"The founding fathers on that rock shared common characteristics. All four valued white supremacy and promoted the extirpation of Indian society. The United States' founding fathers were staunchly anti-Indian advocates in that at one time or another, all four provided for genocide against Indian peoples of this hemisphere.
George Washington...
In 1779, George Washington instructed Major General John Sullivan to attack Iroquois people. Washington stated, "lay waste all the settlements around...that the country may not be merely overrun, but destroyed". In the course of the carnage and annihilation of Indian people, Washington also instructed his general not "listen to any overture of peace before the total ruin of their settlements is effected". (Stannard, David E. AMERICAN HOLOCAUST. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992. pp. 118-121.)
In 1783, Washington's anti-Indian sentiments were apparent in his comparisons of Indians with wolves: "Both being beast of prey, tho' they differ in shape", he said. George Washington's policies of extermination were realized in his troops behaviors following a defeat. Troops would skin the bodies of Iroquois "from the hips downward to make boot tops or leggings". Indians who survived the attacks later re-named the nation's first president as "Town Destroyer". Approximately 28 of 30 Seneca towns had been destroyed within a five year period. (Ibid)
Thomas Jefferson...
In 1807, Thomas Jefferson instructed his War Department that, should any Indians resist against America stealing Indian lands, the Indian resistance must be met with "the hatchet". Jefferson continued, "And...if ever we are constrained to lift the hatchet against any tribe, " he wrote, "we will never lay it down till that tribe is exterminated, or is driven beyond the Mississippi." Jefferson, the slave owner, continued, "in war, they will kill some of us; we shall destroy all of them". (Ibid)
In 1812, Jefferson said that American was obliged to push the backward Indians "with the beasts of the forests into the Stony Mountains". One year later Jefferson continued anti-Indian statements by adding that America must "pursue [the Indians] to extermination, or drive them to new seats beyond our reach". (Ibid)
Abraham Lincoln...
In 1862, President Abraham Lincoln ordered the execution, by hanging, of 38 Dakota Sioux prisoners in Mankato, Minnesota. Most of those executed were holy men or political leaders of their camps. None of them were responsible for committing the crimes they were accused of. Coined as the Largest Mass Execution in U.S. History. (Brown, Dee. BURY MY HEART AT WOUNDED KNEE. New York: Holt, Rinehart, Winston, 1970. pp. 59-61)
Theodore Roosevelt...
The fourth face you see on that "Stony Mountain" is America's first twentieth century president, alleged American hero, and Nobel peace prize recipient, Theodore Roosevelt. This Indian fighter firmly grasped the notion of Manifest Destiny saying that America's extermination of the Indians and thefts our their lands "was ultimately beneficial as it was inevitable". Roosevelt once said, "I don't go so far as to think that the only good Indians are dead Indians, but I believe nine out of ten are, and I shouldn't like to inquire too closely into the case of the tenth". (Stannard, Op.Cit.)
The apathy displayed by these founding fathers symbolize the demoralization related to racial superiority. Scholars point toward this racial polarization as evidence of the existence of Eugenics.
Eugenics is a new term for an old phenomena which asserts that Indian people should be exterminated because they are an inferior race of people. Jefferson's suggestion to pursue the Indians to extermination fits well into the eugenistic vision. In David Stannard's study American Holocaust, he writes: "had these same words been enunciated by a German leader in 1939, and directed at European Jews, they would be engraved in modern memory. Since they were uttered by one of America's founding fathers, however...they conveniently have become lost to most historians in their insistent celebration of Jefferson's wisdom and humanity." Roosevelt feared that American upper classes were being replaced by the "unrestricted breeding" of inferior racial stocks, the "utterly shiftless", and the "worthless" (Ibid)"
http://www.greatdreams.com/lies.htm
-- Modified on 11/18/2010 9:17:38 AM
First, the Founders never thought of an exclusionary rule. If you believe that the constitution is a living, breathing document, maybe it should be re-evaluated in an era when a handful of guys with box cutters can kill 3,000 civiilians. Don't attribute something they never thought of to them and make a joke out of it. It shows shallow thinking.
Second, in the case of possible mass destruction, maybe a "uber-danger" exception to the exclusionary rule is called for. If 1,000 people may be killed, it might be different.
Third, I don't know what the torture was. Some of the "interrogation" involved things like slamming detainees into fake walls that were build so it would make a big sound without hurting them, but scaring them. I don't think any were tortured in the way McCain was. The use of one word to ocver a huge ragne of degree is troubling.
Fourth, you can always take the extreme and make the argument look dumb, such as hook up testicles to batteries and make them scream in court.
I can do the same to your argument going to the extreme. Here. Give him a apology and a million dollars and send him home with 100 pounds of dynamite. See we can both go to silly distortions of the other's view.
In this case, Judge Kaplan refused to allow the government to use its star witness, a man whose identity had only been revealed by Ghailani while he was being tortured in a secret CIA prison.
The torture was so bad that the government voluntarily declined to present statements by the Defendant that came close to a confession bc they knew this would open the door to how this guy was tortured and they did not want the jury to hear that.
Have you considered that maybe the problem is not with "trying terrorists in civilian courts" but with torturing terrorists while they are being unlawfully detained in secret CIA prisons?
If the identity of the "star witness" was obtained through torture, than obviously the torture was effective.
We can are the legality and morality of torture some other time, but by your own words, it does appear that torture has borne some fruit. lol
evidence, although once the worthwhile evidence is extracted the torturee will pretty much say anything.
My objection to torture is 1. it is illegal under US law; 2. it is is illegal under international law; and 3. it blurs the line between terrorist and victim when the victim turns aound and tortures the terrorist.
But no question you can get useful info this way.
the inmates in the yard know how to mete out justice a hell of a lot better than our legel system.