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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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 Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 2:05 am Post subject: (Counterpunch Says ) "Free Jose Padilla" |
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May 23, 2005
A Victim of Government Demagoguery and Public Hysteria
Free Jose Padilla
By MIKE WHITNEY
May 8 marked the third anniversary of the imprisonment of Jose Padilla. Padilla was apprehended at Chicago's O'Hare Airport in 2002 by Federal officers under the shaky "material witness" provision and trundled off to prison. In a conspicuous effort to poison public opinion, Attorney General John Ashcroft announced on national TV that Padilla was conspiring to set off a "dirty bomb" (radioactive device) within the United Sates. To date, the government has never produced any evidence to corroborate their spurious claims. In all probability, Padilla may be entirely blameless.
Jose Padilla represents the crowning achievement in the war on terror. As the situation in Haiti and Afghanistan steadily deteriorates, and as America's 8 divisions continue to bog-down in the Iraqi quagmire; the administration's one unassailable accomplishment is the death-blow it has delivered to the Bill of Rights. Padilla now faces his 4th year of captivity without any formal charges filed against him and without any reasonable expectation of defending himself in a court of law.
Happy anniversary, Jose.
The government defends its detention of Padilla on the grounds that he is an "enemy combatant". The term "enemy combatant" means "presumed guilty" and its application to US citizens or foreign nationals allows the state to operate outside the confines of international human rights law and the Bill of Rights. Simply put, it is the end of the rule of law in America and a rejection of a legal tradition that dates back 800 years. Most likely, the phrase originated in a right-wing think-tank as a way of dealing with potential enemies of the state while ignoring the law. In fact, it has no legal meaning, but its use assumes that the president has the authority to conduct the war on terror however he sees fit; using "all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided terrorist attacks"or, in order, to "prevent future acts of international terrorism." (Congress; Joint Resolution Sept 18, 2001) The Bush administration believes that this empowers the president to strip citizens of their constitutional rights and detain them without charges. So far, the courts have failed to stop this disturbing overreach of executive power.
When Padilla's case appeared before the US District Court, Judge Henry Floyd disputed the administration's defense of the "enemy combatant" label saying, "If the law in its current state is found by the president to be insufficient to protect this country from terrorist plots, such as the one alleged here, then the president should prevail upon Congress to remedy the problem."
Indeed, it's not the purview of the president to invent laws as he goes along, but to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States".
The moniker "enemy combatant" creates the greatest constitutional crisis the nation has ever faced. It undermines the principle of "inalienable rights" by allowing the president to pick and choose who is entitled to the benefits of citizenship. More importantly, it presumes that suspects have no right to challenge the terms of their detention through access to the legal system. The media breezily refers to the plight of enemy combatants as "legal limbo. It is not limbo; it is despotism.
In Justice John Paul Stevens scathing dissent (to the Supreme Court's refusal to hear the Padilla case) Stevens articulates the gravity of Padilla vs. Rumsfeld. He said the Padilla case poses "a unique and unprecedented threat to the freedom of every American citizenAt stake is nothing less than the essence of a free societyFor if this nation is to remain true to the ideals symbolized by its flag, it must not wield the tools of tyrants even to resist an assault by the forces of tyranny."
Stevens is not exaggerating; the threat posed by placing our freedom in the hands of the president is incalculable. The Supreme Court's refusal to hear Padilla's case demonstrates its tacit support for the unlimited power of the president and its unwillingness to address whether Padilla is entitled to any protection under the Constitution. Their rejection condemns Padilla to indefinite detention and shows the world that they are incapable of meeting the requirements of their profession.
The Supreme Court is meaningless if it stubbornly refuses to clarify even the most fundamental points concerning constitutional protections and personal liberty. (The court would not even rule on Padilla's habeas corpus petition, that is, whether he can be kept in jail without being charged with a crime)
In his brilliant article "The Supreme Court and Enemy Combatants", Marc Norton notes a critical opinion written by Judges Rehnquist, Kennedy and O' Connor. (joined by Breyer) Norton says, "The key finding by this gang of four is to uphold the concept of enemy combatants, for citizens and non-citizens alike. There is no bar to this Nation's holding one of its own citizens as an enemy combatant,' they boldly declare."
No bar to holding a citizen as an enemy combatant? What is the Bill of Rights if it is not a bar to the arbitrary power of the state??? The court's finding is a clear vindication of Bush's power-grab and the court's culpability.
Readers should carefully consider Norton's quote and judge for themselves whether it is consistent with any reasonable interpretation of the Bill of Rights. If the Court majority is willing to overturn the inalienable rights of its citizens and confer absolute power on the executive, the task before us is to remove the erring jurists on the court.
When Justice O' Connor issued her blistering statement that, "A state of war is not a blank check for the President"; it was slapped on the front page of every newspaper across the nation. Unfortunately, there's not a word of truth in O' Connor's declaration. The high court cleared the way for Bush to summarily disregard the due process rights of citizens according to his own discretion. By endorsing (in principle) the enemy combatant label, the court removed the guarantees of a speedy trial, the right to confront ones accusers, the right to produce witnesses for one's defense, the right to an attorney, the right to challenge the terms of one's incarceration, and the right to an impartial jury of one's peers. All of these protections are inserted into the Bill of Rights for one reason alone; to establish the procedures that make it impossible for the government to do what Bush has done to Padilla. The provisions (in the Bill of Rights) are expressed in clear, unambiguous language so the state cannot rob citizens of their freedom without just cause and hard evidence "nor be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law." (5th amendment)
"without due process of law!"
Padilla is almost certainly innocent; a random victim of government-demagoguery and public hysteria. Even if the allegations were true, it wouldn't make a bit of difference. The terms of his imprisonment have never been justifiable and he should be released without delay. His continued incarceration (in a 5' by 7' windowless cell in Norfolk, VA.) is an affront to a nation that claims to be committed to human rights, civil liberties and the rule of law.
The Bush administration has no interest in Jose Padilla, a hapless gang-banger caught up in the 9-11, anti-terror dragnet. It's the precedent that's paramount; the go-ahead to toss citizens in jail at the whim of the president and to dispose of enemies without recourse to the law.
The path to tyranny is paved with the language of tyranny. The intrusion of "enemy combatant" into our jurisprudence obliterates the ideals of constitutional protections and inalienable rights. Jose Padilla is just a minor player in this much grander scheme.
We value the law because it protects the very least among us by putting a wall between ourselves and the long-arm of the government. Bush's actions have removed that wall and put every one of us within the grasp of the all-powerful state.
Free Jose Padilla!
Mike Whitney lives in Washington state. He can be reached at: [email protected]
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Counterpunch supports the enemy.
Last edited by Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee on Fri Aug 17, 2007 4:44 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Hater Depot
Joined: 29 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 3:08 am Post subject: |
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| Did holding him for 3.5 years without charges violate the right to a speedy trial? Did the mindbreaking conditions of his confinement violate the right to freedom from cruel and unusual punishment? |
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yawarakaijin
Joined: 08 Aug 2006
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 3:41 am Post subject: |
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You are a f@cking joke. F@ck the constitution, there be ''enemy combatants" out there.  Where the hell did you read anything in that article even remotely allowing an educated individual to come to the conclusion that this publication suppourts Al Qaeda.
F@cking wankers like you who spout that whole "you suppourt the enemy if you don't like the way our government is handling things" are more of a threat than Al Qaeda. Sure they might be able to sneak in another terrorist attack but the only way they will EVER acheive victory is if we hand it to them. You must look like total pussies to Brits, Israelis, Indians and any other country who had/has to deal with terrorism on a daily basis.
I swear to god Osama bin Laden couldn't give two shits about establishing a caliphate or destroying the great satan. He's probably sitting in some dark cave having a beer, watching some porn, then occasionally checking out CNN to see how much real damage scared, pathetic, hatemongering, politically oppurtunistic "americans" are damaging their own country.
The America I know and respect would have found the f@ck responsible, blown his head off or have him in jail (how's that coming by the way?) and called it a days work. Instead, you have duct taped windows, "homeland security", an illegal invasion, billions and billions of wasted dollars, some 3,800 dead american soldiers and who knows how many innocent iraqi women and children. Not the America I grew up respecting. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 4:29 am Post subject: |
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Fact:
counterpunch supports the insurgents .
It was the opinion of the Clinton adminstration that Bin Laden could not be convicted in a US court so he was allowed to go to Afghanistan.
Would be better off today if the US had not worried about Bin Ladens' rights?
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I swear to god Osama bin Laden couldn't give two *beep* about establishing a caliphate or destroying the great satan. He's probably sitting in some dark cave having a beer, watching some porn, then occasionally checking out CNN to see how much real damage scared, pathetic, hatemongering, politically oppurtunistic "americans" are damaging their own country. |
counterpunch is a hate mongering publication.
Of course you think Osama thinks that way then again you are clueless.
[quote]
the invasion was not illegal cause Saddam never gave up his war.
How many Iraqi and other women and Children were saved by getting rid of Saddam?
Counterpunch supporters hate the US. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 4:37 am Post subject: |
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January 21, 2005
The Right to Resist Occupation
The Anti-War Movement and the Iraqi Resistance
By SHARON SMITH
The Iraqi resistance to U.S. occupation is growing, as is its support among ordinary Iraqis. Iraq's interim government recently admitted that the insurgency involves at least 40,000 "hardcore fighters" and up to 200,000 active sympathizers--a far cry from the isolated 5,000 "Baathist remnants" and "foreign fighters" the Pentagon initially claimed to be fighting.
A USA Today/Gallup poll conducted in March concluded, "The insurgents...seem to be gaining broad acceptance, if not outright support. If the [pro-U.S.] Kurds, who make up about 13 percent of the poll, are taken out of the equation, more than half of Iraqis say killing U.S. troops can be justified in at least some cases."
That was shortly before the first siege on Falluja, in which U.S. forces killed over 600 civilians before the armed resistance drove them out. Support for the resistance can only have grown now that U.S. bombs have flattened Falluja, killing hundreds more civilians and driving 200,000 residents to live in the squalor of refugee camps--while dispersing the resistance fighters to other localities.
In mid-December, for example, Knight Ridder reported on a 41-year-old Iraqi woman, Kifah Khudhair, injured in a car bombing in Baghdad--whose rage was directed not at the car bombers, but at the Americans. "What can we do?" her son said. "These things happen every day, like looting and murder. I am angry at the Americans because it is all their fault. This is all because of them."
* * *
IRAQIS SUPPORT the resistance against the U.S. occupation of their country for one simple reason: they want the Americans to get out--now.
Yet many in the U.S. antiwar movement have had difficulty accepting this black-and-white reasoning, preferring to see the world in shades of gray. "[Iraqi] jihadis or America's terror-using hypocrites? If we are truly to stop the terrorists, the world must take sides against both," wrote New Left veteran Steve Weissman recently on Truthout.
This argument by Weissman is faulty on two counts.
First, Weissman equates the 500-pound bombs and high-tech weapons used by the world's biggest superpower occupying Iraq (at the cost of $7.8 billion per month) to the rocket-propelled grenades and roadside bombs of those resisting that occupation. One side aims to control Iraq to fulfill its grand plan to dominate the Middle East and its oil. The other merely seeks the right for Iraqis to determine their own future.
Some 100,000 Iraqi civilians are now estimated dead because of the war and occupation. This followed the roughly 1 million Iraqis killed from the deprivation caused by more than a decade of economic sanctions. And this followed a death toll of up to 200,000 in the 1991 Gulf War. Choosing sides should not be so difficult.
Without for a moment endorsing the tactic of targeting civilians, which is used by parts of the resistance, the sheer magnitude of the death and destruction inflicted by the U.S. upon ordinary Iraqis should dispel any myth that the two sides in this war deserve equal condemnation.
Moreover, Weissman accepts at face value the Bush administration's absurd characterization of the insurgency as dominated by "terrorists" and Islamic "extremists."
On December 15, the Boston Globe published a report by Molly Bingham, who lived from August 2003 until June 2004 in Baghdad researching the resistance. She observed, "The composition of the Iraqi resistance is not what the U.S. administration has been calling it, and the more it is oversimplified, the harder it is to explain its complexity. I met Shia and Sunnis fighting together, women and men, young and old. I met people from all economic, social and educational backgrounds."
She continued: "The original impetus for almost all of the individuals I spoke to was a nationalistic one--the desire to defend their country from occupation, not to defend Saddam Hussein or his regime." Bingham's conclusion should help focus the aims of every antiwar activist in the U.S.: "The resistance will continue until American influence has disappeared from Iraq's political system."
* * *
SUPPORT FOR the right of Iraqis to resist occupation must extend beyond an abstract principle for the U.S. antiwar movement.
While recognizing "the right of the Iraqi people to resist as a point of principle," Phyllis Bennis of the Institute for Policy Studies--in widely circulated notes for a speech to the steering committee of United for Peace and Justice (UFPJ) on December 18--argued, "We should not call for 'supporting the resistance' because we don't know who most of them are and what they really stand for, and because of those we do know, we mostly don't support their social program beyond opposition to the occupation."
To be meaningful, however, supporting the "right to resist" must include support for that resistance once it actually emerges.
Award-winning Indian writer and global justice activist Arundhati Roy got to the heart of the issue in a San Francisco speech on August 16: "It is absurd to condemn the resistance to the U.S. occupation in Iraq, as being masterminded by terrorists," she said. "After all, if the United States were invaded and occupied, would everybody who fought to liberate it be a terrorist?"
If we are waiting for the "ideologically pure" movement--assuming the unlikely scenario that all those opposed to the war could agree on one--we could be waiting forever.
As Roy explained, "Like most resistance movements, [the Iraqis] combine a motley range of assorted factions. Former Baathists, liberals, Islamists, fed-up collaborationists, communists, etc. Of course, it is riddled with opportunism, local rivalry, demagoguery and criminality. But if we were to only support pristine movements, then no resistance will be worthy of our purity.
"Before we prescribe how a pristine Iraqi resistance must conduct their secular, feminist, democratic, nonviolent battle, we should shore up our end of the resistance by forcing the U.S. and its allied governments to withdraw from Iraq."
Focus on the Global South's Walden Bello made a similar point in June. "What western progressives forget is that national liberation movements are not asking them mainly for ideological or political support," he wrote. "What they really want from the outside is international pressure for the withdrawal of an illegitimate occupying power so that internal forces can have the space to forge a truly national government based on their unique processes. Until they give up this dream of having an ideal liberation movement tailored to their values and discourse, U.S. peace activists will, like the Democrats they often criticize, continue to be trapped within a paradigm of imposing terms for other people."
* * *
THE U.S. antiwar movement should heed this advice and expend less energy in judging the character of the Iraqi resistance and more effort on building a visible resistance to the Iraq occupation from inside the U.S.
When the U.S. invaded Falluja and the Abu Ghraib torture scandal broke in the spring of 2004, the U.S. antiwar movement--already ensconced in its misguided effort to elect prowar John Kerry--declined to mount a visible response to these and other atrocities committed by the U.S. in Iraq, effectively sparing the Bush administration from the need to account for its war crimes.
The main challenge for antiwar activists in the United States is to rebuild a visible, national antiwar movement. That means opposing the January 30 election--held under martial law, which will effectively exclude 50 percent of the population--and supporting the resistance that exposes its utter hypocrisy.
Is this strategy too ambitious--too far to the left for "mainstream" America? That is unlikely, since a majority of Americans continue to oppose the war.
U.S. troops are also divided, and we need to actively support those troops who--at great personal risk--are resisting. The latest is U.S. Army Sgt. Kevin Benderman, who refused to redeploy to Iraq earlier this month after serving there from March to September 2003.
"The people that we are fighting now are for the most part people like you and me, people who are defending themselves against a superior military force and fighting to keep that which is rightfully theirs," Benderman said. He added that the Iraqi people have the right to choose their own form of government, "just like we did in America after the revolution."
The antiwar movement must not lose sight of the fact that its main enemy is at home--and any resistance to that enemy deserves our unconditional support.
Sharon Smith writes for the Socialist Worker.
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Counterpunch supports the enemy. |
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thepeel
Joined: 08 Aug 2004
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 4:45 am Post subject: |
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Counterpunch is vile. Disgusting leftist tripe far too often originates from there.
JP is likely not guilty of the charges. In addition, he was detained for too long and likely not treated as well as he should have been. I think he is just too dumb to be dangerous, even if he wanted to (maybe why he converted?). |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 4:48 am Post subject: |
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Padilla guilty on all counts in terror case
The verdict is a boost for the administration and may encourage prosecution of other enemy combatants.
By Richard A. Serrano
August 17, 2007
A federal jury in Miami on Thursday convicted Jose Padilla on charges of aiding terrorist operations abroad, a verdict that follows a long legal battle that pitted the Bush administration against civil liberties groups over how terrorism suspects are detained and should be prosecuted.
Padilla, a U.S. citizen arrested with fanfare in 2002 on charges that he planned to set off a radioactive "dirty bomb" in this country, was never tried on those charges. Instead, his case was combined with that of two other defendants accused of, among other things, conspiracy to murder, kidnap and maim people abroad and providing material support for terrorism.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-padilla17.1aug17,1,5567340.story?coll=la-headlines-nation |
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arjuna
Joined: 31 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 8:43 am Post subject: |
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The Iraqi "insurgents" are fighting the invaders and occupiers of their homeland. Why should any sane person not support them?
Counterpunch is lame. They speak only convenient truths. |
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JMO
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Location: Daegu
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 8:52 am Post subject: |
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If you are ok with your government holding people without trial and without charge, then you are insane.
There is a war on is not a good excuse for taking away peoples rights. |
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Hater Depot
Joined: 29 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 4:45 pm Post subject: |
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| The Iraqi "insurgents" are fighting the invaders and occupiers of their homeland. |
They're also destroying thier country and engaging in ethnic cleansing. Some defense.
Not to mention that a great many of them are actually foreigners from Iran and Saudi Arabia. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 10:01 pm Post subject: |
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| arjuna wrote: |
The Iraqi "insurgents" are fighting the invaders and occupiers of their homeland. Why should any sane person not support them?
Counterpunch is lame. They speak only convenient truths. |
No they are fighting to conquer Iraq that is why the Kurds 20% of Iraq and the Shias 60% hate them.
You are ignorant about the demographics and morally bankrupt. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 10:03 pm Post subject: |
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| JMO wrote: |
If you are ok with your government holding people without trial and without charge, then you are insane.
There is a war on is not a good excuse for taking away peoples rights. |
Depends on who they are.
It was the opinon of the Clinton administration that Bin Laden could not be convicted in a US court. So he was allowed to go to Afghanistan from the Sudan.
Would the US be better off or worse off today if the US had taken away Bin Laden's rights? |
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JMO
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Location: Daegu
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 10:08 pm Post subject: |
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| Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee wrote: |
| JMO wrote: |
If you are ok with your government holding people without trial and without charge, then you are insane.
There is a war on is not a good excuse for taking away peoples rights. |
Depends on who they are.
It was the opinon of the Clinton administration that Bin Laden could not be convicted in a US court. So he was allowed to go to Afghanistan from the Sudan.
Would the US be better off or worse off today if the US had taken away Bin Laden's rights? |
You cannot pick and choose. Give the government(any government) the right to hold anybody without trial or charge and they will abuse it. If you do not have a charge you shouldn't be able to hold them, no matter who they are. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 10:14 pm Post subject: |
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You cannot pick and choose. Give the government(any government) the right to hold anybody without trial or charge and they will abuse it. If you do not have a charge you shouldn't be able to hold them, no matter who they are. |
and so 9-11 happened.
and also Khomeni came to power in Iran. Would the US not be better off today if the US had kidnapped or ( killed him) before he came to power and thrown him in secret prison somewhere ? |
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JMO
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Location: Daegu
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| Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 10:20 pm Post subject: |
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| Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee wrote: |
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You cannot pick and choose. Give the government(any government) the right to hold anybody without trial or charge and they will abuse it. If you do not have a charge you shouldn't be able to hold them, no matter who they are. |
and so 9-11 happened.
and also Khomeni came to power in Iran. Would the US not be better off today if the US had kidnapped or ( killed him) before he came to power and thrown him in secret prison somewhere ? |
Bad argument. Firstly you cannot prove that a major terrorist assault or even 9-11 itself wouldn't have happened with Bin Laden imprisoned.
Secondly you do not have a time machine. If you do not have the proof to lock someone up at the time you should not be allowed to.
Thirdly you are not addressing the innocent people who are locked up(and tortured) in these secret prisons. You cannot take away peoples rights on mere suspicion. Make a charge or let them go. |
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