[Shadowman]

This may be old news to some:

U.S. Can Hold Citizens As Enemy Combatants
Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A29702-2003Jan8.html)

These links indicate that an enemy combatant is whatever the President or the gov says.

MSNBC (http://stacks.msnbc.com/news/842022.asp) Rense (http://www.rense.com/general26/risig.htm) HRW (http://www.hrw.org/press/2002/06/us0612.htm)


****
Am I right to assume that "creating a disturbance" at an airport
like the gentleman in Coffee, Tea, or Should We Feel Your Pregnant Wife’s Breasts Before Throwing You in a Cell at the Airport and Then Lying About Why We Put You There? (http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig3/monahan1.html)

or even having a sport utility rifle :what: could get a citizen labeled and detained as an enemy combatant?

[Art Eatman]

I guess the question is whether or not "Enemy Combatant" is properly or accurately defined in the legislation.

SFAIK the individual U.S. Citizen being held as such does indeed fit the dictionary definition of the term.

Art

[Shadowman]

I'm worried: the "checks and balances" of the three branches
has been eliminated.

-that this is an executive order (are legislation and executive order the same thing?) and will become arbitrary.

... in both those cases that the government has the authority to declare a citizen an enemy combatant and strip him of his constitutional rights. In Hamdi, the government has even refused to comply with court orders. Once the government simply declares someone is an enemy combatant, it says that U.S. courts have no jurisdiction."From this site (http://foi.missouri.edu/terrorandcivillib/ashcroftshould.html)

Just came across this http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A58308-2002Nov30&notFound=true

If there has been no declaration of war (by congress) then why have wartime powers been assumed?

[Art Eatman]

"...why have wartime powers been assumed?" On account of 3,000 dead at the WTC. On account of Congress voted to give the Prez authority to Do Something. As far as those held, they themselves held guns against U.S. troops.

I don't like a lot of the law which has been passed since 9/11. It is more effective against law-abiding citizens than against Al Quaida, but Congressfolks far more concerned about their own safety than yours or mine and we're stuck with that fact.

That said, we are dealing with people who will kill us merely because we exist and are not Islamic. We are bossed by folks who can call armed men down upon us, and who are nervous as long-tailed cats in a roomful of rocking chairs. Ergo, to wit and therefore, it behooves one to be judicious as to how one tries to change things back to some semblance of "old freedoms". Judicious isn't the same as silent or as accepting...

Art

[Blackhawk]

The shiny side goes to the outside, Shadowman. You must have made your tin foil hat wrong side out. :D

Just because somebody's an American, they don't have the right to take up arms against her.

[jmbg29]

US Citizens held as enemy combatants And if they are found guilty, I have dibs on shooting the :cuss: ers!

If they hadn't :cuss: ed up 20 years too late, they never would have been "held". I would have dropped them in their tracks. Too bad the Navy won't take a guy back once he gets a little old n' fat.:uhoh: :(

[Marko Kloos]

This troubles me greatly.

What you are saying, and what the majority of people in this country seem to be in agreement with, is the following:

The United States government, which most of you don't trust to make any competent decision regarding your lives, can have any citizen jailed indefinitely without the benefit of a lawyer and a jury trial. All they have to do is to declare them an "enemy combatant". The definition of "enemy combatant" is completely up to the government, but as soon as they declare someone to be an Enemy Combatant, they are completely removed from the judicial system, and no court in the country can do anything about it.

And this has you nodding in agreement?

This country is truly marching lock-step towards a police state, when Conservatives and Liberals take turns setting fire to the Bill of Rights. The only difference between the Left and the Right is which part of the parchment they light first.

Amendment V

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

And here I thought the language of the BoR was pretty straight-forward. Did I hear somebody complain about the Liberals trying to "re-interpret" the Second Amendment?

[El Tejon]

I understand the reasoning of the 4th Circuit, however anything that can be abused, will be abused.:(

[1goodshot]

If your shooting at or trying to kill Americans then you should be locked up forever

[Shadowman]

I think lendringser eloquently expressed the relevant points
and el tejon summed up the concern.

When I read the following I thought it sounded like something from Cuba or North Korea.

the administration could order a clandestine search of a citizen's home and, based on the information gathered, secretly declare the citizen an enemy combatant, to be held indefinitely at a military base. Courts would have very limited authority to second- guess the detention, to the extent that they were aware of it.

[Delmar]

Never thought I'd see the day when I would quote Barry Goldwater, but, "a government strong enough to give you everything you want is strong enough to take it all away" certainly applies.

[TheeBadOne]

Here's what I got out of it. During times of war the US didn't/doesn't return POW's because it didn't/doesn't make sense to send your enemy back where he could continue to fight against you.

Not asking right/wrong/indifferent. Just asking if this is pretty much what was said. It's what I got out of it.

[Delmar]

What I get out of it is the Constitution is apparently conditional, not a guarantee

[Art Eatman]

Kinda hard to be labelled an Enemy Combatant unless you're combatting, ain't it?

Kinda hard for me to see how I'd acquire the label for wandering along while minding my own bidness or writing bitch-letters to Congressfolks or editors.

The folks who've been so labelled apparently were inded involved in hostile activities, right? They didn't have a history of sitting home and watching reruns of The Waltons.

Art

[TearsOfRage]

Because of course we all know that no one has ever been falsely accused of anything in this great country, right?

[Marko Kloos]

Kinda hard to be labelled an Enemy Combatant unless you're combatting, ain't it?

That's exactly the point: there is no definition for "enemy combatant" in the law, other than "the government says so". This makes the label intentionally vague and sets legal pathway for all kinds of abuses. (Remember the RICO laws, or the way the Feds have managed to stretch the "interstate Commerce" clause?)

Jose Padilla was not "combatting", unless you use a torturous definition of the word "combat". He was arrested on U.S. soil, not wielding an AK in Afghanistan.

[Ian]

Fine. So everyone so far declared an "enemy combatant" has been guilty. Does anybody really think it'll stay that way?

SSNs originally were never going to used for identification.
The FCC was originally around only to prevent German saboteurs.
The original maximum income tax bracket was 7%.

Mission creep is an absolute fact of government. If we leave this power in government hands, it's guaranteed that sooner or later we'll be permanently imprisoning large numbers of people either innocent or guilty of only minor crimes.

[TallPine]

If your shooting at or trying to kill Americans then you should be locked up forever

And how does this relate to "molon labe" ...? I guess those farmers at Concord Bridge were "enemy combatants" from the British point of view.


Some possible definitions of "enemy combatant" ...

1) anyone who doesn't turn in their guns voluntarily

2) anyone who disagrees with the government

3) anyone else have any suggestions ...?

If this is a "slippery slope" why do I feel like we are dropping off of a cliff ?

[El Tejon]

TallPine, taxes, of course! Citizen, only Enemies of the State do not pay their taxes on time. There's no hope for El Tejon.:(

[DeltaElite]

Scary stuff. Bush is running amuck again......:fire:

[pax]

Lendringser's post was so accurate that there's really nothing to add to it. Go back and read it again.

pax

[Khornet]

a definition of enemy combatant in any other war in which we took prisoners?

In WWII a man could be locked up for being captured while driving a Wehrmacht garbage truck, tho not a combatant....just part of the enemy's apparatus.

In those days they wore uniforms and marched funny. Today's enemy doesnt wear uniforms but is just as deadly serious. He may be a klutz who tries to use explosive sneakers, or he may be (as Hamdi was) carrying a rifle in the field against US forces. Same-same, all part of the Jihadi apparatus. Enemy combatants. Lock 'em up.

No doubt about it, gov't loves to overstep. But I think you folks are hyperventilating a bit. We still live in a legal system which goes so far to protect the rights of the accused that this week (I'm not making this up) a judge ruled that Miranda rights have to be read to EACH ONE of a psychotic's multiple personalities.

I think there are other things more worth worrying about.

[G-Raptor]

As I understand the ruling:

A US citizen who is captured overseas while engaging in combat against US forces or aiding the enemy can be held as an enemy combatant. I agree with this ruling. IMO, such a person forfeits any constitutional protection.

However, the court did not address the Padilla case where a US citizen (accused of aiding the enemy) is arrested in the US. That case has yet to be heard. IMO, such a person MUST have constitutional protection until evidence is presented in court that he/she has forfeited that protection.

[bastiat]

The big problem:

The government can label and hold you as an 'enemy combatant' until you can prove otherwise.

To prove otherwise, you just need the help of your lawyer, who you can't talk to, because you've been labeled an 'enemy combatant'.

The very definition of a catch-22.

I admire their ultimate goal (protecting the country), but despise their methods.

Reverse the situation:

"President Hillary Clinton and Vice President Feinstein today released their latest list of 'enemy combatants' to be held indefinately without access to their lawyers..."

Does the thought of that give you a warm, fuzzy feeling of security?

[Art Eatman]

bastiat, I said at the time of the "Patriot Act" that while the Bushies most likely wouldn't abuse such bad law, I fear for the nation if Clintonesque types return to power. The "Homeland Insecurity" stuff is merely more of the same.

In other words, even moreso than the WOD, we are getting farther away from the Constitution and a "Government of Law" and are headed straight to a "Government of Men".

That said, "combatant" has a specific meaning. If the meaning becomes modified, twisted, it would merely be in line with the evil possibilities inherent in the laws mentioned above...

Art

[bastiat]

They've already tried to declare padilla, who wasn't really engaged in taking up arms, in a military sense, an enemy combatant.

If you're a US citizen, and the US is holding you in the US on charges, you should have a right to see your attorney so they can dispute the charges with your help. It doesn't matter what the charges are, you still have a right to defend yourself in an attempt gain your freedom via the courts.

[jmbg29]

U.S. citizens overseas who take up arms against their country can be held as enemy combatants without the constitutional rights afforded other Americans, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday.Vs. US Citizens held as enemy combatants Note the difference?

The first one is the actual synopsis of the ruling. The second one is intentionally misleading. Huh, fancy that. The blame America first types being misleading. Go figure.

This ruling has nothing to do with Padilla or any of the other BS being brought up on this board.

This just in...

Take up arms against this country while in a foreign COUNTRY!!!! And you will be LUCKY TO BE HELD ALIVE!!!!!

Any questions? :fire: :fire: :fire: :banghead:

[Khornet]

CITIZEN OR ENEMY?

By all accounts, both from the Left and the Right, the latest ruling from the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond is the beginning of the end of all our civil rights.

The court ruled in the case of one Yaser Hamdi, a U.S. citizen who was captured in the field in Afghanistan fighting with Taliban forces against the United States. Mr. Hamdi has since been held as a prisoner of war, which means he doesn't have a right to the various legal protections afforded by the Constitution to citizens arrested by domestic police forces. The Chicken Littles are up in arms because the Bush administration claims the right to treat enemy combatants as......... enemy combatants.

Specifically, the ruling affirmed the government's authority to detain American citizens captured in battle against us, or who are implicated in terror attacks against U.S. citizens or interests. The ruling very pointedly left the matter of American citizens arrested in this country unaddressed, thereby conferring no authority to arrest and detain you and me in violation of the Constitution. This point appears not to have penetrated a number of heads before the panic button was pushed. Perhaps the weirdest claim has been that the ruling gives the Bush administration the power to define anyone as an enemy combatant, raising the specter of blue-haired grandmothers tossed into prison camps for bad-mouthing the administration.

But really, this is so much hyperventilation. Far from extending vast unconstitutional power to the government, the Court did no more than state the obvious. Better said, the Court reaffirmed what has always been. What has actually been happening is not a steady expansion of government authority over private citizens, but rather a constant push to extend citizenship rights to enemy prisoners of war.

It's never been difficult to know who is an enemy combatant, and it has been so simple all along that it has never crossed anyone's mind that we needed a law to affirm it. It's as if we required a law to define what the color blue is, or what is day and what constitutes night. You leave your country, go to another, join their army, pick up a rifle, and march into battle against us, and you're an enemy combatant. It should be obvious, but in this day and age it's not. For we live in a time when lawyers and judges build careers on the most outrageous violations of common sense. The complaints of inhumane treatment of the prisoners in Guantanamo Bay are a case in point. The case of Mr. Hamdi is another.

What's appalling about the ruling is not what powers it vouchsafed to the government; it's that any ruling was necessary at all. For decades our legal system has expanded the concept of rights to the point where they no longer have any meaning other than what some activist judge chooses. In a country where (and I'm not making this up) a judge can rule that each one of a schizophrenic suspect's multiple personalities has individual Miranda rights, it has actually become necessary to codify that the government has authority to do what the Constitution requires of it.

In the eternal push-and-shove of government power vs. citizens' rights, it's always appropriate to be wary of the natural tendency of government to overreach. But every action produces an equal and opposite reaction. If the Bush administration has given the criminals' rights people a mighty shove, it was only pushing back. John Ashcroft is only necessary because of left-liberal groups like the ones who filed Amicus briefs on behalf of Mr. Hamdi. The roster of their names occupies the first seven full pages of the opinion, and reads like the guest list at a DNC fundraiser.

If these people don't want the government to treat citizens as prisoners of war, they might start by dropping their demands that prisoners of war be treated as citizens.



Michael R. Bowen M.D.

[Ian]

Having found a copy of Volume III of The Gulag Archipelago at the local library, I have learned that Soviet citizens attempting to escape from labor camp were prosecuted as "Economic Saboteurs." Look at what this government has imposed on me (and you) and tell me why I shouldn't expect it to sooner or later act like Stalin, and prosecute tax evaders, "assault weapon" owners, pot smokers, or people with expired license plates as "enemy combatants."

Sorry if I'm ranting. I just discovered that the IRS is going to tax the lousy $50 of interest my bank account earned me, and I'm really pissed.

[Delmar]

Khornet,
There are some of us who worry about the unsaid-and just where does it stop? I have no problems about this Hamdi fella or Padilla, who both can be fairly said to be caught red handed.
But.....
Not many people had a problem with the RICO law, except for people on vacation or a legitimate business trip who were pulled over and had their money seized, having to go to court and file motions to get their own property back. An "overreach" as you put it, is a nice way of describing a thieving, stinking bag of pond scum in government clothing.
Sure, there were instances where the LEO might have looked at something which would look suspect, but there is documented abuse in some parts of our country and it repeats.
Our judicial system looks whacked to me at times too, which is why I do my best to end up on a jury every single time I'm called simply because I see it as my duty instead of a bother. I suspect others here do the same and maybe you do too. If so, good on ya!
I don't think our court system is so fragile that we cannot take care of our own, and the problems are not so bad that a good dose of common sense won't cure the abuse.
It should never be looked upon only as those we vote in and call it a day. This Republic is a participatory thing.

[Khornet]

I think we agree more than you suspect. But gov't encroachment is everywhere, and you've gotta pick your battles. I think this ruling is the wrong one.

[2dogs]

The United States government, which most of you don't trust to make any competent decision regarding your lives, can have any citizen jailed indefinitely without the benefit of a lawyer and a jury trial. All they have to do is to declare them an "enemy combatant". The definition of "enemy combatant" is completely up to the government, but as soon as they declare someone to be an Enemy Combatant, they are completely removed from the judicial system, and no court in the country can do anything about it.

lendsringser

See my post "No Lawyers in Foxholes"- NY Post OpEd addresses this.:)

[bastiat]

There are two different circumstances at work here:

If they are actively involved overseas taking up arms against the US, toast 'em for all I care. That's what combat is - you're not their to arrest them, you're there to defeat them.

However, if you safely have them in custody, especially in a case like padilla's, where he's already incarcerated, then you should give him the benefit of a lawyer and a trial. That's what due process is all about.

[Waitone]

While I don't get fuzzy feelings with the imprecise term 'enemy combatant," I do get a flat-out case of industrial grade heartburn at the thought of fighting a WAR in the courts.

Islamofascist terrorists, terror states, and the Chinese are fighting a WAR against the US via asymetrical means. They intend to use tactics against us against which we have no defense (as they perceive it). For example, OBL's attack on WTC was an Arab's attack on our financial system, something that doesn't exist in exact duplicate in the Arab world.

Congress could be helpful (yea, why start now) in defining enemy combatants. Problem is that debate would rip a scab off the whole fiasco of illegal immigration.

I am as concerned over the assault on our constitutional rights as anyone on this board. Problem is the attack has been underway for decades. Only recently has it gotten visible and gained speed.

Holding US citizens w/o charges and trial, etc is really bad mojo, but at the same time I was not aware the Constitution and Bill or Rights was a suicide pact.

Interesting times are ahead.