Anyone who has read this blog knows that there are few Republican bloggers who were as critical of George Bush as me. I opposed Guantanamo, waterboarding, the Patriot Act, and the wholesale trashing of the Constitution. Obama offered Americans a 'change' from those policies...it's unfortunate that this 'change' is no better, and by many measures, is far worse.
The decision to try Mohammed - who masterminded the 9/11 attacks - in the civlilan court system raises some difficult questions:
1) If Mohammed's acts are merely "criminal" and not part of an Act of War by Al Qaeda, then why are we fighting in Afghanistan? Our incursion into Afghanistan was based on the notion that the US was under attack by a foreign entity, warranting a military response to defeat the attackers. If Mohammed was an upper level operative of the attack, then he should be tried in a military tribunal. If he is simply a 'criminal,' then Obama should withdraw us from Afghanistan immediately and proclaim the incursion an unwarranted mistake. Anything short of this is illogical and hypocritical.
2) The Federal court in New York will need to deal with the issue of the admissibility of evidence obtained during the 183 waterboarding sessions used with Mohammed. This is a no-win situation for the American public: if the Court rules the evidence in inadmissible, it endangers the possibility of a conviction. But if it rules that the evidence *is* admissible, it's even worse: it could establish the right of the State to use torture to obtain evidence in domestic criminal investigations, which will complete the evisceration of the Bill of Rights.
I wish I knew what Obama was thinking when this was announced....
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