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Senate okay with indefinite detention of U.S. citizens
By Marty BeckermanDecember 2nd, 2011, 12:00 amComments (29)
As all maybe a few American schoolchildren know, the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution states: "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury ... and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence." Unfortunately, our founding fathers were too lazy, stupid and shortsighted to add "unless the accused is a terrorist, a dirty terrorist!" to the Bill of Rights.
The Senate has just corrected this grievous mistake on the part of James Madison and Co., because modern politicians — faced with modern problems, such as not wanting to provide their opponents with fuel for negative campaign ads — are much wiser than the dead revolutionaries who established our way of life. By a 55 to 45 vote, legislators refused to block the military from indefinitely detaining U.S. citizens suspected of joining a terrorist organization, including those apprehended on domestic soil. (In related news, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg just wondered if he can designate Occupy Wall Street protestors as bloodthirsty jihadists. Ha! Ha! How could this possibly be abused?)
In the patriotic words of Sen. Lindsey Graham, who absolutely loves limited government, except when he doesn't: "When they say, 'I want my lawyer,' you tell them: 'Shut up. You don’t get a lawyer. You are an enemy combatant, and we are going to talk to you about why you joined Al Qaeda.'" (Actually, nobody is going to talk to you, because you're in solitary confinement for the rest of your life. Oh, you have an American passport? Cute.)
Strangely, the Senate then voted 99-1 to clarify that the decision, which President Obama has promised to veto, won't affect "existing law" one way or the other — meaning it's not a per se endorsement of detention without trial for citizens, just a refusal to ban it, or something — with Sen. Carl Levin explaining: "We make clear that whatever the law is, it is unaffected by this language in our bill." And "whatever the law is," it's probably not what you learned in civics class.
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Commentarium (29 Comments)
If enacted - it won't be - into law, this will last about ten seconds in the courts. Interesting that you quote a Republican when this was enacted with the overwhelming concurrence of Democrats in the Senate.
What's really interesting to me are the Right-wing sockpuppet comments that often appear on stories like these, typically within an hour or two of the Nerve articles being posted. It's plain to see when you look back at the Politics section.
The article title mentions the "Senate," not Republicans. The first linked page describes the subject as "legislators," not Republicans. The two politicians named in the Nerve article (Bloomberg and Graham) are indeed Republicans, but they aren't even labeled as such. Yet we already have two comments -- only minutes apart -- that attempt to apologize for Republicans and shift the blame.
While it is true that both Senate Democrats and Republicans approved the original bill (S. 1867) by an overall vote of 93-7, the Feinstein amendments (S. Amdt. 1125 and S. Amdt. 1126) were constructed to offer greater protection to American citizens potentially targeted by the government for indefinite detention. Democrats voted in favor of those 41-10 and 39-12 respectively, while Republicans voted against the Feinstein amendments 44-3 and 42-5.
In a political world where the Right vociferously champions smaller government and ostensibly embraces the Constitution and Bill of Rights as essentially holy texts, why are Republicans overwhelmingly voting against language that plainly protects American citizens from a bigger, more oppressive government?
Pragraph #3 is implying that Lindsay Graham is hyprocritical for supporting this measure due to the author's mis-interpretation of the GOP platform. I think that's why the Republican frequent posters got defensive.
55-45 in the Democrat-controlled Senate. You can't spin that.
One interpretation of more Democrats voting against the Feinstein amendments than there were Republicans voting in favor of them is that the dissenting Democrats believed they were correctly representing their constituencies. Another interpretation is that Republicans, as they have demonstrated with the recent threat of a government shutdown, simply don't have the balls to vote against the party line.
Sock Puppets, indeed: Most likely on Koch Bros. payroll. Conservatroll comments on Nerve are almost always the same troll.
The libtard troll once again beating a moot point to death.
i wouldn't bet money on the courts overturning this, let alone Obama vetoing it. the military-industrial cliche is in full effect.
More failed trolling from SOL.
The libtard troll strikes again. And misses.
as you miss the point, conservatroll.
As I miss the point when I troll myself as everybody. Rush rules!
failed conservatrolling. Let me guess...next you'll start calling yourself a moron again?
Derp. Why would we call ourselves morons?
You can't blame this one on the Republicans.
because they didn't come up with the Patriot Act. Derp!
Yeah, actually they did. Derp.
That was so libtarded of me. Out of controlll.
Who ate my OXYCONTIN!!!
I've found a new alias to troll myself with. I'm big, fat, and stupid.
you are, Rush!
I am Rush.
OTL is right. I expect this from McCain and Graham. But Carl Levin is getting a phone call, an email and a snail mail letter from me explaining why I expected better from him and how it is highly unlikely that I will ever vote for him again. If the purpose of this isn't to change existing law, then it is only a political ploy to look "tough on terrorism."
straight up bullshit. no other word for it.
Boy, I thought we were in trouble back in 2001.
Turns out that having the Pentagon and the banksters run the country ain't working out quite as well as the brochures said it would.
Funny you don't hear the military talking about this at all, do you? Care to hazard why?
I trolled myself again. Yes!
Now you say something