"The United States Supreme Court yesterday rendered a decision which I think is one of the worst decisions in the history of this country."
-- John McCain, 2008.06.13

Really?

Does that bonehead really think protecting the right to be heard in court is...

• worse than locking thousands of Americans in internment camps because they had Japanese ancestry? (Korematsu v. United States -- 1944)
• worse than forcing African Americans to sit at the back of the bus? (Plessy v. Ferguson -- 1896)
• worse than slavery? (Dred Scott v. Sanford -- 1857)

Does John McCain

• think it was OK for North Vietnam to hold him without a real trial before an impartial court in which he could defend himself against his accusers and the evidence?
• mind that they tortured him?
• have a problem with resolving problems (such as - has this person performed, attempted to perform, or conspired to perform acts of terrorism?)
  

There is a lot of misunderstanding about that recent Supreme Court decision.

That decision confirms right basic human right that says if you are accused of a crime, you have a right to a hearing before an impartial court.

That's all. No more, no less. If we are going to detain people SUSPECTED of illegal behavior, then we have to put them on trial.

That decision does not send lunatic terrorists out into the streets with no restrictions on what they want to do. It simply says that the accused has the right to a trial. Period. Well, not period. It also says that such human rights have been established for a thousand years (10 centuries, 100 decades, 500 generations), and that it's not appropriate to dump that right just because the government is running a fear campaign against its citizens.

How many 'detainees' have been convicted of any crimes connected to terrorism? None. Zero. Zip. Nada.

Given that track record, I'm inclined to think that your gubmint knows that it can't convict very many - if any at all - of those detainees. If they're not guilty, why are we holding - and torturing - them? The government has had 6 1/2 years to build cases against those suspected terrorists.

Let's get a grip on this. Those people are suspected terrorists. The government has shown no inclination to prove that those detainees are guilty of anything. Innocent until proven guilty, yada, yada, yada. Flag, apple pie, Mom, baseball, and the best legal system in all of the time this species has been on the planet.

I say we should put them on trial. If they're found guilty in a legitimate court, put 'em in a hellish prison. If they're not guilty, well, we made an oopsie. A one-way ticket home would be nice, an apology with the ticket would be nicer. No, wait. I forget. We're supposed to be a nation built on Christian principals. WWJD?

Does anyone remember how we got the detainees to detain?

1. Some were actually caught in situations where it was reasonable to arrest them and try to build a case against them. It's time to put them on trial and resolve it: guilty or not guilty?
   
2. Some were completely innocent of anything except being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and were rounded up by US troops or intelligence agents.
3. Most - this is so outrageous - were rounded up by bounty hunters and handed over to US troops with no evidence that they were bad guys . Again, wrong place, wrong time. The bounty hunters were Afghan tribesmen who worked on piece-rate. They got paid by the head, but didn't have to show any kind of evidence against the people they sold to the US government. Piece-rate with no quality control is a disaster waiting to happen, whether the product is clothes, cars, or humans.
   
   By the way, trafficking in humans- isn't that slavery?
   

Again, the recent decision by the Supremes doesn't free anyone from prison or overturn convictions or anything else nefarious. It's no more than an affirmation of human rights.

It also says to the US government that it's time to put these people on trial - or release them. Do something or get off the pot!

If those people really are terrorists, it shouldn't be hard to convict them. A speedy trial is the best thing for all Americans and for America's place in the world. After all, why should we try to out-do such dictatorships as China, Burma, the old USSR and Chile and Argentina, and dozens more rogue nations?

Let's regain some of the basic decency for which the USA had always been famous.

Labels: bonehead, bounty hunters, detainees, magna carta, mccain, slavery, supreme court, terrorists