One of the problems is that ‘indefinite’ refers to an undefined duration for some, and undefined criteria or even both for others. Saying ‘we don’t know how long these people in limbo will have to stay in limbo’ seems perfectly reasonable to me, but saying ‘we intend to keep these people somewhere, maybe limbo, maybe wherever, who knows’ seems horrific. “Indefinite detention” could mean either(or both).
Mental health confinement for people who have undergone years of deprivation and torture to the point where they are not recognizably who they were before should also be an easy sell, and if there’s anybody left in Guantanamo Bay at this point that doesn’t fit that description they should just be put on the payroll.
What you’re really running into here isn’t so much a policy disagreement as it is doctrinal response. The relationship between the activist Left and their politicians is based on a doctrine of mutual preventative betrayal. We know Obama is going to betray our support and govern far to our right; it’s what Democrats do. We have to hit him first, so when he does throw us under we can show we’ve not been mindless lackeys. The politicians know we’ll hang them out to dry on the first excuse we can find; it’s what the Left does. They have to hit us first, so that when we do bite them they can show they were never beholden to our anger and irrationality. Of course, with Obama we had Hope, but even those of us with the Hope mostly Hoped he would do things he was already doing, like win and be black.
This controversy on the Left is about establishing not-Obamatard street cred before Obama gets around to launching his massive “Everything Will Stay the Same” initiative, and if you’re smart you’ll get on the bandwagon.

As soon as he enrolled at Harvard, I thought to myself

Endymion, I totally blanking agree. Thanks.

So what is your alternative to President Obama’s plan whether it be prolonged detention or preventative detention. How would you handle those prisoners that can’t be tried but have committed acts of terrorism and threaten to commit more? And just for argument’s sake lets say they really HAVE committed these acts and leave that particular argument for another time.

It seems to be ignored that one of the issues at Guantanamo (and Bagram and Abu Ghraib) was that blameless, clueless, actually innocent people are being held without trial and have been tortured. That issue should be addressed first, LONG before arguing as to whether “the bad guys at Guantanamo” (Chris Matthews) can be called political prisoners without offending “real” political prisoners worldwide, and what should be done with “the ones who can’t be tried for whatever reason.” What happened to the issue of the innocent detaineee? I know what happened re. the luckless taxi driver murdered by sadistic torture at Bagram: the torturers were separated out and “punished” (but the authors of the torture were NOT)–but I wonder why it’s never talked about outside of the documentary “Taxi to the Dark Side.” The “detainee” argument is way off course, following rules set down by tv news media, I find. Like everything else so jaw-droppingly off course since 1-21-09, it looks Orwellian. Not by you, sgwhiteinfla, just overall. Any debate in the blogs that echoes the tv news spells “abandon hope” to me.

I totally agree with your take on this. As a matter of fact it seems to have been lost in the shuffle that President Obama said 50 detainees have been approved to be transferred to a different country as soon as they will find one to take them. Think about that for a moment, 50 frikkin people. If we are going to transfer them then odds are high that they were innocent the whole time. Thats 1/5 of the population of GITMO right now roughly. And it doesn’t seem like they are even done reviewing all of the cases. There should be a veritable outcry from our side of the spectrum that we still have 50 innocents in detention at GITMO many of whom have probably been there for years and years. Combine that with the 21 who have already been ordered released and you have 71 detainees that are in one form or another innocent who we are still holding in GITMO. But unfortunately many of us missed that point when the subject of preventative detention came up. I am hoping that others go back and revisit what President Obama said and speak out for finding a way to release those prisoners ASAP.

That’s a difficult question because I’m not sure what the President’s plan is. If what he’s proposing is to simply ‘prolong’ the detention until he can verify all the information on the prisoners he inherited upon taking office in order to ‘prevent’ an embarrassing mix of Willie Hortons and improper executions, that seems reasonable in the real world. If ‘prolonged’ is merely a euphemism for eternal, or until they die, that plan would need an alternative.
Whether or not someone who has been driven incompetent to stand trial(that’s what you mean by “can’t be tried” right?) was responsible for their actions back when they committed them can only be ascertained through forensic research; interrogating either the detainees or the people who drove them insane would be inconclusive. I’m not averse to letting that take as long as justice takes, provided some transparency, but what I’d like to see is an act of Congress providing for enormous reparations paid to the individuals contingent on intense and lifelong mental health treatment and monitoring. Then, the fact that they’re all going to be acquitted on technicalities wouldn’t really matter.

Hey policy wonks, and friends and acquaintances of policy wonks who get to work in the Pentagon, oooh! here are some places you can do research to help the President with his plans for Preventive Detention for enemies of the state, ’terrorists’, designated thoughtcriminals or just poor shmucks picked up after being snitched upon.

maybe Obama could use ’troikas’:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NKVD_troika
they were utilized by the NKVD whenever they found it too inconvenient to use the regular Soviet judicial system. they were:
”introduced to supplement the legal system with a means for quick punishment of anti-Soviet elements”

Also ” Evidential standards were very low: a tip-off by an anonymous informer was considered sufficient grounds for arrest. Usage of ”physical means of persuasion” (torture) was sanctioned by a special decree of the state, which opened the door to numerous abuses, documented in recollections of victims and members of the NKVD itself.”

so far so good, sounds like what your Progressive Leader is after.

every show trial needs a nice elastic, inclusive ’crime’ for the ”detainee” to be guilty of. With a little modification, policy wonks, you could suggest to Obama something based on:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_58_(RSFSR_Penal_Code)

58-1: Definition of counterrevolutionary activity:
”A counterrevolutionary action is any action aimed at overthrowing, undermining or weakening of the power of workers’ and peasants’ Soviets… and governments of the USSR and Soviet and autonomous republics, or at the undermining or weakening of the external security of the USSR and main economical, political and national achievements of the proletarial revolution”

undermining, yeah, that should do it.

feel free do do more research on this, folks – besides the NKVD, there was the STASI, famous for its complete protection of the people of its country, East Germany.

Also the Gestapo and SS also vigorously protected, using both pre-emption and prevention, and even, out out commitment to the rule of law, provided the ’terrorist detainees’ with trials and tribunals, albeit with a rather high conviction rate.

according to historian Robert Gellately’s analysis of the local offices established, ”the Gestapo was for the most part made up of bureaucrats and clerical workers who depended upon denunciations by ordinary Germans for their information.[3] Indeed, the Gestapo was overwhelmed with denunciations and spent most of its time sorting out the credible from the less credible denunciations.[4] ”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G…..Enemies.29

presumably Obama will also appoint a few staff to ”sort out the credible from the less credible denunciations.” That would be Progressive of him!

Good point about civil confinement being an applicable precedent for prolonged detention.  (You even got me to look up the concept of Overton Window!)  I’ve got a lot of difficulty drawing too many parallels, but it is in the same general category.

My feeling is that if the cases against said dangerous detainees can’t be made, they should be released.  The danger they pose shouldn’t be unmanageable.  And we do have a tradition of releasing dangerous (domestic) criminals when the cases against them can’t be made because of tainted evidence or prosecutorial misconduct.

However, the political optics of such a release are truly frightening.

It seems like these people fall into a category like POWs, except there’s no nation that’s the enemy, no war has been declared by Congress, and the idea of being in a perpetual state of “war” is hugely disconcerting, to say the least.

Methinks you’re reading of this is way too narrow. Political prisoners? Of course that’s going to happen. That’s the whole point. Obama said he wants to imprison people who cannot be charged, because they haven’t committed crimes. In other words, he wants to imprison people indefinitely who are innocent in the eyes of the law. It’s naive to suggest this kind of power will not be abused wholesale, since the State is seeking to put people in prison simply because someone somewhere wags a finger in their direction.

Do you realize that every environmental group in the US is considered a “terrorist group” by DHS? Ditto for every animal rights, labor and human rights group as well. Here’s a snippet from a DHS report listing some of these “Terrorist Groups”:

Mainstream organizations with known or possible links to ecoterrorism include
the following:
• Greens
• People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA)
• The Sierra Club
• National Wildlife Federation
• Audubon Society
• Humane Society of the United States (HSUS)
• Friends of the Earth
• Greenpeace
• Earth First!47
• Coalition to Save the Preserve (CSP)
• Environmental Task Force
• The Frogs
• In Defense of Animals
• New Jersey Animal Rights Alliance
• Fund for Animals (U//FOUO)

Notice anything odd about this? Fund for Animals!? Audubon Society?! Fer Pete’s sake! And that’s just some of the enviro groups. So my $40 check to National Wildlife makes me a terrorist in the eyes of DHS!

Here’s the link to the report….

As for Whitehouse’s lame example, for civil commitment, one has to provide evidence to a court, wherein an actual judge makes a determination. Obama’s proposed prison system won’t require any evidence, since he’s already admitted this is about people who haven’t actually committed any crimes, yet are somehow deemed “dangerous.”

If you pay attention to the policies coming out of the DHS crowd, you’ll notice that literally anyone can be made to fit that description… especially if the State doesn’t need to bother with actual evidence. Seriously, if a bunch of aging birders are “dangerous,” then we’re all in deep doo doo.

Indeed, given that there are more than one MILLION “terrorists” on the “terrorist watch list,” Obama is going to need a lot of prisons!

We already do use preventative detention. Sexual predators, after they’ve served their jail time, may still be held until they are deemed no longer a threat to society. The Supreme Court has upheld this policy. I don’t particularly agree with this policy (at least as it is applied to people who were convicted prior to the passage of the law) but it is legal. That, I suspect will be the basis of Obama’s plan.

No actually that is not what he said. What he said was he wanted to continue to hold prisoners who have ALREADY been imprisoned, without charges.

Whether or not someone who has been driven incompetent to stand trial(that’s what you mean by “can’t be tried” right?)

Yeah that would be one category but it would also fit people who were guilty but were torture to try to get them to snitch on their fellow terrorists but are still of sound mind.

Another category would be people who had witnesses snitch on them but said witnesses are now dead.

Another would be if the person who infiltrated their group was an asset and bringing him into court would blow his cover.

This are all hypotheticals, I don’t know that any of them actually apply but I can see where they could.

yeah, as you policy wonks know, ” The United States leads the industrialized world in incarceration. In fact, the U.S. rate of incarceration (762 per 100,000) is five to eight times that of other highly developed countries, according to The Sentencing Project, a criminal justice think tank.”

from: http://abcnews.go.com/thelaw/story?id=5009270

according to The Sentencing Project we’ve only had a 500% increase over the past thirty years – clearly what your Progressive Leader needs to do is create another system, where it is easier to put people in cells for life!

maybe he could give his bureaucrats a quota system, so they don’t slack off.
say, 100 ’terrists a month, and a bonus, or a shiny medal, if they can protect the Homeland from 250 Possible Future Terrorists (PFT’s) in a single month!

But where in America would Obama ever find psychiatrists or psychologists to participate in the sham of preventative detention? It’s not like these ethical professionals have participated in the torture regime or anything.

If America stands for anything, it stands for not locking people up indefinitely. In fact, it’s one of the bases of our founding. If Obama goes off the rails here, then he’s not the constitutional scholar he’s billed to be.

In fact, he’s a tyrant.

Thanks for the comment.

As for the precedent of releasing dangerous criminals I agree that we have done that in our past to preserve our court system. But on the other hand we have also held innocent people for years and denied them DNA testing to allow them to exonerate themselves. So there is that. But as you pointed out the politics of releasing “guilty” terrorists onto our soil be a death knell to anyone who ordered it. And if we are going to be real about this we have to factor in the politics of the situtaion. Besides that what if its someone who really DOES plan to attack again as soon as they get out? I have asked this uncomfortable question before and I will ask it again, what happens if a released GITMO detainee ever releases a successful terrorist attack on America? And by successful I mean scores dead and many more injured? Now we can even offer up that maybe it was a detainee who was actually innocent when we locked him up but was radicalized in GITMO. As much as the Pentagon numbers are hyped about how many released detainees “returned to the battle” the truth is there are at least a handful HAVE been confirmed to have become terrorists after being released. Imagine that one or two or five detainees blowing something up here. Just think about the shitstorm that would rise up after that. And don’t think for one moment from the President on down politicians aren’t factoring that in when it comes to how they want to go about closing GITMO.

So while I understand and on some levels agree with what you are saying about the “right” thing to do being to release people we can’t convict, I would say that actually pulling that off is an impossibility. So what are out other options if we actually have any?

Ok let me give you a for instance. Supposedly one of the NY Four who was picked up last week for attempting to blow up a synagogue and blow military planes out of the sky is a schizophrenic. Evidently he had gone out of his meds and gone off the deep end. Now I am not a psychiatrist and I am only going by media reports, however if this guy was real al qaeda would civil committment apply to him? More generally if there ARE terrorists who exhibit mental problems would civil committment apply to them? I think its likely that it at least might and if they truly do have mental problems I would imagine more than just a few mental health professionals would line up to sign off on it. Now keep in mind, the major difference in my opinion, between what Bush has already done and Obama is attempting to do is that Obama is talking about doing it in the light of day. I mean why are we even talking about it today? Because at least some form of the process was in a speech he gave two days ago. So at the very least whatever he is planning on doing will be out there for us to see and even protest should he, as you said, decide to go off the rails. And if he is true to his word then this won’t be a situation like the OLC memos where you get a bunch of yes men to just find information to back stop the policy. No in stark contrast, if Obama is true to his word, this will be done with both Congressional and Judicial oversight and in deed most important of all, the oversight of citizens just like you and me.

What should we DO? Is that the question?

Seriously?

At the risk of sounding like a simpleton, we should do what the LAW says we must.

Make a legal arrest. Have an arraignment where a judge determines the charges are valid, accepts the plea and makes a preliminary determination on bail. Offers the accused the chance to insist on a speedy trial, and then sets a date. It’s called “due process” because that’s what it freaking IS.

If Obama and the DoJ wants to do something different, they need to change the law. If they do, it needs to survive constitutional review buy the Judiciary. If it cannot, then Obama and the DoJ need to consider revising the constitution. It’s called the Rule of Law, and it’s supposedly what we’re all about.

And yes. If you cannot make a legal case against a terror suspect, you LET THEM GO. You can track them, keep them under surveillance, and if they are not American citizens you can begin deportation hearings against them. All this pants-wetting about how they “want to kill Americans” so we simply can’t have them walking around free is an obvious red herring that doesn’t pass the simplest smell test – do you have any idea how many people out there are committed to killing Americans? Have you noticed that when they succeed it’s big news, not a mundane event? That’s because we actually do have a fairly sophisticated anti-terror and international criminal investigation operations.

The reason I keep referring to these people as “political prisoners” is that the arguments in play are so ridiculous and disingenuous on their very face that the only rational explanation for having this “debate” or undertaking these clearly illegal actions is politics. This is about careers, and fund-raising, and partisan electoral politics, and ultimately, power.

If you aren’t immediately frightened and deeply suspicious when the government starts telling you how in THIS case they just can’t follow the law, but they’re going to make sure that only the “bad people” will fall victim to their abuse, you haven’t been paying attention for the last forty years…

mikey

one for the unintentional self-parody file!

the oversight of citizens like you is surely something that will deter a Unitary Executive, should he ever get to feeling too big for his britches.

who needs ”inherent rights” when there are recent undergrads from mid-tier colleges who are doing blog hits instead of bong hits?

Hmm, not sure I want to live in a country where someone can undergo torture and then without receiving any kind of ameliorative mental treatment be considered competent to stand trial. For all the grue and horror, what defines torture is an assault on the distinction between reality and fiction; something I think you need to have with you in court and something that doesn’t really get better on it’s own.
In the other situations you give, those hypotheticals could get trials–really short ones. They’d all get speedy acquittal or the equivalent of “$50 and time served!” ala Night Court, but they’d go to a judge. I don’t know, maybe with an undercover informant they could even make it stick, I’m sure there are already ways to protect undercover agents in court.
I don’t think any of these guys can be convicted(at least after the appeal), but that’s different from saying they can’t be tried.

What Digby said.
And I don´t think mental illness is coincidental to civil commitments. If you leave it out and reduce the conditions to “danger to themselves and others”, that is more than an invitation for abuse, it is practically an order to take political prisoners.
Also, can you explain why you think someone who is detained without having commited a crime, because the government thinks he´s dangerous, based on his opinions and believes, is not a political prisoner?
Bear in mind that conspiracy is a crime, and can be dealt with by the law.
mo09

In Texas an appeals panel of judges admitted that the perpetrator of a crime was “crazy” yet said he was legally sane and still culpable for his crime thereby keeping him on death row. Just FYI, the guy had pulled out one of his eyes and eaten it and that was after he had already plucked out the other one.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..76658.html

So I think you will find that we ALREADY live in a country where insane people are ruled competent to stand trial.

I don´t really understand your question here. If a criminal is also mentally ill, then there are specific procedures in place that balance the fact that he´s sick and all its implications with the fact that he commited a crime. It might even lessen his sentence.
What does that have to do with your question whether people might be detained indefinetely, if they are a danger to themselves and others?
mo09

Also, can you explain why you think someone who is detained without having commited a crime, because the government thinks he´s dangerous, based on his opinions and believes, is not a political prisoner?

My disagreement lies in the fact that I don’t believe that situation was what President Obama said or was referring to in his speech. If you click on the link to my comment at Greg Sargent’s blog you will see that in the speech President Obama CLEARLY was pointing to people who had ALREADY committed a crime or crimes yet whom in his estimation couldn’t be brought to trial lest they be found not guilty for various reasons.

We already have a system in this country whereby a person, without having harmed themselves or another, can be committed to a psych ward for a period of time because they are deemed a danger to themselves or others. That was the basis for Senator Whitehouse’s comment. So if we are already able to do that with American citizens, would that be applicable IF President Obama was indeed talking about preventative detention of prospective terrorists(which I don’t agree that he was) and they were found to have mental problems when you are talking about the rule of law and Constitutionality?

President Obama was referring to detainees who had in fact committed crimes in the past but we just couldn’t prove it in court for one reason or another

“had in fact” is problematic in the extreme. this assumes a level of absolute knowledge that is superhuman. that is why we have a system which requires proof in a court and due process — because errors are made by prosecutors.

if justice means anything to us we are required to use a process that we would find acceptable if we were the accused.

I´m not sure where you say :”and they were found to have mental problems” in your original post. But I must admit I didn´t follow all the links. And Whitehouse says: “to argue by analogy” so I figured he meant, “well they´re not sick but can´t we just treat them as if they were?” and to this, I say no.
Now that I understand your question, I´m even more at a loss. Why would anyone say that the normal rules of civil commitment don´t apply to people suspected of terrorism? If they are severly mentally ill , then they can be commited. Though really, at that point, I doubt they´d be much of an national security risk.
mo09

And I agree with seline. Courts determine whether someone has “in fact” commited a crime. And if they can´t so that, maybe because the “proof” was obtained through illegal means, i.e. torture or illegal surveillance, then I say who are you to say that they have “in fact” commited a crime?
mo09

I understand what you are saying, but I also understand the politics of the situation. There is literally no way that group of people are being released into this country. And I am not talking about the Republican definition of “into this country”. I am talking about the “let them walk free among us” definition. Its not going to happen. Period. Full stop. So my question is what are the alternatives from that? We can keep saying they should just be released if we can’t convict them but to me that would be the epitome of spitting in the wind. Like it or not there WILL be politics involved in this decision. And the truth is the more we refuse to accept that and try to come up with other viable solutions the more we will begin to look like the GOP on other matters IMHO. That might seem wrong but in my mind that is the reality we are looking at. They just had a 90-6 vote to refuse to even fund the closing of GITMO in the Senate and the House followed suit. You think the Dems and especially Harry Reid were scared of just the thought of closing GITMO, start talking about releasing detainees that many in govt believe to be “guilty” and “dangerous” and see what happens.

btw, sgwhiteinfla, I followed you here from swampland, and I always enjoy your comments over there. I learned a lot from you! Thanks.
mo09

Thanks for coming by!

I just think, Ok, this is a bad situation, it´s entirely possible that Obama will have to truly and irrevocably get his hands dirty. Though I admire people who say there is always a choice, and not just for overtone window reasons. But wouldn´t it be way worse to justify this singularity with some kind of tortured legal reasoning, and thus make it easier the next time?
mo09

Maybe it comes down to, is it worse to let the government get away with breaking the law, or with weakening the rights of the people.

i reject your premises.

first, i reject that your knowledge of what will ever be politically acceptable is absolute.

second, i am not politically active in order to devise or give political cover to unjust and immoral policies. that is not the role or responsibility of a citizen.

the responsibility of a citizen is to resist injustice. in that way, even if so-called preventive detention should be codified by obama and party leadership, it will be known that there are still be some of us who reject and denounce it.

let it not be said that the entire country has gone mad.

I respect your position, all I am saying is that while protesting the government’s action if we don’t have a viable alternative its likely going to be all for naught. I for one want to have a seat at the table helping to shape bad policy rather than only being able to look back and being grateful that I opposed it from the start. Again I don’t agree that what we are going to be doing is going out locking people up before they actually commit a crime, however if thats what IS on the table I want to be able to say that there is another way to protect us and still not embrace lawless policy. Until that alternative is put forth, and I don’t believe that just not doing it is a viable alternative, I think we are dooming ourselves to just go along for the ride. But again I don’t knock you for your approach. We all have our own path’s to walk.

selise: let it be said like Noam Chomsky said it:

”Historical amnesia is a dangerous phenomenon, not only because it undermines
moral and intellectual integrity, but also because it lays the groundwork for
crimes that still lie ahead. ”

seems some of the callow youth do not even aspire to moral and intellectual integrity.

you have no seat at the table and giving up your principles will not buy you one.

may i recommend a book to you? it is mayer’s they thought they were free, published in 1955

How and why ‘decent men’ became Nazis – the life stories of ten law-abiding citizens.

here is a bit from chapter 14: Shame

“Oh, ‘effectiveness,’” I said. That I heard from my friend the teacher. For the sake of being effective he did everything required of him, and of course he wasn’t effective. He knows that now. But then he had hopes of being able to oppose the excesses…”
”Yes, it was always the excesses that we wished to oppose, rather than the whole program, the whole spirit that produced the first steps, A, B, C, and D, out of which the excesses were bound to come. It is so much easier to ‘oppose the excesses,’ about which one can, of course, do nothing, than it is to oppose the whole spirit, about which one can do something every day.”

One more reason to beg Texas to secede. But this is ties to something that sets me apart from many of my natural political allies–I don’t believe America is a nation ruled by laws. Seriously, if you think this is a nation of laws, try crossing the street. The rule of law is a goal, much like the Constitution is a dream of what America should be rather than a description of what it is. I want my America to be moving, always moving, away from the kind of decision you cite and toward uniform empathy and rational action. But I don’t believe we’re there now, nor even that we ever were.

I for one want to have a seat at the table helping to shape bad policy rather than only being able to look back and being grateful that I opposed it from the start.

Would you have wanted a seat at the table when FDR interned the Japanese? When Congress passed the Sedition Act? In the insanity of war, the constitution gets violated not out of necessity but out of stupid panic. Ultimately, the law is implemented by people, and people, even good people, are crazy.

But eventually the insanity is passed, the laws are repealed, the court precedents change. Obama is all about taking the long view. Well, I’m taking long view. Someday this is going to blow up in our face. I want to be in the best possible position to fix it then.

Sure, no politician wants to stand up for the Constitution because the next terrorist attack becomes your fault. The policy argument for preventative detention is bogus, but the political argument is rock solid. It’s inevitable. Hopefully civil libertarians in Congress will do their best to put safeguards on it–oversight, transparency, higher standards of treatment (hey, you can *detain* people, but you shouldn’t be allowed to *punish* people without trial), there’s plenty of room for to improve a bad law. At the very least, offer up as much delaying action as possible, and maybe a few more liberal justices in the courts will push back on this later.

But civil libertarians in the general public have to continually call this out–it’s unconstitutional, there are no good examples of such a law in history or abroad, it’s stupid (arguably, releasing them but keeping track of them might let you find new plots) and it’s totally open to abuse.

Looking back at the sex offender confinement argument in the late 90s, it was exactly like this one. The guy they wanted to confine was basically promising to rape more children if they let him go. The Supremes blinked and let Kansas keep him locked up. It was even harder in that case to oppose detention that it is in this one.

But once you’ve got your foot in the door of precedent, you can kick it the rest of the way open. Now we’re going to lock people based on evidence we can’t present in court, or even civil hearings. Maybe it’s secret, maybe it’s hearsay, maybe it’s coerced. Maybe it just isn’t there, and some interrogator just hated the look on your face.

Can’t wait to see where we move next on the slope from here.

Thanks, Spencer, for a rare bit of sanity for the left blogosphere over this issue. My honest hope is that Obama is attempting to quietly and gradually define the classification of “enemy combatants” subject to blatantly unconstitutional process like preventive detention out of existence – in other words, by not Gitmoing and waterboarding these people in the first place, we can treat them according to established norms, such as designating them POWs, and subject to those laws, or as criminals, and treat them according to the criminal law.

But judging from the posters here, claiming that Obama is ushering in an era of American Nazism (I know, I know, according to you we’ve actually been Nazis since 1776), he’s not going to be given the benefit of the doubt, whether it’s the civil liberties absolutists claiming he’s the personification of totalitarianism, or the MSM, which seems eager to run with Dick Cheney’s portrayal of Obama as the personification of appeasement.

Dang, I always forget about the “benefit of a doubt” clause in Article II, where the Constitution doesn’t apply if the president seems like a nice guy.

Because that’s the only justification defenders of this policy have offered so far.

There is a John Yoo quality about this article which, however haltingly, seems to support the expansion of preventative detention.

For a long time, the only way to civilly commit someone was if that person was actively psychotic.

The Supreme Court, unfortunately, expanded civil commitment to include certain sex offenders, and this has brought about a cottage industry of junk psychologists willing to testify as to the dangerousness of sex offenders.

I work as a public defender in New York State, and I am aware of situations involving alleged sex offenders where an “expert” offers testimony that the mere fact of an arrest tends to support the idea that the person will commit a sex offense in the future. This is simply a means of avoiding any actual proof of the offense by allowing a so-called expert to act as a conduit for the prejudices and beliefs of the police. The dangers of such bogus social science should be evident.

Civilly committing alleged terrorists without proof beyond a reasonable doubt that they are terrorists can only continue to erode the protections individuals have under our Constitution to be free from arbitrary imprisonment.

Given his intellectual acuity and constitutional law expertise, Barack Obama is surely aware of this. His attempt to expand the law of preventative detention can only lead us further into an erosion of each American’s right to be free from arbitrary jailing.

See also
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/04/us/04civil.html

> [sg] No actually that is not what he said.

What’s not what who said?

I reread my entire comment and could find nowhere
having suggested that anyone had said anything.

> What he said was he wanted to continue to hold
> prisoners who have ALREADY been imprisoned, without
> charges.

One parallel that occurs to me is spies. What
legal framework have we and other countries used in the
past for dealing with spies?

Your definition of “political prisoner” is too narrow. Under your definition, Alfred Dreyfus would not have been a political prisoner.

On the other hand, some of those imprisoned certainly do fit your definition of political prisoner, it’s just that we, or most, do not identify with their politics.