According to http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,58326,00.html an Intel programmer who is also a US citizen has been held in solitary confinement, with limited access to his family or lawyers, without charges being brought, for two weeks and counting. No explanation has been given for his detention, the only theory being that three years ago he donated money to an organization that was subsequently alleged to have ties to terrorists.

The question I'd put to you is this: is such detention justifiable? Does it help security, or does it weaken us and destroy what we supposedly stand for? Can we stand by while Kafka-esque episodes like this take place around us? Which of your co-workers will be next...or will it be you? Have you donated to any charities lately?

First, to add to your original post, Platypus:
Domestic Security Enhancement Act

This is the follow up to the Patriot Act which would presumably allow the government to expand their powers beyond those they are exercising against Mr. Hawash. According to the Wired article he is currently being held as a "so-called material witness" so they haven't had to charge him with anything yet. Sounds strikingly similar...

So to your questions:
Is such detention justifiable? No... it's surrendering freedom to fear and trampling the rights of individuals -- unjustifiably.
Does it help security, or does it weaken us and destroy what we supposedly stand for? No doubt it will be passed off as helping security, but hindsight into previous repressive regimes should show us what garbage that is. It weakens us as a society and destroys our principles.
Can we stand by while Kafka-esque episodes like this take place around us? I should hope not! I've already sent letters to my representatives here about this and have tried to make more people aware when the opportunity presents itself.
Have you donated to any charities lately? You know... I always thought there was something shady about that Ronald McDonald fellow. I'm sure Asscroft will be knocking any day now over that "socialist special" I got at the drive-thru the other day...

Justifiable. Probably not.
Help security: Probably, but at what cost?

there had better be some extraordinary evedince against this person.... or the @#$% will hit the fan.

--cheers

"There were some 1200 guys rounded up after September 11th. What happened to all the others?

...They were whisked out of the country in secret."
CBS: Guilty Until Proven... April 6, 2003

Apparently Mr. Hawash is far from being alone in this matter. This is not only ridiculous but practically criminal... according to Robert Rubin, lawyer and the legal director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights.
From the CBS aritcle:

Omar, the first "detainee" profiled in the report, was finally released and allowed to return to his family. Others were not so lucky...


"Of the 1200 men detained after September 11th, the government claims about 130 of them actually did commit crimes."
[Post intended as update for Platypus' questions]

ABS, I fail to see what that has to do with anything (in this thread) care to tie all that into what we're talking about?

--cheers

[Edit: articles color-coded for added simplicity]
I'm not sure how you could fail to see the connection between the two articles...

From the original Wired article:


Then, from the CBS report I listed:


Just to make sure it was clear the second time around, and because I had the time on my hands, I've color coded what I felt was relevant between the two articles. Furthermore, I think the final quotes from the CBS article presented their own relevance to the questions Platypus asked.
Specifically:

Tough issuse, but I come down on the side of stricter enforcement of existing laws and regulations. Once I was certain we were doing all we could with what was already on the books, then I'd be willing to pass even more restrictions if needed.

We have an annoying habit of passing new laws whenever something hits the news(hate crime legislation is one of my favorites). I don't necessarily think that's the case here, but until we've shown we are doing all we can with what we got then I say let's wait.

As for those cases being cited, I see no problem with the way they're being handled. Yeah I know, easy to say because its not me. Sorry, but times have changed. Terrorism is global and its a war. Sometimes there is unintended collateral damage in war. Those who are in custody and are innocent of all criminal activity, including immigration violations, are very few in number. Unfortunate, yes. Unavoidable, no.

From my original post citing the CBS story:


That means that of those detained, 1,070 had not committed crimes. That's 89.2%

Few in number...?

Have they changed that much? The people who drafted the Bill of Rights had some experience of war, and still felt that those protections were needed to maintain democracy. Were they wrong? Is this war somehow so different from all other wars, that what was not justified then is justified now?



How is denial of access to families or to adequate legal representation, or secrecy regarding the fates of the "disappeared" people, unavoidable? This isn't just an "oops" kind of mistake; this is a deliberate, premeditated, and unjustifiable abrogation of basic civil rights. It's the kind of thing for which we routinely condemn other nations. Failure to observe due process is both morally wrong and practically unwise. Even if we "win" this "war" it won't be much of a victory if we become a dictatorship in the process.

The same type of thing happened during the Civil War, and we didn't turn into a dictatorship then...

If things get out of hand, there are checks and balances, i.e. the law will be amended or repealed, or (more likely) struck down by the Supreme Court.

I'm just curious... if inhumane treatment bordering on torture, secret trials and secret deportations aren't out of hand, what is?

Don't we take issues with other countries who disappear people? I thought we did. As Rubin concluded:


[Edit: below]
In regards to the Supreme Court striking down such practices, I'm curious as to how anybody is supposed to even appeal to the Supreme Court when the defendant's lawyer isn't being shown the evidence. Instead, they're simply being told that the government has "secret evidence" while their client is either continued to be held or secretly deported.

Actually we pretty much did, and we were lucky it didn't last. I don't like to count on luck when rules and/or common sense can suffice.



Checks and balances are intended to prevent this kind of thing, not address them after the fact. Waiting years for the same Supreme Court that appointed George W Bush to rule on the misdeeds of his administration doesn't do a lot of good for those whose rights are being trampled on today.

The question, if you recall, is whether such actions are justifiable in the present, not how (or even whether) remedies can be found after the fact.

Platypus: You took some of the words out of my mouth - twice. Yes, we did turn into a dictatorship under Lincoln during the Civil War (let's hope it doesn't require similar measures to end our current dictatorship) and, no, times have not changed in the least since September 11, 2001. For a couple of hours one morning the United States became a wee small bit like the rest of the world. Big deal.

Before people start leaping all over this posting with some shrill "Tell that to the families of those who blah blah blah" - I should point out that I am from one of those familes. And my cousin, who gave his life in the rescue attempt in the WTC, would not want his sacrifice to be exploited as an excuse to trash the Bill of Rights - never mind waging an unprovoked, unrelated war. His immediate family - like those of most of the victims of the September 11 attack (according to my aunt, anyway) - is vehemently opposed to the Bush regime's response to the attack and will be doing everything in their power to see that Dubya is ousted in 2004.


To the questions then:

Is such detention justifiable? No, of course not. There is no justification for such detention under our Constitution - not that that matters any more.
Does it help security, or does it weaken us and destroy what we supposedly stand for? It doesn't help security in any significant way - and it dispenses with our ideals altogether.
Can we stand by while Kafka-esque episodes like this take place around us? We can - and most of us will (as most of us have been) - but we should not. As patriotic Americans we should never accept the compromsing (never mind the destruction) of our ideals. Never. Not under any circumstances.
Have you donated to any charities lately? Yes - and probably some, like UNICEF, which would once again be deemed communist front organizations - or is it terrorist front organizations these days?

The first part of your post is another example of what could be construed in some circles as a threat to the President. Is it possible for you to state your case and objections to the current policies without the veiled death talk? The moderators on this forum are pretty active so I'm surprised this type of thing is permitted.

That next section regarding 9/11 is insensitive and your family equivocation doesn't justify it.

Passion51 - I have NO idea how you construed Wertz's post to be a threat to the president. I find intimidation tactics such as yours to be threating only to debate.

Edited to add - the only thing I got out of Wertz's post is that some of us are willing to suspend habeus corpus, some of us are not, and some of us (no one on this forum) have trouble even spelling habeus corpus, much less define it. His reference to Lincoln was to prompt us to ask ourselves if we willing to live in an America that suspends a Constitutional right, as it was so asked in the Civil War.

If we turned into a 'dictatorship' under Lincoln, and Lincoln's 'dictatorship' was ended by assassination, and we hope 'similar measures to end our current dictatorship' aren't required...how else could it be taken? Vote him out of office?

I am by no means trying to intimidate any debate. I just prefer it to remain civil.

We interrupt this thread to bring you the following clarification of what I can only see as an unwarranted attempt to discredit me as an individual:

Passion51: In fact, my "let's hope it doesn't require similar measures to end our current dictatorship" was referring to the entire course of the Lincoln presidency: widespread unrest and upheaval, an unnecessarily protracted war with great loss of life on both sides, inordinate divisiveness within the government (and even the Republican Party), acts of Congress to restore a more democratic form of government, and, yes, political assassination. All of which was framed as something that I said I hoped wouldn't happen. I stand by that.

I felt that your previous attempt to so twist my words that a "death wish" (by which I presume you meant "death threat") could be construed was such a stretch that I didn't feel it warranted a response at all. As you're not letting it go, though, I should mention that the only comment I'd made which could be so twisted was a desire to imagine that some day members of the War Party might be subject to judgement for their sins. In no way did I imply that I hoped that would happen any time soon or as a result of anything other than a blissful passing from a ripe and healthy old age to their well-deserved rewards.

I appreciate your efforts to reconstruct my postings in order to characterize them as some sort of (heavily) veiled threat against the president (this was attempted on another board with much less subtlety and finesse), but, really, am I worth all the energy to create such a fiction? I'm flattered, but you must feel that my postings are easier to dismiss than all that, mustn't you?

For the record - and to "pre-emptively" disavow any future words which you may want to put into my mouth - I wish Mr. Bush a long and prosperous life - not that he'll need any assistance from my good will for that. I just pray to every possible divinity in the universe that he spends the rest of it running more private corporations into the ground rather than the entire country.

Apologies to all participants for pursuing this, but I really felt that it was necessary to nip this in the bud and to publicly make my intentions clear.

We now return to the regularly scheduled thread...




You are welcome to react to my family's experience however you please. My point, in the context of whether using the tragedy of September 11 as justification for, say, suspending habeus corpus, was that it is not.

Behaving as though no one had ever suffered the pain and loss related to acts of terror until the late summer of 2001 is what is insensitive here - deeply insensitive. It is also megalomaniacally arrogant and foolish. The national equivocation, lead by our Chief Executive's speech-writers and agenda-setters, is no justification for shredding the Bill of Rights any more than it's a justification for empire-building and the attendant war profiteering by the Bush family and their friends, associates, and sponsors. It does a grave disservice to the memory of all those who lost their lives on September 11. Their surviving relatives know it - and feel it every day of their lives. Anyone else's failure to appreciate that is irrelevant, except to the extent that it makes the exploitation of those deaths even more difficult to bear.

For the record, I read...



as while you "hope" similar measures aren't required to remove the "dictator" Bush, you would not necessarily be against it (you just hope it doesn't go that far).

The Civil War had nothing to do with removing Lincoln as President or ending his "dictatorship". I did read that as a veiled implication that violence might be needed against the "dictator" personally. Very crude, if you ask me.

I say we need to clamp down on illegal immigration as the greatest way to keep us safe. The way I see it, there are three possible classes of individuals who would be either plotting attacks or have material evidence in relation to such...

1. Illegal alien. For a criminal of this type (those plotting attacks), public arrest and trial. For a witness of this type, threaten deportation. Give them a short (say, 1 week) time frame to cooperate, then follow through with deportation. The carrot for cooperating would be legal resident status. This isn't very attractive currently, since there is little difference between legal and illegal immigrant status. The clamp down, overall, will lead to an incentive to attain "legal" immigrant status.
2. Legal non-citizen resident or alien. In other words, a person who is a citizen of another country who is legally in the US. I would use similar carrot/stick methods as above, except the stick includes revocation of legal immigrant status and then deportation (for witnesses). This would be justified in my view.
3. Citizens. A sticky scenario, to be sure. You can't use the methods above, obviously. You would need to treat them (witnesses) as regular material witnesses, no other way around it. Unless you can prove they are flight risks or hostile or have commited criminal acts already (which would include planning something or aiding enemies of the US). I would hope that citizens would be much less inclined to help foreign organizations harm this country.

As to how this relates to habeus corpus : I still believe that, for non-citizens that are suspected of being involved, habeus corpus can be suspended. If we follow my guidelines above, however, that wouldn't be necessary, since its hard to plan and carry out an attack on NYC from Syria or Lebanon.

I didn't ask you, amlord. No one asked you. What I would ask is that you stick to the topic. That will prevent the necessity of any further off-topic rebuttals.

Jaime/Mike: I can (and probably should) reply to this, but to do so would be to keep this thread off topic - which I'd been trying to avoid. So: should I respond or should I just report amlord's posting as a gratuitous, off-topic attack?

FINAL WARNING - THIS TOPIC IS NOT ABOUT THE CIVIL WAR, WERTZ'S COMMENTS ABOUT THE CIVIL WAR OR YOUR FEELINGS ABOUT WERTZ'S COMMENTS. DROP IT NOW OR I CLOSE THIS.

Respect Platypus' debate question:

I wasn't exactly sure where to put this, but I recalled participating here and it seems to fit... somewhat.
U.S. can detain illegal immigrants indefinately
"Illegal immigrants could be held indefinitely without bond if their cases present national security concerns, under a decision by Attorney General John Ashcroft."

The group in question are illegal immigrants. But when considering citizens and legal immigrants are being held seemingly indefinately, without charges in the name of national security, I think it has some bearing on habeus corpus. Thus far, people already being held in the United States are done so without having charges filed against them. If this is to reflect the position of Ashcroft and Homeland Security, they could very easily find themselves lost in the shuffle of "national security" along with the illegals.

It is certainly the subject of another thread, but this may also have some bearing on the combatants being held in Guantanamo Bay. In any cases of questionable detentions (which currently abound), I think it will be important for us to watch how they are treated by the Attorney General and Department of Homeland Security.

An explanation has finally been provided for Hawash's detention. I don't think any of us can really evaluate the strength of the charges against him, but I totally agree with the sentiment expressed in the last sentence of the newspaper report:



This abuse of the "material witness" loophole to detain people without due process must stop. The cost (to our rights) is high, the benefit (to security) infinitesimal.

Meanwhile, here's another story about the Fourth Amendment being tossed in the crapper, all in the name of defending the father...errr, homeland. Think about it the next time you go out for Indian food; you could be the one looking a "law enforcement" (yeah right) officer in the eye over the muzzle of a gun, just because you felt like eating some chicken vindaloo. Yeah, you - with the crew cut and the "support our troops" bumper sticker and the purple heart in the dresser drawer back home. They don't know that. They don't care. You're not a citizen to them; if you're lucky you're considered merely an obstacle, something to work around in pursuit of the Bad Guys. If you're not lucky...how long before one of these jumpy cowboys actually kills someone who was just going to scratch their nose? Will that be enough to make the rah-rah crowd stop and think about what's happening to the rights for which this country supposedly stands?

I have only been back in the states for about 7 months now. I think it was about the first week I was home (in Florida) that a major highway was closed for half the day because a woman overheard a conversation between (arab looking) medical students. One said something like,"If we can't bring it down, we'll get (his name) to do it." She took that to mean they were going to bomb something, when actually they were referring to bringing a CAR down (from up north), not a building.

Anyway, the worst thing about this was not the closing of the highway to search the vehicles with no real cause (which was egregious enough), but the subsequent reactions of residents in the community. The local paper published editorials claiming that these students did the equivalent of 'yell fire in a crowded theatre' !!!!! It seems, a person can't hold a private conversation anymore because big brother might misunderstand.

What is going on? This paranoia and willing surrender of basic rights is as ridiculous as the complete indifference before the attacks. We have gone from one extreme to the other. From ‘nothing can ever touch me’ to ‘everyone is out to get me’.
This is not the same country I left over 3 years ago.

One of my biggest fears about these stories is about what might happen down the road. I don't mean in a slippery-slope sense, but rather that as long as some arrests keep being rolled out, and the War on Terrorism can keep chalking up "victories," our collective initial outrage will start to fade as the shocking becomes mundane, and we will come to accept this as one more "necessary evil" for the sake of security.

Of course, I hope that doesn't happen. I hope that our initial outrage will be translated into activism, that more and more people will start grumbling at their elected representatives and getting organized.

I could imagine this issue coming to the Supreme Court's table before too long. It'll be interesting to see what they do...

Interesting indeed, but probably not pleasant. This is the same Supreme Court that appointed Dubya in the first place, and has shown great sympathy for Ashcroft's positions. Given its current makeup, and even more its likely makeup after the next couple of retirements and even-more-conservative replacements, I wouldn't exactly consider them reliable allies in the fight for our rights.

Here's another opinion on whether detentions for "Breathing While Arab" are really doing anything good for security. Yeah, sure, the URL points to AlterNet, but the original source is one that I don't think can be dismissed so lightly.

Good article, Platypus. Thanks for the link.



We are alienating the exact people we need to align ourselves with right now. This is absolute symbolism over substance, to our own detriment.

All this is a tragedy. Lincoln suspended Habius Corpus too. People need to start being held accountable.

I have no problem with the suspension of Habius corpus with regards to foriegn nationals. In fact, its not being suspended, it does not apply to them. I admitt that there is the danger of a slippery slope here but Im more concerned with appeasing militant Islamics. We have been entirly too gracious with nations, especially in the Middle East, who are dangerous to our security. Yemen, Saudia Arabia, Palestine, Iran, Syria are breeding these mindless killers and we have to protect ourselves. If that means rounding up foriegn nationals and locking them up, so be it. In this country you recieve the benefit of a doubt and you are considered reasonable and law abiding by default. The only thing that will change this presumption of innocence (charity) is proof to the contrary and there is abundant proof the Middle Eastern nationals are a threat.

I am not going to weep for someone being detained after contributing to charities that are fronts for terrorist organizations. What concerns me is the taking of the hostages in Iran, the attack on the Stark, the attack on the Kole, two embassies in Africa and the destruction of the World Trade Center in New York. This is coming from the Middle East and as far as Im concerned answering the threat of Islamic militant blood cults is long overdue.

The US Constitution states in Article 1, Section 9, Clause 2,



Let me remind you that Article 1 regards the powers of the Congress.

Common sense tells us that there is no invading army within the borders of this country. We can also say for a fact that there is certainly no armed rebellion. With these two premises we can conclude that the Congress of the United States of America cannot suspend the Writs of Habeas Corpus (WHC). Neither can the attorney General, nor the president, nor any one else suspend WHC. Finally, this man, guilty though he may be, is entitled to all the rights and privileges under the WHC.

As to directly answering the debate questions, here are my answers.

No. This man is a citizen of the USA. As there is no rebellion nor any invasion congress cannot suspend WHC.Therefore such detentions are not justifiable.

It most certainly weakens us as we are now one step closer to becoming a police state. One of my greatest concerns is that the government will abuse its power if we allow this suspension to go unchecked. What other freedoms that we hold dear will they take away under the pretence of keeping us safe? This current administration may not abuse the power that they hold. But what about future administrations? You must always remember that ALL governments do not like to relinquish the power they hold. And when they, the governments, do relinquish power in most always involves blood shed. I hope and pray that no such thing will ever happen. And no, it does not help security. PLEASE UNDERSTAND THAT I AM NOT ADVOCATING REBELLION. I AM ADVOCATING, HOWEVER, A CLOSER WATCH ON OUR GOVERNMENT'S SEEMINGLY GOOD EFFORTS TO PROTECT US SO WE DO NOT SUDDENLY FIND OURSELVES SUBJECT AGAIN TO THE TYRANNY WE HAD UNDER BRITISH RULE.

No, we cannot stand by, but there are other ways of dealing with situations like this besides the unconstitutional suspention of the WHC.

--Hilgy

Passion51,

The next time, though, it could very well be you. Don't think so? I found this article on the internet a few days ago. Don't remember which site, but I think you'll find it interesting:

Careful: The FB-eye may be watching
Reading the wrong thing in public can get you in trouble

Edited to remove complete copywrited article. Please post a link to full articles, and take the time to read the Rules and Guidelines

Not if Patriot II passes, Amlord. A provision authored there by Ashcroft would allow the US governmaent to strip and Amaerican of his citizenship and have him deported for as little as "providing monetary support to terrorists" via just such a "charity" situation as started this entire thread (ie: donating to a charity that later turns out to be a front for terrorists).

Please don't say it can't ever happen to innocents anymore. It's plain that it already is happening, and will only get worse under the current administration.

It looks like Mike Hawash has pleaded guilty after all. Two wrongs still don't make a right, though. Holding a US citizen for weeks without charges and without access to family or legal representation is still wrong, even if the suspect turns out to be guilty, and abuse of the "material witness" loophole is still wrong too.

Hawash is being held under a 1984 Material Witness statute allowing the government to hold potential witnesses who are a flight threat, there has been plenty of time to strike down this law.

I can understand the need sometimes to hold material witnesses who are a flight risk, I can not see withholding access to lawyers and family. Also any detention should be as short as possible.Holding people for weeks and months threatens the freedom of us all.

So in this case, we have a guy who was detained under the Material Witness provisions who it turns out was actually intending to become a foreign hostile.

We caught him before he had a chance to blow up our guys in Afghanistan, and now he is even ratting out his accomplices.

System seems to be working.

T'ain't right. I understand we have to tighten up security, but this is what they do in police states, this is not what America is, we need to stop destroying our principals.

CP