Do Not Pass Go, Get Declared a Domestic Terrorist, Get Sent to Gov't Run Camp

[De Selby]

Headless, your analysis of the problem is fundamentally misguided.  Your stuck on what you think the perceived facts of each detention will be - if only bad people are detained, you're fine with it, and that's different from a policy of detaining political opponents.

Here's what you missed, and the key problem with your support for unlimited detention:  In the criminal system, the government has to allege facts and prove them beyond a reasonable doubt.  This is how you ensure that the bogey-men like Padilla go to prison, while the political opponents like gun owners do not.

Now, under Bush, you supported giving the government the power to use a label (terrorist) to detain anyone it wants, and to deprive that person of any right to challenge the detention.  Knowing that Bush would not always be in office, what mechanism do you then have for only ensuring that the Padillas go to prison, and not the run-of-the-mill gun owners?

Answer: None, because there's no review process and no check on the government's power.  It just says "terrorist", and that's the end of the story.  This is the problem with relying on the rule of "when headless thinks it's okay to arrest and detain it is, and when headless doesn't, it's not" to guide your approach to to this issue.  It's an institution that exercises the power, not a person, so unless you have a reliable mechanism to monitor and restrict its activities it absolutely will imprison people that you feel insulted at having to compare with Jose Padilla.

Sometimes you need to focus less on what you think are the facts of each case (because in reality, you don't have any clue what Padilla did personally), and more on how the process for determining right from wrong works in order to get a decent result.  Tossing out important restrictions on state power because you hate the accused today is a guaranteed mechanism of facing gross injustice against someone you don't hate tomorrow - and this bill is proof of that.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

That supposes that there is no process in place for determining who winds up in detention as a terrorist and who does not.  The facts are otherwise.  There is a legal system for judging terrorists in Gitmo and guys like Padilla. 

We've been round and round on precisely what type of legal framework would work best for handling terrorists, whether the current system is ideal or not, whether a traditional criminal system can do justice for people who bear no resemblance to criminals.  I don't want to fall into that morass again here. 

But the fact is that we do have a system that separates people who ought to be detained as terrorists from people who oughtn't be detained.  Any argument that rests upon the premise that there is no way to differentiate between them is flawed from the beginning.

Any actions by the current government that fails to differentiate terrorists from honest Americans, as currently happens, will be something entirely new and unprecedented.

[seeker_two]

That supposes that there is no process in place for determining who winds up in detention as a terrorist and who does not.  The facts are otherwise.  There is a legal system for judging terrorists in Gitmo and guys like Padilla. 

Somebody should tell Padilla.... 

[De Selby]

The facts are otherwise.  There is a legal system for judging terrorists in Gitmo and guys like Padilla. 

We've been round and round on precisely what type of legal framework would work best for handling terrorists, whether the current system is ideal or not, whether a traditional crimina

There is only a system that was forced on the government by the courts- you opposed even that.

Can you explain how this bill is any different from the pre-court procedures instituted for padilla?  What was the "process"?