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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dale Baker who wrote (22773)	7/3/2006 4:54:39 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541370

You have mixed the concepts so far I don't know where to start. The concepts aren't properly entirely separate, the enemy doesn't only operate in Afghanistan. If they operated in large armed bands in wilderness areas in the US it wouldn't be unreasonable to drop a 500lb bomb on them in the US. Instead when they operate in the US they act more like spies or criminals, but they are still an enemy force not just a band of criminals. I am very sympathetic to the idea that Bush has gone to far in his domestic surveillance efforts, particularly if the example of surveillance is entirely domestic (in other words you aren't talking about monitoring calls or money transfers from Al Qaeda to people in the US). I'm less sympathetic to the argument that the policies are clear and major constitutional violations. IMO Bush has pushed in to the murky grey areas, and that can be a bad or dangerous thing, but it is not the same as just ignoring the constitution. Gitmo is a sad exaggeration of a loophole in the international laws of war. Perhaps not strictly illegal or unconstitutional but extremely detrimental to the American ability to stand up as a leader in human rights. Should have been shut down years ago to contain the political damage now being caused. I really don't understand how you can come to that conclusion. In conflict you normally take prisoners, and the idea of "kill them all, don't take any prisoners" would be considered a violation of the spirit and letter of international norms and agreements. If you take prisoners you have to keep them somewhere. If we close Gitmo we will have to move the prisoners somewhere else. When we took prisoners in past wars there was normally no issue of trials. The prisoners do not have to have done anything illegal in order to be proper prisoners. If they are a member of a hostile force, and you let them go than they will resume hostilities. So you don't let them go. If countries generally were somehow forced to let them go than "take no prisoners" would have become the normal mode of operation, even with international agreements against the idea.