I’m not a big fan of Lindsey Graham, but once in a while he’s not a total waste of oxygen:
One would have thought that Holder would have been prepared for this obvious question. That he wasn’t just shows what an incompetent, political hack he really is.
[Update a few minutes later]
Andy McCarthy, the anti-Holder, expands on the subject:
The lawyer’s stock in trade is precedent. Whether you’re a prosecutor or any other lawyer faced with a policy question, the first thing you want to know is what the law says on the subject: Has this come up before? Are there prior cases on point? What have the courts had to say? Those are the first-order questions — always.
…How could Holder possibly not know the answer to this fundamental question — how could he, in fact, be stumped by it. If he studied and agonized over this decision as he says he did, this would have been the first issue he’d have considered: the fact that there was no legal precedent for what he wanted to do. Or, put another way, if there was a single case that supported Holder’s decision, it would have been the only case we’d have been hearing about — from DOJ, the academy, and the media — for the last ten months.
Hack. The country’s in the very best of hands.
[Update a few minutes later]
The insanity grows. Senator Leahy says it’s OK, we don’t need to interrogate bin Laden.
It seems to me Graham’s Miranda warning point might actually be a bit of a red herring.
On the one hand, suppose they picked up Bin Laden and interrogated him without reading him Miranda. That would mean they couldn’t use anything they got out of him against him in court, but couldn’t they still use it for any other purpose?
On the other, suppose they did read him Miranda, but then later took him off for some enhanced military-style interrogations. BL would soon find out that his right to remain silent wouldn’t stop his military/CIA/FBI interrogators from doing nasty things to him to persuade him to do so anyway, much as they successfully persuaded KSM.
I’m against trying our enemies in a public court for other reasons, but this Miranda issue doesn’t seem like much of a problem. AFAIK (not a lawyer here) lack of Miranda isn’t a get out of jail free card for criminal defendents. It can get the evidence derived from interrogations thrown out of court, but not necessarily the charges themselves. What’s wrong with this straighforward rule: if you want to use the results of your interrogations in court, Mirandize, otherwise no need to.
Better yet, forget about trying enemy combatants — lawful or otherwise, U.S. citizen or not — in civilian courts.
Makes for a much simpler interrogation scenario, seems to me. But then, I’m neither mentally ill nor a lawyer (and I often wonder whether there’s a significant difference).
Better yet, forget about trying enemy combatants — lawful or otherwise, U.S. citizen or not — in civilian courts.
I can think of three things wrong with this right off the bat:
1) It doesn’t let you put on show trials to embarass the previous administration.
2) It doesn’t allow you to demonstrate that your former law firm has the U.S. Attorney General in their pocket, and hence are #1 in terrorist legal defense.
3) It doesn’t allow you to mock and undermine the idea that the U.S. is an enemy to be feared if you are a terrorist.
Other than that it seems pretty reasonable to me.
Dang. I always overlook those.
It may be that Holder and friends did study and agonize over this decision as they say they did even if they hadn’t considered precedents on the subject. Their detailed consideration of the issue was almost certainly focused on the political implications, not the legal issues. The whole KSM trial decision is about politics.
All this is irrelevant. Congress will pass a law denying use of Federal funds to transport detainees to US soil or to give them civilian trials. Obama will say to his nutlog base, “I tried but Congress wouldn’t let me. I suspect obstructionist right-wing Republicans.” Congressmen from nutlog districts will vote against the denial. Congressmen from relatively sane districts will vote for it.
It’s a batting-practice pitch grooved to Congress so it can look sane even if it votes for the health care bill.