and Black Robes
Published on December 1, 2009
At roughly the same time the president was repeating his diplomatic blunder, we saw Attorney General Eric Holder step to the microphones to make an important announcement—one that had to wait until the president was safely out of the country for plausible deniability. Holder came forward to tell us that after chatting with his wife and brother (who we must assume are great legal scholars), he concluded it was best we bring Khaled Shaikh Mohammed (KSM) to the United States to be tried in civilian courts in New York City. My jaw dropped. To do this, they would bring KSM within walking distance of the gaping wound where the World Trade Center once stood. I was flabbergasted at the notion and heavyhearted for the people of New York.
Attorney General Holder is no rookie to the Justice Department. He served as deputy under former Attorney General Janet Reno in the Clinton era. It was Holder who gave Clinton the legal justification to explain why the pardon of Puerto Rican terrorists and Marc Rich was perfectly acceptable, but only after securing the support of Puerto Rican groups vying for the release of those terrorists, for his wife’s Senate campaign, and very large amounts of money from the ex-wife of Marc Rich.
Holder was also present for the fiasco that was the Ramzi Yousef trial. Though the Justice Department tried other conspirators in the first attack on the World Trade Center, it was the trial of Yousef that did the most damage to the U.S. The trial resulted in conviction and a life sentence but also did great damage to our intelligence gathering operations aimed at al Qaeda and bin Laden. For instance, in the trial’s discovery phase it was revealed that the CIA and NSA were keeping tabs on Osama bin Laden by listening in on his satellite phone. Within days of the Yousef legal team getting this information, bin Laden ceased using the satellite phone. That blow to intelligence gathering operations alone may have cost us over three thousands lives in 2001.
Here we are in 2009 and the liberals again want to treat an act of war as a crime in civilian courts, with all the horrible ramifications that it entails. Once again we will have the terrorist whose plan killed so many Americans brought near the scene of the crime to mock his victims, the survivors, and friends and relatives of the victims too. What is unconscionable is that this is exactly what KSM wanted. He wanted to be brought to New York for a show trial and we are giving this vile piece of human debris what he wants. It is an insult to the memory of the 9/11 victims and all who have died in the War against Terrorism that KSM be given this forum to vilify Americans on our own soil, while in the process he will undoubtedly be trying to inspire others to follow his path of Jihad against the West. I cannot fathom the thinking that brought us to this point.
Bringing him here from GITMO will mean he will be afforded the full Constitutional rights afforded any American citizen. This will cause many problems. For instance, how exactly do you seat a jury of his peers? Are there a large number of Islamo-fascists in NY City? If you do seat a jury of his peers, which obviously means there will be Sunni Muslims sitting on that jury, what are the odds they will be willing to convict a fellow Sunni Muslim of killing infidels? Will those jurors be willing to go home and face the dangers that might be posed to them for having convicted him, for what might their Sunni neighbors do to them?
How do you get around the fact he was not read his Miranda rights on the battlefield? What assurance do we have that a liberal judge won’t throw out all the evidence obtained prior to a Miranda rights reading, if there ever was one? What if the evidence is thrown out because some squishy liberal is offended that he was water boarded for it? Never mind that water boarding has actually yielded information that saved American lives.
What happens if he decides to forgo legal counsel and represents himself? Imagine what documents and evidence he will demand to see in the discovery phase. He is actually fairly intelligent and grasps details well. He will take full advantage of the situation. After all, this is a trial for his life; he can pull out all the stops and demand intelligence that will compromise operations and the lives of operatives we have. We could not refuse him this course if he chooses it.
It will also be a media circus. Imagine the press coverage from around the world and what a fertile terrorist recruiting operation KSM can make this from the courtroom. All while Holder would have to sit there and take it.
This is a mess that need not have happened. There was no need for a trial at this time. The issue of prisoners of war getting trials was settled by the U.S. Supreme Court in Johnson v. Eisentrager in 1950. We need not give trial to an enemy detained in time of war. However the fools now residing at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue are loathe to admit we are still in a war.
Had this been left alone, and when the War on Terror was over, a military tribunal could have been used and none of these issues would be a factor. But for some bizarre reason liberals insist on dragging us down this deluded and suicidal path. It is sheer folly that will cost us dearly.
I am not reassured by Holder’s insistence to the Senate that they will convict him. He keeps telling us not to worry, and that if we could only see the evidence we would know that conviction is assured. This argument reminds me of the old Western movies where they tell you there will be a fair trial and a hanging in the morning. Holder then tells us if he fails to convict him, we won’t let him go anyway. That is just brilliant. That makes a mockery of our entire justice system and gives the enemy the ammo to say it was an unjust trial from the start. So why bother to try him if we are going to hold him no matter what? It is all so inept and embarrassing for the world to see what kind of people now are running the United States.
One last disturbing point about all this is telling the American people Eric Holder made this decision to try KSM in New York just a couple weeks ago. That is just another Obama administration lie. New York Governor David Patterson, who is a Democrat, tells us that he was told way back in May, that the trial would take place in New York City and was informed of this by the Obama Administration. It is clear that if this fails, Obama wants to be able to say he had nothing to do with the decision. If they were one hundred percent sure of conviction, there would be no need for plausible deniability on this subject. The fact that Obama feels the need to cover himself in this way suggests they know only too well they may lose the case against Khalid Shaikh Mohammed. That is disturbing.
No amount of logic or legal thought went into this—just the continued ideological folly of liberals who want to treat acts of war as though they were committed by common street thugs. Just as they pursue failed Marxist economic plans that deepen our economic woes, they will dive in to this full steam ahead, damn the consequences. This is dangerous, unnecessary and will make future terror attacks all the more likely.
Elections have dire consequences my friends.