"I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him. "

I think it is safe to say that Justice for the 9/11 victims is not part of Bush's agenda.

Oh, please... So why try Hamdan, then?

Ah, yes... this all meshes rather well with your "Iraq is a diversion" nonsense.

Look, in the grand scheme of things, Bush is quite correct; Removing BinLaden from the equation is not going to solve, as I've indicated before, the larger problem we face, which is radical Islam. BinLaden is a symptom of that illness, not the cause, and removing him still leaves the larger problem of the illness.

If we manage to get the guy fine, that's a good thing, but it's not going to solve the problem. OTOH, if we manage to corral radicalised Islam, we've cut the legs out from under BinLaden as well.

That said, in six months when this guy gets turned loose, as looks to be happening, now, it'll be interesting to see where he surfaces.

Hans the Wehrmacht driver was equally subject to detention without trial, even if he wasn't guilty of breaking any laws. The idea of individualized guilt and innocence determinations for enemy combatants is simply bizarre.

Sure, but Hans was likely captured in a Wehrmacht uniform while driving a Wehrmacht vehicle. He was in the employment of a hostile military during a time of a definable war and treated according to definable runs. Hamdan, meanwhile, isn't part of a uniformed military and isn't an EPW.

Hans the Wehrmacht driver was equally subject to detention without trial, even if he wasn't guilty of breaking any laws. The idea of individualized guilt and innocence determinations for enemy combatants is simply bizarre.

Apparently the members of the military commssion didn't take this man's crimes all that seriously. I know someone who got 84 months in Florida for writing $1,300 worth of bad checks. Seven years.

but please exlain to us, how you figure Hamden innocent

Bit, you seem to be increasing confused. Where did I say I figured him innocent? Clearly, I am agreeing that he is at least complicit.

And since Bush is on record saying this about Bin Laden:

"I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him. "

I think it is safe to say that Justice for the 9/11 victims is not part of Bush's agenda.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/03/20020313-8.html

Look, for all I care, they could've lined Hamdan up against the nearest wall in buttplug Afghanistan (or where ever he was captured) and summarily shot him.

However, the military tribunal is certainly sophisticated enough to 1) know that ruling the way they did would allow guys like you to say exactly what you are saying, 2) know that guys like you would say what you are saying, and 3) that is why the prosecution chose to start with a small fish like Hamdan before moving on to bigger fish. Gotta try to build a little faith and confidence in the system.

If the tribunal isn't smart enough to figure all that out on their own, they aren't smart enough to sit on the tribunal.

N.b. however that Haynes is gone.

There are serious problems with the system, but I am not going to believe that the jurors (or panel, as Scott Horton has it) were actually instructed how to vote, or threatened if they acquitted -- not without particular evidence.

Huh? What exactly did they do that was even ever-so-slightly wrong?

Hamdan was tried by a military tribunal sanctioned by Congress, authorized by the UCMJ, and mandated by the Supreme Court.

I'd have to go back and recheck the Congressional sanction and the SC decision but i'm pretty sure neither one mandated a farce show trial that the accused literally could not win.

That's what these are. we've heard it straight from the source that there are to be no acquittals. Evidence be damned these guys are all going down.

That's isn't a trial. not even by the lax standards of military justice.

It's an obscenity.

Five months from now is January 7?

Maybe the Pentagon will actually let him go a couple of weeks after that ....

I think I may be able to find even a lot of human rights types who will argue against you there.

Good luck with that, let me know what you find.

Well, actually I'd already looked at that a few days ago, incidental to another dicussion. Owing to the multi-link filter, here, let's accomplish this, this way.

And as you read those links please note that the most prevelant use of the argument is what I suggested... by human rights types.

So does silence equal complicity, or not?

How in the hell are they even mentionable in the same paragraph as the commanders at Auschwitz

I won't get into that directly, but it occurs to me to ask as a sidebar about the mere functionaries at Auschwitz...

Sorry, for lack of clarity. The Lieber Code is another name for General Order 100 (link at bottom), which was the result of Lieber's groundbreaking effort to summarize the laws of war. (J. Allred references "general orders," but seems to be more interested in evaluating the practical application of those orders in the post-war analysis)

Based upon the language (which probably doesn't rise to criminal law-level clarity), military commanders tried civilians for aid and comfort of the enemy. I will try to look up some examples, but I would be surpised if this didn't include people housing horses for guerrilas or hiding them in the barn. Whether this is analagous to driving a car is probably debatable. I don't think its debatable that noncombat support for the enemy was treated as a military offense.

General Rule 100

The jurors? I'm not following you, Tlaloc. They aren't lawyers. They were instructed in the law by the judge, and had to rely on his characterization thereof.

Whatever the merits re: Hamdan, the issues are nowhere close to, say, the issue confronting Lt. Calley's subordinates when he told them to kill *all* the villagers at My Lai. That was obviously wrong, such that IMHO every soldier there who fired a shot should've been court-martialled.

It was not so obviously shocking to the conscience for the jury to accept Judge Allred's characterization of the law, and to find that Hamdan's duties as chauffeur and bodyguard met the definition of the alleged offense.