US gets itself in a noose with its core democratic values
Emma Tom, The Australian
June 14, 2006
~snip~
For too long, ill-informed and ill-deodorised lefty activists - such as student protesters and Britain's most senior judges - have been shrieking that the Guantanamo terrorists should be formally charged, should be able to challenge their detention in court, should be questioned without testicle electrodes, blah blah habeas corpus blah (talk about demanding).
This week the US responded by revealing the intricacies of how it determines the guilt and innocence of enemy combatants. Thanks to the aggressive terrorist suicide strikes at Guantanamo Bay at the weekend, we now know that the US is not operating in a judicial black hole.
The leader of the free world does, in fact, have a bold new approach to due process - an approach that draws heavily on the acclaimed standards of proof involved in the witch-drowning trials of 17th-century Europe.
~snip~
No doubt the bleeding-heart, latte-swilling, gay-marriage, ABC, Bush-bashing brigade will try to claim there's a world of difference between a mass-murderous suicide that wipes out a great chunk of New York and three lonely self-strangulations that occur in isolated cells in an island camp so secret that even lawyers and family members aren't allowed in.
But despite the endless whining and hand-wringing, the US approach to enemy combatant justice has been revealed as being perfectly straightforward: if you're in Guantanamo and you top yourself, you're guilty. This is because it proves that you're a one-eyed jihadist who's prepared to stop at nothing to besmirch America's good name by making it look like the great nation has treated you so badly you've lost your will to live. You evil bastard.
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