From: Phil Osborn (philosborn2001@yahoo.com)
Date: Thu Jul 31 2003 - 19:06:14 MDT
So, states have special "rights" that people somehow
do not? Well, at least it's a consistent position.
States define whatever "rights" exist by virtue of
having more guns than mere citizens. I get that. OK,
"Rights" then are merely whatever is legal. I.e.,
Jews had no right to exist in NAZI Germany, just as
our heroic* drug dealers have no similar "right" to
exist in the U.S. (or anywhere on Earth, in as much as
the U.S. has now given itself the "right" to hunt them
down and kill them anywhere in the universe).
*Hey, if Ms. Lynch can be a hero for passing out and
being rescued, then a drug dealer, who takes huge
actual risks to deliver products to eager consumers,
in spite of armed thugs in uniform expending every
effort to find and imprison or kill him, certainly
qualifies... Or maybe only if the drug dealer has a
cute photogenic face?
So, all we have to have is any ongoing conflict - and
WHO decides THAT issue - and then we can just dispense
with all that silly nonsense about juries, due
process, trials, public tranparency... I guess Hitler
had it right with that little fire at the Reichstag,
huh? This is a libertarian position??? libertarianism
sure has changed from what I thought it was.
Now I can certainly understand that if someone is
pointing an RPG at you, you don't have to read him or
her his rights before blowing the sucker away.
However, the whole point of giving battlefield
personnel that discretion is that the demands of
self-preservation require it. Once you have actually
subdued and captured the person, then other rules
apply, including due process, trial by jury, etc.
And the need to prevent enemy combattants from taking
advantage in ways that involve non-combattants
involuntarilly - as in spies pretending to be
civilians, or using civilians otherwise as human
shields - still requires a determination that this has
in fact been the case. Which means public trial by
jury, etc.
The discretion to kill or otherwise inflict harm on
any person is limited by the natural requirements of
the situation. We all have the natural right to
defend ourselves from immediate attack. None of us
has the right to extend that to killing other people
after they are safely in custody - except in the very
limited circumstances of a natural battlefield
emergency, which, again, is justified by immediate
need.
Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@yahoo.com)
Date: Wed Jul 30 2003: .... While ANY conflict is
ongoing, seized enemy combatants, legal or illegal in
nature, can be held indefinitely. Disposition under
courts of law is only REQUIRED when a specific
conflict has ended, but this ONLY applies to LEGAL
combatants.
(Me: And so, once again, somehow some military person
makes a determination that supercedes and nullifies
all other rights. Just declare that person ILLEGAL
and then you can do whatever you want to them. Just
announce that a conflict is ONGOING and you can
declare anyone ILLEGAL whenever you want.)
....I am so adamant that illegal combatants should be
seen as the worst sort of criminal on earth, because
they seek to destroy the most important bonds of trust
that maintain the subservience of military to
civilian.
(Me: my understanding is that we already have cases
now of American citizens losing their citizenship
rights BEFORE any trial, just by this same sort of
declaration - the "American Taliban" being one such
example.)
(Me: who would have thought that throwing out a couple
centuries of supposed Constitutional-based liberty
would be so simple?)
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Thu Jul 31 2003 - 19:14:28 MDT