My blog shares ideas regarding Sociology,Conservative Politics, Catholic beliefs, current events, personal stories, Philosophy, humor and entertainment news.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Mark Levin Explains John Adams & the Boston Massacre
Mark Levin explains that there is NO parallel between John Adams, the Boston Massacre, and the lawyers who defend enemy combatants today who are without a doubt guilty of committing terrorist acts, or aiding in terroristic acts.
If you look at it a certain way, Levin is right. There isn't a parallel. Terrorists are apparently trying to overthrow our country; the British soldiers were not attempting to do that. We were. Our great and wonderful Founding Fathers were trying to overthrow the system of that time.
Anyway- Levin is operating from a position of fallacious logic. Somehow, because Adams only defended ONE of the soldiers, there is no parallel? Uh...what?
I shudder when I hear people like this, because it makes me wonder where our system of law has gone. What happened to giving people a fair trial? Under our definition of terrorism, those British soldiers were terrorists. They killed civilians. Yet Adams and his two colleagues realized something very important- if we deny people (any people, no matter how much we dislike them) the rights due to any human being, we are no better than they.
Liberty, Your operating from falacious logic. Levin has been a constitutional lawyer for many ears and knows the constitution like the back of his hand and he's correct. The lawyers using Adams as a justification to defend enemy combatants in the U.S. civilian system is falacious.
A fair trial for these people is a military tribunal instead of giving them additional rights under Ameriican sytem which they have NO right to since they were not citizens or civilians living within the United States when they were captured.
Those British soldiers were NOT TERRORISTS. You are highly mistaken. Who do you think controlled America at the time? Britain controlled America or the colonies at the time and they were not foreign nationals or terrorists but citizens who were domestic criminals.
There is no way that enemies of the state captured on a foreign battlefield should be awarded full constitutional rights. I know that some fringes on the left would even award animals such rights and a lawyers---this is the logical end to their position.
These people don't even have the right to military tribunals as they did not wear a uniform to fight a war. According to the Geneva Convention, those conducting warfare out of uniform are to be hung as spies. The other side did not honor the Geneva convention, yet nutjobs over here think terrorists caught on the battlefield are somehow entitled to OUR Constitutional rights. If Nations of this world want our Constitutional rights, then they can forgive our so called debts, pay for all the free food we donate, and pay our taxes. Now thats the sort of redistribution of wealth that needs to happen.
The British and Americans wore uniforms in the revolutionary war, as did Germans, Hessians Native Americans and French who also fought in our Revolutionary war.
John Adams did the job he was hired to do. Lawyers are hired to put their personal feeling aside and defend those who hire them to the best of their abilities. Now Lawyers push agendas, try to get people to sign on a.k.a. "tort" so they can push an agenda driven lawsuit through the court system. This practice should be a criminal activity. Eric Holder is a tort lawyer who pushed an agenda of interfering in the generous military tribunals of many detainees from Afganistan and Iraq. The world standard of war, the geneva convention, was not honored by the other side in the treatment of our captured or in their conduct of the war so we owe them nothing. Giving them military tribunals is a show of generosity. Did Daniel Pearl get such treatment? Can anyone here name a soldier that got such treatment in Iraq or Afganistan?
Liberty, where do you get these ideas? The British soldiers where more like the police in this situation. They had a fellow soldier that behaved badly. I would call it more of an example of Police brutality.
The thing is, Teresa, that these men aren't getting tribunals. They're not getting trials. And we have to give them trials. If we don't, we risk the entire abandonment of the principles that we were founded on.
This issue is very convoluted, and there's a lot of stuff that needs to change. Adding a LOT of complexity is the fact that many of the men we've detained...we didn't detain. Egypt or Saudi Arabia or the ISI caught them, held them for awhile, then sent them here at our behest because for some strange reason we think we have a right to any prisoner who looks Middle Eastern. So we're not even catching many of the detainees.
Then the men are held for years in some cases without legal counsel, in a facility without any oversight. All of these facilities are overseas or off our coasts- Gitmo, for instance, or CIA "black-sites." Not a good way to carry out jailing people. It just doesn't look good.
I really don't understand the argument that "well, since these men aren't uniformed and they aren't fighting as an army, then we don't have to treat them as human beings." That is not an American attitude in my opinion.
I will admit that there are many differences between Adams' situation and ours. But Levin's argument that just because Adams "only defended one" he was somehow different doesn't make sense to me. Would someone enlighten me?
The Bush administration had plans to try about 60 to 80 of the 245 foreign inmates still being held at Guantanamo. The camp once had some 750 prisoners. Eric Holder suspended military tribunals.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/5134328.stm The delay saved lives. http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2009/11/column-years-of-delay-saved-lives.html
Liberty, Typo corrections: The Bush administration are not the people who delayed the military commissions. It was lawyers working on behalf of the enemy comabatants.
Obama suspended prosecutions and military commissions with an Executive Order. KSM and others could have been tried by a Military commission by now.
Obama and his administration are still figuring out how to handle the detainess now when many enemy combatants could have already been tried in front of a military commission. Because of lawsuits made on the detainees behalf there has been only a few trials and convictions of enemy conbatants. That is when there was a specific Act created the focused on detainees and military tribunals--Military Commissions Act of 2006. http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/06/29/scotus.tribunals/index.html
14 comments:
If you look at it a certain way, Levin is right. There isn't a parallel. Terrorists are apparently trying to overthrow our country; the British soldiers were not attempting to do that. We were. Our great and wonderful Founding Fathers were trying to overthrow the system of that time.
Anyway- Levin is operating from a position of fallacious logic. Somehow, because Adams only defended ONE of the soldiers, there is no parallel? Uh...what?
I shudder when I hear people like this, because it makes me wonder where our system of law has gone. What happened to giving people a fair trial? Under our definition of terrorism, those British soldiers were terrorists. They killed civilians. Yet Adams and his two colleagues realized something very important- if we deny people (any people, no matter how much we dislike them) the rights due to any human being, we are no better than they.
I *heart* Mark Levin.
Liberty,
Your operating from falacious logic. Levin has been a constitutional lawyer for many ears and knows the constitution like the back of his hand and he's correct. The lawyers using Adams as a justification to defend enemy combatants in the U.S. civilian system is falacious.
A fair trial for these people is a military tribunal instead of giving them additional rights under Ameriican sytem which they have NO right to since they were not citizens or civilians living within the United States when they were captured.
Those British soldiers were NOT TERRORISTS. You are highly mistaken. Who do you think controlled America at the time? Britain controlled America or the colonies at the time and they were not foreign nationals or terrorists but citizens who were domestic criminals.
Cube,
I *hear* Levin too.
God I love that man!!!!
There is no way that enemies of the state captured on a foreign battlefield should be awarded full constitutional rights. I know that some fringes on the left would even award animals such rights and a lawyers---this is the logical end to their position.
Don't you just LOVE it when people who don't know what they're talking about take on someone who is highly qualified in his field?
Levin is so correct.
These people don't even have the right to military tribunals as they did not wear a uniform to fight a war. According to the Geneva Convention, those conducting warfare out of uniform are to be hung as spies. The other side did not honor the Geneva convention, yet nutjobs over here think terrorists caught on the battlefield are somehow entitled to OUR Constitutional rights. If Nations of this world want our Constitutional rights, then they can forgive our so called debts, pay for all the free food we donate, and pay our taxes. Now thats the sort of redistribution of wealth that needs to happen.
The British and Americans wore uniforms in the revolutionary war, as did Germans, Hessians Native Americans and French who also fought in our Revolutionary war.
John Adams did the job he was hired to do. Lawyers are hired to put their personal feeling aside and defend those who hire them to the best of their abilities. Now Lawyers push agendas, try to get people to sign on a.k.a. "tort" so they can push an agenda driven lawsuit through the court system. This practice should be a criminal activity. Eric Holder is a tort lawyer who pushed an agenda of interfering in the generous military tribunals of many detainees from Afganistan and Iraq. The world standard of war, the geneva convention, was not honored by the other side in the treatment of our captured or in their conduct of the war so we owe them nothing. Giving them military tribunals is a show of generosity. Did Daniel Pearl get such treatment? Can anyone here name a soldier that got such treatment in Iraq or Afganistan?
Levin really knows his stuff.
Liberty, where do you get these ideas? The British soldiers where more like the police in this situation. They had a fellow soldier that behaved badly. I would call it more of an example of Police brutality.
Good point Odie.
The thing is, Teresa, that these men aren't getting tribunals. They're not getting trials. And we have to give them trials. If we don't, we risk the entire abandonment of the principles that we were founded on.
This issue is very convoluted, and there's a lot of stuff that needs to change. Adding a LOT of complexity is the fact that many of the men we've detained...we didn't detain. Egypt or Saudi Arabia or the ISI caught them, held them for awhile, then sent them here at our behest because for some strange reason we think we have a right to any prisoner who looks Middle Eastern. So we're not even catching many of the detainees.
Then the men are held for years in some cases without legal counsel, in a facility without any oversight. All of these facilities are overseas or off our coasts- Gitmo, for instance, or CIA "black-sites." Not a good way to carry out jailing people. It just doesn't look good.
I really don't understand the argument that "well, since these men aren't uniformed and they aren't fighting as an army, then we don't have to treat them as human beings." That is not an American attitude in my opinion.
I will admit that there are many differences between Adams' situation and ours. But Levin's argument that just because Adams "only defended one" he was somehow different doesn't make sense to me. Would someone enlighten me?
Liberty,
The Bush adminsitration are not the people who delayed the military commissions. It was layers working on behalf of the enemy comabatants.
http://article.nationalreview.com/414647/justice-delayed/andrew-c-mccarthy
http://www.heritage.org/press/commentary/ed112309b.cfm
The Bush administration had plans to try about 60 to 80 of the 245 foreign inmates still being held at Guantanamo. The camp once had some 750 prisoners. Eric Holder suspended military tribunals.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/5134328.stm
The delay saved lives.
http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2009/11/column-years-of-delay-saved-lives.html
Liberty,
Typo corrections:
The Bush administration are not the people who delayed the military commissions. It was lawyers working on behalf of the enemy comabatants.
Obama suspended prosecutions and military commissions with an Executive Order. KSM and others could have been tried by a Military commission by now.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/washington/22gitmo.html
http://reason.com/blog/2009/01/21/obama-suspends-military-tribun
Obama and his administration are still figuring out how to handle the detainess now when many enemy combatants could have already been tried in front of a military commission.
Because of lawsuits made on the detainees behalf there has been only a few trials and convictions of enemy conbatants. That is when there was a specific Act created the focused on detainees and military tribunals--Military Commissions Act of 2006.
http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/06/29/scotus.tribunals/index.html
Post a Comment