In a belated epiphany, the Supreme Court's Habeas Corpus decision of 12 June is recognition of what was the Bush Administration's greatest fraud: terrorists were everywhere, and they were dealing with them.
One of my biggest puzzlements post 9-11 was why the Bush administration would go to such extra-legal legal lengths to imprison alleged terrorists outside of any supportable legal framework. These prisoners (among them children as so eloquently discussed by the Honorable Dennis Kucinich this week) are held without the ability to usefully answer or confront charges, in prisons around the world, sometimes with little or no evidence to support their incarceration and abduction. Clearly the American and international justice system could easily handle such cases under existing laws with the legal protections for the accused extant. Why weren't these people declared Prisoners of War either? That was truly enigmatic to me. POWs could be held indefinitely--pending the outcome of a conflict or international negotiation.
The answer: the Bush administration wanted numbers, not justice. They sought to prove a terrorist was hiding under every rock by incarcerating as many people as possible without regard to whether or not they were even legitimate suspects or POWs. By October 2001, the "body count" of the war on terror would be terrorists in custody. By depriving these people of their basic rights under international or constitutional law, the administration could make a case for funding a war indefinitely--moving aggressively against terror "havens" like Iraq, and convincing the American people that we fought an army of evil cock-roaches that scampered everywhere. This was especially important because the Bush administration had ignored Al Qaeda until 12 September 2001. The fact that the administration had failed to contain relatively small numbers of terrorists, had ignored real and relatively easy to counter threats, could not be allowed to enter the "different world" discussion. Thus, America and its compliant media entered into a new McCarthy era where terrorists were everywhere, including Hollywood, Washington, and Topeka. And they could prove it by the sheer volume of terrorists in custody. There were 100s of them! None was represented by counsel, or going to trial in public mind you, so you could also torture them and see what else turned up. They were mostly brown-skinned, abducted from chaotic Islamic countries which disliked America, and easily demonized. It was a classic plan--shock and awe. Use these people and their secret intelligence as justification for all manner of war and attack. Within this cynical trumped up groundswell for war, the administration never caught any of the ring leaders. Further, as they began capturing "100s" of terrorists, the strangest part of this whole undertaking took place: a hugely suspicious anthrax attack against Democrats and the media. Terrorist were everywhere! And Bush and Cheney were just the men to deal with them.
But what was Plan B?
Eventually these prisoners would have to receive some kind of justice? Having taken the hostages and flouted the law, Bush, like a child who has stolen cookies or has run away from his parents in a mall, had managed to put out of his thoughts the consequences of his actions--he must have hoped the President Obama would be confronted by the illegalities and war crimes while he cleared brush in South America. Today, the Supreme Court began to walk back in the Constitution. America will now have to confront the war crimes of President Bush. He has incarcerated scores of innocents to improve his body count and justification for being a limitless unitary executive. Like executive over-reach of the past, reparations, apologies, and lengthy reiterations of existing international law will have to happen. It is pretty clear that in denying every one of the prisoners their rights, Bush hoped to avoid facing any consequences of his actions: illegal abduction, illegal incarceration, jailing minors, mistreating POWs, ignoring constitutional and international protections for persons suspected of crimes, torture. It is a grab bag of war crimes. Within the mix of the mostly unlucky are choice groups of truly bad criminals. And the case against them has now been weakened immeasurably by the unlawful manner the administration prosecuted this war. Just when one thinks the administration cannot be any less competent, they dig a deeper cellar.
My synopsis: the administration purposely paraded 100s of POWs before the world's cameras as "illegal combatants" to prove there was an imminent threat. Denied them any representation, fair trials, evidence, or ability to confront their accusers. Tortured many of them without fear of repercussion since there would be secret military tribunals of dubious legality to rubber-stamp the pre-arranged verdicts. And there was Anthrax. Sadam. Iran. And a fearful public. The public wasn't really fearful of terrorists--no; just that taking the wrong side or looking unrepublican might cost them their jobs. Hell, they were listening to your calls, reading your porn, and watching your library list. Habeas Corpus was dead. The fear has always been the Republican over our shoulders. So we did nothing while they committed heinous war crimes in our name. And unknown numbers of people, never formally arraigned or charged, many tortured to death, are still out there in limbo waiting for our conscience to overwhelm our financial fears.
The Supreme Court may have finally snapped our ample sweaty asses with a wet gym towel. We better start looking at the damage right now. Oh, and Madam Speaker, the Constitution compels us to impeach and remove. Congress isn't spot-free in this. . . Aiding and abetting comes to mind.