The Way We Treat Private Manning, and Why It Matters

[LnGrrrR]

This is a great article from Glenn Greenwald, and points out why our actions have long-reaching effects.

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2011/04/11/manning/index.html



China also "accused the U.S. . . . of pushing for Internet freedom around the world as a way to undermine other nations, while noting that Washington's campaign against secret-spilling website WikiLeaks showed its own sensitivity to the free flow of information," and further "lambasted the U.S. over issues ranging from homelessness and violent crime to the influence of money on politics and the negative effects of its foreign policy on civilians." China’s human rights record is atrocious, but can anyone contest the validity of its objections to the U.S. and the Obama administration’s purporting to act as human rights arbiters for the world?

[xrayzebra]

Oh, cry me a river. Poor baby. I would say screw him,
but he would enjoy that.

[ElNono]

Oh, cry me a river. Poor baby. I would say screw him,
but he would enjoy that.

ray, what you think about the actual subject of the thread? :lol

[boutons_deux]

XZ doesn't think, he reacts, like WC, to his ideology and biases.

[xrayzebra]

How do you spell "BS". I especially liked this little
blurp: ""more than 250 of America's most eminent legal scholars" that "includes leading figures from all the top US law schools, as well as prominent names from other academic fields" -- featuring "Laurence Tribe, a Harvard professor who is considered to be America's foremost liberal authority on constitutional law";..."

Hehehehehe.

What do I think of the article. It is a joke like the
250 Liberal scholars of Constitutional law.

[Winehole23]

The Obama administration's decision last week to shift the high-profile 9/11 case from federal court is bound to move the military system toward legitimacy. The commissions lack the seasoned body of precedent that guides civilian courts, so their procedures will have to survive litigation by defense lawyers. But once the commissions gain stature and become the "new normal," every future administration will have a ready instrument to arrest, judge and sentence wholly within the executive branch, evading the separation of powers carefully calibrated in the Constitution. The judicial branch has no role except on appeal, where only the federal court for the D.C. circuit may review a verdict and sentence after the trial.


It seems far-fetched to imagine tribunals in San Francisco as well as Guantanamo, yet the law allows the spread of such a system, impeded only by officials' restraint. Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. pledged Monday to restrict the use of commissions, but one official's good intentions cannot shield civil liberties from government intrusion. Restraint usually dies during spasms of fear over national security.


The framers saw that rights depend on structural bulwarks, not on particular officeholders. "All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree," James Madison declared at the Constitutional Convention as he noted "the political depravity of men and the necessity of checking one vice and interest by opposing to them another vice and interest." The checks are being eroded here.
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/apr/10/opinion/la-oe-shipler-military-commissions-20110410

[boutons_deux]

Obama’s constitutional law professor joins group calling Manning’s treatment illegal

Nearly 300 experts, scholars and authors demand an end to Manning's rough treatment

The Harvard professor who taught President Barack Obama about America's founding document has added his name to a letter damning the treatment of U.S. Army Private Bradley Manning, the lone soldier accused of leaking a vast number of government secrets to anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks.

Harvard Constitutional law professor Laurence Tribe, who quit his post as an adviser to the Obama administration about three months ago, is just one of nearly 300 of the nation's top legal minds and other experts to sign an open letter calling on the government to treat Bradley Manning as it does other prisoners.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/04/11/obamas-constitutional-law-professor-joins-group-calling-mannings-treatment-illegal/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheRawStory+%28The+Raw+Story% 29

===============

We see with Manning how the The Greatest Country In The World treats anybody who dares to expose its lies and crimes.

Govt lies to Human-Americans non-stop with no consequences, but if you lie to the govt, horrible punishment.

[Winehole23]

A two-tiered system of justice makes us look like a banana republic. The sad tragedy of all this is that we already have a system that works, is far cheaper, and has been far more effective in delivering terrorists to justice: the criminal justice system.

[xrayzebra]

XZ doesn't think, he reacts, like WC, to his ideology and biases.


Well Boy Wonder of the Communist world, I
am sure you could expound for hours on end
about our Constitution and what is wrong with
it.

Ideology and biases. See above quote.

[ElNono]

I guess if you can't establish the moral high ground with your actions, you can always try to do it with guns blazing...

[xrayzebra]

I guess if you can't establish the moral high ground with your actions, you can always try to do it with guns blazing...

Define that "moral highground" for me. Like
stealing secrets from the government and giving
them to some creep to put on the internet.

You play games, you play by the rules. He may
end up paying the ultimate price. Death.
All in the name of "moral highground".

What a load of crap you guys spout.

[DarrinS]

Screw Manning

[ElNono]

Define that "moral highground" for me. Like
stealing secrets from the government and giving
them to some creep to put on the internet.

You play games, you play by the rules. He may
end up paying the ultimate price. Death.
All in the name of "moral highground".

What a load of crap you guys spout.

He has not been tried or sentenced... by any court.

Maybe we should torture you for treason first, ray, then try you of any alleged crimes.

The irony is that such course of action is as close to communist China as you'll ever get. That you cheerlead that position is rather amusing.

I guess being authoritarian wasn't cool until you were for it.

Tell me what moral high ground the US has to tell China to stop capturing and torturing 'dissidents' without trial when it does it itself?

[RandomGuy]

He has not been tried or sentenced... by any court.

Maybe we should torture you for treason first, ray, then try you of any alleged crimes.

The irony is that such course of action is as close to communist China as you'll ever get. That you cheerlead that position is rather amusing.

I guess being authoritarian wasn't cool until you were for it.

Tell me what moral high ground the US has to tell China to stop capturing and torturing 'dissidents' without trial when it does it itself?

ah the smell of hypocrisy in the morning. I have always found it highly puzzling that the people who push the Constitution and country the most are the ones who seem to be least attached to the principles of either.

[Winehole23]

Tale of two departments: State Department invokes international #humanrights (https://twitter.com/search?q=%23humanrights) law today regarding an American in custody in #North (https://twitter.com/search?q=%23North) Korea. about 19 hours ago (https://twitter.com/PJCrowley/status/57992522064068608) via web
https://si3.twimg.com/profile_images/868289967/2010_0502_pj_73_bigger.jpg (https://twitter.com/PJCrowley)
PJCrowley (https://twitter.com/PJCrowley)
Philip J. Crowley

https://twitter.com/PJCrowley/status/57992522064068608


The Defense Department, playing by its own rules, declines the #UNSpecialRapporteur (https://twitter.com/search?q=%23UNSpecialRapporteur) an interview with an American in custody in #Quantico (https://twitter.com/search?q=%23Quantico).https://twitter.com/PJCrowley/status/57996110580547584

[boutons_deux]

"who seem to be least attached to the principles of either."

they are attached to their ideological, self-serving INTERPRETATION of the Constitution, and of History

(eg, Civil War wasn't about slavery.

Boston Tea Party was against government power).