RSS FeedAmerican “Legal Fictions” for 2007
Slate magazine is offering the Bush Administration’s Top 10 “Dumbest Legal Arguements of the Year.” In 2006, they presented the Top 10 “Most Outrageous Civil Liberties Violations.”
Here is this year’s list in brief (see the article for details):
10. The NSA’s eavesdropping was limited in scope.
9. Scooter Libby’s sentence was commuted because it was excessive.
8. The vice president’s office is not a part of the executive branch.
7. The Guantanamo Bay detainees enjoy more legal rights than any prisoners of war in history.
6. Water-boarding may not be torture.
5. Everyone who has ever spoken to the president about anything is barred from congressional testimony by executive privilege.
4. Nine U.S. attorneys were fired by nobody, but for good reason.
3. Alberto Gonzales.
2. State secrets.
1. The United States does not torture.
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4 Responses to “American “Legal Fictions” for 2007”
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“7. The Guantanamo Bay detainees enjoy more legal rights than any prisoners of war in history.”
This is true. All of the ununiformed combatants captured on the battlefield could have (and in my opinion should have) been shot under the Geneva Conventions.
Hi Jonathan,
We would be interested to hear how such actions would be justifiable under the Geneva Conventions, especially considering the flexibility afforded to cultural interpretations of identifying uniforms, i.e. black turbans, as well as situations accounting for intel and special forces that obviously wear irregular costume.
And then would like a follow-up on how it could be ethicially justified.
Thank you.
The applicable info is here: http://www.forces.gc.ca/jag/training/publications/loac_man_e.asp
Special Forces wearing irregular costumes qualify as executable under the GCs. Your mention of “intelligence” is without substance. The ethical justification question is meaningless: any such execution would be legal.
If you are serious about the subject: http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/lawwar.htm
Cheers
Genuinely interesting. We do welcome alternative perspectives, and the Bush administration’s justification of these practices still baffle the entire legal community: “The argument that Guantanamo prisoners have greater rights than they would otherwise be afforded relies on deep distortions of both fact and law.”
The Supreme Court decided in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld that that GC and the Uniform Code of Military Justice do apply, and that commissions were a violation of Federal law:
“…if there be “any doubt” whether he is entitled to prisoner-of-war protections, he must be afforded those protections until his status is determined by a “competent tribunal.” . Because we hold that Hamdan may not, in any event, be tried by the military commission the President has convened pursuant to the November 13th Order and Commission Order No. 1, the question whether his potential status as a prisoner of war independently renders illegal his trial by military commission may be reserved.”
Also, under Article 5 coercions are not allowed under GC as they are in the commissions.
So to suggest that they are afforded more rights does seem a gross mischaracterization.
See: http://www.slate.com/id/2179174/