More could be deemed enemy combatants by bill

blackredyellow

So, not only can we hold "enemy combatants" without charges, and our gov't is fighting to allow themselves to torture them, but now, just about anyone can be considered an enemy combatant.


More could be deemed enemy combatants by bill

By Vicki Allen1 hour, 8 minutes ago

The United States could detain more foreigners as enemy combatants under legislation Congress will debate this week after a last-minute change in the bill, lawmakers said on Tuesday.

Democrats complained that Republicans quietly made several changes to the bill defining procedures for trying foreign terrorism suspects after an agreement last week between the White House and a group of dissident Republican senators.

"There are significant changes," said Sen. Carl Levin (news, bio, voting record) of Michigan, the top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee. He said the new elements could complicate efforts to push the bill through Congress before lawmakers leave this weekend to campaign for November elections.

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham (news, bio, voting record), a key negotiator on the bill, said enemy combatants would now include those who provided money, weapons and other support for terrorist groups as well as those involved in actual operations.

Graham of South Carolina said the term "enemy combatant" also would apply to those fighting a U.S. ally.

"We're making sure that an enemy combatant could be defined as something other than a front-line troop," Graham said. "We want to make sure that giving material aid and support to terrorism would put you in the enemy combatant category."

Graham said U.S. citizens could not be deemed enemy combatants under the bill, but several human rights advocates said the language was so broad that they believed Americans could be detained under it. The Center for Constitutional Rights said even attorneys representing Guantanamo inmates could be deemed enemy combatants.

The Bush administration has declared the detainees held at the U.S. naval facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, most of whom were picked up in Afghanistan, to be enemy combatants who can be detained indefinitely.

The bill to set up trial procedures for terrorism suspects -- which Bush needs after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down his original plan -- is slated to go to the House of Representatives floor on Wednesday.

In the Senate, Democrats and Republicans still were wrangling over possible amendments, and final action could be put off to later in the week.

Senate Democrats and the Republican chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, were trying to restore habeas corpus rights for Guantanamo inmates to challenge their detention. The bill would strip those rights, which Specter said was unconstitutional.

Specter also filed a compromise amendment to limit detainees to one habeas corpus application.

Levin, who also is pushing to restore habeas corpus rights, said he opposed the new definition of enemy combatants. "You can identify anyone anywhere as an enemy combatant, and their rights would be severely restricted whether or not you captured them on a battlefield," he said.

"We want those who would threaten the United States to be held and detained as long as they are a threat to the United States. But we believe in fundamental fairness too," said Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois.

Senate Republican leader Bill Frist of Tennessee had told Democrats that only technical changes had been made to the bill. His Democratic counterpart, Sen. Harry Reid (news, bio, voting record) of Nevada, said Democrats would not try to hold up the bill, but were demanding a chance to offer amendments.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060926/pl_nm/security_guantanamo_dc_3

jsand

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham (news, bio, voting record), a key negotiator on the bill, said enemy combatants would now include those who provided money, weapons and other support for terrorist groups as well as those involved in actual operations.


You have a problem with this? Why?

Puck78

you're pathetitc

jsand

Puck78 wrote:

you're pathetitc

Who is?

blackredyellow

jsand wrote:

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham (news, bio, voting record), a key negotiator on the bill, said enemy combatants would now include those who provided money, weapons and other support for terrorist groups as well as those involved in actual operations.


You have a problem with this? Why?

I don't know what the actual language in the bill is, but "other support" is awfully vague. I can't count the number of times that I've heard people like Cheney and republican commentators refer to many of the things that liberals have done as "supporting terrorists" or "giving comfort to the enemy", etc...

According to Bush, the whole point of this bill was to clarify the Geneva Convention, but then vague stuff like this gets put in?

Puck78

jsand wrote:

Who is?

you and your friend Graham

jsand

Puck78 wrote:

you and your friend Graham

What's the point of leveling a personal attack on me? I don't agree with you on an issue so I'm pathetic?

jsand

blackredyellow wrote:

I don't know what the actual language in the bill is, but "other support" is awfully vague. I can't count the number of times that I've heard people like Cheney and republican commentators refer to many of the things that liberals have done as "supporting terrorists" or "giving comfort to the enemy", etc...

According to Bush, the whole point of this bill was to clarify the Geneva Convention, but then vague stuff like this gets put in?

Absent the "other support" language, do you take issue with deeming people who provide financial support and/or weapons to terrorists as enemy combatants?

jlew24asu

jsand wrote:

What's the point of leveling a personal attack on me? I don't agree with you on an issue so I'm pathetic?

its typical dude

jsand

jlew24asu wrote:

its typical dude

I know - Maybe I'm just having trouble thinking outside of the box that society has made for me.

mammasan

jsand wrote:

Absent the "other support" language, do you take issue with deeming people who provide financial support and/or weapons to terrorists as enemy combatants?

I don't have a problem with financial and weapons suppliers being labeled enemy combatants, but that "other support" is troubling. I do have a problem with how we handle such people. We do have laws in this country, granted by our constitution, that protects people from the current methods that our government is using when dealing with enemy combatants. I don't trust our government as far as I can spit, which is not very far at all. The language is too vague and allows the government to label any action or behavior that goes against their policy regarding terrorism as supporting terrorism. Too much power and authority being given to an institution that already has too much power and authority and has no ability to use it wisely.

On a side note, not that I should be preaching, but let's try to refrain from personal attacks. Just because jsand may not agree with what is said doesn't mean that he/she should have to be verbally assaulted for it.

blackredyellow

jsand wrote:

Absent the "other support" language, do you take issue with deeming people who provide financial support and/or weapons to terrorists as enemy combatants?

Yes, I do... we have laws in place to try and prosecute those types of people. I don't think that we should place the "enemy combatant" label on them so that we can do whatever we want with them (endless dentention without charges, questionable interrogation methods (or torture).

This kind of stuff is just so orwellian to me... we continue to broaden our definitions to the point where more and more people can fall into these types of catagories.

Puck78

so, when Saddam is provided of chemical weapons to attack the Kurds by the USA, who's the supporter of "terrorist" groups?
and when Bin Laden is trained by the CIA, who's the supporter of "terrorist" groups?
and when the CIA help Pinochet?

Puck78

blackredyellow wrote:

This kind of stuff is just so orwellian to me... we continue to broaden our definitions to the point where more and more people can fall into these types of catagories.

that's it.

Puck78

jsand wrote:

I know - Maybe I'm just having trouble thinking outside of the box that society has made for me.

box that the society made for you? I thought that you were living in the USA, where the majority (according to the last elections) think like you. Don't play the part of the man undertow, you're well mixed in the majority. And don't play the part of the victim.

mammasan

Puck78 wrote:

so, when Saddam is provided of chemical weapons to attack the Kurds by the USA, who's the supporter of "terrorist" groups?
and when Bin Laden is trained by the CIA, who's the supporter of "terrorist" groups?
and when the CIA help Pinochet?

Come on you know that there is a double standard when it comes to our actions. Hell right at this very moment we are harboring two international terrorist who where implicated in the bombing of a Cubana Air liner in 1973 which killed 74 people. Our very own government should be labeled an enemy combatant by their own definition, but the status quo remains " Do as we say and not as we do."

jsand

Puck78 wrote:

box that the society made for you? I thought that you were living in the USA, where the majority (according to the last elections) think like you. Don't play the part of the man undertow, you're well mixed in the majority. And don't play the part of the victim.

I was referring to a pretty humorous post by someone else in one of the 9/11 conspiracy thread. I wasn't playing the part of the victim. The majority think like me? How could you possibly know that - election results?