That's exceptional, America! -- the justice edition
News blogs, sports blogs, entertainment blogs, and more from Philly.com, The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News.
That's exceptional, America! -- the justice edition
Speaking of Muslims, an Islamic terror suspect was tried in an American courtroom, before a jury, with well-established rules of evidence, including some that could not be admitted because of Bush-era torture tactics. The jury found for acquittal on almost all of the charges but still found enough evidence for a conspiracy rap that will put the suspect away, probably for the rest of his life. Upholding the sacred U.S. Constitution AND locking away a terrorist for life? Folks on the political right should be ecstatic! Yeah, right.
As expected, Glenn Greenwald has the best take:
But the most important point here is that one either believes in the American system of justice or one does not. When a reviled defendant is acquitted in court, and torture-obtained evidence is excluded, that isn't proof that the justice system is broken; it's proof that it works. A "justice system" which guarantees convictions -- or which allows the Government to rely on evidence extracted from torture -- isn't a justice system at all, by definition. The New Yorker's Amy Davidson made this point quite well today:
Let’s be clear: if time in the extra-judicial limbo of black sites, and the torture that caused some evidence to be excluded, makes prosecutors’ jobs harder, the problem is with the black sites and the torture, and not with the civilian trials that might eventually not work out quite the way everyone likes. It’s a point that bears some repeating. Our legal system is not a machine for producing the maximum number of convictions, regardless of the law. Jurors are watching the government, too, as well they should. Ghailani today could be anyone tomorrow.
It's supposed to be extremely difficult for the Government to win the right to put someone in a cage for their entire lives, or to kill them. Having lived under a tyranny in which there were very few barriers impeding the leader's desire to imprison or otherwise punish someone -- and having waged a war to escape that oppression -- the Founders designed it this way on purpose.
It would be nice if civil liberties' buffs, like me, could be ecstatic about the handling of the Ghailani case, but it's not that easy. The truth is that even if Ghailani had been found innocent on all charges, he still would have been held behind bars indefinitely as an enemy combatant, one of the many bastardizations of the American rule of law that the Obama administration has clung to or even enhanced. Still, we'll award some partial credit for a partial victory for a U.S. system of justice that, when it works, actually can be exceptional.
Bonus No. 1: Talking Points Memo has a good roundup of the reaction, right and left.
Bonus No. 2: On the American exceptionalism front, especially as it relates to the Palin '12 bandwagon, there was a great op-ed on the subject today in the Washington Post by Matt Miller -- check it out.
So we had a show trial that, regardless of verdict, would have had the same results: life in prison. Awesome.— RG
Comment removed.- God, I hope you just wrote this to provoke strong comments and reactions from the general public Will. If you really feel this way, heaven help us!— cb54
Will, why do you hate America? As Undersecretary of War John J. McCloy said when speaking of his desire to force innocent Japanese Americans into concentration camps during WWII, “The Constitution is just a piece of paper.” Why can’t you be a patriot like Undersecretary McCloy was?— Hamlet- Hamlet, why attack McCloy, whose long dead? Why not go after Obama, like you did Bush, for clearly ignoring the Constitution? Unless you're choosing to ignore that factoid, because he plays for your team.— RG
If they gave him a trial without any intention of releasing him even if he was aquitted of all charges, then it was just a show trial, and a sham. Is this an example of the justice system working? The left can have it both ways here. They can stand on their soapbox and yell about the sanctity of the Constitution and know Ghailani was never going to get out anyway. way to stand up for real principles. They also love the civilian trial because they know, at some point, some slick lawyer is going to take the focus off of the terrorist and attempt to put the Bush administration on trial. That's what they really want.— jmc- Will, ss a true conservative for once I generally agree with you. While I don't think Constitutional protections extend to non-citizens, I see much more danger in the precedent of government's ability to detain without restriction than I do in the possibility of a terrorist slipping through the system.— Mirror
- There are no politicians who play for my team since Sestak and Murphy were voted out. And while Obama has been disappointing on this front, I never expected him to be much more than Bush lite anyway (when I saw how the corporate media was fawning over him before the 2008 election I knew he wasn't what he appeared to be). But to answer your question, RG, I brought up McCloy for historical perspective on this issue - although you are right, I do think he was a creep and I’m glad he’s dead.— Hamlet
- If American exceptionalism exists, it surely must have something to do with the treatment of the accused at law. After all, the First, Second, Ninth and Tenth Amendments are the ones everyone knows these days, but five of the other six amendments in the Bill of Rights have to do with the rights of the accused, so the Founding Fathers clearly must have cared about it. And that's no surprise, given that so many of them were either merchants who were tried in juryless British vice-admiralty courts for violations of British trade policy, or lawyers who'd spent a career defending said merchants.— Billy Ray Winthorpe
jmc, if it takes having Obama in the WH for conservatives to finally see the light and recognize the folly and immorality of detaining people without civil rights, then that's change I can believe in.- Hey Bunch. Just a little legal lesson. Defendants are not found innocent. They are found either Guilty or Not Guilty.— time2leavephilly
- Just curious if anyone has any knowledge of whether information excluded in this trial that would have been included in a military tribunal would have led to convictions on more counts.
Of course, even there would have been more convictions, it wouldn't have made a significant difference in the impact of a guilty verdict on how he lives his life (assuming he gets life without parole anyway).
But surely, since people are so sure that trying him in civilian court is a huge security threat, they must have evidence of how a military trial would have produced a different result.
Right?— Talking point sleuth 
This decision is what I said would happen because a civilian jury would never see evidence that can be legally presented before a military tribunal. How can you ensure proper evidence handling techniques overseas where the first people on the "crime" scene aren't trained in handling evidence to our standards?? The defense was able to have thrown out or at least argue that evidence was "contaminated" before the jury. In the end both systems are just - it just depends on how you define justice. If you define justice as "the administration of law; especially : the establishment or determination of rights according to the rules of law or equity" then the civil courts suit you better but if you define justice as "conformity to truth, fact, or reason" then the military tribunal affords a greater chance for justice.— bird11- bird, the handling of evidence has nothing to do with this. It is how the evidence was obtained -- illegally. The only evidence that was thrown out was the evidence obtained illegally through torture. Justice is served when the guilty are found guilty by legal means -- not by unjust means.— Master Dreamz
- Andrew Sullivan
- Blinq
- Blogorrhea
- Blonde Sagacity
- Free Republic
- Instapundit
- James Taranto
- ScrappleFace
- The Corner
- Buzzmachine
- Eat the Press
- Editor and Publisher
- Media (Huffington Post)
- Media Bloodhound
- Mickey Kaus
- Pressthink
- Romenesko
- The Inksniffer
- A List of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago
- Above Average Jane
- BlankBaby
- Citizen Mom
- Keystone Blog
- Metroblogging Philadelphia
- Phawker
- Philadelphia - America's Hometown
- Philadelphia Will Do
- Philebrity
- Philly Future
- Phillyblog
- Phillyist
- The Clog
- The Next Mayor
- Welcome to Phillyville
- Young Philly Politics
- Afro-Netizen
- All-Spin Zone
- Atrios
- Bad Attitudes
- Billmon
- Booman Tribune
- CorrenteWire
- Fables of the Reconstruction
- iFlipFlop
- Kiko's House
- MyDD
- Philly (Dragonballyee)
- Rowhouse Logic
- Slacktivist
- Suburban Guerilla
- Tattered Coat
- upyernoz
- AmericaBlog
- Andy Borowitz
- BuzzFlash
- Crooks and Liars
- Cursor
- Daily Kos
- David Sirota
- Drudge Report
- Echidne of the Snakes
- Fire Dog Lake
- Glenn Greenwald
- Hullabaloo
- Jesus' General
- Jon Swift
- Josh Marshall
- Juan Cole
- Kevin Drum
- Mad Kane
- Majikthise
- Matthew Yglesias
- Oliver Willis
- Raw Story
- Swing State Project
- Talk Left
- Taylor Marsh
- TBogg
- The Carpetbagger Report
- Think Progress
- War and Piece
- Wonkette
- A Citizen's Blog
- Balls, Sticks and Stuff
- Beer Leaguer
- Dick Polman
- Phillies Nation
- Philling Station
- Shallow Center
- The 700 Level
- The Good Phight
