Awwww…the Senate is playing nice:
A bipartisan group of senators reached a compromise yesterday that would dramatically alter U.S. policy for treating captured terrorist suspects by granting them a final recourse to the federal courts but stripping them of some key legal rights.
Gee, ain’t that swell. I love how it’s “bipartisan.” Because the stripping of key legal rights is something we can all get behind.
As it turns out, the law is basically saying that detainees have no access to the federal court system, except for the ability to appeal to the D.C. Circuit. Which is already kind of feeble, and that’s without the key “oh, but” clause: “the court may examine only whether a military tribunal followed its own standards and procedures.”
Jesus Christ.
The point, kind of, to this rather sickening piece of legislation is that it will almost certaintly not leave Congress with an amendment by John McCain to the effect of “torture bad.” And while I agree that the immediate cessation of torture in Guantanamo Bay is a very important goal, I kind of do wish that we could achieve it without having to legimize the military’s kangaroo courts.
What gets me is that the legislation currently on the table would seem to violate the Supreme Court ruling that habeas corpus could not be suspended for Guantanamo detainees. If it was unconstituional then, its probably unconstitutional now, unless they slipped a new amendment in while I was reviewing movies. Of course, the catch-22 is that this law makes it impossible for anyone now in Guantanamo to appeal to the Supreme Court.
I think the cutest part is how the Washington Post headline call this an agreement on detainee “rights.” Because, to my non-legal eyes? It doesn’t look like “rights” have a lot to do with it.