Patently false equivalency and painfully inapt analogy.

Which Muslim nation is just like Germany again? Which charismatic Muslim fascist leader has an industrialized state and military at his disposal?

Would it be Field Marshall Osama of Osamabombastan?

Or would it be Teh Talibanic Hordes of Talibanistan?

Maybe your stupid Hitler analogy would have been better taken if you used Sadaam as a referent and all his aggressive success in Iran and Kuwait.

I'm going to say this with as much sincerity as I can muster--your dumber than a sack of hammers.

Good points all.

I was just riffing off the top of my head. I should have thought to look at Boumediene as having addressed the issue.

The MCA should be repealed in whole or part and then burned. It might be the most pernicious piece of legislation since the Alien and Sedition Acts including the Alien Enemies Act which is still operative today 50 U.S.C. 21.

And though we may be miles apart on some subjects, that we're both big Dylan fans gives me hope.

Typical conservative. Responds to an argument without even reading it.

Who could have ever seen that coming.

"Israel a self-constructed unsubsidized Oasis of bootstrapping grit, pluck, and gumption".

Wow I didn't see that coming either.

That's probably how they'll do it . . . they'll say they were holding KSM as a "material witness" in the investigations of others rather than as an accused himelf and that's how they'll get around it.

And whatever sentence he receives they'll probably credit that time towards his sentence(s) which may be so long that it won't really matter anyway.

Of course it's total utter BS by the government but that's how the law works sometimes.

Had Bush installed an American-friendly Sunni strong-man in Iraq, there would have been no need for an occupation. This is what the Sunnis wanted. Shi'ite Iran is a destablizing force in the region. Bush and his people were urged to do this, but no. Bush had to pursue his Utopian visions.

What's "utopian" is believing we have a "right" to install any "American-friendly anybody" anywhere in the world. It is precisely the American national hubris and arrogance that pisses people off and ensures that "others" don't have the "human-right" to "self-determination".

By "Shi'ite Iran" I presume you mean all the young and college age students and all their supporters that are seeking to change and open Shia Iran by pushing back against the absolutist rule of the Mullahs and the Revolutionary holdovers in the government?

So they must be "destablizing" in the "good sense" right?

What about our "good buddies" and BFFs the Syrians who we shipped our Canadian friend Mr. Arar to for a little "enhanced interrogation"? Are they "good or bad destablizing Shia Muslims"?

is this:

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district where in the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.

Because I can't think of a single case ever off the top of my head (though I may be mistaken), where the State has had actual custody of an accused, and it didn't violate the 6th Amendment to bring him/her to trial 6, 7, 8+ years down the road.

The courts will be blazing some very new legal trail attempting to write around and rationalize the delay in bringing some of these people to trial. It'll be very interesting to watch the legal tap dancing they do around that problem. My guess is they'll reframe it as an "immigration law" issue in such a way as to be able to justify the length of the detentions without trial.

Again if someone knows of an onpoint case(s) that establishes the legal precedent for having custody of someone for these lengths of time without charging and then trying them, I'd appreciate it if you'd link them at your sig.

The only reason it amounts to a "show trial" is by virtue of treating different classes of people under differing degrees of due process.

Treat them all the same and the accusation of "show trial" disappears from the right and left's rhetorical arsenal.

Afford all human beings, not captured on the battlefield and subject to the Geneva conventions and any associated legal protocols or processes, to the same due process and live with the results. That's as good as "justice" gets. What you don't get to do is define the "whole world as the battlefield" and pick and choose who gets what due process and expect anybody but frightened Americans to perceive it as a coherent and reliable system of justice.

If you can invent a system of justice that works better and is more reliable (perfect just being unattainable) than ours please share it with everyone. I'm all ears.

But maybe the trolls here (not you specifically) are right. Maybe we should just skip trials, and rules of evidence, and the Constitution, and convict people (or not) of crimes on the basis of what we read in newspapers. We'll leave it to The Press to report "all the facts" and then we'll all call in like on American Idol and vote for conviction or acquittal. The old classic public "thumbs up or thumbs down". That'll work really well I'm sure.