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 |  Subject: Obama Wins A Round in His Quest to Imprison Americans Without Trial  Fri 21 Sep 2012, 12:25 | |
| Obama Wins A Round in His Quest to Imprison Americans Without Trial A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
]The Obama administration
has won a courtroom victory in his bid to detain U.S. citizens without
trial. The president already executes foreigners at will. “That’s
the evil beauty of these Bush-Obama laws: they cut across international
borders and render all the people’s of the world equal in one important
respect: President Obama claims the right to kill each and every one of
them.”] Obama Wins A Round in His Quest to Imprison Americans Without Trial A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford “The lawyer for
the American plaintiffs thinks Homeland Security is gearing up to make
lots of arrests of U.S. citizens, in anticipation that Middle East
protests will spread to American soil.” It is not true that
Barack Obama single-handedly destroyed the rule of law in the United
States. The savaging of the Bill of Rights was, in effect, a tag team
effort between Obama and his predecessor, George Bush, two presidents
united in a single-minded quest to remove all barriers to the
imprisonment, without trial or charge, of persons anywhere in the world,
including U.S. citizens. George Bush did the initial groundwork,
interpreting the 2001 congressional mandate to strike militarily against
al-Qaida as giving the president the power to hold foreign prisoners
without charge in Guantanamo, and, in theory, to treat American citizens
the same way. But that was a stretch, and only a presidential opinion. George Bush knew that it
would be very difficult to get a preventive detention bill through
Congress; Democrats would raise holy hell, and protesters would call for
his head. But Barack Obama accomplished what Bush could not: On New
Year’s Eve, Obama signed a preventive detention law as part of the
National Defense Authorization Act. Under a Black Democrat, the rule of
law ceased to exist within U.S. borders. Obama had already declared the
rest of the planet a killing ground. Then, back in August, a federal district judge in New York, Katherine
Forrest, slapped a temporary restraining order on preventive detention,
ruling on behalf of a group of activists and journalists who said the
they could be thrown in prison permanently simply for speaking or
writing about groups targeted by the United States. What, precisely and
under the law, constituted providing “support” for al-Qaida or related
groups? Obama’s Justice Department lawyers refused to say, claiming they
had not thought the question through. Clearly, President Obama, like
President Bush, wanted leeway to interpret the law any way he sees fit,
so he can lock up whoever he wants, whenever he wants, for whatever
reason, or for no stated reason at all. But Judge Forrest wasn’t having
it. On September 12, she made her injunction permanent, ruling that
Obama’s preventive detention law was unconstitutional. “Under a Black Democrat, the rule of law ceased to exist within U.S. borders.” For less than a week, the
Bill of Rights returned to U.S. soil. But, this past Monday, a federal
appeals court judge put the Constitution back on hold, removing Judge Forrest’s injunction
on preventive detention. The entire three-judge appeals court will
begin hearing the case on September 28. Obama’s lawyers say the
government needs to be allowed to detain certain prisoners without
charge or trial in Afghanistan.
But Bruce Afran, the lawyer for the American plaintiffs in the case,
thinks Homeland Security is gearing up to make lots of arrests of U.S.
citizens, in anticipation that Middle East protests will spread to
American soil. That’s the evil beauty of
these Bush-Obama laws: they cut across international borders and render
all the people’s of the world equal in one important respect: President
Obama claims the right to kill each and every one of them, or lock them
up forever, on his own say so. In that sense, Obama recognizes no legal
difference between U.S. anti-war protestors and anonymous targets in
Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, or Somalia. All of our lives and freedom
are subject to the whims of an American president. For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to BlackAgendaReport.com. BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.
Source:-http://blackagendareport.com/content/obama-wins-round-his-quest-imprison-americans-without-trial | |
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