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Obama proposes Indefinite Preventive Detention without trial
[Quote:]
Obama proposed a new system of Indefinite Preventive Detention yesterday in his National Security speech that is stunning in its illegality.
Obama is proposing we keep people locked up not for the crimes they have committed and we prove they committed in a court of law, but on the chance that they might commit crimes in the future. There will be no trial, for no crime exists to be charged. There is only the nebulous threat of “future acts” to justify depriving people of their liberty potentially indefinitely.
Is this justice?
Imagine you are picked up off the street for daring to write something provocative in your blog. Perhaps you vaguely threaten to relocate to Afghanistan and work with a humanitarian aid organization there. Unkown to you the humanitarian aid organization might possibly be associated with the Afghan resistence. Perhaps the head of the aid organization is the third cousin twice removed of a suspected warlord causing our march for empire trouble on the border. Based on that alone you could be kept in a cell forever. After all, letting you out of that cell might mean you really would do what you threatened and we can’t have that.
Don’t think it couldn’t happen.
Let me start by saying that I find this idea (even the “only” 28 days of England) a really scary thought and not something out of the reach of most current democratic governments…
Now, I tend not to trust news where only small clips of the speech are shown, seems to me that is quite easy to take only the pieces that say what you want to say. Obama has not said “indefinite” even once, he hasn’t even implied it, and no mention of “future crimes” neither. Yes, he talks about the “terrorist training camps” and that they will exist 5-10 years from now (and he’s right, by the way). Now, I’m not sure of the north american legislation (no, I’m not american), but in my country (where we have had many times the number of deaths from terrorist attacks than the U.S.) what the people in these camps are doing is a crime. So there’s no need to talk about any scary “pre-crime” shit to accuse and trial them.
One thing Obama has said (and has been quickly “forgotten” by the news reporter) is that this program would be managed by the judicial power, and that, as far as I know is a big change (for the better, i hope) from the current state of things.
To be clear, I’m in no way defending Obama or this plan, but I would like to read more about it before letting the dogs out.
That halo tarnished pretty fast, didn’t it?