Now when the Republicans insist that they are theonly true patriots, the most fervent defenders of the Constitution and thesharpest counter-terror strategists, however, those hysterical claims should betested against the facts with calm and candor.
The first instance is the controversy over theupcoming trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, indicted for plotting the Sept. 11terror attack along with four accomplices and slated for trial in a federalcourthouse, and the decision to prosecute "underpants bomber" UmarAbdulmutallab as a criminal defendant.
Leaving aside the logistics and costs of any publictrialbecause the city of New York will remain the most tempting target forjihadists no matter where any trial occursRepublican critics charge the Obamaadministration with compromising national security.
That complaint would deserve more respect if onlythey had voiced the same concerns when the Bush administration was pursuingprecisely the same course of action. But as partisans whose only purpose is toundermine their political adversaries, regardless of the effect on Americanprestige and national security, these roaring elephants were as silent aslittle mice back then.
Bush Administration Used Federal Courts
Even coming from Washington's habitual hypocrites,all the sudden outrage over trying terrorists in court is over the topand ablatant insult to every right-wing rube they expect to rally behind them.
As reporter Jane Mayer explains in the current issueof The New Yorker, despite all thetough talk about "enemy combatants" and military commissions, theBush administration almost always indicted terror suspects as criminals andtried them in federal courts. Statistics compiled by New York University'sCenter on Law and Security show that since Sept. 11, the criminal justicesystem has convicted around 150 suspects on terrorism indictments, and dozensmore on broader national security violations. That contrasts with only three Guantanamo detainees,apprehended overseas, who have been convicted in military commissions at theisland prison camp.
Among the civilian defendants sent to prison forlife were Richard Reid, the "shoe bomber" who tried to bring down acivilian passenger jet, much like Abdulmutallab, and Zacarias Moussaoui, theso-called 20th conspirator of the Sept. 11 attacks.
"When the Bush Justice Department obtainedthese convictions," Mayer notes, "the process was celebrated by someof the same people" who are now assaulting the patriotism and judgment ofAttorney General Eric Holder for his efforts to do the same thing.
She quotes Rudolph Giuliani, who said after theMoussaoui conviction: "I was in awe of our system. It does demonstratethat we can give people a fair trial." No doubt he will be deployedbetween now and November to denounce the very thing that he held in awe simplybecause a Democrat now occupies the Oval Office.
But Giuliani was right. A fair trial is the Americanway. A fair trial is what the Constitution provides for every criminal suspectapprehended on our soil, at the very leastwhich is why the Bush White House,knowing that the courts would uphold those traditional liberties, decided tohonor them despite its authoritarian leanings. A fair trial is the way to provethat we aren't afraid of Al Qaeda and that, when captured, they will be heldaccountable by the civilization they wish to destroy.
Our public officials take an oath to uphold theConstitution because that is the best way to protect the nation. From its firstdays, the Obama administration has sought to fulfill that pledge with acombination of judicial prosecutions and military force, with indictments anddrone strikes.
The prosecutions have forced several defendants tocooperate, including Abdulmutallab, and the dronesalbeit at a terrible cost incivilian casualtieshave badly disrupted Al Qaeda. Whatever the wisdom ofObama's policies, he is honestly trying to protect both the country and theConstitution. It is too bad the same cannot be said of his unscrupulousadversaries.
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