"Harry Krause" wrote in message
...
basskisser wrote:
'The President is Not a Tribunal'

Yesterday, in a major blow to the administration, a federal judge
ruled that "President Bush had both overstepped his constitutional
bounds and improperly brushed aside the Geneva Conventions" when he
established military tribunals in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to try
detainees as war criminals. The ruling, which put a halt to the
tribunal of Salim Ahmed Hamdan, was just the latest in a string of
setbacks to the administration's legal approach to terrorism. In June,
the Supreme Court ruled that – despite the administration's arguments
to the contrary – prisoners were entitled to challenge their status as
"enemy combatants" in federal court. The administration has yet to
comply with that ruling and plans to fight the ruling handed down
yesterday. The Justice Department vowed to immediately appeal the
ruling and plans to seek an emergency order to prevent it from being
enforced.


Without delving into partisan politics, I was glad to see this ruling.
If you are trying to convince the world that you are acting out of
morality, as we often do, then it is important to act morally, and one
of the ways you do this is by honoring international treaties and
conventions on matters such as these - even if your opponents do not.



BUSH'S POLICIES PUT U.S. SOLDIERS AT RISK: Judge James Robertson's
opinion yesterday touched on a basic, but frequently overlooked,
reason the Geneva Conventions were ratified by the United States – to
protect American soldiers. Judge Robertson wrote that by asserting
that the Guantanamo detainees were outside the reach of the Geneva
Conventions, the administration weakened "the United States' own
ability to demand application of the Geneva applications to Americans
captured during armed conflicts abroad."

Precisely right.

It's only practical to abide by the Geneva Convention when you're fighting
an enemy that is a signatory to the agreement, and actually abides by it
themselves. Terrorists do not abide by the Geneva Convention, aren't
signatories to the agreement, and should not be entitled to its
protections...particularly because they themselves don't abide by the
accepted "rules of war".