citizens can be named as enemy combatants

Ken Brown k.brown at ccs.bbk.ac.uk
Thu Jan 9 07:06:58 PST 2003


Michael Cardenas wrote:
 
> I think you're overreacting a bit. The actual case involves someone
> who was in a foriegn country for years, and was in the war zone at the
> time he was fighting the US.

Hey, I'm not a USAan and I don't even live there. But I think I know
your Constitution well enough to know that I never read the bit about
how long you have to live in a foreign country to lose your rights.

The argument is just the same as the one we're always using about crypto
or security. The system is as strong as it's weakest link. If there are
2 doors to your house you need to lock them both.

Someone, somewhere, has to decide whether this man's service in a
foreign army is naughty enough to lose him his constitutional rights. If
*that* decision-making process has weaker legal protection than a normal
criminal trial would have had, the effect is that the legal protection
of the whole system is reduced.  If the process of removing someone's
constitutional rights is not itself subject to those rights, then those
rights are hollow and can be removed at will.

Ken Brown





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