Conviction of Padilla is Bad News for All Americans, Including Journalists and Protesters

[babylonsister]

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/25887

Conviction of Padilla is Bad News for All Americans, Including Journalists and Protesters
Submitted by dlindorff on Thu, 2007-08-16 21:05. Criminal Prosecution

By Dave Lindorff

With habeas corpus a thing of the past, with arrest and detention without charge permitted, with torture and spying without court oversight all the rage, with prosecutors free to tape conversations between lawyers and their clients, and with the judicial branch now infested by rightwing judges who would have been at home in courtrooms of the Soviet Union or Hitler’s Germany, for all they seem to care about common law tradition, the only real thing holding the line against absolute tyranny in the U.S. has been the jury.

snip//

Beginning today, we can expect the government to begin arresting people on an array of trumped-up charges, locking them away in black sites, on military bases, or maybe even overseas, subjecting them to all manner of torture, and then finally bringing them to trial on trumped-up charges. We can also expect juries, made fearful by breathless warnings that “evil ones” mean us and our nation harm, to buy the government’s stories.

Who is at risk? That’s hard to say, but it’s clear that it won’t just be hardened terrorist types. A presidential executive order signed by Bush on July 17 declares that anything that “undermining efforts to promote economic reconstruction (sic) and political reform (sic) in Iraq” could be deemed a crime making the perpetrator subject to arrest. Would writing essays critical of the president, the war in Iraq, or the “reconstruction” effort in Iraq meet that standard? Who knows? Would being interviewed for commentary as part of a news story on English-language Al Jezeera TV (which Bush and Cheney have declared to be supportive of the Iraqi insurgency, and which Bush reportedly at one point considered bombing!)? And how about anti-war protesters? We already have Washington, DC, under pressure from Homeland Security, threatening the organization World Can’t Wait with multiple $10,000 fines for posting flyers around the city announcing an anti-war march and rally on September 15. If they go ahead with the protest, will they be joining Padilla?

I have little doubt that this administration would love to lock up journalistic critics and protesters in military brigs, so the question is: how would juries respond to charges that American journalists and protesters against the war were treacherously undermining the Bush war effort?

I used to be confident that most juries would laugh such cases out of court. After the Padilla decision, I’m not so sure.

You want to think that your fellow citizens have at least some measure of common sense, but this case suggests otherwise--that they are easily frightened, gullible, and willing to believe the most fantastic claims of the government.

The future does not look good for freedom in America.

[shance]

1. The good news is perhaps people will now see how we are all vulnerable to this Administrations abuse

n/t

[TechBear_Seattle]

6. You assume that Americans care about the abuses

As long as there is plenty of "reality" television and sensationalist celebrity news, who cares about what the administration does? That is why the Junta has been able to get away with so much for so long and why Congress doesn't give a rat's tail.

[babylonsister]

11. They might care if the media cared to explain it, which hasn't happened,

and I don't see much of that for the future.

[VP505]

2. I don't believe that the news is that bad.

I am more inclined to agree with this post: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=1600901&mesg_id=1600901

[librechik]

10. thx for the link, vpilot

that cheered me up!

[PDJane]

3. Sorry, but.....

that "shining city on the hill" is starting to look like a third world slum right about now.

[ThomCat]

8. Agreed.

:(

[leftchick]

4. I guess the checks and balances congress promised us

are now considered "quaint". :grr:

[ThomCat]

9. How soon until we go back to the original system

where only wealthy white men of the ownership class were really considered citizens?

All the rest of us are certainly loosing all of our rights.

[hfojvt]

5. there's the presidential order again, and wrong again

Unless there's a new Presidential Order. The old one does not make "undermining efforts to promote reconstruction" in Iraq a crime.


"You want to think that your fellow citizens have at least some measure of common sense, but this case suggests otherwise--that they are easily frightened, gullible, and willing to believe the most fantastic claims of the government."


I want to think my fellow progressives have some measure of common sense instead of being frightened, gullible and willing to believe the most fantastic claims ABOUT the government. Yet Lindorff seems to be trying to frighten gullible readers.

[L. Coyote]

7. K&R The present does not look good either!

[Hydra]

12. Welcome to Hell

Enjoy your stay.