Thursday, June 12, 2008

About Damn Time

MSNBC is reporting that the Supreme Court has ruled 5-4 that Gitmo Detainees have the right to challenge their detention in U.S. and more importantly civilian courts! Some further reaction here, here and here.

I've never really been a fan of Gitmo or of the whole detainee/enemy combatant thing the Bush Administration tried to push- it seemed like it was coming from the 'making shit up as we go' school of legal thought, if you think about it. Terrorists couldn't be POWs according to the Bush Administration (despite the fact that we were at 'war') and they couldn't be ordinary criminals to be tried in civilian courts either, so they just made a bunch of shit up. A special status for them. That seemed like total bullshit to me- one cannot just invent legal precedent just because you don't like what you've got- and finally, it seems the Supreme Court might have lowered the boom.

Finally!

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