David Seaton's Blog

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-19T15:43:20Z

It is bad for the American justice system to mix war and habeas corpus. If we are going to spend the rest of our lives going around the world blowing things up and killing people, we should try to keep it separate from our hyper-legalistic, domestic way of life. IMHO.

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-19T06:33:37Z

I just had a terrible thought. A Catch 22 idea.

It appears that KSM is eager to take the credit for 9-11... The greatest terrorist attack in history. He is positioning himself in the Islamist world as the "great master mind". The big hero!

What if bin Laden releases a tape saying that KSM is fake, that he had little or nothing to do with the attack? That he is just trying to get all the credit for something that other "heroic martyrs" planned and executed?

What if Al Qaida says that KSM is just a poor nut trying to be famous, like somebody confessing to be a serial murder just to get some attention? What happens to the great "show trial" then?

What a disaster this is!

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-19T05:33:56Z

Correction:
Mixing war and criminal law is a dreadful mistake.

How do we justify "targeted assassinations" under our system of laws? We make war outside our system of laws. To mix the two worlds is to destroy both.

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-19T05:32:27Z

And do the families of the "collateral damage" victims of the predator attacks have a right to sue the US government for damages?

Mixing war and criminal law is a dreadful mistake.

How do we justify "targeted assassinations" under our system of laws. We make war outside our system of laws? To mix the two worlds is to destroy both.

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-19T05:27:48Z

With you on that one all the way bro. What has me worried though, is that Obama is supposed to be an expert on constitutional law, but I'm getting a sneaking suspicion that he found his law degree in a box of crackerjacks. We are talking about destroying habeas corpus here. Really it would have been better if KSM had fallen down stairs in the Karachi police station and broken his neck, or as they say in Guatemala, had been "poisoned while trying to escape", then to destroy the whole idea of habeas corpus in the USA.

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-19T05:19:56Z

I rather doubt you will find a jury anywhere and certainly not in NY that is going to be leaning to acquit KSM before the fact.

Here we get to the issue of "change of venue". What you are saying is that KSM cannot get a fair trial in New York... What a disaster!

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-19T05:17:45Z

OK, KSM has been tortured to obtain his confession. How do you use that as evidence in a court of law?
You don't need a Cochran to blow that apart. What a disaster!

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-19T05:14:42Z

I think Buchanan has effectively pointed out how contradictory our system is in a twilight situation like this. Under your reading how is KSM different from OJ? Would the victims have to sue him in a civil court? Would he have to sell his memoirs and film rights to pay the damages? From a point of normal, criminal law this thing is contaminated beyond belief. A total disaster.

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-19T05:02:23Z

He can recant on anything he signed or requested under military custody, because it is public record that he was tortured. To convict this guy in a normal court of law is to destroy habeas corpus.
What a disaster!!!

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-18T21:15:22Z

If the guy is dumb enough to plead guilty than everything may go OK, but if he gets the right lawyer. He'll walk or if convicted he will have created horrible precedents for American law by making it possible to torture suspects and not give them access to the evidence used against them. He will have destroyed the American legal system. I don't see anything positive about that, really I don't.

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-18T21:09:06Z

I think you are right Lalo. And I think that show trials are not part of the rule of law. I agree with the following that I've taken from the Washington Post

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a former military lawyer who has worked with the Obama administration at times, told Holder that he had reached an opposite conclusion about trying Mohammed and his four alleged co-conspirators.
He said that trying people in civilian courts who were captured on foreign battlefields would lead to confusion among military officials about the kinds of legal rights that detainees would enjoy, such as their right to remain silent and to seek a lawyer. Graham also asserted that the Obama administration was turning "the war on terror into a police action."
"We're making history here and we're making bad history," Graham said. "The big problem I have is that you're criminalizing the war. You're confusing the people fighting the war. . . . You're making a fundamental mistake here."

And I'm even more worried about the American police getting confused than the soldiers. How about waterboarding in the local police station?

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-18T20:27:39Z

I think he may realize before too long what damage he could do to the American system by pleading "not guilty" and getting a Johnnie Cochran to get him off and then doing all the talk shows. Much more damage than he ever would do as a shaheed.

David Seaton Commented on An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-18T20:23:07Z

So - yes, it already is a show trial because KSM is not going anywhere regardless of the outcome.

Stop and think what you are saying there. Our whole legal system is based on habeas corpus. All defendants are presumed innocent till proved guilty beyond any reasonable doubt. All defendants have a right to examine the evidence used against them and confront the witness against them to cross-examination. Evidence procured by torture is not admissible under this system. This not only covers KSM, it covers you too. This is called "the rule of law".

Stop and think about it, we are about to throw out hundreds of years of the most noble traditions that millions of people have died to defend for centuries, just for a couple of building and 3000 dead people.

If this is not a fair trial under our age-old rules than KSM will have done more damage to the USA through his day in court than he ever did with the airplanes.

David Seaton recommended An interesting take on the sheikh by David Seaton

2009-11-18T16:50:30Z

David Seaton Commented on Europe in the world of the "G-2" by David Seaton

2009-11-18T06:40:22Z

I didn't say that the USA and China aren't relevant I only said that they don't define relevance.

David Seaton Commented on Europe in the world of the "G-2" by David Seaton

2009-11-17T20:18:23Z

Definitely there have to be government: federal, state, local programs to retrain people and help them recycle. Unions are good for this too, the problem with US unions is that they are "trade" unions and not "class" unions and could only retrain older workers for the same industry, whereas class unions cover all the trades and civil service too.

David Seaton Commented on Europe in the world of the "G-2" by David Seaton

2009-11-17T20:11:15Z

Thanks Art