oh

gee

i'm crushed. let me go shut the drapes, curl up in a fetal position, and cry til my eyes fall out.

You are jumping ship from the post of yours about how American citizens would be treated in another country if accused of a crime ......The girl has been held since before Nov. of 2007 , so your claim that other countries dont just arrest and hold people isnt holding up.

hold on there honu. i said when you're in another country, you're under their laws-meaning our constitution does nothing for us any where else. for instance, i wouldn't want to be caught in iraq-i don't relish the thought of being stoned for a crime. as to how long any one else holds you, i'd imagine it differs from one country to another.

Actually you wouldnt be stoned in Iraq , Saudi yes , Iran most likely , maybe even Dubai , but not in Iraq because they dont let the religous maniacs rule the country.
Back to subject at hand , if you choose to believe that people are being detained by our government for no good reason Im not going to try and change your mind. Write your congressman , ask them to have them released without delay , you could even offer up some sort of service for these poorly accused people , ah dunno maybe take them into your home or donate some money to them and their families.
I have no problem with locking up people who may even have been just hanging out with their buddy the terrorist , because they should pick better friends and not be hanging out where they could be percieved as wanting to kill Americans

if you could explain to me how my thoughts on a trial = me wanting people released, i'm breathless with anticipation. my contention is that the argument of 'they aren't citizens, thus not covered under our constitution' is a bullshit argument-we try foreign citizens in our courts every day. a guy from mexico flew an ultralight into arizona-laden with marijuana. did we lock him up, never charge him and detain him for years? no. he was tried, found guilty, and sentenced to 33 months in one of our jails. i'd imagine he'll be returned to mexico once he serves his sentence.
but please, give me a break on claiming i'm for releasing anyone.

He was flying pot over , uhm I dont think his intent was to drop bombs and kill Americans ..... Hey they could just execute them for all I care save us the time and money because most likely if it were you or I in their country our head would already be in a basket.
Im sorry I mistook you wanting to have them released.......

i wasn't comparing him to a terrorist, i was using him to illustrate that we have no difficulty in putting a non citizen who has no claims to constitutional rights on trial.

Joe McCarthy is gearing up for a comeback

These people havent been arrested in America. Most countries would have already executed them.

which is what makes us different.

we don't paint with a broad brush and refuse to see the innocent mixed in with the guilty.

we don't bury our mistakes. even if it's years late, we make amends.

doing otherwise is unamerican.

i did some digging, as i was left after this discussion, and others in the past, with the feeling that i might have been missing something. unlike some folks (here and elsewhere) i don't necessarily do a search or ten with an attempt at backing up my own viewpoint. i don't see how that would possibly educate me on a topic of convsersation. at any rate, i found this

http://www.cfr.org/publication/5312/...ombatants.html

after asking the question 'did we detain enemy combatants during world war two'. now, obviously the answer would be yes-i was looking for background/historical precedent that bush had used to determine enemy combatant status. now, i personally don't know that you could call what we're fighting regarding terrorism as war (i've always thought you needed an enemy country with a standing army to have a war) but that's a whole different subject and topic of debate.
at any rate, my approach had been based on criminality and how criminal cases are handled-not in the approach of having pow's. apparently that was the wrong approach, and i stand (well, sit actually) corrected.

We are not supposed to be other countries.
Ya see taking the moral high ground gives us the bully pulpit.
And we apparently lost our bully pulpit.
Bully pulpit's are expensive.