New Rules for Afghan Prisoners

The administration is implementing a new review system for prisoners held in Afghanistan.

Under the new rules, each detainee will be assigned a U.S. military official, not a lawyer, to represent his interests and examine evidence against him. In proceedings before a board composed of military officers, detainees will have the right to call witnesses and present evidence when it is "reasonably available," the official said. The boards will determine whether detainees should be held by the United States, turned over to Afghan authorities or released. For those ordered held longer, the process will be repeated at six-month intervals.

I don't have a big problem with this change -- with one significant exception. Because of the nature of the Afghan War, we are almost certainly going to pick up some innocent people, or individuals who we don't need to continue holding for whatever reason. There has to be some process in place to determine who needs to be held, and who we can release.

The only portion of the new system that is a bad idea is giving detainees any sort of "rights," such as the aforementioned right to call witnesses. The U.S. should review each case and determine whether calling witnesses is warranted, or what evidence should be considered. It should not be up to prisoners in a war zone to make those sorts of decisions. In other words, the system as described is reasonable, but it should be top-down to serve U.S. interests, not bottom-up to protect detainees. 

HOT5 Daily 9/13/2009

1. "A completely bizarre protest that’s based on love of country *UPDATED*" A huge protest in DC without all sorts of anti-Americanism? The difference between right-wing and left-wing protests.

Representative Sample: Here are just a few examples of these neophyte activists who seem to have absolutely no appreciation for the fact that the purpose behind a march on D.C. is to let everyone know how evil America is but. These guys seem weirdly stuck on archaic concepts such as freedom, self-governance, self-reliance, and informed representative government

2. "A Sign For The Times: Democrat Response To Tea Parties In A Nutshell" He pretty much nails it.

Representative Sample: It's a photo.

3. "Friday Photo: What you won't see at a town hall meeting" Let's hope not.

Representative Sample: It's a photo.

4. "Obama’s risky China trade policy" Risky as in really stupid and counterproductive.

Representative Sample: Would seem like we should not annoy a country that we owe that much money to by slapping tariffs on some of their exports, unless of course we owe a bigger debt to someone else who has asked for those tariffs; or more precisely, unless the president owes someone else.

5. "The health care "reformers" go after medical technology" Another reason to block this supposed reform.

Representative Sample: the proposed tax is a calculated effort to divert capital from the medical technology industry to other uses in the economy, because new medical technology drives costs that are now going to be assumed by the government (or at least will be if the Senate leadership gets its way).

To submit a blog post for HOT5 Daily, please e-mail me at unrright@NOSPAMgmail.com. Put HOT5 in the subject.

Glenn Beck's 9-12 Project

Glenn Beck has been getting a great deal of attention lately. I don't watch him, but I read about his "9-12 Project," so I thought I would take a look at his website. At the top he has a symbol of a segmented rattlesnake, representing "12 Values" and "9 Principles." The 12 values are pretty basic, but the 9 principles demonstrate why I'm not a political activist. I'm just way too cynical. My comments on each:

1. America is good.  That's awfully vague. Pure good? Good as opposed to bad? I'd have put something like "America is a force for good" instead. 

2. I Believe in God and He is the Center of my Life.  Obviously I don't, and he isn't. What is the point of putting this in there? Why would you want to exclude large numbers of otherwise like-minded people from your political movement?  And I'm not just talking about atheists. There are many people who believe in God, but wouldn't say he's the center of their lives. 

3. I must always try to be a more honest person than I was yesterday.  I'm sorry, that just sounds ridiculous to me. If some speaker actually said that I'd be rolling my eyes and laughing under my breath.

4. The family is sacred. My spouse and I are the ultimate authority, not the government. Yeah right. Try exercising your authority not to pay your taxes, or your authority to drive 100 mph down the highway. Saying that you and your spouse are the "ultimate authority" is just silly. Nice wishful thinking. And I'm not sure exactly what he means by the family being sacred. 

5. If you break the law you pay the penalty. Justice is blind and no one is above it. Again, more wishful thinking. Justice is different for those with greater status, power or resources. It always has been, and probably always will be. 

6. I have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, but there is no guarantee of equal results. Ok, finally one I have no problem with (although I'm guessing Beck believes in natural rights, and I do have a problem with that).

7. I work hard for what I have and I will share it with who I want to. Government cannot force me to be charitable. Nonsense. It can and does force you to be charitable, and to contribute to many things which you might actually oppose. It's called taxation.

8. It is not un-American for me to disagree with authority or share my personal opinion. What if your personal opinion is that the U.S. would be better off as an Islamic theocracy? Is that un-American?

9. The government works for me. I do not answer to them, they answer to me. We should elect people who actually believe that.

Just one note... Although I'm not a Glenn Beck fan, I have nothing against him either. If his 9/12 project helps galvanize opposition toward Obama's policies, I'm all for it. But I find his 9 principles hard to take too seriously.

HOT5 Daily 9/12/2009

1. "What 9/11 Means" One of the better articles I read yesterday.

Representative Sample:Terrorists are not 'criminals', they are not 'freedom-fighters', they are not 'misunderstood'. They do not have equal standing with the people they attack and kill. They do not have civil rights under any established law. They do not enjoy protection under the Geneva Convention.

2. "Flight 93" The reserve militia and defense against terrorism.

Representative Sample: The only part of the American national security establishment that successfully defended America on 9/11 was the portion of the reserve militia on board Flight 93, acting without orders, without hierarchy, without uniforms or weapons, by spontaneous organization and action.

3. "Bin Laden's Bodyguard of Lies" The role of Pakistan.

Representative Sample: The problem is that these Islamic radicals have been operating openly in the ISI for three decades, and were put there by the government in the late 1970s, when it was decided that Islamic conservatism was the solution for Pakistan's problems

4. "Iran: What would you do if you were Prime Minister of Israel?" I wouldn't want to be in his position, but if I were,  a nuclear first strike on Iran would definitely be an option under consideration.

Representative Sample: what would you do if Prime Minister of Israel? When a lot men, including the head of state, say they want to kill, indeed have killed you in this instance, do you take them at their words

5. "9-11: Eight Years Later" The differences between then and now. With video of the attack.

Representative Sample: Today? People remember the day’s events, but not the impact of them. This will continue the further removed we are from the most deadly attack on American soil.

To submit a blog post for HOT5 Daily, please e-mail me at unrright@NOSPAMgmail.com. Put HOT5 in the subject.

As We Remember 9/11, Britain Works to Cripple Its Intelligence Services

The Telegraph reports that Britain's Attorney General, by way of the Metropolitan police, is investigating MI6, its formerly secret foreign intelligence service, for "alleged complicity in torture." MI5, the UK's counterintelligence agency, is already being investigated.  According to the police,

"This is unrelated to Binyam Mohamed but looks at the conditions under which a non-British citizen was detained and the potential involvement of British personnel.

The idea of a police or other legal investigation of supposedly secret intelligence operations would be laughable if it wasn't so damaging. This is the extent to which blind legalism has led. 

There's a telling paragraph in the article,

The existence of MI5 and MI6, which celebrate their centenary this year, was not even acknowledged until 1992 but since then the government has laid out an explicit legal framework that governs their activity.

For almost 90 years, the British government didn't even acknowledge the existence of these organizations or their operations. Why? Because they are supposed to be secret intelligence agencies. For some reason many people have forgotten that the effectiveness of secret intelligence operations requires secrecy. I'm not sure why that's become a difficult concept lately.

Likewise, for the same near 90 years, there was no "explicit legal framework" for their actions. Why? Because secret intelligence operations, by their very nature, often operate outside the law. For most of the history of British intelligence, the UK has recognized the obvious. Espionage is by definition an illegal activity, as are many things associated with it. Chaining down intelligence agencies with legal restrictions is something like preventing bicycle riders from using the pedals. Yes, you can still ride a bike without using them (sort of), but pedals are an integral part of the machine. Riding without them greatly reduces the usefulness of bicycles.

If you had told Winston Churchill that the UK would be launching a police investigation of its secret intelligence services, on behalf of foreign terror suspects who claimed they were tortured, he would have looked at you like you were completely insane. But now insanity masquerades as the "rule of law."

Thoughts on the Anniversary of 9/11

It's now fashionable in some circles to downplay what happened on 9/11/01, and to pretend that the U.S. overreacted. We hear that terrorists aren't really that great of a threat, and that the dangers of radical Islam are overblown. Pointing out various aspects of the threat is dismissed as "fearmongering." Many actually want to extend U.S. constitutional rights to known terrorists, and treat terrorism as a law enforcement matter, as if they were nothing more than common criminals. These attitudes are all too common, among people who have basically forgotten 9/11 for all intents and purposes.

On 9/11 a mere 19 people killed 3000 in the heart of our largest city, doing massive economic damage, and actually shut down the entire U.S. air transport system. Just one personal example of the kind of disruption this caused... My wife's niece (from Texas), who had the bad luck to be in Manhattan on business that day, could not get home for days. She managed to exit the city after sharing a hotel room with a stranger, but then could not get home. Flights were grounded, and no rental cars were available. After several days she finally got a rental car by paying an exorbitant rate, and drove from New Jersey to Texas to get home. That situation was probably replicated for business travellers across the country.

Again, the death and destruction of 9/11 was inflicted by only 19 terrorists. They employed no nuclear, biological or chemical weapons, just some hijacked commercial airliners. Despite our post-attack security measures, as an open society the U.S. is highly vulnerable to terrorism. Most of those who minimize the threat are blissfully ignorant, or willfully blind, about the impact of an attack that does utilize weapons of massive destruction. A terrorist strike with even crude, low-yield nuclear weapons would make 9/11 look like a minor incident in comparison.

The threat of terrorism, driven by radical Islam, is still out there, and it is real. On the anniversary of 9/11 it is worth pointing that out, since there are many who would rather pretend that it barely exists. In many ways it is remarkable that there hasn't been another major attack on the U.S., a tribute to our war efforts. For all its mistakes and incompetence in many areas, the Bush administration did succeed in preventing another attack. With all the Bush-bashing that takes place even now (sometimes even by me), that's another thing worth remembering.

HOT5 Daily 9/11/09

1. "Obama's Lies Matter, Too" Some useful perspective.

Representative Sample: If calling out lies and misrepresentations about a significant policy proposal is such pressing journalistic business—and it should be!—you'd think the watchdogs might start with the guy doing the proposing.

2. "Blaming the Free Market for Government Actions" A standard tactic of the left.

Representative Sample: 1. Regulate something
2. Blame the free market for inevitable disruptions caused by the regulation

3. "Aircraft Carriers: Lessons of the Past" Are large carriers sacred cows, relics of the past whose time has passed?.

Representative Sample: the admirals and some politicians have elevated the status of large carrier platforms in importance above its primary reason for existence, the naval fighter/bomber. This is why you hear in the US of a naval “fighter gap”

4. "Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics (9): Too Small Sample Sizes in Surveys" I probably disagree with this guy on most political issues, but he has many useful articles.

Representative Sample: the smaller the sample, the greater the influence of luck on the results we get. Asking the opinion of 100 people, and taking this as representative of millions of citizens, is like throwing a coin 10 times and assuming – after having 3 heads and 7 tails – that the probability of throwing heads is 30%.

5. "*New* 100 Questions for Christians" Actually 66 questions, but still entertaining.

Representative Sample:  33. If Jesus said you could move a mountain with faith as small as a mustard seed, why do faith healers wear glasses?

To submit a blog post for HOT5 Daily, please e-mail me at unrright@NOSPAMgmail.com. Put HOT5 in the subject.