On "Bill of Rights Day" (Thursday, December 15), concerned Minnesotans representing Veterans for Peace, Women Against Military Madness, Amnesty International, the ACLU and other peace and justice and civil liberties groups celebrated the 220th anniversary of the ratification of the Bill of Rights by speaking out for the Constitution and against the National Defense Authorization Act. The first ten amendments to the Constitution that guaranteed the rights of citizens to have free speech and not be imprisoned without due process were ratified on December 15, 1791. Many of those rights are now in jeopardy of being lost as President Obama has stated he will break his earlier promise to veto the NDAA and will, instead, sign the bill into law allowing military detention of U.S. citizens without factual justification, due process or a trial.
It appears that the dogs of war, (remember a "war on terror" originally sold as fighting them "over there so as not to fight them here") could now be unleashed domestically upon U.S. citizens.
US Citizens are exempt from Military detention (section 1032)
Existing law is unaffected (section 1032 e)
Here's the text- please read this for yourself before becoming an agent of Fear.
Remember- Congress cut off funding for Gitmo Prisoner Transfers- essentially killing his early 2009 Executive Order to close it. This is one way Congress is trying to keep Gitmo open- and the changes insisted by the President give him and the intelligence Community, the flexibility to keep suspects out of military detention.
The line you are probably confused by is part(e) of section 1031, which states "nothing in this section shall be construed to affect existing law or authorities", which is just a bunch of redundant word play; meant to deceive people like you. From a legal perspective, this part of the bill really reads "this section of this bill affirms the interpretation of past legislation and so therefore does not change it".... in other words, section 1031 clarifies the way in which past legislation should be interpreted, rather than changing that past legislation.
Do you really believe that section 1031 does not apply to US citizens simply because it asserts that previous legislation has not been changed? The bill clearly does not exclude US citizens from its definition of a "covered person under this section", and the one attempt in congress to exclude US citizens from this definition of a "covered person under this section", failed.
http://pleasecutthecrap.typepad.com/main/2011/12/indefinitedetentionbs.html
And here is a link to the text: http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112s1867pcs/pdf/BILLS-112s1867pcs.pdf
I hope that gives some perspective to any readers and observers.
The line you are probably confused by is part(e) of section 1031, which states "nothing in this section shall be construed to affect existing law or authorities", which is just a bunch of redundant word play; meant to deceive people like you. From a legal perspective, this part of the bill really reads "this section of this bill affirms the interpretation of past legislation and so therefore does not change it".... in other words, section 1031 clarifies the way in which past legislation should be interpreted, rather than changing that past legislation.
Do you really believe that section 1031 does not apply to US citizens simply because it asserts that previous legislation has not been changed? The bill clearly does not exclude US citizens from its definition of a "covered person under this section", and the one attempt in congress to exclude US citizens from this definition of a "covered person under this section", failed.
This bill does, quite clearly, include US citizens under its definition of a "covered person".
PAUL / 2012 to preserve our rights
"Senator Levin (addressing Senate president): "And I'm wondering whether the senator is familiar with the fact that the language, the language which precluded the application of section 1031 to American citizens was in the bill that we originally approved in the Armed Services Committee, and the administration asked us to remove the language which says that US citizens and lawful residents would not be subject to this section?"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=V5Oo3gzj2oc