Another Obama about-face: Miranda rights for Afghan detainees

[VeeP]

Oh, they're coming fast and furious now.

Any Obamabots care to reconcile....

this:

Obama administration grants Miranda rights to detainees in Afghanistan

For, the Obama Justice Department has quietly ordered FBI agents to read Miranda rights to high value detainees captured and held at U.S. detention facilities in Afghanistan, according a senior Republican on the House Intelligence Committee (Mike Rogers, R-MI).

Rogers, a former FBI special agent and U.S. Army officer, says the Obama administration has not briefed Congress on the new policy. "I was a little surprised to find it taking place when I showed up because we hadn't been briefed on it, I didn't know about it. We're still trying to get to the bottom of it, but it is clearly a part of this new global justice initiative."

...with this?

Flashback: Obama Says Detainees Don't "Deserve" Miranda Rights

(note: video caption states March 2003, when in fact the 60 Minutes interview occurred in March 2009.)

 

[B_Mister Buildington]

Hey, now, what are you trying to do here? Start some sort of argument?

 

[VeeP]

Nope, just trying to figure out where this administration stands on key issues key from one day (hour?) to the next. Maybe someone who sees eye-to-eye with these clowns can explain it to me. All I know is this one's a biggie and it appears to be yet another 180.

 

[Trinity]

Oh, they're coming fast and furious now.

Any Obamabots care to reconcile....

this:

Obama administration grants Miranda rights to detainees in Afghanistan

For, the Obama Justice Department has quietly ordered FBI agents to read Miranda rights to high value detainees captured and held at U.S. detention facilities in Afghanistan, according a senior Republican on the House Intelligence Committee (Mike Rogers, R-MI).

Rogers, a former FBI special agent and U.S. Army officer, says the Obama administration has not briefed Congress on the new policy. "I was a little surprised to find it taking place when I showed up because we hadn't been briefed on it, I didn't know about it. We're still trying to get to the bottom of it, but it is clearly a part of this new global justice initiative."

...with this?

Flashback: Obama Says Detainees Don't "Deserve" Miranda Rights

(note: video caption states March 2003, when in fact the 60 Minutes interview occurred in March 2009.)

Obama believed that detainees didn't deserve miranda rights before he actually tried to close Gitmo and delved into the process of prosecuting terrorists (and had to mesh it with his rhetoric as well), just like Attorney General Eric Holder believed that detainees didn't come under the Geneva Conventions back in 2002 before he was AG and his boss condemned the previous adminstration for their handling of the rights and prosecution of terrorists.

Important points are discussed in this article in the LA Times:

Miranda rule may hamper detainee trials


White House Press Secretary Gibbs did his usual song and dance about it (which is more embarrasing than admitting he doesn't know). Why can't Gibbs stop wasting the WH Press Corp's time and simply say "I don't know, I will have to get more information and I'll give you an answer tomorrow?"

White House Press Corps.org: Miranda Rights Read To Detainees - White House Press Briefing by Robert Gibbs

 

[B_starinvestor]

Nope, just trying to figure out where this administration stands on key issues key from one day (hour?) to the next. Maybe someone who sees eye-to-eye with these clowns can explain it to me. All I know is this one's a biggie and it appears to be yet another 180.

Wondering if they can install some type of software in the teleprompter to alert Obama on contradictions and flipflops??

 

[oralhijinks]

Based on their Gitmo status they did not get Miranda because they were not being charged with a Federal or State crime. They are battlefield detainees. The past administration nor the current administration care to classify them as PoWs either. Since they are now to appear before a federal judge they must be Mirandized because they are being charged under federal terrorism statues.

The last of the detainees are really the lucky ones. It may sound strange to say but they will at least get a fair trial. Even military tribunals are very fair. I know that's not what people want to hear as it's much easier to classify those officers who sit on the tribunals as Nazi thugs but frankly that's not the case. Those captured after the close of Gitmo will make it to the hands of the Afghan National Army and will experience a whole new meaning to the word pain. In Pakistan it will be the same. The primary forces operating in Afghanistan are special operations forces. Their primary job is to win the hearts and minds of the people by providing medical, dental, veterinary, sanitation, logistics, force multiplication, and stability. Of course they fight when required but the Green Beret is really a nation builder by mission. As such they do not have the capability to provide for and maintain a common prison camp so captured foreign fighters will be handed over the indiginous governments.

 

[VeeP]

Obama believed that detainees didn't deserve miranda rights before he actually tried to close Gitmo and delved into the process of prosecuting terrorists (and had to mesh it with his rhetoric as well), just like Attorney General Eric Holder believed that detainees didn't come under the Geneva Conventions back in 2002 before he was AG and his boss condemned the previous adminstration for their handling of the rights and prosecution of terrorists.

Yep, they're furiously attempting to put the toothpaste back in that tube, but the fact is they can't mesh it with their past rhetoric. Sadly, the media's blatant failure to properly vet this guy during the campaign is really starting to show.

White House Press Secretary Gibbs did his usual song and dance about it (which is more embarrasing than admitting he doesn't know). Why can't Gibbs stop wasting the WH Press Corp's time and simply say "I don't know, I will have to get more information and I'll give you an answer tomorrow?"

Gibb's conduct is stunning on a daily basis anymore.

Q Okay. Just so I understand what you're saying, when you said it wouldn't come as a surprise to you, what did you mean by that?

MR. GIBBS: I'm not surprised by a lot in this town anymore. Let me look at what you're talking about --

Q You're not contesting that that's a policy that's being used? I'm just trying to make sure I understand what you're saying.

MR. GIBBS: I feel like you should be reading me my rights. (Laughter.) That's why I'm hoping to get my lawyer.


I'm so glad he thinks this is funny. A ranking member of the Intelligence Committee finds out while on the ground and this guy is cracking jokes??

Wondering if they can install some type of software in the teleprompter to alert Obama on contradictions and flipflops??

Pretty amazing that the most intelligent president we've ever had wouldn't be able to keep track of his own. I guess he needs the teleprompter for every single speech he makes in order to maintain the chin-up dictatorial pose. Wait... is that goose-stepping I hear?

 

[D_Ireonsyd_Colonrinse]

Good for Obama. He's evolving. He listens. He's open to suggestion from people more knowledgable than Trinity and VeeP.

Oh, no! Detainees - like that innocent guy that was just released, Lakhdar Boumediene YouTube - Detainee Speaks Out After Being Freed - June 8, 2009 - might have the right to remain silent and consult with an attorney?


What kind of country lets its accused remain silent and talk to an attorney? Sheer madness!

Obviously some posters on this forum would feel much more at home under authoritarian regimes (maybe they should move to North Korea?... or time-travel back to the Middle Ages under the auspices of the Roman Catholic Church).

 

[Trinity]

Good for Obama. He's evolving. He listens. He's open to suggestion from people more knowledgable than Trinity and VeeP.

umm...Obama supports and maintains indefinite detention without trial. And according to the most recent statements from the Obama Administration, they haven't adopted a full policy of reading detainees their Miranda Rights.

“The real rumor yesterday is whether our forces were reading Miranda rights to detainees and the answer to that is no,” Gen. David Petraeus
​

Oh, no! Detainees - like that innocent guy that was just released, Lakhdar Boumediene YouTube - Detainee Speaks Out After Being Freed - June 8, 2009 - might have the right to remain silent and consult with an attorney?
What kind of country lets its accused remain silent and talk to an attorney? Sheer madness!

Obviously some posters on this forum would feel much more at home under authoritarian regimes (maybe they should move to North Korea?... or time-travel back to the Middle Ages under the auspices of the Roman Catholic Church).

The issue of prosecuting terrorists isn't as simplistic as you make it, otherwise you will have to include Obama in your authoritarian regime insult above. Obama still supports indefinite detainment without trial and not mirandizing as a policy.

Obama did flip flop on his prior statement a few months ago. And Gen. Petraeus and the DOJ are disavowing a policy of reading miranda because statements like the following made by Rep. Hoekstra resignate:

When they mirandize a suspect, the first thing they do is warn them that they have the ‘right to remain silent.’ It would seem the last thing we want is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed or any other al-Qaeda terrorist to remain silent. Our focus should be on preventing the next attack, not giving radical jihadists a new tactic to resist interrogation–lawyering up. - Rep. Hoekstra
​

But the Dept. Of Justice actually confirmed they were mirandizing some detainees. Once again Obama has it both ways:

“There has been no policy change and nor blanket instruction issued for FBI agents to Mirandize detainees overseas. While there have been specific cases in which FBI agents have Mirandized suspects overseas, at both Bagram and in other situations, in order to preserve the quality of evidence obtained, there has been no overall policy change with respect to detainees.” - DOJ Spokesperson Dean Boyd
​

 

[sparky11point5]

I agree with Will -- I am glad that Obama is willing to extend an important safeguard to due process and and actually exhibiting our values.

Oh, and this is not new, it started under Bush.

Miranda Rights For Detainees Started Under Bush Administration

Geez, you people are reaching. Not that it is a good idea, or not, if you want to argue that. Instead, you try to smear Obama for any possible reason.

 

[Trinity]

I agree with Will -- I am glad that Obama is willing to extend an important safeguard to due process and and actually exhibiting our values.

Oh, and this is not new, it started under Bush.

Miranda Rights For Detainees Started Under Bush Administration

Geez, you people are reaching. Not that it is a good idea, or not, if you want to argue that. Instead, you try to smear Obama for any possible reason.

This another one of those...Bush did it first, Obama is innocent ? No.

The title from the story from the huffington post is misleading. The detainees under Bush were:

...read rights similar to a standard U.S. Miranda warning, and officials designed the program to get to the information the CIA already had gleaned by using waterboarding, which simulates drowning, and other techniques such as sleep deprivation, forced standing and the use of extreme temperatures. - Huffington Post
​

Nobody is smearing Obama. As the OP stated Obama himself said that detainees didn't deserve miranda rights in the video clip. Obama is now, doing otherwise but at the same time claiming that he isn't. If the Huffington Post article is accurate, Bush read rights similar to U.S. Miranda to detainees because they had been harshly interrogated. Are you saying Obama copied Bush in doing that?

 

[faceking]

They are just preparing to technical run them thru the US legal system, which has NOTHING to do with the battlefield.

Guessing Barrah will run the 10's of thousands of young men/women he just shipped back out ot Afghanistan through the ringer when they didn't "have probable cause" to shoot at the Taliban.

I noticed all the women dressed in black on the street corners here protesting Iraq/Afghanistan that "NO WAR is JUST" and "US OUT OF THE MIDDLE EAST".... are gone since late January. Fucking cunt hypocrites.

Oh, they're coming fast and furious now.

Any Obamabots care to reconcile....

this:

Obama administration grants Miranda rights to detainees in Afghanistan

For, the Obama Justice Department has quietly ordered FBI agents to read Miranda rights to high value detainees captured and held at U.S. detention facilities in Afghanistan, according a senior Republican on the House Intelligence Committee (Mike Rogers, R-MI).

Rogers, a former FBI special agent and U.S. Army officer, says the Obama administration has not briefed Congress on the new policy. "I was a little surprised to find it taking place when I showed up because we hadn't been briefed on it, I didn't know about it. We're still trying to get to the bottom of it, but it is clearly a part of this new global justice initiative."

...with this?

Flashback: Obama Says Detainees Don't "Deserve" Miranda Rights

(note: video caption states March 2003, when in fact the 60 Minutes interview occurred in March 2009.)

 

[D_Tully Tunnelrat]

The title from the story from the huffington post is misleading. The detainees under Bush were:

...read rights similar to a standard U.S. Miranda warning, and officials designed the program to get to the information the CIA already had gleaned by using waterboarding, which simulates drowning, and other techniques such as sleep deprivation, forced standing and the use of extreme temperatures. - Huffington Post​

Actually the bulk of the quote is from the Washington Post (2/12/08), and it goes as follows:

"FBI and military interrogators who began work with the suspects in late 2006 called themselves the "Clean Team" and set as their goal the collection of virtually the same information the CIA had obtained from five of the six through duress at secret prisons.

Officials said most of the detainees talked to FBI and military interrogators, some for days, others for months, while one or two rebuffed them. The men were read rights similar to a standard U.S. Miranda warning, and officials designed the program to get to the information the CIA already had gleaned by using waterboarding, which simulates drowning, and other techniques such as sleep deprivation, forced standing and the use of extreme temperatures."

Which is basically a flip-flop in strategy on the part of the Bush Admin. First they were enemy combatants so there was no need to gather proper evidence in order to make a case; just pump them in any way possible for more "information." When Boumediene, Hamdan and Co., were able to gain the right of habeas corpus, which is far more significant than Miranda, then the Bush Admin. decided to try and gain the same information the right way.

The Obama Admin is attempting to triage a disaster, which like Katrina, has been ignored. Each detainee group is unique, and Obama is trying to figure out an appropriate way to deal with them.

Just take the example of the 20 Uighur Muslims, who were formerly independent, but are now part of China, where they are a minority and have been persecuted. They want to be independent again, like Tibet. They were in Afghanistan to learn from OBL how to fight, when they were captured by the US. The US does not want to ship them back to China for fear that they will be tortured, or worse. So, the Admin struck a deal to send them to the former US island territory of Palau (in the Micronesia part of the South Pacific), in exchange for $200M in US aid.

This is only one example, but that's a complicated, and really expensive solution. It shows how far the Obama Admin. is willing to go to solve the problems left behind by the previous Admin.​

 

[deleted15807]

Can we really blame the GOPer's like Star, the entity known as Trinity and nick444 who come here to commune in their misery that McCain and Palin aren't running the country further over the cliff into the abyss with empty slogans of 'small government' and 'free markets' and 'culture of life' and 'fiscal responsibility' and 'personal responsibility' and 'regulatory relief'. Each one gutted after 30 years of ideological failure. You would be depressed too.

The situation is critical:

Poll: GOP suffers from low self-esteem

The Grand Old Party is suffering from low self-esteem. According to a new poll from Gallup, 38 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents have an unfavorable opinion of their own, compared with just 7 percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents who have an unfavorable opinion of their party.

Poll: GOP suffers from low self-esteem - John Ward Anderson - POLITICO.com
​

 

[Trinity]

Actually the bulk of the quote is from the Washington Post (2/12/08), and it goes as follows:

Actually, I know that because I read the article. What I stated still stands. The title of the Huffington Post article is a joke. Bush didn't have the CIA read them their Miranda rights...they read them something similar. And as I stated, if the article is accurate Bush did that because detainees were harshly interrogated. You assert Bush did it first, Obama just followed what Bush did.

Obama flip-flopped. Obama stated that detainees did not deserve miranda rights and now he's reading miranda to some (although having it both ways as usual). Bush didn't change positions, Bush adhered to clarifications made by the Supreme Court.

The Obama Admin is attempting to triage a disaster, which like Katrina, has been ignored. Each detainee group is unique, and Obama is trying to figure out an appropriate way to deal with them.

Just take the example of the 20 Uighur Muslims, who were formerly independent, but are now part of China, where they are a minority and have been persecuted. They want to be independent again, like Tibet. They were in Afghanistan to learn from OBL how to fight, when they were captured by the US. The US does not want to ship them back to China for fear that they will be tortured, or worse. So, the Admin struck a deal to send them to the former US island territory of Palau (in the Micronesia part of the South Pacific), in exchange for $200M in US aid.

This is only one example, but that's a complicated, and really expensive solution. It shows how far the Obama Admin. is willing to go to solve the problems left behind by the previous Admin.

The Uighurs were trained by Al-Qaeda affliates.

/17 Uighur detainees are either members or associates of the Eastern Turkestan Islamic Movement (also known as the Turkestan Islamic Party), a U.S. and UN-designated al Qaeda affiliate. Most of the Uighur detainees have admitted they were trained at ETIM/TIP training camps. And at least eight of them have admitted that Abdul Haq, a member of al Qaeda’s elite Shura council, ran the training camps where they learned to wage jihad. Thomas Jocelyn, The Weekly Standard & The New York Times - The Opinionator, Eric Etheridge - Uighur Problem
​

It is believed that any initial threat they posed would have been to China and China refused to take them back: Uighur militant groups

No other country wanted them either...Palau will take them for the money.

Obama's willing to go far to solve problems left from Bush? No. The Uighurs had habeas corpus and visibility from their court case under Bush, otherwise they would be in Afghanistan indefinitely detained courtesy of Obama.

And that $200M is an outrage.