Free Jose Padilla: Three Years In Prison, Not A Shred Of Evidence

CounterPunch
May 23, 2005

A Victim of Government Demagoguery and Public Hysteria
Free Jose Padilla
By MIKE WHITNEY

May 8 marked the third anniversary of the imprisonment of Jose Padilla. Padilla was apprehended at Chicago's O'Hare Airport in 2002 by Federal officers under the shaky "material witness" provision and trundled off to prison. In a conspicuous effort to poison public opinion, Attorney General John Ashcroft announced on national TV that Padilla was conspiring to set off a "dirty bomb" (radioactive device) within the United Sates. To date, the government has never produced any evidence to corroborate their spurious claims. In all probability, Padilla may be entirely blameless.

The government defends its detention of Padilla on the grounds that he is an "enemy combatant". The term "enemy combatant" means "presumed guilty" and its application to US citizens or foreign nationals allows the state to operate outside the confines of international human rights law and the Bill of Rights. Simply put, it is the end of the rule of law in America and a rejection of a legal tradition that dates back 800 years. Most likely, the phrase originated in a right-wing think-tank as a way of dealing with potential enemies of the state while ignoring the law. In fact, it has no legal meaning, but its use assumes that the president has the authority to conduct the war on terror however he sees fit; using "all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided terrorist attacks"or, in order, to "prevent future acts of international terrorism." (Congress; Joint Resolution Sept 18, 2001) The Bush administration believes that this empowers the president to strip citizens of their constitutional rights and detain them without charges. So far, the courts have failed to stop this disturbing overreach of executive power.

The moniker "enemy combatant" creates the greatest constitutional crisis the nation has ever faced. It undermines the principle of "inalienable rights" by allowing the president to pick and choose who is entitled to the benefits of citizenship. More importantly, it presumes that suspects have no right to challenge the terms of their detention through access to the legal system. The media breezily refers to the plight of enemy combatants as "legal limbo. It is not limbo; it is despotism.

In Justice John Paul Stevens scathing dissent (to the Supreme Court's refusal to hear the Padilla case) Stevens articulates the gravity of Padilla vs. Rumsfeld. He said the Padilla case poses "a unique and unprecedented threat to the freedom of every American citizen. At stake is nothing less than the essence of a free society. For if this nation is to remain true to the ideals symbolized by its flag, it must not wield the tools of tyrants even to resist an assault by the forces of tyranny."


http://www.counterpunch.org/whitney05232005.html

Think about it. One day government comes to your door and accuses you of being a terrorists. No right to counsel, no rights at all. This could be you or me one day!