Buried amongst the untold affronts to the Bill of Rights, the Constitution and the very spirit of America, the torture bill contains a definition of “wrongfully aiding the enemy” which labels all American citizens who breach their “allegiance” to President Bush and the actions of his government as terrorists subject to possible arrest, torture and conviction in front of a military tribunal.

01:27 GMT UPDATE

After five hours of searching through the 80-plus page bill, Alex Jones, who won the 2004 Project Censored award for his analysis of Patriot Act 2, uncovered numerous other provisions and definitions that make the bill appear as almost a mirror image of Hitler’s 1933 Enabling Act.

In section 950j. the bill criminalizes any challenge to the legislation’s legality by the Supreme Court or any United States court. Alberto Gonzales has already threatened federal judges to shut up and not question Bush’s authority on the torture of detainees.

“No court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider any claim or cause of action whatsoever, including any action pending on or filed after the date of the enactment of the Military Commissions Act of 2006, relating to the prosecution, trial, or judgment of a military commission under this chapter, including challenges to the lawfulness of procedures of military commissions under this chapter.”

The Bush administration is preemptively overriding any challenge to the legislation by the Supreme Court.

The definition of torture that the legislation cites is US code title 18 section 2340. This is a broad definition of torture and completely lacks the specific clarity of the Geneva Conventions. This definition allows the use of torture that is, “incidental to lawful sanctions.” In alliance with the bill’s blanket authority for President Bush to define the Geneva Conventions as he sees fit, this legislates the use of torture.

The media has spun the bill as if it outlaws torture – it only outlaws torture for “enemy combatants,” and in fact outlaws the retaliation of any military against the United States as “murder.” Those deemed “enemy combatants” are not even allowed to fight back yet the government affords itself every power including the go-ahead to torture.

• Further actions that result in the classification of an individual as a terrorist include the following.
• Destruction of any property, which is deemed punishable by any means of the military tribunal’s choosing.
• Any violent activity whatsoever if it takes place near a designated protected building, such as a charity building.
• A change of the definition of “pillaging” which turns all illegal occupation of property and all theft into terrorism. This makes squatters and petty thieves enemy combatants.

In light of Greg Palast’s recent hounding by Homeland Security, after they accused him of potentially giving terrorists key information about U.S. “critical infrastructure” when filming Exxon’s Baton Rouge refinery (clear photos of which were publicly available on Google Maps), sub-section 27 of section 950v. should send chills down the spine of all investigative journalists and even news-gatherers.

“Any person subject to this chapter who with intent or reason to believe that it is to be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of a foreign power, collects or attempts to collect information by clandestine means or while acting under false pretenses, for the purpose of conveying such information to an enemy of the United States, or one of the co-belligerents of the enemy, shall be punished by death or such other punishment as a military commission under this chapter may direct.”

Subsection 4(b) (26) of section 950v. of HR 6166 – Crimes triable by military commissions – includes the following definition.

“Any person subject to this chapter who, in breach of an allegiance or duty to the United States, knowingly and intentionally aids an enemy of the United States, or one of the co-belligerents of the enemy, shall be punished as a military commission under this chapter may direct.”

For an individual to hold an allegiance or duty to the United States they need to be a citizen of the United States. Why would a foreign terrorist have any allegiance to the United States to breach in the first place?

This is another telltale facet that proves the bill applies to U.S. citizens and includes them under the “enemy combatant” designation. We previously cited the comments of Yale law Professor Bruce Ackerman, who wrote in the L.A. Times, “The compromise legislation….authorizes the president to seize American citizens as enemy combatants, even if they have never left the United States. And once thrown into military prison, they cannot expect a trial by their peers or any other of the normal protections of the Bill of Rights.”

The New York Times stated that the legislation introduced, “A dangerously broad definition of “illegal enemy combatant” in the bill could subject legal residents of the United States, as well as foreign citizens living in their own countries, to summary arrest and indefinite detention with no hope of appeal. The president could give the power to apply this label to anyone he wanted.”

Calling the bill “our generation’s version of the Alien and Sedition Acts,” the Times goes on to highlight the rubber stamping of torture.

“Coerced evidence would be permissible if a judge considered it reliable — already a contradiction in terms — and relevant. Coercion is defined in a way that exempts anything done before the passage of the 2005 Detainee Treatment Act, and anything else Mr. Bush chooses.”

Since with this bill, in the aggregate, Bush has declared himself to be above the Constitution and the laws of the United States, the allegiance of American citizens is no longer to the flag or the freedoms for which it stands, but to Bush himself, the self-appointed dictator, and any diversion from that allegiance will mandate arrest, torture and conviction in a military tribunal under the terms of this bill.

Similar to the UK’s Glorification of Terrorism law, which top lawyers have slammed as vague, open to interpretation and a potential weapon for the government to kidnap supposed subversives, the nebulous context of “wrongfully aiding the enemy,” could easily be defined to include publicly absolving an accused terrorist of involvement in a terrorist attack.

That renders the entire 9/11 truth movement an aid to terrorist suspects and subject to military tribunal and torture. In addition, Bush’s recently cited National Strategy for Combating Terrorism, which is available on the White House website, labels conspiracy theorists as terrorist recruiters. […]

Propaganda Martix

Something must break…

This entry was posted on Monday, October 2nd, 2006 at 4:02 pm and is filed under Insanity, Politricks.