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Recent
Stories
July
30, 2003
David
Lindorff
Poindexter the Terror Bookie
Congratulations
to CounterPuncher Gilad Atzmon! BBC Names EXILE Top Jazz CD
July
29, 2003
Jeffrey
St. Clair
"Journalist Spotted! Journalist
Dead!" Guatemala Bleeds; US Press Yawns
Thomas
J. Nagy
The Belligerent Dr. Pipes
Kurt Nimmo
Tom Delay Goes to Jerusalem
Chris
Floyd
Dead Reckoning: Bush Warriors Sign Off on War Crimes
Robert
Fisk
Another Botched Raid; Another Massacre
Jason Leopold
Did Chalabi Help Write Bush's State of the Union Address?
Conn Hallinan
Food Bully: Bush's Biotech Shock and Awe Campaign
Dan
Bacher
Sacramento's War on Free Speech
Ray
McGovern
Cheney Chicanery
Website
of the Day
Julie Hilden Caught on Tape
July 26 / 27, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
NYT's Screws Up Again; Uday and
Qusay Deaths Bad for Bush; Gen. Hitchens at the Front
Gary
Leupp
Faith-Based Intelligence
Saul Landau
A Report from Syria
Stan
Goff
Bring 'Em On Home, Now!
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Book Cooking at Boeing
Andrew
Cockburn
The Sons Are Dead; Now the Blood Feud
Begins
Jason Leopold
CIA Points the Finger at the Pentagon's Office of Special Plans
Robert
Fisk
The Power of Death
Joanne
Mariner
Monsieur Moussaoui
Standard
Schaefer
Joblessness and the Invisible Hand
M. Shahid
Alam
The Global Economy Since 1800: a Short History
Harry
Browne
Northern Ireland: the Other Faltering Peace Process
Fidel Castro
Moncada, 50 Years Later
Lula
Democracy Requires Social Justice
Edward
S. Herman
Refuting Brad DeLong's Smear Job on Noam Chomsky
Ron Jacobs
Guided by a Great Feeling of Love: a Review of Gordon's The Company
You Keep
Julie
Hilden
A Photographer, an Offer and Cameron Diaz's Topless Photos
Adam Engel
Man Talk
Poets'
Basement
Keeney, Witherup, Short, Nimba, Guthrie and Albert
July
25, 2003
Francis
A. Boyle
Impeaching Bush
David
Krieger
15 Questions
Harvey
Wasserman
Pat Robertson's Supreme Fatwah
Steve Dunifer
Seize the Airwaves!
Dan
Bacher
Federal Judge Throws Out Bush Salmon Plan for Klamath River
Kurt Nimmo
Bread, Circuses, Uday and Qusay
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Weblog
Website
of the Day
Stop the Wall!
July
24, 2003
Elaine
Cassel
Ashcroft Loses...Again
Robert
Fisk
The Ugly Story of Camp Cropper: The
US Torture Camp in Iraq
David
Lindorff
Dumb and Dumber in Iraq
Christopher
Brauchli
Ashcroft Demands Death Penalty in
Puerto Rico
David
Vest
Dylan in Bend
Tom Turnipseed
Killing Saddam & His Family Won't Stop Killing of US Troops
Douglas
Valentine
A Nation of Assassins
Stew Albert
Contract Killing
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Weblog
Website
of the Day
Report on Palestinian Child Prisoners
July
23, 2003
Uri
Avnery
Caesar's Favor
David
Lindorff
Lynne Stewart's Big Win: Ashcroft
Rebuked
Mano
Singham
Iraq's Missing WMD Scientists
Steve
Perry
Better Late Than Never: the Press, the Dems, and Bush's Lies
John Stanton
Avoiding Plato's Republic in America: Is Anarchy the Only Hope?
Patrick
Bond
Bush and South Africa: a Petro-Military-Commerce Mission
Harry Browne
A Victory for a Disarming Irishwoman
Paul
Beaulieu
When the WTO Comes to Montreal
Robert
Fisk
The Sons are Dead, But the Resistance
Will Grow
William
Witherup
Georgie Porgie
Website
of the Day
Lieberman & Falwell:
True Love at Last
July
22, 2003
Diane
Christian
Bad Guy / Good Guy: War Forces;
Peace Frees
Jeremy
Brecher
Solidarity and Student Protests in Iran
Steve
Kretzmann
and Jim Vallette
Plugging Iraq into Globalization
Sam
Smith
Greening the Golden Triangle
James
Plummer
Smile, You're on Federal Camera
Lucretia
Stewart
This Day Shall Not Define My Life:
January 18, 2003
Website
of the Day
Iraq Coalition Casualties
Hot Stories
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Elaine
Cassel
Civil Liberties
Watch
Michel
Guerrin
Embedded Photographer Says: "I
Saw Marines Kill Civilians"
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Paul de Rooij
Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click Here
for More Stories.
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July
30, 2003
You
Call This Justice?
How
Ashcroft Coerces Guilty Pleas
By ELAINE CASSEL
The Washington Post reported on the tragedy and
travesty of the convictions of six men in Lackawanna, New York,
the so-called "Lackawanna Six." John Ashcroft's prosecutors
charged the men with conspiring to attend an al-Qaeda terrorist
camp. Does that sound a little far-fetched to you? Like two lovers
conspiring to have an illicit affair that is never consummated?
Or two stock brokers talking about how they might pull off some
scam?
The men were never charged with any act
of terrorism. They were nailed for briefly attending a training
camp for jihadists in Afghanistan. They didn't stay long, and
only one of the had any evidence that suggested he might engage
in terrorism. Five of the six were born in Lackawanna, and all
had gone to school there and continued to live there as adults.
The Justice Department publicly condemned
the men as operating a terrorist cell in Lackawanna, a charge
that did not stick. Indeed, the conspiracy charge itself was
so weak that as I followed the case, I was hoping for a win to
put Ashcroft in his place.
But that did not happen. All six pled
guilty and will serve an average of nine years in prison. Their
lawyers are sick about it, the men and their families resigned
to their fates. Why did they plead?
Simply, because they knew that if they
did not plead guilty, and if the government's case ran into trouble
(as it seemed it would), the prosecutors would do as the prosecutors
in the Zacarias Moussaoui case may do; ask President Bush to
declare the men enemy combatants, and remand them to a military
jail somewhere where they can, under current court decisions,
stay for the rest of their lives--without being charged or tried.
Or they could be charged, tried, and perhaps executed by a military
tribunal, as the Pentagon is preparing to do with enemy combatants
seized from overseas and detained in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Their defense began to unravel when the
two witnesses capable of testifying about their lack of involvement
in al-Qaeda could not be produced--one was thought to be held
in Guantanamo, but the government refused to admit he was there.
The other was killed by the US in a car bombing in Yemen. Coincidence?
Perhaps, perhaps not. But convenient for the prosecution, regardless.
The men were not willing to resist disappearing
into the black hole reserved for enemy combatants, and who could
blame them? For one federal court of appeals, the 4th Circuit
in Richmond, ruled that once Bush declares someone an enemy combatant,
the judiciary must not look behind the designation and question
its propreity or credibility. That's right, no meaningful judicial
review.
The prosecutors may just as well have
put a gun to the men's heads and threatened to kill them on the
spot if they did not plead.
That is not what prosecutors are supposed
to do. They are supposed to charge fairly and uphold the rule
of law. Their duty is not to get convictions but to do justice.
Funny, what the Lackawanna prosecutors called justice looks more
like that of China, Pakistan, and the Sudan, than that required
under the Constitution of the United States.
But that was the first Constitution,
the one before the Constitution according to Bush, Ashcroft,
and Rumsfeld.
Elaine Cassel
practices law in Virginia and the District of Columbia, teachers
law and psychology, and follows the Bush regime's dismantling
of the Constitution at Civil
Liberties Watch. She can be reached at: ecassel1@cox.net
Weekend Edition Features for July 26 / 28, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
NYT's Screws Up Again; Uday and
Qusay Deaths Bad for Bush; Gen. Hitchens at the Front
Gary
Leupp
Faith-Based Intelligence
Saul Landau
A Report from Syria
Stan
Goff
Bring 'Em On Home, Now!
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Book Cooking at Boeing
Andrew
Cockburn
The Sons Are Dead; Now the Blood Feud
Begins
Jason Leopold
CIA Points the Finger at the Pentagon's Office of Special Plans
Robert
Fisk
The Power of Death
Joanne
Mariner
Monsieur Moussaoui
Standard
Schaefer
Joblessness and the Invisible Hand
M. Shahid
Alam
The Global Economy Since 1800: a Short History
Harry
Browne
Northern Ireland: the Other Faltering Peace Process
Fidel Castro
Moncada, 50 Years Later
Lula
Democracy Requires Social Justice
Edward
S. Herman
Refuting Brad DeLong's Smear Job on Noam Chomsky
Ron Jacobs
Guided by a Great Feeling of Love: a Review of Gordon's The Company
You Keep
Julie
Hilden
A Photographer, an Offer and Cameron Diaz's Topless Photos
Adam Engel
Man Talk
Poets'
Basement
Keeney, Witherup, Short, Nimba, Guthrie and Albert
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