Jew World Order

2012 NDAA Detention Statute “Unnecessary and Dangerous” 

© 2012 by Linda Moulton Howe

“I have signed this bill despite having serious reservations with certain
provisions that regulate the detention, interrogation, and prosecution of
suspected terrorists.  … I want to clarify that my Administration will not
authorize the indefinite military detention without trial of American
citizens. Indeed, I believe that doing so would break with our most
important traditions and values as a Nation. My Administration will
interpret section 1021 in a manner that ensures that any detention
it authorizes complies with the Constitution, the laws
of war, and all other applicable law.”

– Pres. Barack Obama Signing Statement
for H. R. 1540 –
National Defense Authorization Act, Dec. 31, 2011

U. S. President Barack Obama signed H. R. 1540 – NDAA into law
on New Year’s Eve, December 31, 2011, while on vacation in Hawaii.
Image © 2011 by Pete Souza/White House, Getty Images

H. R. 1540

Subtitle D—Counterterrorism

Sec. 1021. Affirmation of authority of the Armed Forces of the United States to detain covered persons pursuant to the Authorization for Use of Military Force.

Sec. 1022. Military custody for foreign al-Qaeda terrorists.

---

January 27, 2012  Washington, D. C.  – The 2012 Fiscal Year National Defense Authorization Act, known also as the NDAA, was signed into United States law on New Year’s Eve December 31, 2011, by President Barack Obama during his holiday vacation in Hawaii.

In his Signing Statement, President Obama said he was putting his signature to the NDAA because “the Act authorizes $662 billion in funding for the defense of the United States and its interests abroad.”  Further the President wrote, “…despite having serious reservations with certain provisions that regulate the detention, interrogation, and prosecution of suspected terrorists … I want to clarify that my Administration will not authorize the indefinite military detention without trial of American citizens.”

The detention of suspected terrorists are described under Subtitle D – Counterterrorism, Sections 1021 and 1022 of the NDAA. Those detention sections affirm that the authority of the President under the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), a joint resolution passed in the immediate aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks, includes the power to detain, via the Armed Forces, any person “who was part of or substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners, and anyone who commits a belligerent act against the U.S. or its coalition allies in aid of such enemy forces, under the law of war, without trial, until the end of the hostilities authorized by the [AUMF].  The 2012 NDAA text authorizes trial by military tribunal.

The American Civil Liberties Union, Amnesty International, Human Rights First, Human Rights Watch, and editorials published in The New York Times and other media warned that these sections violated the U. S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. 

U. S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont cautioned:  “The legislation could also give future presidents the authority to throw American citizens into prison for life without charges or a trial. This bill also contains misguided provisions that in the name of fighting terrorism essentially authorize the indefinite imprisonment of American citizens without charges.”

Others said Congress was re-defining the entire United States as a battlefield and that “codifying by law the indefinite detention on American soil is a very dangerous step.”

Sections 1021 and 1022 – under some legal interpretations – would allow indefinite detention of U. S. citizens under military authority after only suspicion of participating in terrorism – without charge or trial.

Then California U. S. Senator Diane Feinstein went through three versions of a compromise amendment to Section 1021 that was adopted by a 98 to 1 vote not long before President Obama signed the NDAA into law. But even though the Feinstein amendment is supposed to preserve current law concerning U. S. citizens and lawful resident aliens detained within the territory of the United States and Sen. Feinstein’s intent was to remove the requirement of military detention for terrorism suspects arrested in the United States, some legal scholars I have talked with say Sections 1021 and 1022 are not necessary and are dangerous threats to American civil liberties.

The ACLU argues: “Senator Feinstein’s bill addresses the question of whether American citizens can be indefinitely detained within the United States, but it doesn’t do anything to reinforce the longstanding ban on the military being used inside the United States itself to detain American citizens, and it also doesn’t stop this president and future presidents from making worldwide claims of indefinite detention authority.”

I took the confusion to 49-year-old Christopher Anders, J. D., Senior Legal Counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union in Washington, D. C.

Interview:

Christopher  Anders, J.D., Senior Legal Counsel, American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Washington, D. C. :  “This is a really big deal! For the first time in about sixty years, Congress passed legislation that allows this president and any future presidents to have the military put into military detention people without charge or trial – potentially for the rest of their lives based on suspicion alone. And there is no limitation by geography or by time or anything else. So, if there is an allegation that somebody has a relationship to a terrorist organization – even if that is all it is, an allegation – that can be enough to put someone into a military prison for the rest of their lives.

WHO NOW IS IN CONTROL OF EXECUTIVING THIS NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT?

Presumably it’s the Defense Department. But one of the things that is amazing about it (statute) is that it does not tell you who it is who is making the decision. So it says that the president has this authority, but it’s not saying is it the president alone who makes this decision. Is it people in the military itself? Is it civilians in the military? Is it government bureaucrats somewhere? And I think that’s one of the many, many problems with this legislation is that there is this enormous bestowal of power on the executive branch without the kinds of checks that you would expect to see when you have civil liberties at stake.

WHAT IS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THIS NEW NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT STATUTE AND THE PATRIOT ACT?

Well, I think they are both examples of Congress running around scared and passing legislation that the country will later regret – turning over to the president the ability to go into peoples’ lives to interfere with the way people are living based on suspicion alone and without a lot of oversight.

For the ACLU, we believe that if the president or the military were to use this kind of power within the United States against United States citizens, we believe it would be unconstitutional. The constitution should provide that kind of protection against the military being used to indefinitely detain American citizens. So that’s why we think it’s a big mess that Congress created. It’s a big mess that President Obama signed into law. And they have an obligation to the entire country and to the world to fix that.

ISN’T IT TRUE THAT UNDER THIS ACT AS IT IS WORDED NOW,  ANY AMERICAN COULD END UP UNDER MILITARY AUTHORITY AND HELD AWAY FROM THE NORMAL AMERICAN LEGAL SYSTEM?

Yeah, will I think the problem with the way this bill is drafted is it was done in secret. The Senate twice in an Armed Services Committee held secret markups of this bill behind closed doors. No one was allowed into that room. It was then later re-drafted in a conference committee, again behind closed doors. And the product that came out is something that people are still scratching their heads about. There are almost as many opinions on what this does as there are people looking at it!

NDAA Sections 1021 and 1022
“Unnecessary and Dangerous”

NOT LONG AFTER PRESIDENT OBAMA SIGNED THIS NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT ON DECEMBER 31, NEW YEAR’S EVE, I TALKED WITH PROFESSOR MARK TUSHNET AT HARVARD LAW SCHOOL AND HE SAID THIS ACT IS BOTH ‘UNNECESSARY AND DANGEROUS.’

Yeah, we’re ten years out from 9/1. Osama bin Laden is dead. The United States is out of Iraq. The government is trying to figure out how to pull out of Afghanistan. There is no reason at this point that Congress should decide that it’s going to pass this new indefinite detention statute, which is unlike anything that’s passed since the McCarthy era.

RIGHT, AND THE WORD ‘TERRORISM’ TODAY IS GOING TO BE USED WITH THE SAME KIND OF ABUSE POTENTIAL AS ‘COMMUNIS’ WAS DURING THE
MC CARTHY ERA.

[ Editor’s Note:  Wikipedia. “McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from the late 1940s to the late 1950s and characterized by heightened fears of communist influence on American institutions and espionage by Soviet agents. Originally coined to criticize the anti-communist pursuits of Republican U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin, ‘McCarthyism’ soon took on a broader meaning, describing the excesses of similar efforts. The term is also now used more generally to describe reckless, unsubstantiated accusations, as well as demagogic attacks on the character or patriotism of political adversaries.”]

And I think that the important thing that everyone has to remember is that the government makes mistakes. And I think if you were to look at one of the main benefits of having a criminal justice system is that when you have a criminal justice system, there is a requirement that there be a proof beyond a reasonable doubt in court that the person committed a crime. When you put the government to that test and you give the defendant the opportunity to prove his or her innocence, the chances that you are mistakenly imprisoning the wrong person go down.

But if you are putting people in prison potentially for the rest of their lives based on some government bureaucrat’s say so or someone’s suspicion here or there, we know there are hundreds of thousands of people on No Fly lists. Most of those people do not belong there. We believe that would still be unconstitutional to do that. But again, the problem is that can take a very long time to prove that to a court and to get a court to make that kind of decision. In the meantime, the person can be held in prison for potentially a very long time.

SOMEONE COMES AND SAYS YOU ARE UNDER ARREST AS A TERRORIST .WHAT IS THE VERY FIRST THING THAT YOU DO?

(laughs) Well, I think if anyone does get into that situation, certainly contact a lawyer, certainly contact the ACLU. We are very committed to making sure that this law is not used that way and we’re very committed to defending anybody who believes that it is being used against them that way.

IS THERE A NATIONAL 800 NUMBER THAT EVERY AMERICAN LISTENING COULD USE TO CONTACT THE ACLU IF THEY WERE ARRESTED UNDER THE NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT?

We don’t have an 800 number, but certainly the ACLU has an ACLU state affiliatein every state as well as the national ACLU based in New York. And all those ACLU state affiliates are very interested in litigation and all of them represent people in court. They are all places where people can go to get legal services.

WHAT IF THE DEFENSE DEPARTMENT ON THE MILITARY SIDE ARRESTS AN AMERICAN CITIZEN UNDER THE NDAA AND THEY ARE TAKEN TO THE MILITARY SIDE AND THEY AREN’T EVEN GIVEN THE RIGHT TO A PHONE CALL?

It’s certainly the reason why we need to have the laws we have and the due process protections that we have.

FROM THE AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION POINT OF VIEW, THE NDAA IS ERODING WHAT WE THOUGHT WE HAD AS CIVIL LIBERTIES BEFORE DECEMBER 31ST, 2011.

Yeah, and I think part of it is a problem with the idea that the United States is at war everywhere and that the military should be used everywhere. I think where most Americans are is that most Americans recognize a role for the military in protecting the country. That doesn’t extend to people picking up American citizens or anybody else in the United States or around the world. The place where the U. S. military should be operating are the places where Congress has made the decision that the United States really should be using the military. And right now, that’s in Arfghanistan. And if the president needs more authority, the president should go back to Congress and say, ‘We need to use the military here or there.’

But for Congress to just say, ‘Here, Mr. President, here is all this power. Use the military anywhere you want in the world and pick up without charge or trial anyone who you or anyone working for you has a relationship to a terrorist organization – well, we’ve extended the battlefield  to a worldwide battlefield.’

As a result, we have eroded the civil liberties that everybody has walking down peaceful streets.

AND THE ENTIRE AMERICAN PUBLIC IS ESSENTIALLY PUT INTO THE POSITION OF BEING SUBJECTS OF SUSPICION BY THEIR OWN GOVERNMENT.

Well, I think one of the other things that we want to impress upon Congress is that Congress made this mess. Courts did not make this mess. President Obama on his own did not make this mess. Congress made this mess! And Congress has an obligation to fix it and Pres. Obama has the obligation to work with Congress to fix it.

If Arrested as Terrorist, What Do You Do?

COULD YOU SAY TO THIS AUDIENCE WHAT YOU AS AN ATTORNEY FOR THE ACLU WOULD RECOMMEND THAT EVERYBODY DO IF THEY ARE EVERY ARRESTED AS A ‘TERRORIST’ UNDER THE NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT?

On the ACLU’s website, which is www.aclu.org, there is a card you can print out and keep in your wallet that is called:

KNOW YOUR RIGHTS: 
http://www.aclu.org/files/assets/bustcard_eng_20100630.pdf

And that is a card that tells you the basic rights you have anytime that you are questioned by any law enforcement, any time you are arrested, anytime you are put into somebody else’s custody, government’s custody. Those rights are rights that every American should have an expectation to get.

And so, I guess what I would urge is that people become familiar with that. And I think that’s something that’s going to work in the context of the NDAA, but it also works in the context where lots of people who get pulled over by police for all kinds of things that are not nearly as consequential as any kind of violation of the NDAA’s requirement. It’s really designed to let you know what rights you have and then what rights the police have and what they can do and what they can ask of you under the constitution.

EACH PERSON LISTENING SHOULD FIND OUT WHAT THEIR LOCAL ACLU PHONE NUMBER IS IN ANY OFFICE NEAR THEM AND WRITE THEM DOWN ON THIS RIGHTS THAT YOU HAVE AT THE ACLU WEBSITE?

Yes.”

More Information:

For further reports about threats to U. S. and American civil liberties, please see Earthfiles in Archive below.

• 08/14/2011 — More Earthfiles Viewer Feedback About Greek Book and Oltissis
• 07/09/2011 — Front Cover of “Ted Connor’s” Confiscated Greek Book
• 04/18/2011 — Part 1: Original Scorched Carbon of CIA Memo Links Government UFO Cover-Up and JFK Assassination
• 04/18/2011 — Part 2: Original Scorched Carbon of CIA Memo Links Government UFO Cover-Up and JFK Assassination
• 04/18/2011 — Updated – Part 3: Original Carbon of Scorched Memo Links Government UFO Cover-Up and JFK Assassination
• 04/18/2011 — Part 4: Original Carbon of Scorched Memo Links Government UFO Cover-Up and JFK Assassination
• 01/28/2010 — Airport Body Scanners – How Safe Is The Terahertz Radiation?
• 08/01/2008 — Part 1: Rise of Fourth Reich in America?
• 09/14/2007 — Part 1: Psi Spies – True Story of America’s Psychic Warfare Program
• 07/17/2004 — Inside Job – Unmasking the 9/11 Conspiracies by Jim Marrs
• 05/25/2002 — Part 2 – “Dirty Bombs” and “Suitcase Nukes”
• 10/10/2001 — Three Anthrax Inhalation Cases In Florida FBI Opens Criminal Probe – Nano Bomb Update
• 10/06/2001 — Osama bin Laden and the Hezbollah

• 06/24/1999 — Contrails and U.S. Gov. Interest
• 06/02/1999 — Contrails and U.S. Government Interest

Websites:

ACLU Know Your Rights: http://www.aclu.org/files/assets/bustcard_eng_20100630.pdf

Final law H. R. 1540, NDAA: 
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112hr1540enr/pdf/BILLS-112hr1540enr.pdf

President Barack Obama Statement on Signing the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 on December 31, 2011:
http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=98513st=st1=#axzz1iE5qy7a3

ACLU “Indefinite Detention, Endless Worldwide War and the 2012 NDAA”:
http://www.aclu.org/indefinite-detention-endless-worldwide-war-and-2012-national-defense-authorization-act

McCarthyism:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism