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We Lost
National Review Online ^ | May 6, 2006 | The Editors on National Review Online

Posted on 05/04/2006 10:03:41 AM PDT by Sub-Driver

May 04, 2006, 0:48 p.m. We Lost

By The Editors

“America, you lost,” crowed Zacarias Moussaoui after a federal jury in Virginia voted against executing him for the savage murders of nearly 3,000 Americans on 9/11, acts of war against the United States in which the same jury had found him complicit. For once, Moussaoui was right.

Understandably, Justice Department prosecutors suggested that we should take away a different message. Moussaoui, after all, does stand convicted of participation in al Qaeda’s terrorist conspiracy. His future is bleak: He will live out his remaining years in the grim isolation of a maximum-security prison. But that result was attainable without an extensive, massively complex effort to seek his execution. The government was right to undertake this effort. If participating in 9/11’s barbarism isn’t worthy of the death penalty, what is? Nonetheless, by seeking the death penalty, the government raised the stakes and created a new battle. America lost it.

The verdict is a barometer—a discouraging one—of how invested the nation is in the great struggle of our generation. Taking the jurors at their word, they didn’t spare Moussaoui because giving him the death penalty would turn him into “martyr” to the jihadist cause, or would somehow be better treatment than a life sentence. Instead, they homed in on run-of-the-mill personal-tragedy factors that are so common in death-penalty cases: Moussaoui had a rough childhood, his father had a bad temper, he was a victim of racial discrimination.

But a lot of people have bad home lives, and don't try to kill thousands of people, or commit acts of war. Treating Moussaoui’s personal difficulties as a mitigating factor in this kind of case is a denial of moral responsibility, and our war effort needs moral clarity.

(Excerpt) Read more at article.nationalreview.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: clintonjudge; clintonjustice; moussaoui; terrortrials
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1 posted on 05/04/2006 10:03:42 AM PDT by Sub-Driver
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To: Sub-Driver
But a lot of people have bad home lives, and don't try to kill thousands of people, or commit acts of war. Treating Moussaoui’s personal difficulties as a mitigating factor in this kind of case is a denial of moral responsibility, and our war effort needs moral clarity.

No kidding.

2 posted on 05/04/2006 10:05:45 AM PDT by kesg
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To: Sub-Driver

He's the one who will be rotting in a cell for 23 hours a day. He'll have plenty of time to wonder why Allah hasn't saved him and we'll have plenty of time to forget that his pathetic butt ever existed.


3 posted on 05/04/2006 10:06:52 AM PDT by cripplecreek (Never a minigun handy when you need one.)
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To: Sub-Driver

We lost a long time ago, (30 yrs), when we let the elite MSM, and Hollywood run our culture and our pols.


4 posted on 05/04/2006 10:08:33 AM PDT by roses of sharon
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To: cripplecreek
He'll have plenty of time to wonder why Allah hasn't saved him

I thought he said Bush was going to pardon him. I guess he's got Bush confused with Clinton.

5 posted on 05/04/2006 10:09:36 AM PDT by rhombus
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To: Sub-Driver

No matter how careful his captors are, he'll get Dahmer'd.


6 posted on 05/04/2006 10:09:45 AM PDT by facedown (Armed in the Heartland)
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To: Sub-Driver

Amazing how everyone cheered and thought it was so wonderful when Timothy McVeigh got the needle. This is political correctness at it's finest.


7 posted on 05/04/2006 10:09:47 AM PDT by last american
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To: Sub-Driver
His future is bleak: He will live out his remaining years in the grim isolation of a maximum-security prison.

Until our government decides to transfer him to france and they release him.

8 posted on 05/04/2006 10:09:49 AM PDT by WesternPacific
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To: cripplecreek

Don't bet on it. France, for one, would like to extradite him "depending on how harsh his sentence is"--once there, it would just be a matter of time until he's back on the streets. Then again, if we got a 'Rat president again, even this country might release him. Especially since he had a difficult childhood and all (cue the violin music)--according to his lawyers.


9 posted on 05/04/2006 10:10:03 AM PDT by MizSterious (Anonymous sources often means "the voices in my head told me.")
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To: roses of sharon

Who wants to bet that mugwumps in Iraq kidnap some foreigner and demand moonotsosorry's release as ransom. My bet is the mugwumps will use him for some time to come. Better to have offed him and shut down this ploy.


10 posted on 05/04/2006 10:11:14 AM PDT by tigtog
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To: Sub-Driver

HE should be allowed to mingle with the General Populatin on the slam, and then see if he won.

Put him in a cell with a cell-mate named Bubba.

He'll be somebody's be-otch in a week.


11 posted on 05/04/2006 10:12:28 AM PDT by roaddog727 (eludium PU36 explosive space modulator)
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To: cripplecreek

I have heard that long-term prisoners in isolation slowly lose their minds, all motivation, and even their ability to communicate. Granted, Moussaoui wasn't very strong in the sanity department to begin with. Are there any people here who are familiar with people in long-term isolation who could tell us what happens to these people?


12 posted on 05/04/2006 10:13:36 AM PDT by Parmenio
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To: Sub-Driver

You know... this fight is serious, and will be long and difficult, and I am not sure who will 'win' or 'lose'.

But you'll forgive me if I don't give Moussaoui's delusional assessment of the situation a lot of credence.


13 posted on 05/04/2006 10:13:59 AM PDT by HairOfTheDog
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To: Sub-Driver

It's those bleeding heart liberals on the jury in Northern Virginia that think this way. I was so disappointed. I didn't want to waste another tax dollar on him.


14 posted on 05/04/2006 10:14:13 AM PDT by Ptaz (Take Personal Responsibility--it's not fun, but it's the right thing to do.)
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To: Sub-Driver
It's a travesty where we are as a society right now.

This lowlife piece of garbage never even should have gone on trial in our civilian court system in the first place. In World War II he would have gotten a military tribunal for being a foreign spy and saboteur, and he almost certainly would have been swiftly executed.

15 posted on 05/04/2006 10:14:59 AM PDT by jpl
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To: MizSterious

YES, let's remember how the Clintonistas pardoned a slew of terrorists at the 11th hour. Any future 'Rat WH will be highly susceptible to bogus 'humanitarian' pleas from France and the EU to at least allow Moussaoui to be transferred to a French prison (where he will be released after some period of supposed "good behavior"). Any future 'Rat administration will very likely melt when the Euro-twits clamor for so-called 'humanitarian' treatment of this terrorist scum. Republicans are weak enough, but the Demagogues are positively spineless.


16 posted on 05/04/2006 10:15:26 AM PDT by Enchante (Mary McCarthy & Richard Clarke: Al Qaeda and Iraq helped to produce VX in Sudan!!!)
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To: facedown
No matter how careful his captors are, he'll get Dahmer'd.

More likely he'll become a spiritual mentor to the other slammi prisoners, much like rat boy has, supposedly.

17 posted on 05/04/2006 10:15:28 AM PDT by Flavius Josephus (Nationalism is not a crime.)
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To: Parmenio

As far as I'm concerned it's a done deal period. There's really no reason to worry about this guy ever again.


18 posted on 05/04/2006 10:15:45 AM PDT by cripplecreek (Never a minigun handy when you need one.)
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To: Flavius Josephus
More likely he'll become a spiritual mentor to the other slammi prisoners, much like rat boy has, supposedly.

Gonna be tough to do considering that he'll be in his cell alone 23 hours a day with one hour of exercise also alone.
19 posted on 05/04/2006 10:17:45 AM PDT by cripplecreek (Never a minigun handy when you need one.)
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To: Parmenio

It's been a long time since I read about our Supermax here in Colorado, but as I recall, he gets one hour out of his cage, outside alone, per 24 hours. The rest is inside with limited tv. His block mates will include two other terrorists and some heinous mass murderers - all of whom he will NEVER get to speak with. I'm pretty sure Hannibal Lector had it a little better.


20 posted on 05/04/2006 10:17:57 AM PDT by LittleBillyInfidel ("Hello Mullah. Hello Fatwa. Little Billy. Not Sinatra." (Extreme Apologies to Mr. K and Mr. Sherman))
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