Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Whose Side is the Left On?
National Post ^ | 7/3/06 | David Frum

Posted on 07/03/2006 6:29:49 AM PDT by Valin

On Thursday, the U.S. Supreme Court delivered a complex opinion rebuking much of the Bush administration's legal response to the 9/11 attacks. The court ruled that al-Qaeda detainees were entitled to at least a modicum of protection under the Geneva conventions--and that the President needed Congress' approval before sending detainees to military tribunals for trial and punishment.

The high court's decision in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld is being reported as a defeat for the Bush administration, and so it is. But that same decision opens the way to an important and useful debate over counter-terrorism policy--and that is a debate the administration can and should win.

It's symbolically interesting that the Hamdan decision was handed down in the same week that The New York Times triggered a national uproar by exposing details of a U.S. Treasury department program to track terrorist finances around the world. (Two other papers also published the story, but in a less culpable way: Once the Treasury realized that the Times was determined to proceed, it briefed other news organizations itself in order to ensure that the facts were presented accurately and unsensationally.)

The Times' terrorism-financing story followed two other intensely damaging leaks: One to the Times disclosed details of the National Security Agency's program for intercepting terrorist communications; another to the Washington Post disclosed the locations of the prisons where high-value al-Qaeda captives were held for questioning.

(Excerpt) Read more at aei.org ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Editorial; Government; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: hamdan; liberalism; nytimes; trickquestion
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-22 next last

1 posted on 07/03/2006 6:29:50 AM PDT by Valin
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Valin
"Not America's or Freedom's."

Question answered: end of thread.

>:P

2 posted on 07/03/2006 6:30:54 AM PDT by Psycho_Bunny
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Psycho_Bunny

Wow. That was a short thread.


3 posted on 07/03/2006 6:32:33 AM PDT by new cruelty
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Valin
"The Dwarfs are for the Dwarfs."

--C.S. Lewis, The Last Battle

4 posted on 07/03/2006 6:33:14 AM PDT by RichInOC (Stupidity is its own punishment...but too much of the press thinks they're exempt.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: RichInOC
Actually, the left and the MSM strike me more as analogs of Shift and Ginger the Cat, than of the Dwarfs. The isolationist right that thinks retreat can protect them (or Americans) from the Jihad seem analogous to the Dwarfs in The Last Battle.

Personally, I think Lewis's The Abolition of Man and his depiction in The Last Battle of collusion between Narnian (read Western) secularists and the Calormenes (thinly disguised Mohammedans) are proof that the gift of prophecy was still present in the Anglican Communion until at least 1963.

5 posted on 07/03/2006 6:44:50 AM PDT by The_Reader_David (And when they behead your own people in the wars which are to come, then you will know. . .)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: Valin
The Left seems to be deluded into believing that only conservatives are vulnerable to terrorist attacks--that, somehow, terrorists will inherently know that the Left is supportive of them and, therefore, not to be harmed. The Left is playing a potentially fatal game by politicizing national security, but is too blind in its hatred for GWB to realize that fact.
6 posted on 07/03/2006 6:56:52 AM PDT by OkeyDokeyOkie
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Valin

"...and that the President needed Congress' approval before sending detainees to military tribunals for trial and punishment..."

Should be "Congress's."


7 posted on 07/03/2006 7:17:35 AM PDT by Arthur McGowan
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: The_Reader_David

Let's also remember Emeth, the young Calormene soldier.


8 posted on 07/03/2006 7:24:26 AM PDT by Valin (http://www.irey.com/)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: Psycho_Bunny
...end of thread.

Aw, man, I just got here.

9 posted on 07/03/2006 7:33:20 AM PDT by Lando Lincoln (What would a liberal go to war over?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Valin

Yes. I don't recall whether it was another Orthodox or one of my separated Latin bretheren who described Emeth's encounter with Aslan as the best description of salvation outside the *visible* Church ever penned. (Of course 'no salvation outside the Church' is actually a tautology, since in the end, those who are saved *are* the Church.)


10 posted on 07/03/2006 7:39:44 AM PDT by The_Reader_David (And when they behead your own people in the wars which are to come, then you will know. . .)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: Valin
Whose Side is the Left On?

Ooooooo, that's a toughie!! Ummm, just as a guess, Pat, I'm going to say "What is the Left's side?"
11 posted on 07/03/2006 7:45:28 AM PDT by DustyMoment (FloriDUH - proud inventors of pregnant/hanging chads and judicide!!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Valin

I don't understand the question. Do you mean whose side they are on between the Sunnis and the Shiites? Hamas and Fatah?


12 posted on 07/03/2006 7:46:52 AM PDT by liberte
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: OkeyDokeyOkie

I heard some breezy gal on NPR this morning, gushing on how those poor folks down at Gitmo will now be getting "asylum" perhaps, in the U.S. Astonishingly, they neglected to point out just one reason among many is because the countries these gentlemen hail from won't take them back!
But some seem entranced by the whole absurdity.


13 posted on 07/03/2006 7:54:59 AM PDT by Freedom4US
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: OkeyDokeyOkie

They don't take the threat to themselves seriously, but more importantly they see the war effort primarily as a bludgeon with which to beat up the administration. They know that we will be more restrained in our criticism if a Dhmmicrat administration prosecutes the war, so all they have to do is stifle their anti-war, moonbat base (which will die from a sudden lack of media attention once a Dhimmicrat is elected). They are working to reduce the war to a party issue, rather than a threat to us all-it's disgusting, but hardly unprecedented for the American treason party.


14 posted on 07/03/2006 8:07:24 AM PDT by 91B (God made man, Sam Colt made men equal)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: OkeyDokeyOkie

If the voting public cannot see this, it is up to Talk Radio, the Net posters, and the RNC to make sure they do see it. Then too, if W continues to push his judicial appointments, speaks out on staying strong not only in Iraq, but Iran and Korea, and supports the military instead of allowing it to be picked apart, the Dems will be on the defensive till Nov. Can you imagine what would happen if the NY Times, La Times or Boston Globe were bombed by jihadists???


15 posted on 07/03/2006 10:36:06 AM PDT by phillyfanatic
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: Valin

International socialism.


16 posted on 07/03/2006 10:47:04 AM PDT by Robert A Cook PE (I can only donate monthly, but Hillary's ABBCNNBCBS continue to lie every day!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Valin
The Left is concerned with getting its power back. If that means compromising the ability of the country to defend itself so be it. The nation's welfare takes a back seat to their purely parochial partisan interests.

(The Palestinian terrorist regime is the crisis and Israel's fist is the answer.)

17 posted on 07/03/2006 10:51:53 AM PDT by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives On In My Heart Forever)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: goldstategop

The nation's welfare takes a back seat to their purely parochial partisan interests.


(IMO) They (the left) don't really believe we are at war. It's either that or they have gone completely insane.


18 posted on 07/03/2006 11:15:12 AM PDT by Valin (http://www.irey.com/)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 17 | View Replies]

To: Robert A. Cook, PE

Bingo. Having seen what socialism has done all over the world, it's clearly the big lie, but the more obvious a lie it is, the more they buy into it.


19 posted on 07/03/2006 11:23:42 AM PDT by dr_who_2
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 16 | View Replies]

To: OkeyDokeyOkie

The Left is playing a potentially fatal game by politicizing national security, but is too blind in its hatred for GWB to realize that fact.

The few leftist I know honestly believe that there wouldn't be terror if it weren't for the USA. They truly believe we're a target because of our policies but few even attempt to explain what the policies are that are so offensive.

Saudi Arabia and Kuwait and others invited us in. The government of Iraq, a democratically elected government, requests our presence. We buy oil from gulf states just as every other nation of the world does. We do business with most governments of the world just as all other countries do. Then they bring up Palestine but have no idea of the history, instead simply voicing talking points of the Palestinians. The policy that seems to be the biggest offense is that we believe in life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and they don't. We're so wicked. And bin Laden didn't even mention Palestine in the beginning of his terror assaults against us.


20 posted on 07/03/2006 11:41:27 AM PDT by Joan Kerrey
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-22 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson