The Republicans’ latest ginned-up controversy about reading Miranda rights to terror suspects shows us, once again, that GOP pols are as skillful and cunning at lying and manipulating the “liberal media” to disseminate their propaganda as they are as inept at governing when they finally do seize power.
Despite their current efforts to create a new, alternate reality, here are the facts:
In eight years, the Bush administration said it had obtained at least 319 convictions in “terrorism or terrorism-related” cases in the civilian justice system, according to a Justice Department budget document. A study by the Center on Law and Security at New York University found convictions in nearly 9 of 10 cases, with a 16-year average sentence for those convicted of terrorism.
Only two accused terrorists arrested in the United States, Ali al-Marri and Jose Padilla, were moved temporarily into the military system. But after legal challenges by the lawyers supplied to all detainees who face military justice, the Bush administration moved both cases back to civilian courts, where Mr. Padilla was sentenced to 17 years in prison and Mr. Marri to 8 years.
The criminal justice system provided better outcomes nearly every time:
John Walker Lindh and David Hicks were both young Muslim converts who traveled to Afghanistan to join the Taliban and were captured there in 2001 by American troops. But then their cases diverged — in ways that might surprise anyone following the fierce political debate over how the Obama administration should treat terrorism suspects.
Bush administration officials decided to charge Mr. Lindh, an American, in the civilian criminal justice system. He was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison and will not get out until at least 2019.
Mr. Hicks, an Australian, was treated as an enemy combatant — the approach now pressed by President Obama’s Republican critics. He went before a military commission at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba and got a seven-year sentence with all but nine months suspended. He is already free.
And:
The list of convicted suspects includes some of the most notorious criminals connected to al Qaeda. Among them are “shoe bomber” Richard Reid, serving three life sentences without parole; and Zacharias Moussaoui, the so-called 20th hijacker, serving life without parole at a “supermax” prison in Colorado.
Both of them, along with scores of others, were read their Miranda rights, afforded legal counsel, brought before a judge in open court and ultimately convicted.
The fact is, anyone — not just U.S. citizens — arrested anywhere that the U.S. Constitution is in effect has the right to remain silent and the rest, because under the Fifth Amendment suspects may not be coerced into incriminating themselves. Non-U.S. citizens are told, “If you are not a United States citizen, you may contact your country’s consulate prior to any questioning.”
There’s a common sense aspect to this. As any San Diego-area college student will tell you, if an American citizen is arrested across the border in Tijuana, the American is subject to Mexican law, which operates under the Napoleonic Code. Unlike our system, in which suspects are presumed to be innocent until they are proven guilty, under the Napoleonic Code suspects are considered guilty until they prove their innocence.
Similarly, if a citizen of Nigeria like Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Underpants bomber, is arrested in the U.S., our Constitution is in effect, which means he has the right to say nothing until he talks with his lawyer.
