The rules of the game in the age of the “war on terror”

Glenn Greenwald notes several recent legal decisions, all of which accord with the following rules for deciding cases in the age of the war against "terrorism." The Rules of American Justice are quite clear, and remain in full force and effect:

(1) If you are a high-ranking government official who commits war crimes, you will receive full-scale immunity, both civil and criminal, and will have the American President demand that all citizens Look Forward, Not Backward.

(2) If you are a low-ranking member of the military, you will receive relatively trivial punishments in order to protect higher-ranking officials and cast the appearance of accountability.

(3) If you are a victim of American war crimes, you are a non-person with no legal rights or even any entitlement to see the inside of a courtroom.

(4) If you talk publicly about any of these war crimes, you have committed the Gravest Crime — you are guilty of espionage – and will have the full weight of the American criminal justice system come crashing down upon you.

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Today’s target of American civil rights abuses

Glenn Greenwald agrees with Law Professor Jonathan Turley that Americans are facing "ten major, ongoing assaults on core civil liberties, expanded during the Bush administration yet vigorously continued and/or expanded by President Obama:

Assassination of U.S. citizens; Indefinite detention; Arbitrary justice; Warrantless searches; Secret evidence; War crimes; Secret court; Immunity from judicial review; Continual monitoring of citizens; and Extraordinary renditions.
In today's column, Greenwald asks "who are generally the victims of these civil liberties assaults?" Perhaps his question could be tweaked as follows: "Who are today's victims of these civil liberties assaults?" Here is his answer:
The answer is the same as the one for this related question: who are the prime victims of America’s posture of Endless War? Overwhelmingly, the victims are racial, ethnic and religious minorities: specifically, Muslims (both American Muslims and foreign nationals). And that is a major factor in why these abuses flourish: because those who dominate American political debates perceive, more or less accurately, that they are not directly endangered (at least for now) by this assault on core freedoms and Endless War (all civil liberties abuses in fact endanger all citizens, as they inevitably spread beyond their original targets, but they generally become institutionalized precisely because those outside the originally targeted minority groups react with indifference).
This endless war and civil rights abuses are destroying the American character. On this point, Greenwald refers to Martin Luther King's 1967 speech critical of the Vietnam War, which includes this passage:
I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube. So I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such . . . .
Like so much of Greenwald's research and writing, today's column is detailed and precisely and persuasively argued. I would highly recommend reading the entire original.

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U.S. military shutting down public access to trial of Bradley Manning

If the U.S. military authorities were proud of the way they were conducting the trial of Bradley Manning, they would give easy and wide-open public access to the proceedings. They are doing the opposite, as reported by Rainey Reitman at The Nation:

Unfortunately, the military is taking steps to block access by the media and the public to portions of the trial, robbing the world of details of this critically important trial. The details of Bradley Manning’s prosecution aren’t making their way into the public domain in large part because there is no full transcript being made public. During a recess from the hearing, I questioned a Public Affairs Officer who refused to provide his name about when a transcript would be made available. He said that it would likely be three to four months before any transcript would be available to the public—long after the media interest had faded . . . The government has denied any recording devices, audio or video, to be in the media center or the courtroom . . . When Nathan Fuller applied for a press pass to attend the hearing and take notes from the media center, his request was granted—and then rescinded. Among other things, Fuller is an intern with the Bradley Manning Support Network . . .

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Daniel Ellsberg: The Person of the Year is sitting in prison

At Democracy Now, Daniel Ellsberg states that war crimes can be viewed in the Iraq helicopter video that was leaked to Wikileaks.

No question in my mind, as I looked at that, that the specific leaked pictures in there of helicopter gunners hunting down and shooting an unarmed man in civilian clothes, clearly wounded, in an area where a squad of American soldiers was about to appear, as the helicopter gunners knew, to take custody of anyone remaining living, that shooting was murder. It was a war crime. Not all killing in war is murder, but a lot of it is. And this was.
According to Ellsberg, who many have credited with helping to bring an end to the Vietnam war, the alleged leaker of that video should not be sitting in prison:
The Time magazine cover gives protester, an anonymous protester, as "Person of the Year," but it is possible to put a face and a name to that picture of "Person of the Year." And the American face I would put on that is Private Bradley Manning. The fact is that he is credited by President Obama and the Justice Department, or the Army, actually, with having given WikiLeaks that helicopter picture and other evidence of atrocities and war crimes—and torture, specifically—in Iraq, including in the Obama administration. That, in other words, led to the Tunisian uprising, the occupation in Tunis Square, which has been renamed by—for another face that could go on that picture, Mohamed Bouazizi, who, after the WikiLeaks exposures of corruption, in Tunis, himself, Bouazizi, burned himself alive just one year ago tomorrow, Saturday, December 17th, in protest. And the combination of the WikiLeaks and Bradley Manning exposures in Tunis and the exemplification of that by Mohamed Bouazizi led to the protests, the nonviolent protests, that drove Ben Ali out of power, our ally there who we supported up 'til that moment, and in turn sparked the uprising in Egypt, in Tahrir Square occupation, which immediately stimulated the Occupy Wall Street and the other occupations in the Middle East and elsewhere. So, "Person of the Year," one of those persons of the year is now sitting in a courthouse in Leavenworth. He deserves the recognition that he's just gotten in Time. Julian Assange, who published that, another person of the year, I would say, who’s gotten a number of journalistic awards, very much deserve our gratitude. And I hope they will have the effect in liberating us from the lawlessness that we have seen and the corruption—the corruption—that we have seen in this country in the last 10 years and more, which has been no less than that of Tunis and Egypt.
This segment also contains some pathetic spinning of the truth by Adrian Lamo, who turned in Bradley Manning. See, for example, this exchange:
AMY GOODMAN: When the Wired chat transcripts were finally all released in Wired magazine, the transcripts that you said were transcripts of your chat with Bradley Manning, you repeatedly swore that Manning was telling you these things in confidence, as a journalist and a minister. At one point, you said again, "this is not for print." Why did you then break that assurance that you gave to Bradley Manning? ADRIAN LAMO: I believe that that is a fallacious interpretation of my words. I offered him the protection of both journalistic shield and clergical protection. And he did not affirmatively accept either. In fact, at one point he said to me, "I am not your source." So, he did not bring those factors into play.

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