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President George W. Bush chose the Wednesday before 9/11 to be his most vocal in weeks, and again stressed the fight on terror.Bush admitted to the American people that there were secret prisons located throughout the world administered by the CIA. While this was unsurprising in itself, as many had suspected that such facilities existed, it is interesting that the president would choose this moment to make a public announcement about it.The president expanded upon this statement by acknowledging that 14 key prisoners from these prisons were just transferred, given the pertinent knowledge obtained, to our most public terrorist prison, Guantanamo Bay. To justify the secret attainment, the president outlined how the practice has led to the capture of important enemies, including the alleged mastermind of 9/11. In conjunction with this transfer, the president implored Congress to approve military tribunals to bring these and others accused and being held at Guantanamo Bay to trial.I don’t have a problem with the CIA running provisional prisons in strategic positions throughout the world. In fact, I support the president’s efforts to seek justice in an increasingly uncertain world, but the existence of such prisons should have long been public knowledge and not saved so the president could praise his anti-terror skills at a politically strategic time. This is particularly true because some may disagree with the use of ad hoc prisons and they should be allowed to make their case against them, which they cannot do if they are secret.After the prisons were announced, the administration quickly changed the subject to its efforts in overriding a Supreme Court decision limiting the power of military tribunals to convict foreign nationals. Bush is seeking to circumvent a Supreme Court decision granting Geneva Convention rights to our prisoners-of-war by claiming that the “war on terror,” as defined by the president himself, is not an actual war.Unfortunately for the president, the American people’s respect of judicial and human rights has nothing to do with an arbitrary definition of conflict. The administration is seeking to prevent defendants from confronting their accusers, seeing the evidence against them, and even seeing some of the information used in their prosecution, all of which is an assault on our system of justice.If those accused are guilty, which most of them probably are, a fair trial is probably just as likely to convict as a military tribunal. However, if any of them are innocent, a military tribunal will not be a fair trial, as we would have sanctioned by our legal system. For that reason, all trials conducted by our government must conform to the standards of our legal system, regardless of our definition of war, to ensure that innocents are not incarcerated.It is an odd political move for the president to begin only now to become transparent about his administration’s actions. Perhaps the president is responding to his waning numbers with the only thing he has ever known to incite his followers’ support, terror. However, the administration’s terror well has run dry. According to a CBS news poll, people view the world as no more safe now than they did before the war on terror began, despite the lengthy and expensive efforts. At this point the efforts are viewed as misguided and continued use of the terror card will only harm the president and the rest of his party.
Tim Robertson is a graduate student in the Department of Political Science. E-mail him at?opinion@louisvillecardinal.com.
