Between the statements issued by the U.S. government, the inane media that analyzes these statements and the U.S. American public that takes the statements without question, it is safe to say that 99% of this country is brain-dead and on life-support.
The government says that John Walker waived his Miranda rights. In their defense, Ashcroft was quoted by CNN as saying, “No other individual has a right to impose an attorney on him or to choose an attorney for him.”
That’s not quite what the Miranda rights say.
To the best of our knowledge, Miranda rights still begin with the right to remain silent. He would never made it as a terrorist if he were the goddamn canary that the government wants us to believe. Miranda rights also allow criminal suspects to seek legal representation. Why wouldn’t he contact an attorney? Just because he has been declared to be an enemy of the state does not mean he is stupid.
But Mr. Walker must be stupid because he is a mindless terrorist.
Only a mindless terrorist would decide that since it will take over two months to return to the U.S., the best thing to do is to just get rid of those infidel rights and start chillin’ like Bob Dylan with his new friends in the U.S. military and the FBI.
The status of Walker, according to the White House, is a “Battlefield detainee.” The fact that this term does not exist in the Geneva Convention and did not exist before the Administration’s war on terror is beside the point.
Let’s assume that battlefield detainee is a valid status. That would imply that the military, and only the military, is dealing with Mr. Walker until he is transferred to civilian custody in the United States. Such a status puts Walker under the custody of Military Justice until that status changes.
The problem is that, while in military custody, the FBI interrogated Walker, arrested him, read him his rights and obtained a waiver of those rights. The military does not and cannot use the FBI in military investigations because the rules are completely different under military justice.
So what gives? Is John Walker a battlefield detainee from the Taliban or a civilian under criminal investigation? The distinction is important. The U.S. government has shown that they do not care about important distinctions. Furthermore, the government has shown that if they cannot find witnesses to the treason of John Walker, they will manufacture those witnesses.
The last thing they want is for everyone to discover that connections of terrorism to Walker are irrelevant or, at best, not worth the money spent on his incarceration. They don’t want anyone to discover that they have absolutely no idea who was really behind the attacks on September 11th. Dead men don’t tell tales.
