“Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Those who can’t, and can’t teach, create a fake ecological disaster so that they can get grant money.”
from the comments at this post at NeuralNetWriter
Shannon Love
The “Complex” Left vs. the “Simple” Right
Over at Hit&Run, there is a thread about how simplistic and empty Sarah Palin is compared to Obama or previous conservatives. Leaving out the fact that both Reagan and Goldwater suffered the same contempt in their time that Palin does now, it does raise the issue of whether it is important that leftists do in general produce much more complex and “sophisticated” explanations of political ideas than do conservatives.
The major reason that non-leftists’ ideas look “simplistic” compared to leftists’ ideas is that non-leftists’ ideas are usually nothing but statements about the limits of human knowledge.
For example, all arguments for the free market can be distilled to something like:
No human or group of humans has a predictive model of the economy. As such we cannot predict the consequences of economic actions we take. This is especially true of large-scale actions. Therefore, the best policy in the overwhelming majority of case is to not attempt to use the coercive power of the state to try and steer the economy, because the we cannot predict the results and we are more likely to do harm than good.
By contrast, leftist arguments are statements about the possession of knowledge by some elite group of human beings. The “complex” leftists arguments are detailed elaborations of what they think they know in each particular case.
Since When Do Prosecutors Decide the Type of Trial?
In his post, “Why Has Holder Decided to Try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in a Civilian Court?” [h/t Instapundit], Eric Posner says:
Then what is the answer? It is surely this: the Obama administration has decided to offer a two-tiered system of justice. We might call them the “high-quality” (civilian) tier and “low-quality” (military) tier. The high-quality approach offers greater accuracy; the low-quality approach offers less accuracy. The Obama administration will use the high-quality system against people when it has a strong case, and the low-quality system against people when it has a weak case.
This approach makes sense. Endless detention without trial is no longer a politically viable option. The government will make a judgment as to whether a suspect is dangerous or not. If the case is good, the high-quality system will be used. If the case is bad, the low-quality system will be used. In this way, the government can ensure that people it thinks are dangerous will be locked up.
What the hell? Since when do we allow the executive branch to decide the type of trial a defendant receives based on the quality of the evidence the executive branch decides to use? Since when do we give the executive branch any say in how trials are conducted at all?
The Entire Jury Will Have to Be in Witness Protection
On the subject of the civil trial of KSM, Trochilus raises a point I hadn’t considered:
Given the nature and depth of Islamo-facist enmity toward all Western institutions, including all faiths other than their own, toward all our democratic institutions, including our judicial system, and finally toward most Americans; and given their willingness to act on that hatred — who in their right mind would willingly consent to serve on such a jury?
This will be a trial watched by the entire planet. Millions of Islamist fanatics will be watching. There is a good chance that several thousands of those fanatics might decide to exact revenge on anyone involved.
Anyone who sits on that jury will have to spend the rest of their lives looking over their shoulder worrying that they will be the target of a revenge killing. They will become participants in a war with no boundaries and no end.
How Obama is Bringing Martial Law to America
In my previous post, I listed some (but far from all) of the practical problems presented by trying in a civil criminal court an individual (1) who was captured overseas, (2) had evidence against him collected using covert means, with (3) no chain of evidence or custody, and (4) was harshly and physically interrogated with (5) all witnesses and methods being secret.
The greatest danger posed in the trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) isn’t that he will go free. The greatest danger is that he will be convicted and that during his appeals the courts will ratify all of the extraordinary measures used to capture and convict him. The great danger is that the courts will ratify the rough, inaccurate and ambiguous norms of martial law as applying to all civil criminal trials.
After a couple of decades of these court decisions reverberating throughout the legal system, we could end up living under de facto martial law.