From the WSJ Opinion Archives

by JAMES TARANTO
Wednesday, September 6, 2006 3:43 P.M. EDT

Raising the Stakes
In June the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, that war-crimes trials of al Qaeda detainees could not go forward without congressional authorization for the military commissions that were to conduct those proceedings. President Bush had let it be known that he would announce his proposal for such legislation today. Earlier this afternoon he did so in dramatic fashion.

The president announced that 14 top al Qaeda detainees have been transferred from the CIA's custody to the military's. The terrorists, who were at a secret foreign location, now are being held at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. They "include Khalid Sheik Mohammed, believed to be the No. 3 al-Qaida leader before he was captured in Pakistan in 2003; Ramzi Binalshibh, an alleged would-be Sept. 11, 2001, hijacker; and Abu Zubaydah, who was believed to be a link between Osama bin Laden and many al-Qaida cells before he was also captured in Pakistan, in March 2002," the Associated Press reports. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (PDF) has bios for all 14.

This was a closely held secret. Less than a week ago we visited Guantanamo, where we were extensively briefed, but we didn't hear a word about these transfers. We were told that four Gitmo detainees had been charged with war crimes before Hamdan put the process on hold, so that the total presumably is now 18.

Our first reaction to this news is that it certainly raises the stakes in Congress. Before the announcement this afternoon, liberal blogs were all atwitter about "kangaroo courts"; it strikes us that it'll be harder for even the hard left to present the likes of KSM and Binalshibh as victims.

It should be noted that the U.S. is under no obligation to provide these enemy combatants with a trial at all. The liberal Justice John Paul Stevens acknowledged in the Hamdan decision that enemy combatants can be held without charge for the duration of the war; the Nuremberg trials didn't take place until after World War II was over. It will be interesting to see if any serious opposition arises to the president's proposal, given that the alternative is simply to let the terrorists rot.

What Would 09/06/06 FOX News Polls Do Without Americans?
"09/06/06 FOX News Poll: Americans See War on Terrorism Continuing"--headline, FoxNews.com, Sept. 6

Keith Olbermann, Enemy Propagandist?
Last week we noted that Harry Reid, the Senate Democratic leader, had lashed out against Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld after Rumsfeld gave a speech criticizing those who believe terrorists can be appeased. Even though the secretary's speech made no reference to either the Democratic Party or any contemporary politician, Reid accused Rumsfeld of "lashing out" at "political enemies" and playing "partisan games." When Rumsfeld said "appeasement," Reid seems to have concluded: Hey, he's talking about us!

Yesterday President Bush delivered a speech in which he discussed al Qaeda's strategy against the U.S. (ellipses in original):

Along with this campaign of terror, the enemy has a propaganda strategy. Osama bin Laden laid out this strategy in a letter to the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, that coalition forces uncovered in Afghanistan in 2002. In it, bin Laden says that al Qaeda intends to "[launch]," in his words, "a media campaign . . . to create a wedge between the American people and their government." This media campaign, bin Laden says, will send the American people a number of messages, including "that their government [will] bring them more losses, in finances and casualties." And he goes on to say that "they are being sacrificed . . . to serve . . . the big investors, especially the Jews." Bin Laden says that by delivering these messages, al Qaeda "aims at creating pressure from the American people on the American government to stop their campaign against Afghanistan."

Like Reid last week, MSNBC's Keith Olbermann seems to think the president was talking about him:

Make no mistake here--the intent of that is to get us to confuse the psychotic scheming of an international terrorist, with that familiar bogeyman of the right, the "media."

The President and the Vice President and others have often attacked freedom of speech, and freedom of dissent, and freedom of the press.

Now, Mr. Bush has signaled that his unparalleled and unprincipled attack on reporting has a new and venomous side angle:

The attempt to link, by the simple expediency of one word--"media"--the honest, patriotic, and indeed vital questions and questioning from American reporters, with the evil of Al-Qaeda propaganda.

That linkage is more than just indefensible. It is un-American.

Maybe if the Democrats take Congress in November, they can reconstitute the House Un-American Activities Committee and hold hearings on President Bush's misuse of the word "media." Though if you look at the speech closely, you'll note that this wasn't the president's word; it was part of a quote from Osama bin Laden.

Anyway, we are part of the media, and we'd like to say we have no problem with President Bush's speech. As for Olbermann, hey, if the shoe fits . . .

Academic Freedom, Iranian Style
"Iran's hard-line president urged students Tuesday to push for a purge of liberal and secular university teachers, another sign of his determination to strengthen Islamic fundamentalism in the country," the Associated Press reports:

Speaking to a group of students Tuesday, Ahmadinejad called on them to pressure his administration to keep driving out moderate instructors, a process that began earlier this year.

Dozens of liberal university professors and teachers were sent into retirement this year after Ahmadinejad's administration, sparking strong protests from students, named the first cleric to head Teheran University.

The country's oldest institution of higher education remains home to dozens more professors and instructors who outspokenly oppose policies that restrict freedom of expression.

"Today, students should shout at the president and ask why liberal and secular university lecturers are present in the universities," the official Islamic Republic News Agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying during a meeting with students.

What's curious is that here in the west, "liberal and secular university lecturers" resemble Ahmadinejad more than their Iranian counterparts. The Harvard Crimson reports that Harvard--where ex-president Larry Summers was drummed out for voicing forbidden thoughts--is observing the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks by hosting Ahmadinejad's predecessor, Mohammad Khatami:

Harvard Students for Israel released a statement over the weekend calling Khatami's invitation "surprising and alarming" because of Khatami's leadership during the 1999 arrest and torture of several hundred Tehran University student protestors.

The topic of Khatami's lecture? "Ethics of Tolerance in the Age of Violence." Does today's academic left stand for anything other than anti-Americanism?

Corn Chips
David Corn of The Nation, who was the first to suggest that Valerie Plame's "outing" violated the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, now has established that it did not, as he writes on the left-wing rag's Web site:

Her specific position at the CIA is revealed for the first time in a new book, Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War, by the author of this article and Newsweek's Michael Isikoff. The book chronicles the inside battles within the CIA, the White House, the State Department and Congress during the run-up to the war. Its account of Wilson's CIA career is mainly based on interviews with confidential CIA sources. . . .

Valerie Wilson [her married name] was no analyst or paper-pusher. She was an operations officer working on a top priority of the Bush Administration.

But although she was stationed overseas under nonofficial cover, "in 1997 she returned to CIA headquarters and joined the Counterproliferation Division." That was more than five years before Richard Armitage leaked her identity, too long for that disclosure to have violated the act.

Nonetheless, the New York Times, which led the witch hunt for the leaker, still describes her as "covert"!

Oh, and by the way, if her work was so important to national security, what is Corn doing disclosing it, "based on interviews with confidential CIA sources"? Maybe Attorney General Alberto Gonzales should appoint a special prosecutor--no, make it a very special prosecutor--to investigate who leaked this vital information to the ears of Corn.

Someone Alert the Police
"Sexually Violent Predator Meeting Planned"--headline, Rocky Mountain News (Denver), Sept. 5

Sounds Like Entrapment
"Police Hoping to Expose Serial Flasher"--headline, KYW-TV Web site (Philadelphia), Sept. 5

He Won't Pay Till He's Sure All the Charges Are His
"Frist Still Seeks Internet Gambling Bill: Aides"--headline, Reuters, Sept. 5

Half of All Nonmigrants, Too
"Women 'Form Half of All Migrants' "--headline, BBC Web site, Sept. 6

'They Can't Even Pronounce Their L's!'
"US Envoy Says NKorea Talks in Bad Way"--headline, Agence France-Presse, Sept. 6

An Educated Guess: You Eat It
"Scientists Probe How Protein Staves Off Hunger"--headline, CBC News (Canada), Sept. 5

Just Don't Call Him 'Tiny'
"NAVAL BLOCKADE: 9 Warships Seal Off Sulu"--headline, Tempo (Philippines), Sept. 7

Bottom Stories of the Day

By Any Other Name
There's something grimly humorous about this Baghdad story from the New York Times:

There was nothing out of the ordinary about the young man clutching a sheaf of papers at the birth certificate office, except for his name: Saddam Hussein al-Majid.

"All three of your names match his," the clerk at the desk said with a laugh, referring to Iraq's deposed leader. "That's unbelievable!"

Mr. Hussein shrugged in exasperation. "What can I do?" he said. His parents had chosen the name, not he.

Now he was trying to avoid paying with his life for that decision. He wanted to change the first name on his birth certificate to Sajad, favored by Shiites. Mr. Hussein, a Shiite Arab, was all too aware that militiamen from his own sect might assume he belonged to the former ruling Sunni Arab minority.

Over the past few years we've seen lots of reports about Arabs naming their children Osama, Nasrallah, Hezbollah, etc., but let this be a lesson to parents who are thinking of naming their children after political figures. It's one thing to go with a name of someone whose place is secure in history, like Martin Luther or Reagan. But can you imagine having to through life with a name like Hillary or Lennin?

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Today on OpinionJournal:

  • Review & Outlook: A victory for Calderón, and Mexican democracy.
  • Patrick Garrity (from the Claremont Review of Books): What a Cold War realist can teach us about winning a "long war."
  • Jay Winik: The punk kid who reinvigorated professional tennis.

 

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