"Freedom of Arrest" 

A revised version of the Miranda rights is being circulated to law enforcement agencies throughout the United States. The new rights read, as follows: “Freeze! Up against the wall, you slug! You have the right to spill your guts to us! You have the right to confinement in a Navy brig! You have the right to get arrested for having committed to no crime!"

Under provisions afforded in Bill of Rights, you know, the first ten amendments to the Constitution of the United States, you are supposed to ensure your right to live a fairly nice life, free of harassment for political reasons.

Let the U.S. be engaged in an armed conflict, however, and then see what happens if you consider doing anything on the other side of the law. It isn’t funny. You get listed, by the president, no less, as being an “enemy combatant" and tossed in the brig.

The Sixth Amendment reads, in full: “In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence."

Is that clear enough for anyone to understand? It says that anytime someone is prosecuted, they have the right to a speedy trial, open to the public, by an unprejudiced jury of peers, in the area where the crime actually took place. The key element of the Sixth Amendment, in this instance, is where is says the person shall be “informed of the nature and cause of the accusation" and to have the right to be confronted by those bearing witness.

No, I won’t get into other possibly applicable amendments from just the first Ten Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. This one will do just fine all alone.

Do you know the point I am driving at with this column? Well, it involves the arrest of Jose Padilla, dubbed the “dirty bomber" by federal authorities. But is he really a “dirty bomber," and if so, where are his bombs? After his arrest, I’m sure most everyone in the U.S., if not most parts of the world is now thoroughly versed in why a dirty bomb has that name. For those of you who may not know, it is called a dirty bomb because it is a regular bomb, but then tainted with radioactive material, just for good measure. Padilla, who is also known as Abdullah Al Muhajir, is being accused of being part of a plan to build and detonate a dirty bomb.

Well, that’s the funny part of Padilla’s case. There are no bombs. In fact, he didn’t even have any bombs lined up. According to accusations being made, Padilla was feeling out an offer. Basically, looking for good places to plant bombs. Is that illegal? Well, I don’t know. If you read George Orwell’s book, 1984, you would be familiar with a term called Newspeak. The easiest definition, well, for at least part of Newspeak, comes from a website at http://www.k-1.com/Orwell/1984.htm. In the Newspeak section, the author wrote: “The B-Words are not constructed on any etymological plan. The words of which they are made up can be placed in any order mutilated in any way which makes them easy to pronounce (e.g. thoughtcrime, crimethink thinkpol, thought police). Many of the B-Words are euphemisms. Such words for instance as joycamp (forced labour camp) or Minipax (Ministry of Peace in charge of the army), mean almost exact opposite of what they appear to mean." The scary thing about it is one can be charged on a “thoughtcrime." Isn’t the pretty much where Padilla stands right now? He was thinking about doing something, but hadn’t actually done anything.

Before you start tossing those flaming arrows at me, accusing me of being sympathetic to Padilla, sit down and listen. No, I am not sympathetic to Padilla, a native Chicagoan. No, I don’t really care if he is executed at sunrise for treason. What gets me is how things are being handled.

The guy is arrested after landing in Chicago. He is taken into custody, and the president lists him as an “enemy combatant." At this point, he has done nothing, except perhaps talk of some locations he will look at to find the best place to plant a dirty bomb – if he ever gets his hands on one.

If Padilla is being held for just looking around, which is also known as reconnaissance, or recon, for short, then local police departments, as well as federal agencies, such as the FBI, DEA, ATF, and others, are going to be making a record number of arrests this year. Heck, if you are subject to arrest for plotting something, then every drug dealer needs to be arrested before he buys his new cache of dope; every gun-runner needs to be arrested before he gets a new batch of guns; and the list goes on. It’s pretty preposterous, isn’t it? To me it is, and that is exactly my point.

Everything coming out of Washington as of late is geared to “patriots," although I’m not sure, without looking up in the Patriot Act, just what a patriot is, by definition. I can tell you that I am not a patriot. Why? Well, let me get the list started. I use PGP to encrypt my email. I use software on my computer that encrypts data, based on Twofish and Blowfish, both strong encryption tools. I do not support everything being said by the talking heads in Washington just because someone said something is a good idea. I am critical of comments coming from Washington, especially from any agency that looks like it was pulled out of alphabet soup, such as NSA, CIA, FBI, just for starters.

In the June 14, 2002 edition of the Washington Post, Dennis Pluchinsky, a senior intelligence analyst with the Diplomatic Security Service in the U.S. Department of State, wrote an opinion piece. Bear in mind, the piece is said to reflect only Pluchinsky’s opinions, not those of the State Department or any other branch of U.S. government.

Pluchinshy started his piece with a bold statement: “I accuse the media in the United States of treason." He continued his diatribe, writing: “Imagine that you are a supporter or sympathizer of a terrorist group and you have been tasked to identify and collect tactical information on potential U.S. targets. Consider some of the following headlines that have appeared since 9/11: "Private Plane Charters: One Way Around Air Security," "Suicidal Nuclear Threat Is Seen At Weapons Plants," "Priority Required for Protecting Utilities," "NRC Warns of Missing Radioactive Materials," "Freight Transport: Safe from Terror?" "Chemical Plants Are Feared As Targets," "America's Roads May Be Just As Vulnerable As Its Skies," "Study Assesses Risk of Attack on Chemical Plants," "Terror Risk Cited for Cargo Carried on Passenger Jets: 2 Reports List Security Gaps," and "Truck Terrorism Possible, U.S. Says: Investigation Finds Lack of Licensing Safeguards."

The funny thing about Pluchinsky’s piece is that Padilla was doing just what he insinuated a terror group would not be doing: first-hand recon.

In the opinion piece, Pluchinsky writes, “This country is at war. Do you honestly believe that such stories and headlines, pointing out our vulnerabilities for Japanese and Nazi saboteurs and fifth columnists, would have been published during World War II?" Well, the problem is that this country is not at war. Sure, we are involved in coordinated attacks, but a declaration of war has not been issued. Has it?

He continues, writing that, “In a war situation, it is not business as usual. Use some common sense. Certainly, if a reporter or academician believes that he or she has discovered a vulnerability or flaw in one of our sectors or systems, it is important to let others know. It seems reasonable to me that a process should be established where such articles are filtered through a government agency such as the proposed Department of Homeland Security. A skeptic would call this censorship; a patriot would call it cooperation. This type of cooperation existed during World War II and believe me, this current war is a ‘world war’ also." See, I must be a skeptic, an enemy of the state, because I would call that kind of requirement censorship. But notice how Pluchinsky spins his “suggestion": “a patriot would call it cooperation."

Pluchinsky continues, offering a bigger view of his idea. “I propose that the Department of Homeland Security establish a program where academicians, reporters, think tankers or any citizen could contact the department and inform them of security vulnerabilities. If the department determined that these vulnerabilities indeed existed, then it could award ‘Homeland Security Protective Security’ certificates to individuals or ‘Homeland Security Gold Stars’ to newspaper or Internet sites that put the country first during a time of war. If displayed on its banner, this star might increase circulation." You know, as much as I hate the thought, I hate saying it, let alone typing it even more: This sounds like some kind of idea right out of Nazi Germany or Communist Russia.

The analyst isn’t yet done. He continues, writing that, “During World War II, there was a security slogan that went: ‘Loose lips sinks ships.’ Maybe the current security slogan should be: ‘Prolific pens propagate terrorist plots.’ The president and Congress should pass laws temporarily restricting the media from publishing any security information that can be used by our enemies. This was necessary during World War II, it is necessary now. These restrictions were backed by the American public during World War II, and I believe the public would support them now."

Whoa, buddy! “The president and Congress should pass laws temporarily restricting the media from publishing any security information that can be used by our enemies?" What are you talking about, Denny? Where in the Constitution do you find that kind of power granted? The next question would be, “Who gets to determine the type and depth of information?" Then, following a logical progression, do you also forbid people from speaking anything, as well, or emailing friends and family about stuff going on?

See, it is a progression of things that have me concerned. Padilla is just a name to a problem, not a cause for which I am beating a drum: he is being held, as a prisoner, yet committed no crime, although he may have been considering it. Denny Pluchinsky is advocating “temporarily" getting rid of many protections afforded in the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights, as well as the newer amendments to the national framework.

Over on soc.culture.puerto-rico, torresd posted, “If a ‘dirty bomb’ were to be set off in New York, every building in Manhattan and for miles around might have to be demolished, concludes one of the United States' most distinguished scientific bodies."

Some “experts" on the national talk shows and TV news digests have said a dirty bomb is just a psychological weapon, not anything much to worry about. Well, it’s like this: If I am going to glow in the dark, it is a big deal. Okay, so I am poking fun at a serious situation, but hey, what can you do? To me, a bomb is a bomb is a bomb. Whether it blows you to pieces or simply vaporizes you, you are still dead. If it causes you to be sick from a really long time, well, you may well end up wishing you were dead from the blast. At ground zero, the only thing living will be cockroaches, experts say.

I love when everyone wants to clamor about how well protected the U.S. is, especially after September 11, 2001. My question is: “Can the U.S. protect its citizens, or simply defend its citizens?" The question isn’t really hard to answer. Defense is basically the easy part. Protecting the populace is the really hard part. Oh, you don’t believe me? Well, if protecting people wasn’t so hard, why do police departments around the world have unsolved cases for years? In fact, why are the police departments busy? Because they can’t protect you from anything when it comes right down to brass tacks.

Tim Crowley, over on seattle.politics, posted an interesting think-piece about Padilla in the “Bush Police State Kicks Into Gear" thread.

Let me climb down off the soapbox for now. What do you think about these issues? Should Padilla continue to be held for having not committed a crime? Should the U.S. ban free speech? Drop me an email at Dave_Jackson@newsguy.com and let me know your thoughts.

 - by Dave Jackson