bushbasher, are you stunned? Hicks has already told of his terrorist connections and al-Qeada training. He doesn't deny it. His councillor doesn't deny it. He just claims that he never used it and never killed anyone once he received his training. There's no question that he's a wannabe jihadist.

"I don't see any reason why the criminal courts cannot be used for a charge of "attempted murder". But more to the point, we are discussing the U.S. charging people, and so we are talking about U.S. standards of justice." This is your statement. So it's not meaningless or irrelevant to point out that he's better off facing the tribunal rather than American criminal courts.

The question lies in is he to be treated as a combatant, an enemy, a terrorist, a civilian, a pow, or just a harmless Ozzie out for a bit of nature in war torn eastern Europe and Asia.

Step out from behind the bush. It's blocking your perception, And I'd see a specialist about that shoulder. It looks some awful infected. You know if you leaned just a little to the right you wouldn't be dragging it along the ground like that.

Meaningless response, carefully avoiding actually addressing any real issue raised.

For the very, very last time, It doesn't matter whether you, or anybody else, thinks Hicks is a terrorist. It is not the point. It has never been the point. The article which started this thread was pointing out exactly that this is not the point. The reason we have notions of justice and the rule of law is exactly to protect Hicks, and everyone else, from smug, authoritarian creeps.

Talk about goddam bias. When you are willing to address the reality of documented U.S. actions in their "war", then you'll be worth listening to. Until then, you're just another proagandist for old-testament style barbariansism.

aqvarivs

Once again you miss the point, the US citizens have been to trial and found guilty (and not guilty) by a proper court.

If this is good enough for a US citizen why is it not acceptable for an Australian citizen?

How many posters have actually read the Kuran?
Just curious.

bushbasher, And I'd be more willing to accept your claim that you're
sole interest is in justice if you weren't using exaggerative and
emotionally abusive language like,

-the U.S only wants to lock Hicks up for ever

-try and sentence him under the most revoltingly unfair procedures

-torture and kangaroo courts

-Some people are aware of the self-serving nature of governments, and are
suspicious of the propagandistic nature of their declarations

-the idea that the U.S. is "struggling" with notions of justice is laughable.
First, no one has given any argument why Hicks can't be tried in a normal
criminal court. Secondly, there is overwhelming evidence that the U.S. wanted
to lock people up and throw away the key. They're not struggling with justice,
they're struggling with the political swamp they've created through their
barbarism.

A person truly interested in justice would apply it equally and across
the board, not selectively for emotional grandstanding. A person concerned
with justice would be just in their views on America. Not be a person who
capitalizes on pejorative language to assault a nation to appear
sensitive to the plight of an individual. A just person would be much more
balanced and able to see the broader implications and view Hicks case not
as a denial of justice but a series of steps toward justice not only for
Hicks but for all accused terrorist, America, and the rest of the world
during these trying times of global terrorism.

Yes Steve tried, convicted or vindicated as Americans by Americans for crimes against America from inside America. Not as foreign nationals found working against the security of a country and American military aid in a foreign land during a time of war. I don't quite think it is I failing to understand the complexity of justice. Popping Hicks into an American criminal courts environment would be decidedly unjust for Hicks. American jury post 9/11 will not be a sympathetic jury for someone accused of aiding and abetting the Taliban. Exactly what is the death toll for Australian soldiers in Afghanistan?

You don't like my emotive langauge? Big fat hairy deal. This gives you an exuse to avoid discussing the content of my (and other's) posts, but hardly an argument for it. It's not a matter of mistrust of me because of my langauge, it's a matter of whether you are honestly willing to deal with specific issues and specific arguments.

In fact, your tactic is to stay away from specifics, specific criticisms in people's posts, and the specifics of the treatment of Hicks, to instead talk vaguely about "broad implications". People have clear, specific objections to the treatment of Hicks and others, and you simply don't respond. You can't, since otherwise you'd have to honestly address the loathesome behaviour of the U.S. government.

For the same reason, your call for "balance" is vacuous. Appropriate balance can only be judged in relation to specific situations and specific arguments: otherwise you end up with nonsense arguments for "balance" for intelligent-design advocates and the like.

You want to paint we justice-for-Hicks folk as anti-American, but that conclusion just doesn't follow from our stance. We are appalled by specific American acts and policies, and it is the possible justification of those acts and policies you should be addressing.

To quote Barnaby Joyce (from yesterday's NY Times): “It is about due process of law, the principles we are fighting for in Iraq ... In fighting the barbarians, we are starting to imitate the barbarians.”