OUR UPCOMING TRIAL FARCE - A BRITISH VIEW - AT 7:02 P.M. ET:  We've written here before, many times, that British reporters are doing some of the best work in covering the American political scene.  They were the first foreign reporters to understand the shallowness and incompetence of the Obama administration.

Now, Time Reid of The Times of London, examines our latest delight - the decision to try the mastermind of 9-11 in an ordinary federal courtroom in New York: 

Mr Holder said that he would not be bringing the prosecutions unless he thought the outcome would be successful. He added that he had seen evidence not in the public domain that bolstered such confidence. He said that the men would be charged with masterminding and carrying out the September 11 attacks and “I fully expect to direct prosecutors to seek the death penalty”.

Yet trials are unpredictable, and Mr Holder did not address what would happen to Mohammed if he was acquitted and presumably allowed, under US law, to walk free.

Mohammed has also claimed to have beheaded the Wall Street Journal journalist Daniel Pearl and to have been responsible for many other terror attacks.

And...

Some families of the September 11 victims called the decision to try the plotters in a civilian US court a terrible mistake. Other victims’ relatives said that the trial would give the men a platform to “spew” their antiAmerican hatred and invective.

Ed Kowalski, of the 9/11 Families for a Secure America Foundation, said: “To allow a terrorist and a war criminal the opportunity of having US constitutional protections is a wrong thing to do and it’s never been done before. President Obama is wrong to do this.”

The President’s political opponents, who are opposed vehemently to moving any Guantánamo detainees on to US soil, let alone the mastermind of the worst crime in US history, decried the move.

John Cornyn, a Republican Texas senator, said that treating the alleged plotters like ordinary criminals was unconscionable.

John Kyl, a Senate colleague, said that the Obama Administration was “more concerned about extending legal protection to terrorists than security protection to Americans”. Peter King, a New York congressman, said the trial would make the city more of a terrorist target.

COMMENT:  Even if the trials result in convictions, it's a terrible precedent.  These are enemy combatants, not common criminals.  John Kyl is right:  This is an administration obsessed with extending "rights" to people who are not American citizens, and do not deserve the protection given to American citizens.

But I guess all men are brothers, as long as they're out to kill us.

November 14, 2009