Bradley Manning (WikiLeaks Source) Given Hearing After 2 Years In Jail 369
TrueSatan writes "Finally, Bradley Manning's military court case starts. He's only had to wait 2 years to be heard. Manning claims that while remanded in custody in Iraq he 'passed out due to the heat' and 'contemplated suicide.' The United Nations special rapporteur on torture found Manning's detention was 'cruel and inhuman.' Manning wants the case against him to be dismissed because his pre-trial punishment was so severe. Manning's attorney, David Coombs, earlier released an 11-page letter detailing the conditions of Manning's confinement. Manning offered guilty pleas to minor charges, but not to spying, aiding American enemies or treason, and those pleas have been accepted by the judge."
A formal declaration of war is required (Score:3, Informative)
Otherwise you are not in wartime, therefore the claim of the arsehole OP "Traitors should be subject to summary execution during wartime." doesn't apply.
Might as well have said "People called Bradley should be shot if we are invaded by aliens who hate that name".
Re:Case dismissed? (Score:5, Informative)
Your constitution? (Score:2, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_war_by_the_United_States
Congress has to declare it, not just stamp "PAID" on military budgets. Budgets are confirmed by Congress all the time, these are not declarations of war.
Congress has allowed the military to be paid.
Not declared war.
Re:... likely outcome (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Cruel and unusual (Score:0, Informative)
Let me clarify the record on the liar that is Warren Buffet.
He chooses to pay himself dividends, not a salary. This means that his earnings are taxed on both sides, the corporate side and the individual side. As the major stock holder of BH, Buffet pays 35% as a corporation (lower actually, he is fighting IRS on this, he wants to pay only 30% or so, there is a huge legal battle going on there).
His actual tax (just the federal portion, excluding the State tax), is 35% corporate and 15% dividend, which is about 44% total. Again, that's before State and other taxes. So he is a liar.
Now, he pays himself about 60Million in taxes out of about a billion or so that he earns as a corporation (and corporate earnings are his earnings, it doesn't matter what side they are taxed at, it's the money he can't give himself he has to give to the gov't). He was actually asked in a show about this, his response was: "well, I am giving away 99% of my money, so to me it doesn't matter what I pay as a corporation".
Do you not see a problem with that logic? If he gives 99% of money to charity, the fact that he is actually taxed at 35% or so as a corporation doesn't mean anything to him, he is going to give away all of his corporate earnings anyway, but this goes directly against his message that he is paying only 15% tax (pure nonsense).
Also Buffet likes to say that tax rates have no bearing on people making investment decisions.
I have explained this nonsense position in a comment here [slashdot.org], the short of it is: if your investments are GUARANTEED to always succeed, that's one thing, but that's not how investments work, so taxes play a huge role in investment decisions, that's by the way why VCs are leaving.
Do you understand the problem with Buffet? AFAIC Buffet is paying back the gov't that bailed him out in 2009 through the AIG bailout [nytimes.com] with this propaganda. He'd be on the streets today if not for the tax payer money bailing out his company through AIG.
Also don't forget that BH (Buffet's company) profits directly from other companies being shut down, going into bankruptcy and such (which higher taxes help to set up) because BH buys companies in distress at a huge discount, restructures and sells them for parts.
Comment removed (Score:3, Informative)
Re:... likely outcome (Score:3, Informative)
When you are in the military, you agree to follow the chain of command. If you don't like it, don't work for the military and then start complaining about the rules. You can sit outside and complain about the rules all you want and in fact many people do. Military doesn't have much problem with people sitting on the sideline complaining what the military does - it simply doesn't matter - their chain of command starts with the commander-in-chief, and they are given orders which go down the line, and resources to fulfill them. That's how the system works.
Also, military does have mechanisms to address problems that arise in the military. But deliberately breaking all rules, and giving confidential information to foreign nations, no matter whether you agree with it or not, is straight up the definition of treason. If you don't agree with what your country does and do such things, you are committing treason - the intent might be as noble as you want, and the beneficiary nations may like what you're doing, but from the point of view of your country it is treason, and if you get caught, you will be prosecuted for treason. Bradley Manning, if he indeed did what he is accused of, will be considered a traitor. It's up to the court to determine whether this is the case, and all the whining about it is not going to change that.
Those people are big boys, they should understand basic definitions of their actions. Somehow in this age, because of how relatively peaceful last 60 years have been, a lot of people have lost (or never acquired) some basic concepts.
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Informative)
Under the Military Code of Justice you are NOT innocent until proven guilty.
UCMJ Article 51(c) [about.com] reads in part:
Re:This is truly a difficult situation (Score:5, Informative)
It's called the Office of Special Counsel and it has demonstrated its complete and utter failure [examiner.com]. No whistleblower in their right mind would attempt to use it given its history:
While the Department of Justice relentlessly pursues, prosecutes and imprisons inconvenient whistleblowers, high-ranking bureaucrats who violate their rights are usually coddled by the system. The crooked wheel of justice crushes those at the lower levels of the government and pushes up criminals in high places.
Deleting hundreds of files pertaining to whistleblowing disclosures and complaints of retaliation and reprisal;
Rolling back protections for federal employees against discrimination based on sexual orientation;
Staffing key OSC positions with cronies who shared his discriminatory views;
Engaging in retaliatory activities against OSC staffers who opposed his wrongdoing;
Assigning interns to issue closure letters in hundreds of whistleblower complaints without investigation;
Intimidating OSC employees from cooperating with government investigators;
Misusing prosecutorial power for political purposes;
Reducing the backlog of cases pending at the OSC by 56% percent by closing cases without an investigation and destroying electronic files;
During the fiscal year of 2008, the OSC filed 0 corrective action petitions with the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB);
During the fiscal year of 2008, the OSC obtained 0 stays from the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB);
Bloch reassigned his perceived critics within the OSC to field offices across the country – giving them 10 days to accept, or else they'd be fired;
Bloch imposed retaliatory transfers upon OSC staffers he perceived as having a "homosexual agenda";
OSC under Bloch rarely recognized legitimate whistleblowers, typically only when the whistleblower has already prevailed elsewhere;
UCMJ also forbids unlawful command influence. (Score:5, Informative)
It also forbids unlawful command influence: [court-martial.com]
So everyone parroting "UCMJ! UCMJ!", I have a simple question for you. Do you want Bradley Manning immediately released, given the Commander-in-Chief's textbook case of unlawful command influence, [msn.com] or are you a hack engaging in situational ethics?
Re:This is truly a difficult situation (Score:5, Informative)
Little if any of what Manning exposed qualifies as corrupt or criminal
Yeah, right: You dont count anything in this short list [eff.org] as corrupt or criminal?? If so, your either a troll, a shill or grossly uninformed... take your pick.