Hick's nice little earner..

[Gob]

I know you well enough to know, that if this were some other topic, and somebody else had responded to to substantive, evidence supported points that you had made, the way you responded to me, (weak arguments, ad hominems, diversions) you would be the first one to call them on it....

And rightly so....

It really is not like you to resort to these sorts of tactics...

The only thing I can figure is, that you so want the narrative of this story to be about Gitmo rather than The Traitor Hicks, (and that in order for that narrative to work Hick's actions have to minimized, and his current claims of being some sort of naive victim have to be embraced and deemed credible) that it has affected your objectivity.

Or I could just be winding you up Jim.

Truth of the matter is this, and is hiden in my replies to a degree.

I believe Hick was a stupid Bogan who made some very bad choices due to, well, being a stupid Bogan.

However, his crimes if any, were of being stupid.

He should have been punished with regard to the severity of his crimes, as most criminals are.

He should have been tried and convicted of his crimes.

He should have, despite the nature of his actions, been given a trial in an open court with proper representation.

The Aussie government should have acted on his behalf as he is a citizen.

What should not have happened is the farrago of justice, including five years in solitary, and torture, he experienced.

29 June 2006, the US Supreme Court ruled that the military commissions were illegal under United States law and the Geneva Conventions. The commission trying Hicks was abolished and the charges against him voided.

So a year later and after more torture, the U.S. military commission announced that it had prepared new charges against David Hicks. The drafted charges were "attempted murder" and "providing material support for terrorism", under the Military Commissions Act of 2006.


On 26 March 2007, following negotiations with Hicks's defense lawyers, the convening authority Judge Susan Crawford directly approved the terms of a pre-trial agreement.

The agreement stipulated that Hicks enter a guilty plea to a single charge of providing material support for terrorism in return for a guarantee of a much shorter sentence than had been previously sought by the prosecution.

The agreement also stipulated that the 5 years already spent by Hicks at Guantanamo Bay could not be subtracted from any sentence handed down, that Hicks must not speak to the media for one year nor take legal action against the United States, and that Hicks withdraw allegations that the U.S. military abused him.

Accordingly, in the first ever conviction by the Guantanamo military tribunal and the first conviction in a U.S. war crimes trial since World War II, on 31 March, the tribunal handed down a seven year jail sentence for the charge, suspending all but 9 months.

In other words he was "convicted," of what we do not know, and spent 5 years in solitary and experiencing torture, is that justice?

Do you not see how Hicks' current persecution by some as "folk hero" who survived the brutality of the US Gitmo camp, has been created, not by Hicks, but by the kangaroo court justice he received?

Do you not see how more and more evidence is coming to light that Hick was a fool who was tortured for being stupid, and this creates an image of him which reflects better on him than it does on the whole Gitmo farce, a farce which achieved nothing ,.

[Lord Jim]

The Aussie government should have acted on his behalf as he is a citizen.

Well, my view is that the Aussie government should have acted not on "his behalf" but on behalf of it's obligation as the representative of the Australian people, to have him returned to Australia to answer for the crimes he committed against the Australian people by becoming a traitor...

He should have been punished with regard to the severity of his crimes, as most criminals are.

Yes, and if that had happened he would still be in prison, not running around free making money off of being a traitor...

Which as I have said, is what I see as the greatest pity in this....

torture, he experienced...

experiencing torture, ...

tortured for being stupid...

You keep using the word "torture"...

Laying aside the fact that you and I probably have different definitions of what constitutes "torture", I've made very clear that I do not, (for what I believe are solidly documented reasons, that I have laid out here in detail) believe a single thing that comes out the mouth or from the pen of this self-serving, self absorbed narcissist, now that he is after the fact trying to construct an "I was just a naive innocent" narrative, given the fact that this narrative is completely at variance with what he is known for a a fact to have done, said, and written before he became a "cause celeb"...(and before he became a guest at Gitmo)

Perhaps you see his "affidavit" as a damning indictment; absent credible corroboration, I see it as a fairy tale...I give it, or anything else he says now, absolutely no weight whatsoever, given how many demonstrable untruths the man has told...

He has seized on this "naive innocent" victim narrative as a cynical way to get a big payday from a bunch of folks who are only too willing to eat it up, because they want to make him into some symbol about Big Bad Gitmo, because of their own ideological views about Gitmo....

And their fervent desire to use him to grind their apoplectic axe about Gitmo, (a role he's quite happy to play in exchange for the money and attention) has caused them to completely lose sight of what this guy did....

Which is what ought to be front and center as the issue here.

[Gob]

Other investigations show that Guantanamo Bay detainees, including David Hicks, were forced to take high dosages of the controversial anti-malaria drug mefloquine despite showing no signs of the disease, an unprecedented practice that has been likened to ''pharmacologic waterboarding'' by a US military doctor


Evidence including previously secret reports and witnesses including a Guantanamo guard, and New York lawyer, Josh Dratel, support Mr Hicks's claims that he was drugged. Mr Dratel, who has top secret security clearance from the US Department of Justice and has acted for a number of detainees including Mr Hicks, was to give direct evidence of the ''non-therapeutic'' drugging. In an affidavit prepared for the trial, Mr Dratel revealed that US prosecutors had admitted that Mr Hicks's claims that ''guards had forced him to eat a meal which contained a sedative before they read him the charges'' were true. He was told it had been done to protect the officers from his reactions.

Former Guantanamo guard Brandon Neely also supplied an affidavit for the trial saying that detainees were regularly beaten for refusing to take the medications.

Mr Neely has also said that the doctors never told the detainees what drugs they were being given.



Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/national/witnesse ... z28YljvINc

US authorities have put David Hicks in solitary confinement to break his will and punish him, regardless of whether he is ever found guilty of terror-related offences, his lawyers say.

US military lawyer Michael Mori and civilian lawyer Joshua Dratel said today they had only recently learned their client had been returned to isolation and there had been no reason given for the decision.

"The information I'm getting is David has done nothing to motivate this," Major Mori told reporters in Adelaide.

"It was just some decision randomly made or made with some ill motive.

"I don't know what the motivation was but I'm sure if he's stuck back in isolation it will break his will."

Mr Dratel said returning Hicks to isolation was a "rather substantial step backwards" in terms of his mental and physical wellbeing.

"Unfortunately, there's no basis for it in terms of security or administrative issues. It seems to be purely punitive," he said.

"The US government has been criticised internationally ... and this is the one thing it still has control over - how to mistreat David and the other detainees.

"This is an opportunity to punish David regardless of whether in fact he's ever brought to trial or found guilty."

Hicks' military commission trial is currently on hold, pending the decision of a related US Supreme Court matter involving another terror suspect.

Can you just let me know what actions of trechery Hicks undertook which would validate this?

[loCAtek]

He (Hicks) thought Mylanta was a sedative, up to and including it's use for gastro-intestinal problems, common throughout the ME ...and the world.

[Lord Jim]

Other investigations show that Guantanamo Bay detainees, including David Hicks, were forced to take high dosages of the controversial anti-malaria drug mefloquine despite showing no signs of the disease

The anti-malaria drug thing has already been explained exhaustively in this discussion, so I won't spend much time on it. You get them before you go to the tropics (I was injected with one before I went to the Philippines) So it makes perfect sense that people moved to a tropical climate would get them. It would have been negligent not to do.

(As for the lurid descriptions of the nature of the drug, until someone who isn't "un-named" comes forward with actual evidence, I dismiss them out of hand)

US authorities have put David Hicks in solitary confinement to break his will and punish him, regardless of whether he is ever found guilty of terror-related offences, his lawyers say.

Oh his lawyers said that did they? Oh merciful heavens, why didn't didn't you say so in the first place? That settles it then. There can be no more authoritative and objective source about his treatment than his attorneys. Just to really make the point about his treatment 100% indisputable, maybe you can find a quote from his mother....

BTW, this:

including five years in solitary,

Is incorrect:

In March 2006, camp authorities moved all ten of the Guantanamo detainees who faced charges into solitary confinement. This was described as a routine measure because of the impending attendance of the detainees at their respective tribunals

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hicks

Now, moving back to the far more important topic of what The Traitor Hicks did, and his current blatantly false claims about how innocent and naive he was:

Can you just let me know what actions of trechery Hicks undertook which would validate this?

Actually what he did would validate far worse punishment than he actually received; as I've said, he got off lightly; Let's take another look at the relevant sections of the Australian law governing treason:

(d) levies war, or does any act preparatory to levying war, against the Commonwealth; [Yes] or
(e) engages in conduct that assists by any means whatever, with intent to assist, an enemy:[Yes]

(i) at war with the Commonwealth, whether or not the existence of a state of war has been declared;[Yes] and
(ii) specified by Proclamation made for the purpose of this paragraph to be an enemy at war with the Commonwealth; or

(f) engages in conduct that assists by any means whatever, with intent to assist:[Yes]

(i) another country;[Yes] or
(ii) an organisation;[Yes]

He should never have gotten off with six years and a book deal; he should be spending the balance of his miserable life behind bars, (Though of course true justice for The Traitor Hicks would involve a rope and short drop, but as I've pointed out under the Australian system life in prison is the closest he can come to getting the justice he deserves.)

Oh and here's some more on The Life and Times of The Traitor Hicks (say now there's a book title). Even his stint in Pakistan where he became , (in his words "capable and war-ready...very well trained for jihad") was not his first training in the fine arts of guerrilla warfare:

Hicks travelled to Albania, joining the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), a militant organisation of ethnic Albanians fighting against Serbian forces in the Kosovo War, for two months.[

And more from the pen of The Traitor Hicks, written contemporaneously to his actions, back before he became a Born Again Naive Innocent:

In October and November 2001 (after 9/11) Hicks wrote multiple letters to his mother, Sue King, back in Australia. He asked that replies were to be directed to Abu Muslim Austraili, a pseudonym he used to circumvent non-Muslim spies he believed intercepted correspondence. In these letters he detailed the validity of Jihad and his own prospect of "martyrdom".

"As a Muslim young and fit my responsibility is to protect my brothers from aggressive non-believers and not let them destroy it. Islam will rule again but for now we must have patience we are asked to sacrifice our lives for Allahs cause why not? There are many privileges in heaven. It is not just war, it is jihad. One reward I get in being martyred I get to take ten members of my family to heaven who were destined for hell, but first I also must be martyred. We are all going to die one day so why not be martyred?"[32]

Man I gotta tell ya....

As a poster boy for the unjustly accused, this guy leaves a lot to be desired....

[Lord Jim]

Sometimes when I get into an in-depth discussion like this I find over time, that the more I consider the opposing arguments, and the more research and educating myself on the topic I do, I discover flaws in my initial position, and my viewpoint evolves and changes, based on more extensive knowledge...

And then other times, when I get into an in-depth discussion like this I find over time, that the more I consider the opposing arguments, and the more research and educating myself on the topic I do, the more I become convinced that I was right in the first place...

Strop, take a wild guess as to which category this discussion is falling into?

In fact, if anything, the more I have learned about what this guy did, the only flaw I see in my initial position is that I did not fully appreciate the degree of his personal culpability and the extent of his wrong doing.

At first I realized he had acted wrongly, but thought perhaps he didn't fully understand the implications of what he was doing. Now, after having seen the full catalogue of his activities and his own words, the idea that he didn't understand what he was doing or getting into is proven ridiculous.

This guy didn't pop into Afghanistan from Australia a couple of weeks before 9/11 on some sort of romantic lark. He spent two years training and fighting in guerrilla organizations, learning all the fine points of (to use his own description) "Jihad"....

[loCAtek]

So, no pity points awarded to Hicks, and no Conspiracy Theory™ to attract ~Steve here, with.

[Econoline]

I think we can all agree that if the Australian government insisted that Hicks be extradited to Australia ASAP, and if the U.S. (as an ally) had complied, it's hard to conceive of any possible scenario which could have turned out WORSE for the U.S., Australia, and the cause of international justice than what has happened. (Not to mention what may well happen in the future, i.e. Hicks becoming a best-selling author and folk hero.)

[Gob]

Econo nailed it.

[Gob]

Couple of points Jim.

He was given 50x the recommended dose of mefloquine, while already in a non-malaria location, your justification for that woudl be, what exactly?

And you still haven't shown any examples of Hick acting treacherously, just putting yes against a series of criteria isn't really that helpful.

Why did the US let him off so lightly after all those years of solitary and torture, could it be that they had nothing on him despite their best efforts?

What do you think the treatment of Hicks has done for the image of the US?

[loCAtek]

If he was my folk hero, I'd be embarrassed for my country.

[loCAtek]

Why did the US let him off so lightly after all those years of solitary and torture, could it be that they had nothing on him despite their best efforts?

Could it be the US followed legal procedure, and released him to his country of origin for prosecution?

[Gob]

Just to follow up that last point Jim, this is the latest article in the Aussie press...

CRITICS of David Hicks have been eerily quiet since prosecutors dropped their court case aimed at seizing the profits from his book.

The critics have been left covered in mud after prosecutors publicly conceded that evidence from Guantanamo probably would not pass muster in an Australian court.

Their admission is the closest we have come to a formal acknowledgment by any Australian authority that Hicks' military trial was defective by ordinary standards of justice. It would have been hugely embarrassing to the Howard government if an Australian court had officially thrown out the evidence and condemned George Bush's kangaroo court.

It is extraordinary that it took prosecutors so long to recognise what a world of lawyers, and much of the Australian public, have long understood - that evidence from Guantanamo was dodgy and Hicks' trial was unfair. The withdrawal of that case brings to an end the official harassment of Hicks under Australian law. It is not, however, the end of the story. While Hicks is now free to get on with his life, there remain lingering questions about his treatment by the United States and Australia.

The charge on which Hicks was convicted, providing material support for terrorism, is still being challenged in the US courts by other Guantanamo detainees. It is alleged that the offence was retrospective since it was unknown to the law of war or US law before 9/11. A decision is expected at any time.

Freedom from retrospective punishment is a sacred US constitutional right, and a human right under international law. It safeguards against arbitrary state power by preventing governments from designating their opponents as criminals after the fact.

If the offence is knocked over in the US courts, the basis of Hicks' conviction will collapse. There are also unanswered questions of accountability facing the Australian government. In opposition, Labor attacked the Howard government for supporting Bush's military trials, arguing that they violated the laws of war, human rights and basic justice.

Continues...

[Lord Jim]

Just to follow up that last point Jim, this is the latest article in the Aussie press...

September 8, 2012

Opinion
Ben Saul

Ben Saul is professor of international law at the University of Sydney and counsel for David Hicks in his complaint to the United Nations.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/ ... z28eLq5wA8

Well not "the Aussie press", so much as an opinion piece written by one of The Traitor Hicks' attorneys...(I believe Hen posted this one earlier...)

Color me impressed....

(I'll deal with your other questions and Econo's post later...I have a pasta sauce to start....)

[Gob]

Yes, but it's still the latest piece in the Aussie press, (hint there are no "Hicks is a traitor" ones, ) so the question; "What do you think the treatment of Hicks has done for the image of the US?" stands.

here's more;

The persecution of David Hicks is a dark stain on the nation's soul
Sydney Morning Herald-07/09/2012
CRITICS of David Hicks have been eerily quiet since prosecutors dropped their court case aimed at seizing the profits from his book. The critics ...


Sydney Morning Herald
Increase in 'terror' killings, says David Hicks' lawyer Michael "Dan ...
Herald Sun-21/09/2012
MICHAEL "Dan'' Mori, the former military attorney who famously represented Guantanamo Bay inmate David Hicks, has told a Perth audience ..

Witnesses back Hicks on chemical torture
Sydney Morning Herald-15/09/2012
Long-held claims by the former detainee David Hicks that he was drugged against his will have been backed by evidence from a prominent ...
Hicks forced to take high drug doses in Guantanamo WA today
David Hicks: The Man Who Was Chemically Tortured Scoop.co.nz
all 12 news articles »


Sydney Morning Herald
Medic speaks out on Hicks doping
Sydney Morning Herald-22/09/2012
"David Hicks was held at Guantanamo Bay for years without charge. He was subject to cruel and degrading treatment, kept in deplorable ...
Evidence mounts that Hicks was tortured by US Green Left Weekly
all 3 news articles »


Sydney Morning Herald
US use of truth drug revealed
Sydney Morning Herald-29/09/2012
New evidence has emerged that all Guantanamo Bay detainees, including David Hicks, were drugged involuntarily with a substance that has a ...


Sydney Morning Herald
Hicks 'drugged against his will' in Guantanamo
ABC Online-18/09/2012
The Greens have raised allegations in Federal Parliament about mistreatment of former Guantanamo Bay inmate David Hicks. Greens senator ...
Greens raise Hicks drugs claims Ninemsn
all 4 news articles »

David Hicks' lawyer reflects on the War on Terror in public seminar
ChristianToday-20/09/2012
In November 2003, he was appointed by the United States Department of Defense to represent David Hicks in Guantanamo Bay and handled ...

Edited to add; This made me laugh, though I admit it's off topic;

Years ago, two men named William Jent and Earnest Miller were sentenced to death in Florida, only to be granted a new trial when evidence emerged, previously suppressed by the prosecution, pointing to their innocence. However, unwilling to admit his mistake, the District Attorney demanded that both should plead guilty in exchange for a sentence of 'time served', and their liberty. As they left the courthouse, one remarked on the irony: "When I said truthfully that I was innocent, they sentenced me to death; today, when I said I committed the crime, they set me free."

Once I thought that such Orwellian moments were rare in the US justice system. Now I know better: indeed, they define Guantánamo Bay.

[loCAtek]

Frankly, we don't care.

[Lord Jim]

LoCa:

I really hope that your posts in this exchange reflect a genuine interest in the subject, and not merely an avenue whereby you can pursue your longtime personal grudge by involving yourself in a disagreement between two posters, one of whom happens to be one of the objects of that long time personal grudge....

I know that your posts have been supportive of the positions I've been taking in this exchange, but if your motive is something other than a sincere interest in the topic at hand, I don't need your help.

Just sayin'....

[Gob]

I don't need your help.

Oh come on Jim, with her and retard as your wingmen, you'd be apples!

[The Hen]

I will give Lo the benefit of the doubt about her interest, or lack of, in this topic.

If he was my folk hero, I'd be embarrassed for my country.

As many will be, myself for one. However, unfortunately you can't pick and choose who gets such an honour. It remains a matter of circumstance.

The folk hero often begins life as a normal person, but is transformed into someone extraordinary by significant life events, often in response to social injustice, and sometimes in response to natural disasters.

Which brings me right back to remaining pissed at the Australian Government for their handling of the situation from the start. If they had done what they would have done under any other circumstances for any other citizen, the whole Hicks saga would most likely have played out entirely differently. There wouldn't have been a book in it for Hicks. There wouldn't have been a court case to decide whether the proceeds of sales were profits from crime. The Australian Government would not be feeling the sting of embarrassment now and, probably even more, in the future.

[loCAtek]

No Jim, it's not personal in any way; I genuinely think that the evidence supports that Hicks received fair and just treatment at Gitmo.