You Have the Right to Remain Silent . . .

Now a howl of anguish is going up among some conservative Congressmen over the so-called "intrusion" of a federal judge on the interrogation of Boston bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.  Last week, early on, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-So. Car.) called for the Tsarnaev brothers, once apprehended, to be held as "enemy combatants" under the Patriot Act and tried by a military tribunal.

However, the Obama Administration decided - quite rightly, your Head Trucker believes - to prosecute Dzokhar, an American citizen, in the usual way through the civilian court system.  And it behooves us all to pay attention to this discussion about civil rights.  Listen to what Judge Napolitano, himself a conservative, has to say about the matter on Fox News:



Why should you care? Because next time it could easily be your ass on the line. As witness what happened to that Elvis impersonator over in Mississippi whom the feds swooped down on last week:

Now mailing poisoned letters to the President is an act of terrorism. Supposing instead of having access to an attorney, who quickly procured a dismissal of charges, Elvis had instead been scooped up from his house, hauled off to Guantanamo, and thrown into some dark hellhole there? Far away from all eyes, out of earshot, without attorney, family, friends, or anyone to help him. And you see how easily it very well could have been you, bud: someone you pissed off online who wanted revenge, or just a careless statement by a friend, relative, or neighbor, and bingo! You're busted. It does happen. All the time.

That's exactly why our English forebears invented such concepts as habeas corpus and trial by jury in open court, to name but two: to ensure that if the cops do make a mistake - and they make plenty, being only human beings, after all - that you won't have to suffer for their mistake.

In this particular bombing case, regardless of what Tsarnaev's mom says about it all being just a big hoax with paint instead of blood, I do think it very likely that the cops got the right man - and he happens to be an American citizen. But it's important to ensure, in fact demand, that he be accorded all the rights that the Constitution guarantees to each of us. Just the same as you would want to be treated. Because that's how the system works. If we let the cops start picking and choosing on their own who gets to be treated fairly and who doesn't - then we will very soon have a police state, where anyone can be arrested at any time and held incommunicado for years, if not for life, at the mere whim of a cop or official. And that's a place you really don't want to go.

Watch this eye-opening, but very entertaining presentation by a law school professor about your civil rights when questioned by police. Pay attention - this is good stuff to know.

Note: I apologize for the spacing errors between paragraphs, caused in some mysterious way whenever I add more than one video to a blog post. Nothing I've tried fixes it. Oh the wonders of technology!