Would bin Laden get habeas rights?
Posted: Tuesday, June 17, 2008 11:20 AM by Domenico Montanaro
From NBC/NJ's Adam Aigner-Treworgy
SAN ANTONIO, Texas -- According to the McCain campaign's top foreign policy advisor, Obama equals Clinton -- at least when it comes to fighting terrorism.
On a conference call with reporters that took place this morning, Randy Scheunemann accused the presumptive Democratic nominee of offering a renewal of what he called the failed law enforcement method of anti-terrorism offered by the Clinton administration in the 1990's.
"Sen. Obama is a perfect manifestation of a Sept. 10th mindset," Scheunemann said, going on to say that Obama's anti-terrorism plans -- and his approval of the recent Supreme Court decision to offer Habeas Corpus rights to prisoners at Guantanamo -- was a "policy of delusion."
VIDEO: Responding to charges by the McCain campaign that he is in a "September 10th mindset," Sen. Barack Obama says that Republicans' "failed strategies" account for bin Laden's avoiding capture.
In a question posed toward the end of the call by Stephen Hayes of the Weekly Standard, the McCain campaign might have found a new talking point with which to emphasize the possible effect of the Gitmo decision. Hayes' asked if -- in the campaign's interpretation -- the Court's decision would mean that if Osama bin Laden was captured and imprisoned at Guantanamo, he too would be entitled to Habeas Corpus rights.
The McCain campaign's answer was yes.
"If Sen. Obama did receive that 3 a.m. phone call," Scheunemann said of the call so often mentioned throughout the Democratic primaries, "I guess his response would be to call the lawyers in the justice department."
*** UPDATE *** NBC's Caroline Gransee adds, The McCain campaign used the conference call today to respond to Obama's recent comments he made on terrorism and to attempt to make Obama look weak on terrorism. The McCain campaign argued that Obama's plan to "treat terrorists as nothing more than common criminals demonstrates a stunning and alarming misunderstanding of the threat we face from radical Islamic extremism."
By continuing this law enforcement approach that Obama advocates for is "very, very dangerous" and is representing the "mindset of 9/10," claimed the campaign. Adding to the campaign's argument, this "change" that Obama wants to implement would only "take us back to the failed policies of the past and every American should find this mindset troubling."
The campaign also said that the Obama camp would say that McCain is practicing the "politics of fear," but the McCain camp pushed back by arguing that Obama is practicing the politics of "delusion."
