The Hamdan Case: Don’t Shoot the Driver

How the Bush administration botched the 'war on terror' by overreaching.

By Michael Hirsh | Newsweek Web Exclusive
Aug 6, 2008 | Updated: 4:46  p.m. ET Aug 6, 2008

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  • Posted By: garysgary @ 08/07/2008 1:26:47 PM

    The war in Afghanistan is a "just" war for the U.S....we were going after people who attacked us. It was mis managed, but it was justifiable. The Iraq war is a different story altogether. Bush, Cheney, Addington, Leiberman, McCain and all the right-wing neo-cons used the "war on terror" umbrella to take down one of Israel's enemies. Aipac and the Israel lobby got the war they wanted from these guys. Iraq never attacked us.
    Why do you think they had to "spin" the war in Iraq to get the American people to go along. If they had told the truth about the real reason for the war, protecting Israel, the american people would not have supported it the way they did. Afghanistan...justified. Iraq...putting another country's interest ahead of US interests. All these guys are traitors!

    • Posted By: ghostmasseur @ 08/14/2008 8:13:03 AM

      Your assumption about going to Iraq being doen for ISrael's sake in not supported by the facts.

      Bush did it for his own reasons not the one you so mindlessly put forth.

    • Posted By: TheVigil @ 08/07/2008 3:38:27 PM

      Yep, totally agree. Afghan War should have been fought, Iraq War was a modern-day Crusade started by Bush due to personal prejudice.

      Sadly, because the Iraq War has gotten all the publicity due to the controversy, it's also gotten the troops and funding. This means that we're now losing ground in Afghanistan where we desperately need to be actually fighting, and winning.

    • Posted By: OnlyCureJGK @ 08/07/2008 3:22:07 PM

      War on Terror? Im terrified that you dont understand that those who control the money control the Terror. Follow the money it always leads to the evil.

  • Posted By: Paul Svec @ 08/06/2008 6:20:03 PM

    Rich W, the only laughter I hear is at you! You still believe that we're winning a war on terrorism by invading the wrong country and prosecuting the wheel man instead of finding the terrorists. Maybe you can get a job in November with one of the Bush gang.

    • Posted By: PresidentSupporter @ 08/06/2008 6:32:15 PM

      Does the driver in a drive-by shooting get to walk away as an innocent man? Why should this clown be any different just because the drive-by shooter takes years and recruits young idiots to do his killing?

      If you hang around criminals and terrorists, then you are just as guilty.

      • Posted By: ghostmasseur @ 08/14/2008 8:04:56 AM

        Actually, the driver of a boss is not always guilty of anything other than aiding and abetting.
        Did he know what was going one. Probably. Does that make him as guilty as those who plan it and carry it out? No.

        No one said he was innocent, just that he was not the same as Bin Laden.

      • Posted By: teddyo @ 08/07/2008 9:28:43 AM

        America (those in power) has done many things alot worse! Glad were getting rid of the president of Terror.

        • Posted By: PresidentSupporter @ 08/08/2008 12:59:43 PM

          Those who started the terror are to blame for the retaliation. It's like a little brother who annoys the crap out of big brother and then everyone is shocked when big brother smacks him. Blame Bin Laden for all the stuff going on today.

      • Posted By: olderwiser @ 08/06/2008 7:07:18 PM

        All has to do with intent. Driver may not know what is going to be done." Hey, taxi. Take me to the bank". Taxi driver takes him to the bank. Robber says, "wait here for me while I go in and cash a check." Strolls out, gets in the cab. Stopped two blocks away by the police. Did the taxi driver know? If he did, then he committed a crime. If he didn't, then he is innocent. What was the evidence in this trial about what the driver knew? Or do you know this?

        • Posted By: PresidentSupporter @ 08/07/2008 5:18:42 PM

          Seriously, do you think this guy is that stupid that he had no clue who the most famous face in the Middle East was or what he was participating in? Perhaps they should give the man an IQ test and if it's below 90, let him go. Surely he wouldn't ever go back to supporting terrorists again.

      • Posted By: TheVigil @ 08/06/2008 9:29:55 PM

        Guilt by association violates the "innocent until proven guilty" principle that is a bedrock of our legal system. It's also a frequent hallmark of authoritarian, dictatorial, or fascist states and one of the ones most frequently misused to jail the innocent. You may support this President, but I believe your support for true American principle is flawed.

        I idly wish someone would drop you off on the wrong side of your town and prosecute you for asking directions of someone there so that you could see firsthand how persecutory and unfair the principle you espouse can really be.

        • Posted By: PresidentSupporter @ 08/07/2008 5:15:46 PM

          Honestly, none of us know right now what was said in the court proceedings, so we don't know for sure if the guy was innocent or guilty. My point is that you have to be completely blind to think that someone driving Bin Laden around had no idea he was working with a terrorist. Maybe he didn't ever kill anyone or do anything wrong, but he is part of a terrorist group. Technically Bin Laden didn't kill anyone either. Maybe Hitler didn't kill anyone personally. Does that make them innocent?

          I hung around with a lot of criminals in my youth and never for one second did any of us think we were completely innocent even though we didn't participate in certain things. Only criminals and liberals think that everyone is completely blameless unless they actually committed the crime. It's a sad and irresponsible way to think. After all, 99% of people in prison swear they aren't to blame for why they're there.

  • Posted By: mariadcruze @ 08/08/2008 11:13:03 AM

    bush
    Is the worst prisident ever! Mcwar is a idiot has no clue on anything he old and ugly. If mcidiot win there will be another war all our sons will get drafted same old shits for the republican party. Iraq war was wrong some people think the surge is working? why did all our troop die where are the Weapons of mass destruction? Where is Bin laden? Mc idiot equals bush failed policys. Where was mcidiots experience when he went to war with iraq? Liberman say mcain is not racist he adopted a bengladeshi girl , but it wasnt him it was his wife. Ofcourse mcain is a racist. if He is president he will deport all the ilegals in america. Mcain had no choice in the adoption is wife has all the dough. And cidy could have done a lot better than this old white trash. Obama 08,12

  • Posted By: Driver of wagons @ 08/08/2008 10:00:05 AM



    Ron Suskind Must be the only real journalist left in this country but I guess its just the "Way of the World"


    By Ron Suskind
    What just happened? Evidence. A secret that has been judiciously kept for five years just spilled out. All of what follows is new, never reported in any way:

    The Iraq Intelligence Chief, Tahir Jalil Habbush -- a man still carrying a $1 million reward for capture, the Jack of Diamonds in Bush's famous deck of wanted men -- has been America's secret source on Iraq. Starting in January of 2003, with Blair and Bush watching, his secret reports began to flow to officials on both sides of the Atlantic, saying that there were no WMD and that Hussein was acting so odd because of fear that the Iranians would find out he was a toothless tiger. The U.S. deep-sixed the intelligence report in February, "resettled" Habbush to a safe house in Jordan during the invasion and then paid him $5 million in what could only be considered hush money.

    In the fall of 2003, after the world learned there were no WMD -- as Habbush had foretold -- the White House ordered the CIA to carry out a deception. The mission: create a handwritten letter, dated July, 2001, from Habbush to Saddam saying that Atta trained in Iraq before the attacks and the Saddam was buying yellow cake for Niger with help from a "small team from the al Qaeda organization."

    The mission was carried out, the letter was created, popped up in Baghdad, and roiled the global newcycles in December, 2003 (conning even venerable journalists like Tom Brokaw). The mission is a statutory violation of the charter of the CIA, and amendments added in 1991, prohibiting the CIA from conducting disinformation campaigns on U.S. soil.

    So, here we go again: the administration is in full attack mode, calling me names, George Tenet is claiming he doesn't remember any such thing -- just like he couldn't remember "slam dunk" -- and reporters are scratching their heads. Everything in my book is on the record, with many sources. And so, we watch and wait....

    There will be more falling by the wayside after this book is read and there may be an impeachment in the works. Wait there already is! This will give it lots of strength. If you are a patriotic American write all of your congressmen/women and senators and ask them what's up with this.


  • Posted By: bin4 @ 08/08/2008 9:43:38 AM

    Okay so are we going to go after his barber next? lol

  • Posted By: Rich W @ 08/06/2008 6:02:14 PM

    The author needs to try some objective journalism instead of this left wing boilerplate claptrap. Does any sane person think that the guy trusted with Bin Laden's life on a daily basis wasn't a committed terrorist? Give me a break. Bin Laden and his cronies are laughing at us in a cave right now.

    • Posted By: raddave @ 08/07/2008 4:08:39 AM

      He probably is a terrorist, but the prosecuter could not prove that beyond a reasonable doubt.

      • Posted By: billinvirginia @ 08/08/2008 8:12:19 AM

        No reasonable doubt standard in military tribunals.

    • Posted By: olderwiser @ 08/06/2008 7:02:15 PM

      All we know is that he could drive.

      • Posted By: olderwiser @ 08/06/2008 7:09:29 PM

        We have spent billions of dollars trying to find a cave man.

        • Posted By: olderwiser @ 08/06/2008 7:12:12 PM

          I believe the words were, "hunt him down and smoke him out". Riding a trillion dollar horse with a billion dollar cap pistol. Hunting a cave man. What a president. Forgot what he was doing and then started a giant war with a country that had nothing to do with the problem.

          • Posted By: olderwiser @ 08/06/2008 7:14:31 PM

            A boilerplate claptrap president.

            • Posted By: olderwiser @ 08/06/2008 7:18:42 PM

              So, he puts up a 25 million dollar reward to catch the caveman. Somebody finds his chauffeur. Holds him for five years and then gives him a trial. What did he do besides drive a man who planned and executed a crime thousands of miles from the chauffeured automobile, or camel? Tell us what he did, Rich.

              • Posted By: jnakhoul @ 08/07/2008 1:24:31 PM

                don't forget all the indiscriminate awards that led to hundreds of innocents being tortured just so the person who turned them in could collect a few grand

    • Posted By: xeyeldinTX @ 08/06/2008 8:47:37 PM

      Regardless of what you may think you "know" our legal system provides for innocent until proven guilty. I would rather a lot of guilty people go free than 1 innocent man die or be incarcerated for something they did not do. This was the entire intent of the innocent until proven guilty. Our government, with 5 years to prove their case could not show conclusively that the man was guilty of more than driving.

  • Posted By: joe_mama @ 08/08/2008 12:49:17 AM

    well, it's official, the 5 1/2 year sentence (most of which has already been served) proves, without a doubt, that the President is a complete idiot, that the War on Terror is a joke, and that we really don't know what the heck we're doing or talking about.

    JM

    ps--don't worry, we can still detain him indefinitely ... we have plenty of loopholes.

  • Posted By: bajan man @ 08/07/2008 8:28:33 PM

    Aren't we lucky to have a government so vigilant to save us from an errant chauffeur. Now, due to wheels of justice, we can sleep at night with the satisfaction that this menace to the free world is no longer a threat. It was a close call for a while as the judges considered whether it was the right thing to do to use evidence obtained under duress. But in their wisdom, they said: to hell with the Constitution, we are above all that nonsense.

  • Posted By: mrzoid @ 08/07/2008 7:14:48 PM

    So, we've established that the bush administration has cocked up yet another thing huh. I guess they were hoping that they wouldnt need to have a real trial, more of a puppet show. That would probably be more entertaining to Bush anyways. Cheney could set it up, tell bush its the real trial, and some staffers could act it out with sock puppets to Georges hand clapping glee.

  • Posted By: OnlyCureJGK @ 08/07/2008 4:15:14 PM

    The Money has to come from somewhere.......... The equipment has to come from somewhere..........
    They who provide the finances, the equipment, the Oil are contributing just as much as the guys pulling the trigger or the fuse or pushing the buttons supplied to them. Look up the Council on Foriegn Relaitions you will find Fanance Companies, Oil Companies, Defense Contractors, Defense administrators. The goverment behind the government. go to the site see what its all about cfr.org

  • Posted By: Porpus @ 08/06/2008 6:01:45 PM

    What is the sentence associated with this conviction? I have read in other articles that it can carry life inprissionment. Doesn't sound like a small victory to me. Also I dispute the premiss that our troops were treated better when we had the "moral authority". How were our troops treated in Somolia, Vietnam, etc.?

    • Posted By: Mimi13 @ 08/07/2008 4:04:18 PM

      66 months, including time served. Someone will have to decide where he goes in about six months.

  • Posted By: szd59 @ 08/07/2008 10:42:14 AM

    I don't recall what happened to Hitler's driver after he was caught. I wonder if he was tortured and imprisoned?

    • Posted By: Mimi13 @ 08/07/2008 4:02:18 PM

      The Court at Nuremberg declined to try him. He was set free and died in 1975 in Germany.

  • Posted By: OnlyCureJGK @ 08/07/2008 3:39:05 PM

    If your going to send a man to prison for operating a car.
    Then you should have sent a man to prison for operating a buisness that sold Oil to Hitler.

    • Posted By: OnlyCureJGK @ 08/07/2008 3:56:49 PM

      To be a traittor you would have to be changing sides would you not. Central Banks don't change sides they are all interconnected they support both sides of any conflict they see as profitable to them. American money created Osoma bin laden in Afghanistan, that has been reported in the news. It has also been reported that he is against the US now. How is he financing his operations now that would be somting to look into. Arms and Oil is big business in times of War. Who benefits from war more than Arms manufactures and Oil manufactures and they can control who they sell to just as this driver could control who he worked for. Follow the money is lead right to the source of tyranny.

  • Posted By: szd59 @ 08/07/2008 10:44:29 AM

    i wonder if Hitler's chauffeur was tortured and imprisoned?

    • Posted By: OnlyCureJGK @ 08/07/2008 3:37:28 PM

      I wander where Hitler got the oil to run his war operation.
      Look that up.

  • Posted By: midnight05 @ 08/07/2008 8:35:33 AM

    We have become what we feared most -- a little dictatorship run by nasty little men with big egos. We have got to restroe the Constitution, close Gitmo and move the cases that can be tried into the criminal courts with attorneys and the ability to confront witnesses. Such a trial, before 9/11, sent the Blind Shiekh to Florence, CO for life. The bad buys can get convicted and the US will not have such a black eye. We cannot open and keep open even the smallest concentration camp -- which is what GItmo is.

    • Posted By: TheVigil @ 08/07/2008 3:36:34 PM

      Look up "FISA camps" if you really want a scare.

  • Posted By: good conscience @ 08/07/2008 11:03:43 AM

    166 days and counting...then we are rid of, forever, the horrible regime that has terrorized the White House and the country and the world for 8 of the worst years in American History. All the Bushes, Cheneys, Rices, Addingtons, and everyone else who falls into that ignominious category will burn in their own self-created hell long after we the people have stopped celebrating...Can't wait!!!

    • Posted By: OnlyCureJGK @ 08/07/2008 3:31:08 PM

      The worst is yet to come im afraid..... Look back this all started before the turn of the century with the Bankers. They are getting more and more control.
      Look up what President Andrew Jackson had to say about the Bankers taking over.
      Look up what President Woodrow Wilson had to say after the Federal Reserve a private instituation was set up. We can it the FED but it is private.
      Look up who founded the Council for Foriegn Relations also a private ogranization cfr.org
      Look up articles written by the president of the CFR about sovernity of states.
      Be informed then share it. That is the only peacefull means of stopping tyranny. 1st amendment right.

  • Posted By: OnlyCureJGK @ 08/07/2008 2:57:09 PM

    War on terror? Driver? this is news...... Come on people...... National security is to maintain Bankers security not to maintain individual's rights or to promote freedom as it should be. It is to create a dictatorship state. The constitution was set up to protect people not inslave them economicaly and politicaly. News reporters stop co-operating with the Elite who own you and start reporting the real issues. Tyranny, Hunger, Poverty, Sickness. These issues are more important than this.

  • Posted By: xtopher @ 08/07/2008 2:07:52 PM

    The person who should really be worried now is George Bush's driver.

  • Posted By: uuforyou @ 08/06/2008 9:38:51 PM

    I agree, it's a loss for Bush-Cheney-McCain.
    A driver??? Is that the best you can do?

    • Posted By: TheVigil @ 08/06/2008 9:45:14 PM

      This administration has spent six hundred billion dollars to catch about five hundred people, and my guess is that four hundred and fifty of them are probably innocent.

      Whatever else you want to say about the Bush administration, to me, it's clear they never consulted an economist in any of these plans.

      • Posted By: jnakhoul @ 08/07/2008 1:19:51 PM

        they did, they were all just soulless neoliberals like that snake bremer

  • Posted By: chuckmcfarland @ 08/06/2008 11:32:13 PM

    w/ all due respect, W. and the admin are first and foremost concrened with making sure that the guy doesn't do it again ( even tho he did very little.) They have gotten their wish. Hamden will go to prison long enough that he will pose no further threat to the U.S. ( whether he posed a threat or not is another subject )

    • Posted By: jnakhoul @ 08/07/2008 1:18:55 PM

      yeah he won't be driving anyone anywhere, now i can sleep

    • Posted By: joe_mama @ 08/07/2008 6:57:11 AM

      I guess you've never heard of "martyrs" ....

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