Stern Lawbreaker! yet thou dost wear
The Calumniate 's most malignly mask;
Nor know we anything so dark
As is the taint upon thy task:
Truth burns before thee on her deathbed

And distrust in thy bidding dreads;
Thou dost accuse fair moon of treason,
And the most despised fires of hell,
with thee, fester sick devoid of reason.

To nobler functions, awful Power!
I call thee: I myself resist
Unto thy trickery from this hour.
O let my revulsion have no end!
Give unto me, made bitterly wise,
The spirit to challenge the ghastly lies;
The confidence of freedom try;
Or in the death of Justice thy bondman let me die!

September, 2001
The Second Coming:
The Age of Bin Laden
By Clinton Fein

Otober 2001
Moronic Irony and Patriotic Hypocrisy.
By Clinton Fein

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Give unto me, made lowly wise,
The spirit of self-sacrifice;
The confidence of reason give;
And in the light of Truth thy bondman let me live!
W. Wordsworth, CCVIII. Ode to Duty

Given the danger to the safety of the United States and the nature of international terrorism, and to the extent provided by and under this order, I find consistent with section 836 of title 10, United States Code, that it is not practicable to apply in military commissions under this order the principles of law and the rules of evidence generally recognized in the trial of criminal cases in the United States district courts.
President Issues Military Order Detention, Treatment, and Trial of Certain Non-Citizens in the War Against Terrorism, November 13, 2001

When Americans accused of terrorism are tried in secret courts by hooded judges in Peru or other nations, the U.S. government rightly objects. To authorize comparable trials in this country will erase any legitimacy of such objections. Worse, it will erode throughout the world the image of America as a place where certain freedoms cannot be compromised -- freedoms that ultimately provide the most basic justification for this country to stake its claim to lead the world and wage the war on terrorism. And worse in turn than the blow to the U.S. image abroad will be the potentially irreversible injury at home if Mr. Bush proceeds, as his order would allow, to undermine the rule of law.
The Washington Post Company, End-Running the Bill of Rights, Friday, November 16, 2001

The Bush administration, which hopes tribunals will let them keep intelligence information secret and avoid a potential public trial of Osama bin Laden, may soon begin to turn over some of the thousands of people held on charges related to the Sept. 11 attacks to military custody.
Declan McCullagh, Wired News, Bush's Tribunals Under Fire

If one looked down from Mars and looked at the countries of the world and said if you had someone in whom you had an interest, where would you prefer -- of all the countries on the face of the earth, where would you prefer that that individual be tried in a military commission, I would think an overwhelming number of the people in the world would prefer it be done in the United States. We have a reputation for being fair and balanced and measured in what we do.
Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld Interview Sunday, December 2, 2001 on NBC's Meet the Press

And in a world where, as human beings we know that people are imperfect and there are a lot of people who are, for a variety of reasons, engaged in doing evil things. And vicious things. And lethal things. Therefore, if we value that and if we value the people of the United States, there's no question but that we have to be willing to defend that way of life and to do that, people have to voluntarily put their lives at risk.
Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld Interview Friday, October 12, 2001 with Parade Magazine