For the love of Christ, I have about had it with our military justice system. They will find any excuse not to hold sexual predators accountable for their actions. I see no good reason why the president, as commander in chief, shouldn’t be able to say what he thinks appropriate minimal penalties are for soldiers who are convicted of sexual assault. Without referring to any specific case, Obama said the following in May:
“I expect consequences,” Obama said at a press conference in early May that came just as the Pentagon released a report detailing rising incidences of sexual assaults in 2012. “So I don’t just want more speeches or awareness programs or training, but ultimately folks look the other way. If we find out somebody’s engaging in this, they’ve got to be held accountable — prosecuted, stripped of their positions, court martialed, fired, dishonorably discharged. Period.”
And now a judge has ruled that two defendants cannot be “punitively discharged” even if they are convicted because the president’s remarks have created “an unlawful command influence.” In other words, the president has made it clear that he expects sexual predators to be discharged, so they can’t be discharged. And if he said that he wanted murderers to be imprisoned, we couldn’t imprison murderers?
This is a stretch, even in the military system of justice where the participants are under the president’s command. It’s bad enough that commanders can set aside military convictions and ignore sentences, but now it’s not permissible for the president to even express his opinion about what should happen to rapists in the most general terms.
They didn’t let unlawful command influence stop the prosecution of Bradley Manning, suddenly they get UCMJ religion on sexual assault? Typical cherry-picking by the big boys in charge.
Remind me what the president said about Manning.
At a fund-raiser, he said, “”We are a nation of laws. We don’t let individuals make decisions about how the law operates. He [Bradley Manning] broke the law!”
I think only an idiot would consider either of Obama’s statements to demonstrate undue influence on a trial, but I can see how others might disagree.
However, to express that concern about a statement the President made about an issue in general, but not about a specific case where the President was talking about a particular defendant, is over-the-top hypocritical.
He should have qualified his statement with the “if these allegations are true,” thing. But if he said that, “if guilty, he should be punished,” that doesn’t seem like a problem to me.
And who knows what his precise wording was? This was what someone who was in the fund-raiser said he said in an off-mike situation.
Did anyone ever hear Carney(or Gibbs if he was the spokesbot at the time) walk back the remarks? I never did, because it was a big deal to some of us at the time.
…and not a big enough deal to anyone else, including the White House, to bother with.
In this case, the military judge(or whomever it is) is a freakin’ idiot. It’s a lot more problematic in the Manning case because he was singled out(according to what was reported).
Now, this?
Jayzoos H. Keerist, not even able to herd his Disciples together, even for a last supper!
President Obama has created “an unlawful command influence?”
He’s the feckin’ Commander in Chief (FSM, how I hate that term, but still…)!!!
How the hell does the feckin’ CiC create “an unlawful command influence?”
Between the Republicans, and too many of the Democrats, does anyone ever listen to what this feckin’ guy says?
And by listen, I mean… do at least something besides doing the feckin’ opposite?
Well, now we know why he got Bo…
We need a disclaimer that everyone who volunteers for military service has to sign about the possible consequences – (death, rape, loss of Constitutional protections) absolving the USA and all its masters and commanders of liability for the side effects of soldiering.
How many would sign up then?
Doubt the fine print would dissuade many from signing up. For too many it’s a job and the only one they can get.
Put that ruling in the context of this;
http://thinkprogress.org/security/2013/06/13/2153961/australia-email-scandal/?mobile=wt
That speech is something you would never see in America, either from ANY politician, or military leader. And not because of ‘undue influence’, but because of ‘lack of courage’.
In America, whenever there is a choice to be made between justice and ‘good ‘ol boys’, the choice will always be the good ‘ol boys.
This judge had that choice, he could have said, ‘errr, you know the POTUS was not talking about this specific case, right?’, instead he would rather have rapists in the military.
.
Who appointed that Judge? What state is he from? What Party is he registered with?
He’s a military judge, so he wasn’t “appointed” in the way that federal judges are appointed – by a President of one party or the other – but is promoted up through the ranks in the Judge Advocate General corp by the military itself.
Which means he knows the promotion game, and what is expected of his rulings.
.
CiC = HNIC
I believe it’s the N in HNIC that is causing the problem…
I get where the judge is coming from. If it weren’t President Obama but rather President Nixon or Bush, I’d be concerned about behind the scenes pressure to come down hard on some poor schmoe. Where there’s a chain of command, there’s a very real risk of pressure being brought to bear on a prosecution, altering the outcome.
This is what “pragmatism” looks like. Stage one: recognize that rape exists. Stage two: put the victim on trial. Stage three: minimal punishment. Stage four: punishment voided by judges and higher ups.
The military justice system will sort out the crime of rape — real soon — like in two or three decades.
TPM has a video the Australian military chief made for their military & citizenry. In no uncertain terms he declares the enforcement of common human decency under his command.
ttp://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2013/06/wow_20.php?ref=fpblg
Where is the American clear voice demanding and enforcing, decency from the military.
Have you seen the Caine Mutiny?