At 11:16 AM 12/15/2001 -0600, John S. Quarterman wrote:
>Richard,
>
>You seem to be asserting a couple of equations:
>
> "open public trial" equals "compromises sources of evidence"
John, I don't see how portions of an "open public trial" could be closed to
prevent compromising the source of certain, perhaps vital, evidence without
us being accused of holding a secret trial. It appears to me that many
people, not knowing the source of the evidence, would not believe that it
was a fair trial. Perhaps you can suggest a way around this which would be
accepted and believed by everyone (me, Tim, Sinclair, the Middle East,
Europe, ...). If you can, then I would certainly prefer such an "open
public trial." However, I would not want to be on the jury since I would
not want to place my family in danger and would not want all of us to enter
a jury protection program. No doubt we could find a sufficient number of
brave, principled souls to fill that role.
> "open public trial" equals "negotiate with or appease such evil people."
I did not intend to equate these two different aspects of the problem. The
first deals with what we do with the terrorists after we catch them. The
second, it seemed to me, dealt with Sinclair's question of what we can do
in the longer run to stop the cycle of violence. I don't know what will
work, I was just commenting on what I think doesn't and won't work. I
could be wrong!
Thanks for asking,
Richard Huseth
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