WE DON'T NEED NO STINKING DUE PROCESS

US can detain 'enemy combatant' indefinitely

President George W. Bush was handed a major victory on Friday in his effort to assert sweeping presidential powers in the war on terrorism as a US appeals court upheld his authority to imprison indefinitely a US citizen captured on American soil.

On the eve of the fourth anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks, the US Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled unanimously that Jose Padilla, a suspected al-Qaeda operative who US officials say was planning to carry out a terrorist attack inside the US, could be detained as an "enemy combatant" without any review by US civilian courts.

... the court's ruling, written by Judge Michael Luttig, who is considered a potential Supreme Court nominee, said definitively that Mr Bush had been given such powers by the congressional declaration authorising military force following the September 11 terrorist attacks. ...

--Financial Times

Not only is this decision utterly in sync with White House policy, it came out on a Friday afternoon, the Bushies' favorite time for sneaking embarrassing news out, and on a Friday afternoon when the whole country is focused on Katrina and the semi-sacking of Michael Brown. Luttig must really want that Supreme Court gig.