Can Someone Here Summarize (Briefly, If Possible) The Military Commissions Act?

[Dinger]

And who voted for & against it? Some repuke idiot wrote a LTTE and said we need to "win the war by breaking the rules, instead of following the rules and losing the war, and something about the "Geneva Convention" being something we can rely on. If my memory serves me correctly, the MCA nullified part/parts of the Geneva Conventions.
It's in today's Wausau Daily Herald. I can't find the link for it yet. I might have to wait till tomorrow.

[whistle]

1. The republicans are going totally fascist now, no rules, victory or death!

[babylonsister]

2. Here's a good summary:

http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/ENGAMR511542006

[meldroc]

3. Good summary. Note that the MCA '06 relies on bad case law.

In particular, it relies on the case Ex Parte Quirin, which was a case during World War II where six defendants accused of being German spies tried to get a habeas corpus hearing. One of them was a U.S. citizen. The SCOTUS ruled that all of them were "unlawful combatants" (that's where the MCA '06 gets the "unlawful enemy combatant" language) and denied them habeas corpus hearings. They were all tried by military tribunal, found guilty and executed.

So citizen or non-citizen, this law allows the Bush administration to declare anyone it wants to be an "unlawful enemy combatant," deny you a fair trial, railroad you with a kangaroo court military tribunal, and lock you away forever, or maybe even execute you.