Political component of detainee ruling

Re “Guantanamo in Congress’ Court Now,” July 1

House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) must delight in insulting the intelligence of the American people. Clearly trying to reap political gain from a humiliating legal defeat, he stated that Democrats “celebrate offering special privileges to violent terrorists.” Democrats are gloating over the Supreme Court putting the brakes on President Bush’s attempt to render the other two branches of government superfluous, but I would not call that celebrating.

So our own Supreme Court, by requiring that the U.S. obey the Uniform Code of Military Justice and the Geneva Convention, is offering terrorists “special privileges”? I suppose this is a variant of the proposition that holding that the U.S. Constitution protects the rights of gays and lesbians is offering homosexuals “special rights.”

This is the most ridiculous drivel that has ever been spoken aloud. I don’t know where these people come from.

LARRY HARRIS

Woodland Hills

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The president states that we are at war against terrorism but that those who commit terror are not soldiers and aren’t afforded the protections of the Geneva Convention. If terrorists are not soldiers, then they must be alleged criminals -- but not to our president, because that would afford them the protection of our courts.

Evidently, the president believes that a terrorist is anybody so labeled by our government. If I were a critic of this government, I’d be a little worried.

MICHAEL VETRIE

Canyon Country