Secondly, our Constitutional guarantees are specifically set forth for the protection of American citizens, not illegal residents or alien citizens not even on our soil. If and when this interminable election cycle is over, I plan to find or start a movement aimed at eventually making the legal branch of government an ELECTED, rather than APPOINTED position.

First of all, habeas corpus pertains to criminal law as happening on civil levels. It does not pertain to persons caught in acts of war against the country or its military.

Second, those so confined for acts of war have been and should be the sole jurisdiction of the executive branch as place of the commander in chief of U.S. military powers, the President. That pusillanimous Congress should have backed the President on this. But, then Congress should long, LONG ago have put the judiciary in its place. Some legal scholars and historians think we’d have to look for Congress to come down on the supreme court all the way back to Marbury.

Thomas Jefferson and others knew that the judiciary could become thuggish and autocratic. These founders would be very displeased that Congress has not trimmed the judiciary, pinioning them to true judicial (and not legislative or executive) functions.

Why weren’t those innocent travelers released with the others whom it was widely reported the govt. had questioned & released in at least two different groups upon finding nothing of note?

If the govt was willing to release those, then this alleged conspiracy to hide their embarrassment by continuing to hold innocent people doesn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense.

How does he know why they are detained?

The administration has never been required to give any justification for any detainee. Many of them were arabs visiting Pakistan for their own reasons when the US administration suspected that islamic foreigners in Pakistan were really going to secret Taliban training camps. These people have been held without justification for years and the US is too ashamed to admit that they have no evidence of terrorist conections.

If the administration cannot explain why someone is detained, that person should be released. Right now, the Bush/Cheney administration is using sophistry to hide the fact that many detainees are not unlawful combatants (anyone not pulled in for actually raising arms against US interests is, by definition, a non-combatant [they can still be a criminal, but criminals have rights]).

When you allow the government to conclude that someone distant has no rights, you are tacitly consenting to the notion that nobody, including yourself, has rights.