When appellate courts decide questions of law, they set precedents for future cases. If they make allowances for the exigencies of the war on terror in order to uphold convictions of [Khalid Sheikh Mohammed] and his associates, it could end up diminishing the rights of ordinary criminal defendants. That’s why the smart civil-libertarian position is to oppose trying terrorists as civilians.

Maybe reducing rights is part of the point. Via Instapundit » Blog Archive » JAMES TARANTO: “You have to wonder if the Obama administration and its supporters bothered to think….