Talk:John Walker Lindh/Archive 1

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[edit] Wikipedia is not CNN.com

Someone had entered:

One possibility is that all his testimonial could be thrown out in court due to technicality and the prosecution would have no case against him.

Well, yes. Another possibility is that his defense lawyer, James Brosnahan, is making statements to the press for tactical reasons. Let's wait and see. Wikipedia is not CNN.com. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Conversion script (talk • contribs)

Was an official explanation of his motives for fighting on the side of the taliban ever given? I didn't see that in the article.. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.154.130.112 (talk • contribs)

The technicality was that his interrogation was a pre-indictment, custodial overt interview, which is not authorized by law, according to Jesselyn Radack, the U.S. Department of Justice ethics adviser. In addition, the government later claimed that it did not know that Lindh had a lawyer, whereas Radack's memos to the contrary were not supplied by the Justice Department although subpoenaed. Martin | talk • contribs 03:33, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV complaint

I removed the following paragraph becuase it was not NPOV complient:

John Walker Lindh essentially became the scapegoat of the Bush administration for a number of reasons. The first and foremost is their failure to capture or kill Osama bin Laden and, in fact, producing factors suitable to his existence and war. It was probably thought that if John Lindh was demonized to a great enough extent, and the public's anger could be focused upon him, then they could simply place him in prison and little attention would be paid to the many failures of the administration. He was charged with providing services and support to the Taliban, despite the fact that a few years previously, the U.S. administration actively supported the Taliban, and told its allies in the region to do the same. America is no safer with John Lindh behind bars and, in fact, is more dangerous in that we know that with the Patriot Act and the many violations of American civil liberties enforced by President Bush and John Ashcroft, any one of us may be next for nearly any offense deemed worthy of being placed under the undefined, blanket-term of "terrorism."

The basic content could be added back if it could be properly attribited to critics of Lindhs proscecution and/or the administrations handling of it. Cab88


I removed the link "Quotes, mainly from fundamentalists, referred to here as the 'American Taliban'" (http://www.reandev.com/taliban/). It is not relevant to the article.
Also, in my opinion, this article clearly does not conform to NPOV. It offers little depth and limited information on the story or conduct of John Walker Lindh, and instead choses to focuse on the alleged misconduct by the U.S. government.
The only links it offers besides the link to the indictment are for an article from the out of the mainstream, ultra-leftist, "Nation" magazine, and two articles on Jesselyn Radack, an activist and former U.S. Department of Justice employee who claims misconduct on the part of the DOJ in the Walker case. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Meh130 (talk • contribs)

[edit] "Arguably a traitor"

First paragraph says "and, arguably, a traitor". Why not take this part out? http://www.freejohnwalker.net/ has some good information which should at least indicate that there is more to this story than first apparent and that labelling him a traitor in the first paragraph is detrimental to the quality of this article. --Erik Enge 16:54, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

So carrying a weapon in the service of a foriegn power with whom your country is engaged in combat isn't even arguably treason now? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.181.12.201 (talk • contribs)
The Northern Alliance captured him in November. President Bush declared the Taliban to be the protectors of Al Qaeda, and so enemies, the previous month. The number of American military in Afghanistan at this time was limited to the 555, 585, 595 special forces with some CIA. Each of the three groups was about a dozen men, who could divide into three four man squads, and these guys were using lasers to guide the bombers. They were almost certainly not within rifle range of anybody, except possibly on their days off, for the excitement. Martin | talk • contribs 03:45, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Describes self as al-Qaeda?

The article asserts John Walker confessing to being al-Qaeda, but there is no citation given for this. And if he did so confess, how do we know it wasnt a coerced confession, as he was in fact tortured by the US military and had no representation? According to his father's speech at the Commonwealth club, aired Feb 10 2006 on KQED radio, John Walker was not aware of al-Qaeda and not involved in al-Qaeda, and joined the Taliban thinking he was helping the Mujahadeen. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.231.255.157 (talk • contribs)

If that's the case he'd be too mentaly deficient to stand trial, as the Mujahadeen didn't need any help, the Soviets being gone for more than a decade. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.181.12.201 (talk • contribs)
He wasn't fighting the Soviets. He went from Lahore to fight with the Pakistanis against the Indians in Kashmir, to protect the "Islamic World". The Pakistanis were hardly the spiritual people he expected, so he left for Kabul. Since he did not speak Pashto or Urdu, only Arabic, he was sent to Kandahar where the arabic speaking group was, and was shipped to Taloqan, north of Kabul. Martin | talk • contribs 04:15, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
He apparently claimed to have volunteered to fight for the Taliban against the Northern Alliance -- thereby upholding the values of crackdowns against "beard-trimming", public executions in soccer stadiums, and a ban on female education, no doubt... AnonMoos 23:32, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
His parents have certainly done him no real service -- if they had just once publicly apologized for Johnnie's actions (especially to the Spann family), or if they had even simply admitted the possibility that his actions might have been at least morally wrong -- rather than putting on display their faded-hippie "If it feels good for you, then it must be right" attitudes (which didn't play very well in the aftermath of 9/11) -- then the scapegoating might have been much reduced. Certainly Johnnie's parents have succeeded in antagonizing the Spann family and making them into their determined enemies, as a result of their rather ill-chosen public remarks.[1] AnonMoos 23:29, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
There are two sides to this story. Robert Young Pelton makes a very strong rebuttal to the above-mentioned Commonwealth Club speech (I've provided a link to it below the link to that speech) in which he makes a case that Lindh was very much part of Al-Qaeda (which Lindh in an early interview refers to under an alternate name, "Al-Ansar"). Pelton points out that although Lindh was fluent in Arabic, he did not speak a word of Pashto or any other Afghan language, which would mean he would have had to fight alongside the "Afghan Arabs" or "Foreign Fighters", in other words, al-Qaeda. The recent Esquire article magazine article (also linked to under "external links") argues the opposite. Both views should be covered in this article. Peter G Werner 02:33, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Clemency campaign

Frank Lindh (JWL's father) hit the lecture circuit about 6 months back trying to drum up support for executive clemency for John Walker Lindh. The campaign has gotten some support amongst some left/liberals (can't think of any notable ones offhand) and, of course, is strongly opposed by many people as well, most notably Jonny Spann, father of Mike Spann, a CIA agent who was killed in the prison uprising Walker took part in. An evenhanded discussion of this recent campaign should be incorporated into the article. Peter G Werner 02:33, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Do the Spanns feel that Lindh killed their son? Or that he was involved in killing their son in any way, other than being in the same fort? Martin | talk • contribs 04:01, 26 June 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Just remember

I think that everybody should just remember that in another time or in another time John Walker Lindh would have been executed for treason, possibly on the battlefield. I think he was obviously treated mercifully by the United States military and government. Whirling Sands 22:46, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

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[edit] John Walker Lindh "alleged homosexuality" clarification

I've changed this paragraph as both JWL's lawyers and Khizer Hayat have denied any homosexual relations and it is widely agreed that the original comments were wrongly reported. Therefore this subject must be seen in the full context. Also the paragraph has been redrafted to avoid any libel. Darth007

[edit] Failed GA

lead is too short to summarize the article, external jumps abound, refs have poor and inconsistent formatting, footnotes should come after punctuation, a section with just one sentence?, has cite needed tags, footnotes should be above external links.Rlevse 01:52, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

It also fails NPOV standards by reporting for a full paragraph (undue emphasis) a false report of homosexuality. It either [1] doesn't belong in the article at all, or [2] needs to be relegated to a brief footnote. - Nunh-huh 01:58, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
I agree that the paragraphs on homosexuality do not deserve the prominence they have. Clearly, his capture and the events before and after that are the reasons that this entry is in wikipedia. Martin | talk • contribs 03:57, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Biased Word Usage

It is said that Khizar Hayat "admitted to" having a homsexual relationship. To admit to something implies that that something is wrong or illegal. Homosexuality is not illegal the use of "admitted" implies that a relationship of that sort is wrong. In order to maintain neutrality I have changed that phrase to "reported having."

[edit] Arabic to English

I changed a couple names to reflect International Community standard when translating Arabic to English. Since their is much ambiguation in the two languages, IC standard eliminates "C-O-P-E" when going from Arabic to English. For example, there is no such name as "Mohammed", it would be "Muhammad". Also, there is no such word (technically) as "Abdul", it should read "Abd-al". Grannis 18:30, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Hamdi v. Rumsfeld

The section regarding Yaser Esam Hamdi seems out of place & could probably be shortened or deleted altogether. Kaiser Vinny 04:40, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:John Walker Lindh Custody.jpg

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BetacommandBot 01:50, 1 August 2007 (UTC)