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Back to Geneva

Military judges in Guantanamo Bay threw out charges against the second and third detainees to be tried under the revised Military Commissions Act, which governs trials of suspected unlawful enemy combatants.

The Trib's take:

The Bush administration could have saved itself a lot of grief, and the United States a lot of embarrassment, by adhering originally to the Geneva Convention and other treaties.

Instead, the administration decided prisoners taken in the war on terrorism would be tried by a special process it threw together for that purpose. The first try was nothing but a kangaroo court. Since then, the system has been through several refinements. Five years later, it still doesn't work.

The act could be remedied by reconvening the Combatant Status Review Tribunals and having detainees declared unlawful combatants - reinforcing the world's impression the process is rigged.

Some lawmakers in Congress are thinking about revisiting the revised act it passed in haste last year. And lawmakers should, at the very least, restore the right of habeas corpus that Congress and the Bush administration saw fit to deny detainees.

But the commissions and tribunals may be too tainted to salvage. There are options: civilian criminal courts; or, better, courts-martial under our existing military justice system - which is what the Geneva Convention called for in the first place.

Bed bugs return

Largely absent in the United States for more than a half-century, bed bugs have made a rather successful comeback. They have spread to all 50 states and the nation's capital.

The Trib's take:

The bugs' previously low profile was due to the postwar, heavy-duty use of DDT and other highly toxic chemicals, and their return to the banning of those pesticides. Growth in international business travel and tourism has also been a factor.

The bed bug is highly adaptive. It has affirmed its status in 21st-century American life with two distinctive institutions: It has its own Web sites, and hotel and apartment infestations are a growing field of personal-injury litigation.

For what consolation it's worth, cavemen had them, too. Sleep tight, etc., etc.

Cussing-ban bombs

A federal appeals court ruled a Bush administration crackdown against broadcasting "fleeting expletives" was arbitrary and capricious and doubted it could be rewritten to comply with the First Amendment.

The Trib's take:

The cases at issue involved blurted obscenities, which celebrities on awards shows seem prone to, and some ripe dialogue in an episode of "NYPD Blue."

In truth, the Federal Communications Commission faces an impossible task trying to regulate certain speech while societal mores are changing rapidly, in an industry that is in constant flux.

The proliferation of cable and radio channels ensure viewers have access to vulgarity-free programming, and proliferating technologies ensure parents can bar their children from adult language. And while it's not a view the FCC shares, certain swear words have become so common as to be devoid of any meaning.