Over at Greg's place, I explain the politics behind the new, unreleased Miranda guidelines in terrorism cases:
Whatever the new guidelines on the use of the public safety exception are, they're likely more a solution to a political problem than a security problem. The administration doesn't want to get caught in another political firestorm because it obeys the law even when terrorism is involved. In the process, they're allowing Republicans to exploit fears about terrorism to chip away at protections against self-incrimination. Republicans hate Miranda because some simply don't believe in the presumption of innocence, particularly in cases involving Islamic terrorism. As Reagan-Era Attorney General Edwin Meese III once put it, "If a person is innocent of a crime, then he is not a suspect."
Miranda came to be because Jim Crow cops in the South were beating false confessions out of black suspects. So there's something ominous about modifying Miranda only a few years after a previous administration approved torturous interrogations of individuals suspected of terrorism. At the very least, the administration should be making public what the new procedures are.
The Miranda thing is merely a symbolic foil for Republicans, an easy shorthand they can use to accuse the White House of coddling terrorists. If it were really an urgent matter, they'd have taken Attorney General Eric Holder up on his suggestion to modify Miranda. But if they did that, they wouldn't be able to use it as a political bludgeon the next time around. This isn't about security; it's about neutralizing a conservative avenue of attack.
