Plaintiff in NDAA case: U.S. has 'gone insane' in its war on terror

Journalist Tangerine Bolen, who along with other activists and writers filed suit over an indefinite detention law, said Thursday that the citizens United States had become indifferent about their rights.

"This panoply of laws and circumstances over the last ten years have led to a milieu that is increasingly dangerous for our own citizens as well as citizens around the world," she told The Young Turks host Cenk Ugyur. "The U.S. government has gone a little bit insane in its war on terror."

U.S. District Judge Katherine Forrest in Manhattan, an Obama appointee, ruled on Wednesday that Section 1021 of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012 likely violated due process rights guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment and free press rights guaranteed by the First Amendment.

Bolen and the other plaintiffs had claimed that Section 1021 of the $662 billion defense spending bill was unconstitutionally vague, and put them in fear of being arrested and held in military custody indefinitely.

Section 1021 covers anyone who has “substantially supported” or “directly supported” “al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners.” But the law does not define “substantially supported”, “directly supported” or "associated forces." It allows the military to detain terrorism suspects without charge or trial.

Bolen said she was a moderate Democrat who voted for Obama, and expressed her disappointment that the President signed the law despite threatening to veto it.

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