Confusing Constitutional Rights with Human Rights Again

Micheal Winters a the Catholic America magazine is in my opinion making a common mistake we see time and time again. See The President's Critics & Lawyering Up

He says in part:
This is what the President’s critics fail to realize. We are not "caving" in the war against Islamic extremists by sticking to our own standards of civilized behavior, standards that require all criminals receive a defense attorney. Indeed, our ability to stick to our standards of civilization is a powerful propaganda tool in our effort to win the war against extremists. The decision to provide Mr. Abdulmutallab a lawyer is the reverse of the Bush administration decision to send suspected terrorists into legal limbo at Guantanamo: Gitmo has been a boon for extremist propaganda and, in the event, it did not necessarily serve to protect Americans.......

The current criticism reminds me of the way conservatives denounce flag-burning. They insist that no one should be allowed to burn the American flag. But, you can burn a flag but you can’t burn the flag, as the New Yorker’s Rick Hertzberg once pointed out, just as you can burn a copy of the Constitution but you can’t burn the Constitution. Even if the original in the National Archives were consumed by flame, the Constitution would live so long as we Americans enjoy the right to free speech, to freedom of religion, and the right to a lawyer. For eight years, the Bush administration stomped on the Constitution.........

Mr Winters is of course free to have any opinion of the Constitution he likes. However I think in all fairness dealing with the Constitutional rights that an enemy Combatants has is a question that has legitimate differing point of views. I think most Americans, correctly IMHO, view these people different than a guy knocking over the local gas station.

I am not sure why it is all clears these terrorists need to be provided an Article III Court at all. It seems most times in our history we have seen cases of compartments where the answers would appear to be ARE YOU KIDDING!!

I think Winters is making a common error. That in his mind he confusing basic human rights with Constitutional rights. Now for sure there is some overlap. However is the mark of a "civilized" society to provide terroist with defense counsel? When was that decided?

We see two world views here at play I guess. People that see this as purely criminal matter and the rest (including me) that see these people as combatments and are to be treated differently.