I used my previous post How America And The Mainstream Media Got Breitbarted On NDAA as a defense of Obama against some of the comments in The Raw Story article Obama pledges to exempt Americans from indefinite detention law.

I received quite a bit of pushback from my post.  One of the comments begins:

Have we been Breitbarted?  NO.  THE NDAA IS DANGEROUS TO EVERYONE-

To borrow from a fellow blogger’s comments from politicususa.com:

“…simply wrong. It does, absolutely, apply to U.S. citizens. I’ve read it, here’s a breakdown of the logical structure of it:  …

Rather than this commenter quoting another commenter explaining it to me and then me explaining it to you, why don’t I give you a link to the document and let you read it yourself. The National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2012.

The bill is 926 pages long, so I will ease your burden a bit by extracting the relevant sections indicating the pages in the document.  You are free to read the original document for more context than what I have extracted here.

p 1

112TH CONGRESS
1ST SESSION S. 1867
AN ACT

To authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2012 for military
activities of the Department of Defense, for military
construction, and for defense activities of the Department
of Energy, to prescribe military personnel strengths
for such fiscal year, and for other purposes.

p 426

15 Subtitle D—Detainee Matters
16 SEC. 1031. AFFIRMATION OF AUTHORITY OF THE ARMED
17 FORCES OF THE UNITED STATES TO DETAIN
18 COVERED PERSONS PURSUANT TO THE AU-
19 THORIZATION FOR USE OF MILITARY FORCE.
20 (a) IN GENERAL.—Congress affirms that the author-
21 ity of the President to use all necessary and appropriate
22 force pursuant to the Authorization for Use of Military
23 Force (Public Law 107–40) includes the authority for the
24 Armed Forces of the United States to detain covered per-

p 427 

 1 sons (as defined in subsection (b)) pending disposition
 2 under the law of war.
 3 (b) COVERED PERSONS.—A covered person under
 4 this section is any person as follows:
 5 (1) A person who planned, authorized, com-
 6 mitted, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred
 7 on September 11, 2001, or harbored those respon-
 8 sible for those attacks.
 9 (2) A person who was a part of or substantially
10 supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces
11 that are engaged in hostilities against the United
12 States or its coalition partners, including any person
13 who has committed a belligerent act or has directly
14 supported such hostilities in aid of such enemy
15 forces.
16 (c) DISPOSITION UNDER LAW OF WAR.—The dis-
17 position of a person under the law of war as described
18 in subsection (a) may include the following:
19 (1) Detention under the law of war without
20 trial until the end of the hostilities authorized by the
21 Authorization for Use of Military Force.
22 (2) Trial under chapter 47A of title 10, United
23 States Code (as amended by the Military Commis-
24 sions Act of 2009 (title XVIII of Public Law 111–
25 84)).

p 428

 1 (3) Transfer for trial by an alternative court or
 2 competent tribunal having lawful jurisdiction.
 3 (4) Transfer to the custody or control of the
 4 person’s country of origin, any other foreign coun-
 5 try, or any other foreign entity.
 6 (d) CONSTRUCTION.—Nothing in this section is in-
 7 tended to limit or expand the authority of the President
 8 or the scope of the Authorization for Use of Military
 9 Force.
10 (e) AUTHORITIES.—Nothing in this section shall be
11 construed to affect existing law or authorities, relating to
12 the detention of United States citizens, lawful resident
13 aliens of the United States or any other persons who are
14 captured or arrested in the United States.
15 (f) REQUIREMENT FOR BRIEFINGS OF CONGRESS.—
16 The Secretary of Defense shall regularly brief Congress
17 regarding the application of the authority described in this
18 section, including the organizations, entities, and individ-
19 uals considered to be ‘‘covered persons’’ for purposes of
20 subsection (b)(2).
21 SEC. 1032. REQUIREMENT FOR MILITARY CUSTODY.
22 (a) CUSTODY PENDING DISPOSITION UNDER LAW OF
23 WAR.—
24 (1) IN GENERAL.—Except as provided in para-
25 graph (4), the Armed Forces of the United States

p 429 

 1 shall hold a person described in paragraph (2) who
 2 is captured in the course of hostilities authorized by
 3 the Authorization for Use of Military Force (Public
 4 Law 107–40) in military custody pending disposition
 5 under the law of war.
 6 (2) COVERED PERSONS.—The requirement in
 7 paragraph (1) shall apply to any person whose de-
 8 tention is authorized under section 1031 who is de-
 9 termined—
10 (A) to be a member of, or part of, al-
11 Qaeda or an associated force that acts in co-
12 ordination with or pursuant to the direction of
13 al-Qaeda; and
14 (B) to have participated in the course of
15 planning or carrying out an attack or attempted
16 attack against the United States or its coalition
17 partners.
18 (3) DISPOSITION UNDER LAW OF WAR.—For
19 purposes of this subsection, the disposition of a per-
20 son under the law of war has the meaning given in
21 section 1031(c), except that no transfer otherwise
22 described in paragraph (4) of that section shall be
23 made unless consistent with the requirements of sec-
24 tion 1033.

p 430 

 1 (4) WAIVER FOR NATIONAL SECURITY.—The
 2 Secretary of Defense may, in consultation with the
 3 Secretary of State and the Director of National In-
 4 telligence, waive the requirement of paragraph (1) if
 5 the Secretary submits to Congress a certification in
 6 writing that such a waiver is in the national security
 7 interests of the United States.
 8 (b) APPLICABILITY TO UNITED STATES CITIZENS
 9 AND LAWFUL RESIDENT ALIENS.—
10 (1) UNITED STATES CITIZENS.—The require-
11 ment to detain a person in military custody under
12 this section does not extend to citizens of the United
13 States.
14 (2) LAWFUL RESIDENT ALIENS.—The require-
15 ment to detain a person in military custody under
16 this section does not extend to a lawful resident
17 alien of the United States on the basis of conduct
18 taking place within the United States, except to the
19 extent permitted by the Constitution of the United
20 States.

Before I can understand this language myself, I think I am going to have to go back and put in hypertext links on references to other sections so that I can figure out exactly what words qualify what sections. Any lawyers in the audience care to write a concordance?