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In a 5-4 decision issued on Tuesday, the Forth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Ali al-Marri can continue to be detained in the United States as an “enemy combatant.” Al-Marri, a legal U.S. resident was arrested on alleged credit card fraud. Though the court also ruled that al-Marri can legally challenge his detention, their decision affirmed the expanded authorities of the Presidency since the 9/11 attacks. Tuesday’s ruling was just the latest convergence between the American judicial system and the government’s so-called “War on Terror” foreign policy. In the new book, “The Culture of Vengeance and the Fate of American Justice,” author Terry Aladjem examines the philosophical underpinnings of justice and punishment in U.S. institutions and media. Arguing that retribution, moral dualism, and vengeance are rooted in the intellectual traditions of liberal justice, Aladjem warns that these authoritarian tendencies pose a problem for democracy itself. In praise of the author’s work, one reviewer says, “Aladjem asks not only why we punish, but why we punish in the peculiar way we do.”

GUEST: Terry K. Aladjem, author of “The Culture of Vengeance and the Fate of American Justice,” lecturer on Social Studies at Harvard University and Associate Director at Harvard’s Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning