Obama Closes Gitmo

[jrrtoken]

Look, if there were people that were tortured for no reason except to amuse the guards or to get false confessions, someone should be prosecuted. But based on evidence the only people tortured were leaders of Al Qaeda that we captured and it was a matter of life and death, there were a few plots that were foiled in the United States thanks to the information gotten.

True, although no one, and I mean no one, really knows what goes on in that prison. Most likely, people have been detained or questioned by mere suspicion or unfortunate acquaintance. For example, look what happened to Cat Stevens.

[Web Rider]

For example, look what happened to Cat Stevens.

 

Who, lets be honest, wasn't helping his case by becoming a staunch Muslim and changing his name to Ussef Islam.

[GarfieldJL]

Who, lets be honest, wasn't helping his case by becoming a staunch Muslim and changing his name to Ussef Islam.

 

I think Obama is going to be in real trouble if there is another attack on the United States, after 9/11 there wasn't a single successful terrorist strike on US soil, and Obama has undid all the safeguards that were in place.

[Tommycat]

I think Obama is going to be in real trouble if there is another attack on the United States, after 9/11 there wasn't a single successful terrorist strike on US soil, and Obama has undid all the safeguards that were in place.

 

Wellll to be fair, it takes a long time to plan an attack. The reality is that we really aren't that much safer. The state department has stated that they expect a nuclear attack on US soil within five years. That's even with all the seemingly added security and random screenings. Truth is we might feel safer, but chances are we are not.

 

Don't get me wrong, I don't like that they are closing the detention center at Gitmo. Hey, maybe they could reopen Alcatraz. Heck even get the prisoners involved in the restoration of it. It's already owned by the US Government

[GarfieldJL]

Wellll to be fair, it takes a long time to plan an attack. The reality is that we really aren't that much safer. The state department has stated that they expect a nuclear attack on US soil within five years. That's even with all the seemingly added security and random screenings. Truth is we might feel safer, but chances are we are not.

 

Don't get me wrong, I don't like that they are closing the detention center at Gitmo. Hey, maybe they could reopen Alcatraz. Heck even get the prisoners involved in the restoration of it. It's already owned by the US Government

 

Reality is that several terrorist attacks were thwarted in the US thanks to Bush's policies.

[The Doctor]

Reality is that several terrorist attacks were thwarted in the US thanks to Bush's policies.

 

And Obama's policies will continue the good work.

[GarfieldJL]

And Obama's policies will continue the good work.

 

If by good work you mean potentially another World Trade Center Bombing...

 

Seriously, under Clinton we had.

 

1. World Trade Center Bombing

2. WACO

3. Elian Gonzolas (sp?)

4. USS Cole

5. US Embasy Bombings

 

Not to mention he completely gutted the CIA.

 

Yet under Bush we really just had 9/11, which you can throw a lot of the blame on the Clintons for gutting the CIA.

 

Obama's cabinet features some of the same bungling Idiots that screwed up everything last time. And he's returning to the Clinton style of completely wrecking our CIA.

 

 

They didn't even consider the consequences of this aside from France liking us again.

[Det. Bart Lasiter]

how is elian gonzalez a terror attack

[Jae Onasi]

Closing Gitmo is nothing more than a symbolic gesture that shifts the problem to another post/base--or more than one of those.

[Achilles]

Closing Gitmo is nothing more than a symbolic gesture that shifts the problem to another post/base--or more than one of those.

That said, I’ll say it again. The only reason to have a place like Guantanamo, on foreign soil, is to attempt to circumvent our own laws.

...

 

EDIT:

 

Either Gitmo is a unique prison, created to circumvent our own laws, and it's closure is significant or it is just like any other prison/base and closing it means nothing. I think there are a lot of sound arguments for the former. I think the latter sounds like a conservative talking point.

[Tommycat]

It is still wrong no matter how many times it is said, or how many people re-quote it.

 

Escape: If they escape they can either go to Cuba, or make a swim.

 

Dedicated prison: This way guards can more easily be trained in dealing with their special needs.

 

Centralized location: With them being there the processing and handling of inmates can be handled more efficiently.

 

NIMBY protection: Lets face it, not a lot of people want them housed near them. This location makes it so that you have the base, and.... well.... Cuba...

 

Highly limited access: People can't just walk up to it. Escape attempts are even more limited. Break outs are extremely difficult.

 

Actually the base becomes American soil, so they are still on American soil. They can't just indiscriminately break laws. However they are not restricted by US penal system regulations.

[Web Rider]

I don't really have an objection to there being a prison there, but if the people running it think that the same isolation that makes it such a good base also isolates them from the law of the US, then a simple change of management isn't going to make a lot of difference. If what it takes is dragging them back home so we can watch them, then that's what we've got to do.

 

Personally, I want to have as few reasons as possible for the recruiting of new terrorists. Gitmo is one of those reasons that we can recitfy. also: in before "we might as well convert to islam and lose our freedoms!" no, because that's stupid. They don't hate us for our freedoms, that hate us for what our influence is doing to their part of the world.

[Tommycat]

Ok, so we relocate it to somewhere in the US... You volunteering your back yard? How about when you also realize that whatever location you move it to also becomes a target for a terrorist attack. Possible escape attempts. Bombings. Generally, that tends to kill tourist activity. They also have to take land from people and convert it into a prison location. So I say again, are you volunteering your back yard. Gitmo was perfect because they didn't have to worry about NIMBY's. The US government only had to ask the owner of the land if they would give up some of it to handle the prison. That was rather convienient as the owner of the land was... the US government.

 

Ooooo I just thought of something that would make it all the better... When you hear this you're gonna wish I was running things...

 

Ok have 24/7 live streaming video of all the inmates and interrogation rooms(obviously no sound in the interrogation rooms to protect secrets). Charge a fee for watching it. The gubmint makes money. Inmates are safe from torture. We can't be accused of torture(because everyone can see we aren't torturing via live web cam). Whiney "Liberals" can check on their favorite inmate. "Neo-Cons" can pick out their least favorite inmate.

 

Maybe we can even have cage matches, and battles to the death, haha er... wait... too far?

[Allronix]

While it may make us a bit more vulnerable in the short term (Released detainee now Yemen al-Qaida commander), the long-term benefits outweigh it. How many times does it have to be demonstrated that information obtained by torture is questionable at best? A human in pain will say he is a little blue Smurf if it gets the jumper cables off his joy department.

 

Gitmo and the practices it represents were the best damn recruitment ad our enemies had. To paraphrase Traya, we are not fighting this war with guns or bombs - those are only the tools. We are fighting a war of belief. Those who want to attack American citizens believe we are evil, and point to Abu Grahib and Gitmo as proof that we are hypocrites who seek to destroy and degrade their people and religion. By closing these black-ops prisons, by discontinuing the practice of torture, we have taken away one of their best arguments to recruit moderates and gain sympathy.

 

Too many of these men have languished without habeas corpus, legal representation, or even a bloody trial! If they are innocent men, they need to be set free and compensated for wrongful imprisonment. If they are guilty, then I'm sure our supermax prisons can hold them adequately. They did a fine job with home-grown nutters like McVeigh.

 

Seriously this was only done cause the rest of the world and the far left wanted it done, with absolutely no regard to the consequences.

 

Garfield, does the Eighth Amendment, the Geneva conventions, or the Nuremberg Trials mean anything to you? International law is not some "quaint, antiquated notion." If another nation, like Iran or Myanmar put our citizens in a version of Gitmo, the same laws apply. We are not above or exempt from the law. In fact, we are a nation of law, and need to act like one if we are going to have any respect in this interconnected world.

 

And while I already know I'm "Far Left," I'm glad that I apparently have "the rest of the world" to back me up!

 

I would rather risk death in a country I can be proud of than live in perpetual shame and hypocricy. America sells itself as the shining city on the hill? Then we'd better damn well walk it as much as we talk it.

 

Good job, Mr. President. In just two days, you've already proven yourself the right man for the job.

[Tommycat]

Sorry, the article you posted had him saying that he was al Queda. So he may have been rightly imprisoned at Gitmo, and wrongly released. Which would indicate that we are turning loose possible terrorists to keep the ones we're more certain about. His own statements are that his imprisonment at Gitmo strengthened his resolve. Granted it may have been just sheer luck that you posted a link to the one guy that was al Q before he went in.

[jrrtoken]

Seriously, under Clinton we had.

 

1. World Trade Center Bombing

2. WACO

3. Elian Gonzolas (sp?)

4. USS Cole

5. US Embasy Bombings

The Waco incident wasn't even a terrorist attack, and why is Elain Gonzalez listed as a terrorist? Oh, and the last two were not on American territory, and were targeted towards military and government personnel, not civilians.

Yet under Bush we really just had 9/11, which you can throw a lot of the blame on the Clintons for gutting the CIA.

We just had 9/11? I suppose that 3,000 lives lost is nothing but a scratch.

Obama's cabinet features some of the same bungling Idiots that screwed up everything last time. And he's returning to the Clinton style of completely wrecking our CIA.

...and that is with no credible proof at all, and is by your own insinuation.

[Jae Onasi]

Either Gitmo is a unique prison, created to circumvent our own laws, and it's closure is significant or it is just like any other prison/base and closing it means nothing. I think there are a lot of sound arguments for the former. I think the latter sounds like a conservative talking point.

If they do nothing about the problems that have made it the rallying point for the anti-war crowd and Michael Moore fruitcakes, then closing the base and moving the problem elsewhere is nothing more a fancy detainee shell game. Closing it on the assumption that that will fix the problems is a useless liberal talking point and does nothing to solve the underlying problem of alleged detainee/POW violations.

 

The gov't either solves the POW problems at Gitmo, thus rendering closure irrelevant, or they just move the problem somewhere else, in which case the detainees are no better off than before, they just have a new landscape outside their prison windows With the latter, the liberals get to point their fingers and say "See? We fixed the problem as Gitmo!!". Sure, it got fixed at Gitmo, but that's treating the symptom and not the disease if the POW rights problem isn't also addressed. All I'm hearing is the clamor for closure, I'm not seeing significant, detailed plans on how the detainees are going to be handled. Assuming that simply closing Gitmo will be the solution to fixing any detainee human rights violations is naive at best. I'll be cynical and say I don't think that their treatment will be very much different in another setting, to be honest.

[Adavardes]

If by good work you mean potentially another World Trade Center Bombing...

 

I think Obama is going to be in real trouble if there is another attack on the United States, after 9/11 there wasn't a single successful terrorist strike on US soil, and Obama has undid all the safeguards that were in place.

 

Two problems I see with this argument:

 

1. The former is little more than alarmist rhetoric, based on the latter argument that the Bush administration did something of actual worth to safeguard us from anything, other than making flying a pain in the posterior. It takes time, YEARS, to plan a terrorist attack like the World Trade Center Bombings, and 9/11. They're gonna take a little while longer to hit us again, at least hard enough to do to us what they did in 9/11. Just because they haven't attacked yet doesn't mean you've averted any real disaster. I'm sorry, but fear rules this argument, and is thusly irrational and baseless.

 

2. What exactly did he undo? To me, all he did was close down a prison where Bush could circumvent everything this country stands for in order to serve his own twisted agenda. There are plenty of offshore prisons to house these "terrorists", where they'll get a fair trial under the Geneva conventions and be proven innocent or guilty, which will then prove whether or not Bush just went around cherry-picking random people based on race or religious preferences.

 

The problem with believing that Bush did anything of actual worth is that you have to assume that his screenings and racial profilings help with finding a terrorist. They don't. They help in finding innocent muslims of middle eastern descent. You're not catching and detaining the correct people on the correct bases. And frankly, Bush just gave us strawmen to make us feel safe and warm, when in reality, terrorism is still a very real threat, because terrorists still hate us, even moreso for Bush's wrongful prosecution of their people, and are still out there. All he did was throw more **** at the fan.

[Achilles]

If they do nothing about the problems that have made it the rallying point for the anti-war crowd and Michael Moore fruitcakes, then closing the base and moving the problem elsewhere is nothing more a fancy detainee shell game.

I see a lot of words, but find very little substance here.

 

The whole point is that they can't do what they've done in Gitmo here. That's why they were doing it at Gitmo and not here. You ignored the entire premise in order to repeat something you've already said.

 

Closing it on the assumption that that will fix the problems is a useless liberal talking point and does nothing to solve the underlying problem of alleged detainee/POW violations.

See above.

 

The gov't either solves the POW problems

They aren't POWs remember? They are "enemy combatants". You are keeping track of the facts surrounding this situation, aren't you Jae?

 

...at Gitmo, thus rendering closure irrelevant, or they just move the problem somewhere else, in which case the detainees are no better off than before, they just have a new landscape outside their prison windows With the latter, he liberals get to point their fingers and say "See? We fixed the problem as Gitmo!!".

Well, except for the whole "no longer being held in limbo" thing.

 

Sure, it got fixed at Gitmo, but that's treating the symptom and not the disease if the POW rights problem isn't also addressed.

Upon further reflection, I think I may have misinterpreted your earlier strawman as a counter-argument and tried to address it as such. It just occurred to me that you've changed the subject to something else and I fell for it.

 

All I'm hearing is the clamor for closure, I'm not seeing significant, detailed plans on how the detainees are going to be handled.

Wait. You mean Obama closed Gitmo without your having signed off on it first? That bastard.

 

Asuming that simply closing Gitmo will be the solution to fixing any detainee human rights violations is naive at best.

Strawman confirmed.

 

I'll be cynical and say I don't think that their treatment will be very much different in another setting, to be honest.

So it's legal to hold people without trial and subject them to torture on U.S. soil? Okay.

[Tommycat]

GITMO IS US SOIL!!!!!!!!!

They cannot legally do anything at Gitmo that they cannot legally do in another military base. While the base itself might be on foreign soil, that does not mean that it is free from US laws. ANY US base becomes US soil.

 

The reality is that because it is a MILITARY base it has a somewhat different set of rules. So you see, the people that keep claiming that the only reason to have it at Gitmo is to circumvent US laws are only slightly right. They could have it at Ft Lumpy, Anytown, USA and still have the same protections they have in Gitmo.

[GarfieldJL]

1. The former is little more than alarmist rhetoric, based on the latter argument that the Bush administration did something of actual worth to safeguard us from anything, other than making flying a pain in the posterior. It takes time, YEARS, to plan a terrorist attack like the World Trade Center Bombings, and 9/11. They're gonna take a little while longer to hit us again, at least hard enough to do to us what they did in 9/11. Just because they haven't attacked yet doesn't mean you've averted any real disaster. I'm sorry, but fear rules this argument, and is thusly irrational and baseless.

 

It is not fear that rules that argument, it is based entirely on history, Clinton gutted the CIA immediately after he took office, wiping out a significant portion of the intelligence gathering ability in an instant. It takes a long time to rebuild something of that nature. Obama appears to be doing the same thing, after Bush finally got our Intelligence Agency back up.

 

2. What exactly did he undo? To me, all he did was close down a prison where Bush could circumvent everything this country stands for in order to serve his own twisted agenda. There are plenty of offshore prisons to house these "terrorists", where they'll get a fair trial under the Geneva conventions and be proven innocent or guilty, which will then prove whether or not Bush just went around cherry-picking random people based on race or religious preferences.

 

And how will you try them, a lot of the evidence is inadmissable and a judge could release them because the soldiers didn't read them their miranda rights as soon as they captured them. The Geneva convention does not apply to terrorists that deliberately target civilians.

 

 

The problem with believing that Bush did anything of actual worth is that you have to assume that his screenings and racial profilings help with finding a terrorist. They don't. They help in finding innocent muslims of middle eastern descent. You're not catching and detaining the correct people on the correct bases.

 

[sarcasm]I'm sure that guys we caught in Afghanistan shooting at our troops or the mastermind of the world trade center bombing is just an innocent muslim.[/sarcasm]

 

And frankly, Bush just gave us strawmen to make us feel safe and warm, when in reality, terrorism is still a very real threat, because terrorists still hate us, even moreso for Bush's wrongful prosecution of their people, and are still out there. All he did was throw more **** at the fan.

 

No, the reality is Bush kept them from having a successful strike in the US after 9/11, that's something the mainstream media tried to keep hidden. If Bush was the idiot you claim he was, those attempted terrorist attacks that were thwarted after 9/11 would have been successful.

 

And I'm sorry the rest of the world can't stand the fact that we had a President willing to say "To Hell with the United Nations." When it was the right thing to do, or are you going to next try to argue that the Iraqis were all better off under Saddam than they are now. The reason we haven't heard anything more about Iraq lately is the surge worked.

[Adavardes]

GITMO IS US SOIL!!!!!!!!!

 

Not for long. Because it won't exist.

 

The fact of the matter is, Obama closed Gitmo because it was the chosen prison to circumvent US law - and that is entirely true, they broke the law of this nation, period - and I very much doubt that the circumvention will be moved to another prison under his watch. Arguing that all prisons have the capability to be Gitmo is asinine. Gitmo is Gitmo, it was the chosen prison for Bush's circumvention of constitutional law, and now it's closed. That means what he did there will end, the prisoners will go to proper prisons, where the observance of constitutional law will not change, and they will recieve what is due to them as human beings.

[GarfieldJL]

Not for long. Because it won't exist.

 

Yeah and if anything happens where one of these prisoners commits a terrorist act after getting loose it will be Obama's fault.

 

The fact of the matter is, Obama closed Gitmo because it was the chosen prison to circumvent US law - and that is entirely true, they broke the law of this nation, period - and I very much doubt that the circumvention will be moved to another prison under his watch. Arguing that all prisons have the capability to be Gitmo is asinine. Gitmo is Gitmo, it was the chosen prison for Bush's circumvention of constitutional law, and now it's closed. That means what he did there will end, the prisoners will go to prisons, where the observance of constitutional law will not change, and they will recieve what is due to them as human beings.

 

Actually it looks like the loony left will probably next demand their release because these people were illegally detained... Obama did not consider the consequences of this at all. He doesn't even know where he's going to put them yet.

[Adavardes]

Actually it looks like the loony left will probably next demand their release because these people were illegally detained... Obama did not consider the consequences of this at all. He doesn't even know where he's going to put them yet.

 

Obama knew that gitmo was a direct violation of the laws this country was built on, and that it needed to be closed. The prisoners will be given fair trial, and if that means being released because they weren't treated properly and given their rights, then so be it. I don't know about you, but I'm not willing to sink to the level of terrorists to try and defeat them. There are other, more effectual ways to find terrorists and bring them to justice. If this is anyone's fault, it's Bush's for opening the prison to this in the first place.

 

And how will you try them, a lot of the evidence is inadmissable and a judge could release them because the soldiers didn't read them their miranda rights as soon as they captured them. The Geneva convention does not apply to terrorists that deliberately target civilians.

 

Innocent until proven guilty.

 

Seems to me that a fair trial is only a legal nightmare to you. To me, it's doing what we are democratically bound to do as a nation.

[Tommycat]

The fact of the matter is, Obama closed Gitmo because it was the chosen prison to circumvent US law - and that is entirely true, they broke the law of this nation, period - and I very much doubt that the circumvention will be moved to another prison under his watch. Arguing that all prisons have the capability to be Gitmo is asinine. Gitmo is Gitmo, it was the chosen prison for Bush's circumvention of constitutional law, and now it's closed. That means what he did there will end, the prisoners will go to proper prisons, where the observance of constitutional law will not change, and they will recieve what is due to them as human beings.

 

Gitmo was chosen for it's remote location, military base, and the lack of local government. Kill someone on a military base abroad, and you can still be tried in a US court. Break a federal law on ANY US base and you can still be tried in a federal court. What constitutional law was broken at Gitmo? Federal laws MUST be obeyed on any US soil.