WaPo: Family Visitations For Gitmo Detainees Under Consideration
May 12, 2011 by admin
WaPo: Family Visitations For Gitmo Detainees Under Consideration
Family Visits for Gitmo Detainees?
May 12, 2011 by admin
Family Visits for Gitmo Detainees?
Detainees at Guantanamo Bay are already allowed video chats with relatives, but now the International Committee of the Red Cross is pushing for in-person family visits as well. And the Pentagon seems to be taking the possibility seriously, the Washington Post reports:
The Pentagon is considering allowing the families of detainees at Guantanamo Bay to visit them, an unprecedented step to ease the isolation of inmates who in some cases have been held at the U.S. facility for close to a decade, according to congressional aides.
If the Obama administration is considering family visits then it isn’t planning to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay any time soon, as Ed Morrisey points out. But it’s hard to not be wary of the administration’s motives. Some have blamed public opinion for obstructing Obama’s plans to shutter Gitmo. This might sound cynical, but it’s easy to see relatives of detainees exploiting these visits for propaganda purposes, to garner sympathy for the prisoners. To some extent, this has already happened with letters and phone conversations.
Republicans are already pushing back against the proposal. Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee Buck McKeon (R–Calif.) has included a ban on any funding for Gauntanamo Bay family visits in the latest Defense Department authorization legislation.
Guantanamo Bay detainees’ family members may be allowed to visit (Washington Post)
May 12, 2011 by admin
Guantanamo Bay detainees’ family members may be allowed to visit (Washington Post)
Washington Post:
Guantanamo Bay detainees’ family members may be allowed to visit — The Pentagon is considering allowing the families of detainees at Guantanamo Bay to visit them, an unprecedented step to ease the isolation of inmates who in some cases have been held at the U.S. facility for close to a decade, according to congressional aides.
Self-Defense? Why Didn’t We Think of That?
May 4, 2011 by admin
Self-Defense? Why Didn’t We Think of That?
(John)
In 2009, Eric Holder appointed a special prosecutor to look into criminal charges against CIA interrogators who, during the Bush administration, allegedly were mean to terrorists. Holder piously explained that it was all about the rule of law:
“I fully realize that my decision to commence this preliminary review will be controversial,” Holder added. “As attorney general, my duty is to examine the facts and to follow the law.”
But that was then, and this is now. Holder testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee this morning, and was asked about the legal justification for killing Osama bin Laden. No problem, he explained:
The killing of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden by U.S. military forces was an act of national self-defense and he made no attempt to surrender, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said on Wednesday.
“It was justified as an act of national self-defense,” Holder told the Senate Judiciary Committee, citing bin Laden’s admission of being involved in the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania.
“If he had surrendered, attempted to surrender, I think we should obviously have accepted that, but there was no indication that he wanted to do that and therefore his killing was appropriate,” he said.
“National self-defense”! Not regular self-defense, which perhaps would apply if Osama had been armed and had threatened the SEALs. Rather, “national self-defense,” which means it is fine to drop in on his compound, corner him and blow his head off. Where was the doctrine of “national self-defense” when Holder was itching to put CIA interrogators in prison for trying to stop new terrorist attacks? Presumably if “national self-defense” justifies shooting a terrorist like bin Laden, it also justifies waterboarding a terrorist like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, or putting a caterpillar in his cell. Where was that doctrine when the Bush administration needed it?
Holder’s breezy responses this morning highlight the incoherence of the Obama administration’s approach to national security issues. There is no factor other than raw partisanship that can explain the administration’s ever-shifting interpretations of the “rule of law.”
We were right, of course, to kill bin Laden, as 86 percent of Americans agree. The SEALs were sent to Pakistan to kill bin Laden, and they did a magnificent job of it. No one in the administration–least of all President Obama–wanted bin Laden to languish at Guantanamo Bay, or, worse, be handed over to Eric Holder for endless legal proceedings. Can you imagine the spectacle? Bin Laden would have had to fight off the liberal lawyers lined up to represent him with a stick. His lawyers would have made O.J. Simpson’s “dream team” look like your local public defender’s office. The spectacle would have been seen by everyone as the reductio ad absurdum of the Obama administration’s anti-terror policies, and likely would have ensured Obama’s defeat in 2012.
So the administration did the right thing, and killed bin Laden. “National self-defense” is a perfectly good rationale for forgoing what in other contexts the administration has called due process, although in this case, revenge is probably a better one. But it is about time for President Obama to acknowledge that national self-defense also justified many other policies, whose effectiveness is increasingly beyond question, that he has self-righteously denounced.
No Flags at Gitmo
May 3, 2011 by admin
No Flags at Gitmo
(John)
Richard Miniter has just published a new book called called Mastermind: The Many Faces of the 9/11 Architect, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed. With the killing of Osama bin Laden in the news, it couldn’t be more timely.
Brian and I will try to line Richard up for a podcast interview, but in the meantime, this astonishing tidbit comes from Big Government:
I was stunned to learn while researching Mastermind that Guantanamo detainees succeeded in convincing prison officials to no longer raise the American flag anywhere they could see it. Each morning on every U.S. military base around the world, the American flag is raised to a bugle. But in the interests of not offending the detainees, it was stopped at Guantanamo.
The mind boggles. Guantanamo Bay must be the most user-friendly detention facility in world history. Up to a point that is fine, but not flying the American flag at a military base? Ridiculous.
BREAKING: BIN LADEN DEAD; Update: Killed "deep inside Pakistan" … (Patrick Ishmael/Hot Air)
May 2, 2011 by admin
BREAKING: BIN LADEN DEAD; Update: Killed "deep inside Pakistan" … (Patrick Ishmael/Hot Air)
Patrick Ishmael / Hot Air:
BREAKING: BIN LADEN DEAD; Update: Killed “deep inside Pakistan” today in a firefight; Update: Found in Abbottabad; Update: Linked to Umar Patek? Update: Details of assault; Update: Early intel came from Gitmo detainees — Topic as yet unknown. Putting this up as a placeholder until the regular crew arrives.
