Obama wants to close the Guantanamo prison!

[XCALIDEM]

No only he wants to close the base, but he also would like to release some prisoners. We are beginning to see his liberal and radical views. Can you imagine having all these terrorists loose out there?

WASHINGTON -- President-elect Barack Obama's advisers are quietly crafting a proposal to ship dozens, if not hundreds, of imprisoned terrorism suspects to the United States to face criminal trials, a plan that would make good on his promise to close the Guantanamo Bay prison but could require creation of a controversial new system of justice.

During his campaign, Obama described Guantanamo as a "sad chapter in American history" and has said generally that the U.S. legal system is equipped to handle the detainees. But he has offered few details on what he planned to do once the facility is closed.

Under plans being put together in Obama's camp, some detainees would be released and many others would be prosecuted in U.S. criminal courts.

A third group of detainees -- the ones whose cases are most entangled in highly classified information -- might have to go before a new court designed especially to handle sensitive national security cases, according to advisers and Democrats involved in the talks. Advisers participating directly in the planning spoke on condition of anonymity because the plans are not final.

The move would be a sharp deviation from the Bush administration, which established military tribunals to prosecute detainees at the Navy base in Cuba and strongly opposes bringing prisoners to the United States. Obama's Republican challenger, John McCain, had also pledged to close Guantanamo. But McCain opposed criminal trials, saying the Bush administration's tribunals should continue on U.S. soil.

The plan being developed by Obama's team has been championed by legal scholars from both political parties. But it is almost certain to face opposition from Republicans who oppose bringing terrorism suspects to the U.S. and from Democrats who oppose creating a new court system with fewer rights for detainees.

Laurence Tribe, a Harvard law professor and Obama legal adviser, said discussions about plans for Guantanamo had been "theoretical" before the election but would quickly become very focused because closing the prison is a top priority. Bringing the detainees to the United States will be controversial, he said, but could be accomplished.

"I think the answer is going to be, they can be as securely guarded on U.S. soil as anywhere else," Tribe said. "We can't put people in a dungeon forever without processing whether they deserve to be there."

The tougher challenge will be allaying fears by Democrats who believe the Bush administration's military commissions were a farce and dislike the idea of giving detainees anything less than the full constitutional rights normally enjoyed by everyone on U.S. soil.

"There would be concern about establishing a completely new system," said Rep. Adam Schiff of California, a member of the House Judiciary Committee and former federal prosecutor who is aware of the discussions in the Obama camp. "And in the sense that establishing a regimen of detention that includes American citizens and foreign nationals that takes place on U.S. soil and departs from the criminal justice system -- trying to establish that would be very difficult."

Obama has said the civilian and military court-martial systems provide "a framework for dealing with the terrorists," and Tribe said the administration would look to those venues before creating a new legal system. But discussions of what a new system would look like have already started.

"It would have to be some sort of hybrid that involves military commissions that actually administer justice rather than just serve as kangaroo courts," Tribe said. "It will have to both be and appear to be fundamentally fair in light of the circumstances. I think people are going to give an Obama administration the benefit of the doubt in that regard."

Though a hybrid court may be unpopular, other advisers and Democrats involved in the Guantanamo Bay discussions say Obama has few other options.

Prosecuting all detainees in federal courts raises a host of problems. Evidence gathered through military interrogation or from intelligence sources might be thrown out. Defendants would have the right to confront witnesses, meaning undercover CIA officers or terrorist turncoats might have to take the stand, jeopardizing their cover and revealing classified intelligence tactics.

In theory, Obama could try to transplant the Bush administration's military commission system from Guantanamo Bay to a U.S. prison. But Tribe said, and other advisers agreed, that was "a nonstarter." With lax evidence rules and intense secrecy, the military commissions have been criticized by human rights groups, defense attorneys and even some military prosecutors who quit the process in protest.

"I don't think we need to completely reinvent the wheel, but we need a better tribunal process that is more transparent," Schiff said.

That means something different would need to be done if detainees couldn't be released or prosecuted in traditional courts. Exactly what that something would look like remains unclear.

According to three advisers participating in the process, Obama is expected to propose a new court system, appointing a committee to decide how such a court would operate. Some detainees likely would be returned to the countries where they were first captured for further detention or rehabilitation. The rest could probably be prosecuted in U.S. criminal courts, one adviser said. All spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing talks, which have been private.

Whatever form it takes, Tribe said he expects Obama to move quickly.

"In reality and symbolically, the idea that we have people in legal black holes is an extremely serious black mark," Tribe said. "It has to be dealt with."

 

[Mr. Shaman]

No only he wants to close the base, but he also would like to release some prisoners.

I'm sure the ones caught-up in BUSHCO's bounty-$weep$ will appreciate it.

 

[Pandora]

I am sure he will find lovely hotels in NYC for them.

 

[Talk2TheHead]

I am sure he will find lovely hotels in NYC for them.

Scared again?

 

[Pandora]

Scared again?

You bet!

We are advertising that we are weak and wont confront, and some of the most evil and confrontational countries are laughing at our total stupidity and all I can do is read that half of our country really doesn’t give a crap because history was made and that is all that matters

 

[pocketfullofshells]

No only he wants to close the base, but he also would like to release some prisoners. We are beginning to see his liberal and radical views. Can you imagine having all these terrorists loose out there?

Ignore that Bush has Released many of them, but you did not care then did you?

Ignorance is bliss, vote republican.

 

[Libsmasher]

Notice that last month a federal judge ordered the RELEASE INTO THE US MAINLAND some IFs at gitmo. It's being appealed, but this is a consequence of the insane Boumedienne decision by the USSC. This is probably the beginning of the culmination of the appeaser movement's effort, given obviously a huge boost by the election of the Bot King, to return to Clinton's lunatic idea that the war on terror ought not be a war at all.

http://thinkprogress.org/2008/10/07/guantanamo-release/

 

[Mr. Shaman]

Notice that last month a federal judge ordered the RELEASE INTO THE US MAINLAND some IFs at gitmo. It's being appealed, but this is a consequence of the insane Boumedienne decision by the USSC.

You (quite) obviously hate the (good) troops; the ones who could give The Idiot Son serious-lessons on what constitutes LAW in our country.

 

[Unite Our Nation]

If these terrorist ending up hurting more people, I hope its the ones backing letting them free...

 

[Pandora]

If these terrorist ending up hurting more people, I hope its the ones backing letting them free...

They will end up in a big city like NYC or LA, That is where they will do the damage so its really kind of funny, its also the people in those cities who say let them out.

 

[Stalin]

Is is not time to give it back to its rightful owners - the Cuban people ?

Comrade Stalin

 

[Mr. Shaman]

If these terrorist ending up hurting more people, I hope its the ones backing letting them free...

Yeah....that makes sense.....taking-revenge against those who'd always considered you (still) a human-being......with human-rights....you know, those evil American-values.

Let's HEAR it for Lil' Dumbya's War Against Terrorism. ​

 

[Pandora]

A letter was passed around a while ago, It ended up on the humor section of this forum. I really seriously and truly do wish that the people being kept at Gitmo had to go live with the people who are complianing about their treatment, obama included

A Lady liberal wrote a lot of letters to the White House complaining about the treatment of a captive insurgent (terrorist) being held in Guantanamo Bay.

She received back the following reply:

The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington , D.C. 20016

Dear Concerned Citizen,

Thank you for your recent letter roundly criticizing our treatment of the Taliban and Al Quada detainees currently being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Our administration takes these matters seriously and your opinion was heard loud and clear here in Washington. You'll be pleased to learn that, thanks to the concerns of citizens likeyourself, we are creating a new division of the Terrorist Retraining Program, to be called the "Liberals Accept Responsibility for Killers" program, or LARK for short.

In accordance with the guidelines of this new program, we have decided to place one terrorist under your personal care. Your personal detainee has been selected and scheduled for transportation under heavily armed guard to your residence next Monday. Ali Mohammed Ahmed bin Mahmud (you can just call him Ahmed) is to be cared for pursuant to the standards you personally demanded in your letter of complaint. It will likely be necessary for you to hire some assistant caretakers!

We will conduct weekly inspections to ensure that your standards of care for Ahmed are commensurate with those you so strongly recommended in your letter. Although Ahmed is a sociopath and extremely violent, we hope that your sensitivity to what you described as his "attitudinal problem" will help him overcome these character flaws. Perhaps you are correct in describing these problems as mere cultural differences. We understand that you plan to offer counseling and home schooling.

Your adopted terrorist is extremely proficient in hand-to-hand combat and can extinguish human life with such simple items as a pencil or nailclippers. We advise that you do not ask him to demonstrate these skills at our next yoga group. He is also expert at making a wide variety of explosive devices from common household products, so you may wish to keep those items locked up, unless (in your opinion) this might offend him.

Ahmed will not wish to interact with you or your daughters (except sexually), since he views females as a subhuman form of property. This is a particularly sensitive subject for him and he has been known to show violent tendencies around women who fail to comply with the new dress code that he will recommend as more appropriate attire.

I'm sure you will come to enjoy the anonymity offered by the burka over time. Just remember that it is all part of "respecting his culture and his religious beliefs" -- wasn't that how you put it?

Thanks again for your letter. We truly appreciate it when folks like you keep us informed of the proper way to do our job. You take good care of Ahmed - and remember, we'll be watching.

Good luck!

 

[Dawkinsrocks]

Many people have been held in GB with no charge or trial.

If you think this is acceptable then you should be very careful.

One day you may be on the receiving end because that is happens when you let civil liberty abuses go unchallenged.

 

[Frolicking Dinosaurs]

Move them to maximum security prisons or military prisons and try them. Our constitution says that if we don't have enough evidence to convict them then we will have to turn them loose. This is how America operates.

Don't like it? Don't let the door hit you on your way to another country.