Posted on 06/08/2005 2:33:33 PM PDT by Brian Mosely
Bush Open to Possibly Closing Gitmo Camp
Email this Story
Jun 8, 5:13 PM (ET)
By JENNIFER LOVEN
(AP) A United States military boat patrols in front of Camp Delta in this Sept. 27, 2002 file photo, in...
Full Image
Google sponsored links
Cut your debt in half. - Settle your debt for pennies on the dollar. Guaranteed
www.fire-inc.net
Cash Money Everyday - Get Paid Cash Everyday Deposited Daily in your ATM
www.personalinstantcash.com
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush on Wednesday left open the possibility that the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, could be shut down following mounting criticism from former President Carter and others.
"We're exploring all alternatives as to how best to do the main objective, which is to protect America," Bush said when asked in an interview with Fox News Channel's Neil Cavuto if he would close the detention center.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, however, said he did not know of anyone in the administration who was considering closing Guantanamo. He defended the military's operation of the camp.
The military provides "a stable and secure and safe environment," he told reporters traveling with him in Norway. "Information gained from detainees there has saved the lives of people from our country and from other countries."
The Pentagon disclosed last week that U.S. guards or interrogators at Guantanamo kicked, stepped on and splashed urine on the Quran. That followed an earlier report in Newsweek, later retracted, that U.S. investigators had confirmed that a guard had deliberately flushed a prisoner's Quran in a toilet. The White House blamed that report for violent protests in Muslim nations.
The prison holds about 540 detainees. Some have been there more than three years without being charged with any crime. Most were captured on the battlefields of Afghanistan in 2001 and 2002 and were sent to Guantanamo Bay in hope of extracting useful intelligence about the al-Qaida terrorist network.
Carter told a human rights conference Tuesday that closing the Guantanamo prison would demonstrate the U.S. commitment to human rights at a time when the U.S. reputation has suffered globally because of reports of prisoner abuses at Guantanamo as well as in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Amnesty International also recently called for Guantanamo's closure, saying the facility is the "the gulag of our time" - a characterization Bush dismissed again Wednesday.
"It's just absurd to equate Gitmo and Guantanamo with a Soviet gulag," he said. "Just not even close."
Bush said the Guantanamo Bay detainees are being treated in accordance with international standards and that any allegations of mistreatment are fully investigated. He defended the policy of holding enemy combatants.
"It's in our nation's interest that we learn a lot about those people that are still in detention, because we're still trying to find out how to better protect our country," he said. "What we don't want to do is let somebody out that comes back and harms us."
Said spokesman Scott McClellan: "They are dangerous individuals. They are enemy combatants for a reason - because they seek to do harm to the American people."
---
I see that now stands2reason. So typical of the press to read something into a comment and twist it to their own wishes and hopes..........makes them feel like they matter......but we know better.
He done everything within the powers given to him on the matter, given another inch, he would have set himself up for impeachment.
Waffled on the Gitmo matter.
That's according to the AP
Cozied up with V. Fox and refused to tighten US Border Controls.
Typical Tancredo hysteria.
Negotiated and promoted Bipartisanship with the demoncats.
He hasn't negotiated nothing, he doesn't need to, he's the POTUS for God's sake, of the party in the majority. If anyone needs to be negotiating, it's the Democrats.
These are all valid issues, which are adamantly opposed by most conservatives.
Just admit you've never liked the President, I don't care if you kept your yapper shut for the first four years or not.
I heard the Cavuto interview clip. what would have been wrong with saying "no, we have no plans to close it".
Absolutely not. They're going to see that headline, they're going to say "oh look, the President might close Guantanamo" and they're going to move on. Not everyone has all day to read things and see what an article actually says. Headlines are supposed to mean something. Headline writing has been terrible in the past few years, and that's why so many people are uninformed.
I'm not saying people are stupid, I'm saying that they believe what is presented to them. If they don't see the article under the headline, they're never going to see that the headline was wrong. You can prevent such a problem in a newspaper, because the article is usually right there with the headline- not so on the Internet, where there's usually just a pile of links.
If he stopped to answer all of these kinds of things...he would end up being futilely chasing fires.
Watch what he does...not what the press says he says.
In response, the AP made up a statement to inflame conservatives. It's their strategery, even if they aren't aware of it. To some extent, they appear to be succeeding too, unfortunately.
my comment was about what Bush himself said, not the headline.
Which is why Democrats like Howard Dean will never become President.
CAVUTO: Speaking of civil liberties, one of your predecessors, Jimmy Carter, was very critical of our operations at Guantanamo Bay (search), saying they should be shut down, that abuses there, if proven true, are dragging our name through the mud globally. What do you make of that?
BUSH: Well, I first of all want to assure the American people that these prisoners are being treated in accordance with the Geneva Convention. I say in accordance with because these weren't normal, you know, military-type fighters. They had no uniforms. They had no, you know, government structure. These were terrorists, swept up off the battlefield in a place like Afghanistan, for example.
And it's in our nation's interest that we learn a lot about those people that are still in detention, because we're still trying to find out how to better protect our country.
Secondly, that anytime there's an allegation of abuse, we investigate. That's what transparent societies do. We've got a press corps that's constantly asking tough questions about prisoner treatment, for example. You just asked one. And that's what open societies do, they answer the questions by saying...
CAVUTO: But now President Carter has said, sir, shut it down. Joe Biden said shut it down. Do you think it should be shut down?
BUSH: Well, you know, we're exploring all alternatives as to how best to do the main objective, which is to protect America. What we don't want to do is let somebody out that comes back and harms us.
And so we're looking at all alternatives and have been. And when there have been questions of abuse and allegations like the Koran, the Pentagon went through a full investigation and then released the data for everybody to see.
And I will tell you that we treat these prisoners in accordance with international standards. And that's what the American people expect. When somebody put out that Amnesty International report, they asked me about it. I said it's just absurd to equate Gitmo and Guantanamo with a Soviet gulag. It's just not even close.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.