Getting past Guantánamo [Barf]

Guardian UK ^ | November 12, 2009 | Ken Gude-Wanker

[Oldeconomybuyer]

President Obama inherited more when he took office than just the 240 detainees who remained imprisoned at the US military base at Guantánamo Bay. He also inherited the legacy of a disastrous detention regime. The Bush administration created a prison camp specifically designed to exist outside the reach of the law. It did so because what it intended to do was transparently illegal: torture, indefinite detention and show trials that made a mockery of justice. Guantánamo became a symbol of American hypocrisy that did measureable damage to American security. Closing Guantánamo and changing US detention policy is not an elective choice; it is a national security imperative.

President Obama recognised the necessity of closing Guantánamo and, in his first policy decision as president, announced a one-year timeline for closing the prison. While that move got the new administration off on the right foot, the process for actually emptying Guantánamo struggled to get going. Many of the problems encountered by the Obama team were due to the staggering incompetence of the previous administration, such as the detainee case file system that literally scattered evidence in cabinets and desk drawers around the world. But there were some self-inflicted wounds, notably the decision to request $80m from Congress for the closure of Guantánamo that prompted one of the now routine Republican freak-outs.

[gitmogrunt]

Ken Gude-Wanker

He pulled his wanker on this article and soiled his diaper doing so.