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What if you gave it a name like "Shining Sands" or "Ocean Breeze" instead of ... Gitmo? The prison center at Guantanamo Bay is destined to be closed down in January because "the name itself is a condemnation" of U.S. anti-terrorism strategy, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Friday. But while it has become a "taint" on America's reputation, according to Gates, the prison facility in Cuba is at the same time "probably one of the finest prisons in the world today," he said Friday on NBC's "Today" show. So could Gitmo be saved with a drastic rebranding effort? If you...

Man receives 2½-year sentence for Toronto bomb plot involvement Credit for time served allows man to be freed A man belonging to the so-called Toronto 18 terror group was sentenced to 2½ years in prison Friday, becoming the first person convicted in a domestic terrorism trial in Canada. The judge in Brampton, Ont., who sentenced the 21-year-old man declared that, with credit for his time already spent in custody, the man had served his time and could be freed. The man was found guilty in September 2008 of participation in a terrorist group that was plotting to blow up buildings...

By: Scott Ott Examiner Columnist | 5/22/09 4:57 AM News fairly unbalanced. We report. You decipher In an effort to shut down the U.S. Naval Detention Center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, thereby restoring America's moral standing in the world, President Barack Obama today declared some 240 enemy combatants held at Gitmo to be 'human fetuses'. In an executive order, the president said, "Since I ordered Gitmo shut down, and people don't want us to bring the inmates here, the only way to extract them from the facility is to change their legal status to one that offers us more choices."...

The top White House spokesman says President Barack Obama doesn't have any particular problem with former Vice President Dick Cheney speaking out on counterterrorism policy or any other issues. Press secretary Robert Gibbs was asked Friday if Obama resented Cheney making a speech almost at the same time as his wide-ranging defense of the decision to close down the prison at Guantanamo. Gibbs said he didn't know what the protocol was for former vice presidents speaking often and loudly in public shortly after leaving office, although he noted that former President George W. Bush has decided to mostly remain out...

What if you gave it a name like "Shining Sands" or "Ocean Breeze" instead of ... Gitmo? The prison center at Guantanamo Bay is destined to be closed down in January because "the name itself is a condemnation" of U.S. anti-terrorism strategy, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Friday. But while it has become a "taint" on America's reputation, according to Gates, the prison facility in Cuba is at the same time "probably one of the finest prisons in the world today," he said Friday on NBC's "Today" show. So could Gitmo be saved with a drastic rebranding effort? If you...

Two lawmakers of President Barack Obama's Democratic Party appealed Thursday to let Uighurs locked up at Guantanamo Bay move to the United States, saying they were victims of injustice. The plea came despite an overwhelming Senate vote a day earlier to block money to transfer inmates out of the deeply controversial "war on terror" prison in Cuba, which Obama on Thursday vowed again to shut down. US authorities four years ago cleared 17 imprisoned Uighurs -- members of a largely Muslim group in northwestern China who the State Department says face worsening persecution by Beijing. But they are stuck at...

WASHINGTON – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Friday she won't talk any more about her charge that the CIA lied in 2002 about using waterboarding on terrorism suspects. "I have made the statement that I'm going to make on this," she told reporters at a Capitol Hill news conference. "I don't have anything more to say about it. I stand by my comment." But Republicans aren't letting this one slide. Ken Spain, spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, issued a statement after the news conference calling Pelosi a political liability to the Democratic party.

Last night, Mark Levin compared the speech of President Barack Obama to remarks made by former Vice President Dick Cheney yesterday. (Full audio of Cheney speech here.): There are flaws within these passages from what President Obama said yesterday: Indeed, the legal challenges that have sparked so much debate in recent weeks in Washington would be taking place whether or not I decided to close Guantanamo. For example, the court order to release seventeen Uighur detainees took place last fall – when George Bush was President. The Supreme Court that invalidated the system of prosecution at Guantanamo in 2006 was...

The trial of the first Guantanamo detainee to be held in a U.S. court will be conducted in New York's Southern District, Attorney General Eric Holder announced Thursday. The decision to hear the case of Ahmed Ghailani in New York comes almost eight years to the day that four of his co-defendants were convicted after a Southern District trial for their roles in a massive al-Qaida conspiracy to kill Americans abroad that resulted in the destruction of two U.S. embassies in Africa, killing 204 people and injuring thousands. "By prosecuting Ahmed Ghailani in federal court, we will ensure that he...

Question... which political Party controls the White House, both houses of Congress and can do whatever they want because their political opponents do not have sufficient numbers to stop them? That’s right the Democrat Party. So when Barack Hussein Obama spoke yesterday regarding the shutting down of Guantánamo Bay prison camp who was he speaking to? Surely he wasn’t attempting to convince Republicans because Republicans can’t stop him and his fellow Democrats from doing anything that they want to do. Democrats could pass a bill into law requiring the American people to register with the government if they attend church...

Never mind the gaps between his past and present rhetoric and his action yesterday. The important point about President Obama's freshly stated plans for the Guantanamo detainees is that he's gaining the hard-earned wisdom of commander in chief. To the national good, Obama has decided to run presumably most of the prisoners through military tribunals, which all along have been the appropriate forum for settling their fates. Tweaking the procedures was his way to cosmeticize a somersault in plain sight. So be it. The President landed where he pragmatically had to. Also to the national good, and even more stunningly,...

"We were able to hold it off with George Bush. The idea that we might find ourselves fighting with the Obama administration over these powers is really stunning." -- Unnamed and dismayed human rights advocate, on legalizing indefinite detention of alleged terrorists, New York Times, May 21 WASHINGTON -- If hypocrisy is the homage that vice pays to virtue, then the flip-flops on previously denounced anti-terror measures are the homage that Barack Obama pays to George Bush. Within 125 days, Obama has adopted with only minor modifications huge swaths of the entire, allegedly lawless Bush program. The latest flip-flop is...

On Nov. 14, 2007, presidential candidate Barack Obama met with employees of Google at the company’s headquarters in Mountain View, Calif. After a discussion of the war in Iraq, he was asked to give his views on Iran, Pakistan and the U.S. terrorist detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Obama spoke at length about Iran. He spoke at length about Pakistan. And then he said, “Last point, Guantanamo. That’s easy. Close down Guantanamo.” the audience broke into applause. [snip] That wasn’t the first, or the last time he said that; Obama went down his national security laundry list hundreds of...

A Guantanamo Bay Version 2.0 may be in the works. A Democratic representative is developing a unique proposal that attempts to strike a middle path in the debate as to whether the U.S. should permanently close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay next year or keep it open indefinitely. Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.) said Thursday that he is open to keeping a more transparent Guantanamo facility, complete with more aggressive third party monitors, open beyond the White House January 2010 closure deadline to hold the most dangerous inmates. "If we have transparency and accountability, than you can leave Gitmo just...

Obama goes first in a few minutes. He's speaking at the rotunda of the National Archives (you think we could get Nicholas Cage on that birth certificate thingey?) on his Gitmo policy and other man-caused calamities.Vice President Cheney gets the rebuttal time. He's speaking at the American Enterprise Institute around 10:45 a.m. EDT.

The spectacle of two duelling speeches with a mile of each other in downtown Washington was extraordinary. I was at the Cheney event and watched Obama's address on a big screen beside the empty lectern that the former veep stepped behind barely two minutes after his adversary had finished. So who won the fight? (it's hard to use anothing other than a martial or pugilistic metaphor). Well, most people are on either one side or the other of this issue and I doubt today will have prompted many to switch sides. But the very fact that Obama chose to schedule...

Neophyte politician Barack Obama met his match in Dick Cheney a mature, experienced statesman. Obama may think Rules for Radicals techniques will work on Dick, but he is dealing with a valiant, unmovable warrior. Obama is used to undying adulation and goes largely unchallenged in spite of minimal strategic policy details. Obama hasn’t a clue what he is doing and Dick Cheney is neither flummoxed nor threatened by bravado. Barry picked a fight with the wrong guy and if anyone should be anxious about the outcome it should be Obama.

Today in DC, Dick Cheney and Barack Obama squared off DC-style to decide whose vision was best to protect us from terrorism. Or it's all just a big charade to distract us. You decide.

MAY 22, 2009 Bush's Gitmo Vindication Obama still hasn't said where the worst terrorists will go. President Obama delivered a major speech yesterday on how he intends to prosecute the war on terror (or whatever it's now called), and in particular his desire to close the detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay. As rhetoric, his remarks were at pains to declare a bold new moral direction. On substance, however, the speech and other events this week look more like a vindication of the past seven years. The President's speech came after both houses of Congress had denied his funding requests to...