The New York Times makes a funny:
Civil liberties and human rights groups — many of whom dislike any policy that involves holding prisoners without trial — reacted with ambivalence to the report that the Obama team has been working on an executive order to establish formal reviews.
Find me anyone who cares about civil liberties and human rights who likes policies that involve indefinite detention. But before you start pooh-poohing the president’s plan, consider the following:
However, almost every part of the administration’s plan to close Guantanamo is on hold, and it could be crippled this week if Congress bans the transfer of detainees to the United States for trial and sets up steep hurdles to the repatriation or resettlement in third countries of other detainees…
…Provisions in the defense authorization bill, which has passed the House and is before the Senate, would effectively ban the transfer of any detainee to the United States for any purpose. That rules out civilian trials for all Guantanamo detainees, including Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. His potential prosecution had remained possible even though the administration had balked in the face of political opposition to a trial in New York.
The defense bill, if it passes the Senate, would effectively force the administration to conduct only military commissions and at Guantanamo Bay, which would also have to remain open to house those held indefinitely. The bill would also create new requirements before the administration could repatriate or resettle detainees who were cleared for release by the interagency task force.
“If it passes, it is the final, decisive blow to the president’s plan,” said Tom Malinowski, head of the Washington office of Human Rights Watch.
Hey, this is another reason to pass DADT repeal in a stand-alone bill. But, seriously, this is the kind of crap the president has to put up with. He has a bunch of cowards in Congress who not only refuse to have his back on making tough decisions, but actually participate in tying his hands during wartime. If he doesn’t want to leave the troops in the field with no supplies, he has to sign the Defense Bill. But the Defense Bill enshrines the Guantanamo system of injustice in perpetuity. So, the president is coming up with some patchwork band-aid to try to make this all consistent with our values. Go ahead and blast him, but make sure you blast Congress first. Blast anyone who voted for (or will vote for) the Defense bill.
Here’s a question: if we’re too scared to hold a trial or relocate an inmate to our maximum security prisons, why would some other country volunteer to take these prisoners off our hands? Being a nation of cowards has consequences.
