Shutting down Guantanamo Bay

[AMDScooter]

Gitmo still open for business. Funding for The Won's inept "lets try them in civilian courts" just got the financial plug kicked out of the wall socket with the last election.

House Continuing Resolution Adds Language to Block Funds to Try Gitmo Detainees in US Courts

[AMDScooter]

Heh. Anyone else remember 2+ years ago when our sh*t-4-brains/post turtle president was a candidate & running around the country stroking the leftoids with all his indefinite detention = 33bil bushy/anti-Constitution BS? Or nearer to two years ago when he promised to shut down GITMO altogether and "restore our rep... yadda.. yadda.. yadda??"

Obama administration readies indefinite detention order for Guantanamo detainees

Turns out actually gubbernin' is teh hard...

[Dutchcedar]

So 'Bambi shut down the shut down.

Promises, promises.

Just words to snooker the leftoid moonbats.

[AMDScooter]

So 'Bambi shut down the shut down.

Promises, promises.

Just words to snooker the leftoid moonbats.

One born every minute...

[AMDScooter]

Shocker for anyone who has not noticed club GITMO is still open for business..

Barack Obama’s plan to close Gitmo 'in shambles'

[SteveW]

.....and to think all that Sunshine and Bullsh!t he pumped up the leftie moonbats about this to get elected.

Does he qualify as a Liar yet? I remember the libs screaming about Bush - whatever happened to Cindy Sheehan?

[JustinC939]

.....and to think all that Sunshine and Bullsh!t he pumped up the leftie moonbats about this to get elected.

Does he qualify as a Liar yet? I remember the libs screaming about Bush - whatever happened to Cindy Sheehan?

Any difference between Obama and Bush is marginal at this point, Obama might be worse only because he's managed to do just as much harm to the country as Bush, but with less time.

I hope Ron Paul runs again.

[SteveW]

Any difference between Obama and Bush is marginal at this point, Obama might be worse only because he's managed to do just as much harm to the country as Bush, but with less time.

I hope Ron Paul runs again.

I can't argue with that. What I don't understand is the all the war protesting under Bush - what happened? Where did it go? Is Gitmo no longer the House of Horrors?

Same things still going on - only it's a lot quieter on the dissention front.

[AMDScooter]

I can't argue with that. What I don't understand is the all the war protesting under Bush - what happened? Where did it go? Is Gitmo no longer the House of Horrors?

Same things still going on - only it's a lot quieter on the dissention front.

Ya... does seem a bit odd that the "O" has adopted if not gone further with the very same bushy policies that a lil over 2 years ago the leftbots were proclaiming "shredded the constitution" and all that on a nearly hourly basis. Except now it's crickets over them very same policies. Good thing all that righteous indignation wasn't the same ole partisan BS eh.

[AMDScooter]

2011... still open for business.

Obama to issue signing statement to object to Gitmo restrictions?

As a candidate, Barack Obama repeatedly and vociferously objected to George Bush’s use of signing statements, almost as often as he objected to the existence of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility for captured terrorists. Here is candidate Obama insisting that signing statements insult the balance of power in the federal government and his explicit pledge not to engage in the practice, telling a crowd that “We’re not going to use signing statements to do an end run around Congress”:



That was then, and this is now. Now Obama is the President, and now he likes the idea of end runs around Congress — at least symbolically:

President Obama may formally object to a provision that would prohibit the use of any funds to transfer detainees from the detention facility in Guantanamo Bay to the United States for any purpose.

The provision — attached to the Defense Authorization bill — would be a critical blow to the president’s stated goal of trying some Guantanamo detainees in civilian courts. Attorney General Eric Holder sent a letter to Congress late last year calling the provision “an extreme and risky encroachment on the authority of the executive branch to determine when and where to prosecute terrorist suspects.”

A final decision on whether to issue a so-called signing statement, which was first reported by ProPublica, and its scope, has yet to be made by the president and his senior staff.

Even with the signing statement, though, the White House says that Obama won’t tempt Congress by violating the provision. He wants to use the signing statement as a way to announce his opposition to the bar on using funds to transfer Gitmo detainees to the US. It could also serve as a basis for a constitutional challenge in court, but that has little chance of success, as the Constitution clearly and explicitly gives Congress the power to fund as well as defund executive-branch agencies such as the Department of Justice and to pass requirements on the use of those funds.

Equally futile will be the White House’s stated objective of removing the restriction by asking Congress to repeal it. The Congress that passed the provision had large Democratic majorities; Obama now has to deal with one controlled in part by Republicans, and in part by a much smaller Democratic majority. That means no deal, as Obama knows well enough on his own.

This is strictly a grandstanding measure, one with a heaping helping of hypocrisy on top. The “Constitutional law professor” knew full well that the signing statements issued by Bush had the exact same legal force as the one Obama contemplates using now. Their only value is to clarify intent in a court challenge over the execution of a law signed by the President, as well as to make a political statement about a particular Congressional action. They were never — never – the threat to the republic that hysterics like Obama painted them to be. Obama demanded that a standard be used that he’s unwilling to meet himself, the “veto or sign and shut up” standard.

Actually gubbernin' is teh hard. Even for a constitutional expert/community organizer.

[AMDScooter]

Commissions? Well.. thanks for the 2 year delay and $$ wasted with your naive and inept EO and civilian trials crapola barrrrak. I'm sure the "shredding the constitution" crowd will be massing soon.... to blame this on Bushy also.

Gitmo commissions reopening for business on 2nd anniversary of shutdown EO?

Two years ago today, Barack Obama took the oath of office and announced that his first act as President would be to order the closure of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay. Two days after his inauguration, President Obama signed EO 13492, which actually was his fourth executive act. For the succeeding two years, Obama has insisted that he remains committed to closing Gitmo and transferring its detainees to federal court and stateside facilities.

Now, though, we have … change:

The Obama administration is preparing to increase the use of military commissions to prosecute Guantánamo detainees, an acknowledgment that the prison in Cuba remains open for business after Congress imposed steep new impediments to closing the facility.

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates is expected to soon lift an order blocking the initiation of new cases against detainees, which he imposed on the day of President Obama’s inauguration. That would clear the way for tribunal officials, for the first time under the Obama administration, to initiate new charges against detainees.

Charges would probably then come within weeks against one or more detainees who have already been designated by the Justice Department for prosecution before a military commission, including Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, a Saudi accused of planning the 2000 bombing of the American destroyer Cole in Yemen; Ahmed al-Darbi, a Saudi accused of plotting, in an operation that never came to fruition, to attack oil tankers in the Straits of Hormuz; and Obaydullah, an Afghan accused of concealing bombs.

Nashiri’s case will be a cause celebre, the Times warns, because of his status as one of three detainees to be waterboarded by the US. That’s why the DoJ had already decided to try him through the commission system anyway; his status has not changed. In fact, Nashiri will face the death penalty at his tribunal, which will ratchet up the pressure on the Pentagon and the White House when his commission begins.

Until now, though, the White House had refused to allow the commissions to start, even for those detainees to which the administration assigned them. They had hoped to close Gitmo first, and then conduct the commissions inside the US. Congress effectively blocked that option by barring the use of federal funds to bring any of the Gitmo detainees to the US for any purpose. At the time, Attorney General Eric Holder claimed that to be an unconstitutional infringement on executive authority, but it appears that the Obama administration has decided against a legal challenge to the Congressional power of the purse.

This quietly-made decision is actually the correct one. The US traditionally has used military tribunals to try war criminals, and the location of the detention facility should be made on the basis of what constitutes the most effective and secure choice. It’s far past time to adjudicate the remaining detainees, all of whom should be put through the commission system instead of Obama’s current plan to hold some without trial indefinitely. That, unfortunately, hasn’t changed:

The administration is also preparing an executive order to create a parole board-like system for periodically reviewing the cases of the nearly 50 detainees who would be held without trial.

If we can have a parole board for the detainees, why not just send them to commissions as well? This looks like an attempt to exhaust patience in Congress and have them agree to civilian trials for the highest-profile detainees, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. If commissions are good enough for Nashiri and al-Darbi, then they’re good enough for all of the detainees.

[AMDScooter]

Maybe we should keep it open, then.....

Panetta: We’d put bin Laden, Zawahiri in Gitmo if captured

Of course we would — it’s why we built the detention center at our naval base in Cuba. However, Panetta’s admission yesterday makes Barack Obama’s promise to close the facility, still the official policy of the Obama administration, a little more difficult to defend:

The head of the CIA told senators on Wednesday that Osama bin Laden would be held at Guantánamo Bay prison if he were captured.

CIA Director Leon Panetta was asked by the ranking Republican on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Sen. Saxby Chambliss (Ga.), what would happen to the heads of al Qaeda — Osama bin Laden or Ayman al-Zawahiri — if they were captured.

“The process would obviously involve — especially with the two targets that you just described — we would probably move them quickly into military jurisdiction at Bagram [air base in Afghanistan] for questioning and then eventually move them, probably to Guantánamo,” said Panetta.

Chambliss agreed with Panetta and said that while it might not be the most politically viable decision, moving bin Laden or al-Zawahiri to Guantánamo would be the best way to handle their capture from a security standpoint.

Indeed. The Bush administration build Gitmo’s detainee center in order to ensure secure detention without the possibility of breakout, either from within or without. The November 2001 jail riot that left CIA interrogator Johnny “Mike” Spann dead, as well as attacks on detention centers in Afghanistan, showed the need for a secure facility outside of the theater, and outside of the US as well, in order to keep the military in charge of detention. The facility cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars to build and still is the only facility that meets the specific needs of detention regarding terrorists captured overseas by military or intelligence assets.

As the Associated Press notes, Panetta’s statement would have some significant legal ramifications:

Under current law, Guantanamo Bay detainees cannot be moved to U.S. soil, even to stand trial.

Both bin Laden and Zawahiri have been indicted and could stand trial in New York City.

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told senators said he expects multiple federal agencies would weigh in on whether to try the men. But if they are sent to Guantanamo, as Panetta predicted, trying the men in the U.S. court system would be prohibited.

Congress could remove those roadblocks for the pair if they desired. Trying the two AQ leaders should be easier than Ahmed “Foopie” Ghailani, as both bin Laden and Zawahiri have openly admitted to ordering the 9/11 attacks, as well as other terrorist attacks against the US. But it would be just as easy to try them by military commission at Gitmo, and probably less complicated, especially if the trial used statements from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed that came after his waterboarding, at least in the 9/11 attack charges.

At least Panetta admitted the obvious. Gitmo is an essential piece of our effort against terrorists, as conducted by our military and intelligence community. If we maintain the use of both against radical Islamist terrorists, then we can’t dispense with Gitmo, and we should embrace its use. Only by returning to a complete law-enforcement approach, which proved wholly inadequate from 1993 to 2001, would Gitmo reach obsolescence. Will the White House admit what Panetta conceded yesterday?

Stating the obvious...

[AMDScooter]

Derp...

[AMDScooter]

NYSlimes prints what it's agenda mindset wishes the law were instead of reporting what it actually is...

Guantanamo and the New York Times's Latest Legal Fiction

The New York Times's latest Guantanamo editorial has been rightly criticized for failing to grapple seriously with the problems created by the Supreme Court's 2008 decision in Boumediene v. Bush. In that case, the Supreme Court created a constitutional right for detainees to directly challenge their detentions in federal court by filing "habeas corpus" petitions. But the Times editorial completely misstates Boumediene's actual ruling.

The Times asserts that Boumediene gave detainees "the right to have a federal judge decide promptly whether their detention is illegal and, if so, order their release because the United States controls the place they are held." But Boumediene did no such thing. It certainly did not rule that any detainee whose detention is ruled illegal has a "right" to be released – in fact, it said the precise opposite: "release need not be the exclusive remedy and is not the appropriate one in every case in which the writ [of habeas corpus] is granted."

Boumediene created no "right" to release – let alone a right to be released into the United States, in violation of immigration laws and other federal enactments that bar detainees' entry. The detainees' attempt to stretch Boumediene to achieve such a result was rejected in 2009 by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in Kiyemba v. Obama, the case that is the subject of the Times's editorial. The D.C. Circuit didn't "subvert" the Supreme Court's Boumediene decision – as the Times accuses. Rather, it accepted Boumediene's rule – that the federal courts have jurisdiction to hear these habeas cases – and then proceeded to answer the next question raised by the detainees' expansive legal claims.

It may be true, as the Times asserts, that "many thought" that Boumediene stood for more than a narrow jurisdictional point. But that proves only that many people misunderstand the case, either deliberately or not.

Nice try "paper of record"...

[AMDScooter]

Anyone remember way back when the left screamed bloody murder about the unconstitutionality of the military tribunals under Bush? Awfully quiet...

Obama Brings Back Military Trials at Guantanamo Bay

President Obama announced Monday that military trials will resume for detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp, saying the tribunals are an "important tool in combating international terrorists."

The president, who issued an executive order outlining the changes Monday afternoon, said Defense Secretary Robert Gates will rescind his January 2009 ban against bringing new charges against terror suspects in the military commissions.

Obama said in a statement that the decision was part of a plan to "broaden our ability to bring terrorists to justice."

Obama vowed when he took office to close the detention facility at Guantanamo, but officials have recently acknowledged that closure is not likely because of questions about where terror suspects would be held.


Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011...#ixzz1FwwM3ffO

So the post turtle made promises... used one of dem 33bil signing statements.. stalled for 2+years.. and ended up right back where Bush left off. Apparently w/o so much as a whimper from the sniveling crybabies on the left who had a 8 year tantrum under Bush.