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2008-02-04 Home Front: Politix
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Detention Dilemma
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By Vincent J. Curtis - The Buffalo News Opinion
GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba What to do about Gitmo? Nearly 300 detainees of the war on terrorism are kept here. Presidential candidates Sen. John McCain and Mike Huckabee, as well as former Secretary of State Colin Powell, are on record as saying they would close the facility. With leading opinion, both Republican and Democratic, calling for the closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility, you have to wonder why it is kept open.
None of those who has called for Gitmos closure has made clear two things: How would closing Gitmo advance the war effort? And what would they do with the detainees kept there?
Concerning the detainees, there are only two options: release them outright, or detain them somewhere else.
To release the detainees outright, including those like Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the mastermind of 9/11, would be a crime. To close the Gitmo facility only to incarcerate the detainees somewhere else seems like a sleight-of-hand trick, a bait and switch. So those who call for the closure of Gitmo without saying why, and without saying what should be done with the detainees, have some explaining to do.
The most common why offered for Gitmos closure are variations of the moral high ground argument. There is a school of thought that says that the Gitmo facility represents a black eye to the United States and what it stands for, because of the allegations of prisoner abuse and the evasion of the rule of law. Conclusion: Gitmo must be closed.
Never mind that all of the allegations of prisoner abuse have been proved false. Never mind the fact that Congress has passed the necessary statutes that now provide clarity in what was almost uncharted legal territory. The moral high ground argument is simply another way of saying that Gitmo should be closed without saying what will be done about the detainees. The argument simply fails to address how changing the location of detention advances the war effort.
This is preaching to the choir here but is a great article, worth the read 
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Posted by Throger Thains8048 2008-02-04 00:00||
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Posted by Throger Thains8048 2008-02-04 01:06||
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Posted by 3dc 2008-02-04 01:10||
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Posted by Procopius2k 2008-02-04 09:32||
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Posted by Excalibur 2008-02-04 10:16||
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