Tag Archives: Guantanamo

Political Rants

The other side.

Last week I wrote about the P.O.W. Bergdahl and how he and his family were being used as a political football. The other half of the story is about the prisoner trade the Taliban negotiated with our government. The same voices that were denigrating the Bergdahl clan described the traded Guantanamo detainees as a  Taliban “dream team” or a set of “MVPs” for the other side in the Afghan war. Setting aside the ridiculousness of the sports analogy, this characterization is as stupid as it is irrelevant.

Let's ask this guy.First of all, they were not high-value detainees. They were leadership within the Taliban regime of the 1990s – 2001, yes, but they were not implicated in the deaths of any Americans. Nor were they captured at great cost, as has been suggested by some. Two or more of them turned themselves in; others were turned in by Pakistani intelligence, probably in exchange for some payment. Will they return to “the fight”? Well, that may be, but keeping Guantanamo open all these years has inspired more (younger) people to join the fight than we could ever release from that legal limbo on Cuban soil. A lot of people want us dead; are we that worried, really?

Then there’s the simple fact that the Afghan war is going to end. Face it, McCain, Graham, Ayotte, etc. … stick a fork in it. Your awesome war is coming to a close, whether you like it or not. Only you are in favor of keeping it going, just as only you were in favor of expanding the Global War on Terror to Syria. The American people are sick of the Afghan war, and they will not miss it.

Now the same political hacks have their hair on fire about Iraq because it is melting down as a result of our having trashed the place with their blessing. This, they suggest, is the argument for staying in Afghanistan for … well, forever. Does anyone, anyone in America agree? Does anyone want their kid to go over there and take a bullet for this sorry project? My guess is no.

Next week, I’ll rant a bit about Iraq. Stay tuned.

luv u,

jp

Political Rants

Permanent rule.

I’ve heard a lot of commentary in recent days about the state of affairs in Egypt, in Russia – about the primacy of the military and the intelligence services in the political life of those countries. Not as much about our own permanent government. I’m talking about the national security regime that persists independently, it seems, of what administration occupies the White House or runs the Congress. It’s a little hard to pass judgment on others when we ourselves have accommodated to something less than democratic rule.

It’s not that this is totally new. We had the Vietnam war, for instance, through Democratic and Republican presidencies, fought with comparable levels of savagery. The latest cycle, which started on September 11 2001, just nine months into the new century, seems much more pervasive, opened ended, and unquenchable. We invaded Afghanistan and still haven’t left. We’ve expanded our expionage and “homeland” security apparatus to encompass literally thousands of federal and contract installations, employing millions of people. We are spied upon in a way that makes the cold war East German state seem amateurish by comparison.

Is this the problem? Really?Even something as seemingly simple as closing Guantanamo. It would have enormous symbolic value, of course. But even though the president professes to want it closed, it remains open. Why? Why haven’t those cleared for release been released? Why haven’t the ones determined innocent / not a threat been moved to some residential setting that isn’t a prison cell? It’s almost as if that policy level is beyond the reach of democratically elected officials. We seem frozen in place since 9/11, unable to adjust our course, unable to accomplish practically anything aside from blowing things up, assassinating people, and spying on their ass. Hunger striking inmates are force fed, even though the president – a constiitutional lawyer – knows that that is abusive and wrong. Can’t change it.

We have to take power back from this permanent government, even if it means standing in the street and facing it down.

luv u,

jp

Political Rants

Guantanahole.

I’m going to write about a topic I haven’t visited for some time in the vain hope that it would be corrected, now that we have left the George W. Bush administration in its deserved dustbin of history. (Save, that is, for within the W. Library, which is a central repository for the disastrous idiocy that was that presidency writ large, but I digress.) The detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has re-entered the news cycle once again, owing in large part to an organized protest – a hunger strike – undertaken by more than 100 of its inmates. I have a few things to say about this shit hole, and I’ll keep it brief.

Guantanamo
Camp Joy.

First: Why the hell is this place still open? I know, I know – Congress demagogue’d the issue of closing it down and bringing some of the still-accused to the U.S. for trial and likely eventual imprisonment. (There’s a surprise – they demagogue everything!) The thing is, Obama has options, particularly with regard to those prisoners cleared for release. There are third countries they can most certainly be sent to. Obama is avoiding this option because it will garner criticism, most likely. Not a good reason at all.

Second: The hunger strike is a manufactured crisis, by all appearances. They have generally been presenting it as a difficult situation being handled by the Army as best they can, but the fact is that conditions at the prison turned decidedly worse when the Navy handed over control to the Army early this year. The prisoners were searched, their Korans pored over by investigators, and the prisioners’ communal priviliges were taken away. They are now kept in isolation 22 hours a day or so. Here’s a possible solution to the hunger strike: rotate the Army unit out and bring back the freaking Navy team that was running it before.

Third: If half of these men have never been charged with anything, have been determined to be of no danger to the U.S., why the hell are they being held … and while they’re being held, why are they being kept in prison-like conditions? Many have been there for 11 years. For chrissake, if they’re innocent, build them a freaking house in Guantanamo Bay and let them live like human beings until they are released. What kind of warped sense of justice is at work here?

Finally, if any of these men die while protesting their ill-treatment, it is going to exponentially increase Guantanamo’s value as a jihadist recruitment tool. Add that to your security considerations, Barry.

luv u,

jp

P.S. – Happy May Day. Invented in America, celebrated elsewhere. Ask why.