Tag: Gitmo

Remember Gitmo?

NO?

It is a US prison on the island nation of Cuba.

Right now it is solely used as punishment for those accused of being “terrorists”.

Some are calling for the prison to close…..

The Guantánamo conundrum never seems to end.

Twelve years ago, I had other expectations. I envisioned a writing project that I had no doubt would be part of my future: an account of Guantánamo’s last 100 days. I expected to narrate in reverse, the episodes in a book I had just published, The Least Worst Place: Guantánamo’s First 100 Days, about—well, the title makes it all too obvious—the initial days at that grim offshore prison. They began on January 11, 2002, as the first hooded prisoners of the American war on terror were ushered off a plane at that American military base on the island of Cuba.

Needless to say, I never did write that book. Sadly enough, in the intervening years, there were few signs on the horizon of an imminent closing of that U.S. military prison. Weeks before my book was published in February 2009, President Barack Obama did, in fact, promise to close Guantánamo by the end of his first year in the White House. That hope began to unravel with remarkable speed. By the end of his presidency, his administration had, in fact, managed to release 197 of the prisoners held there without charges—many, including Mohamedou Ould Slahi, the subject of the film The Mauritanian, had also been tortured—but 41 remained, including the five men accused but not yet tried for plotting the 9/11 attacks. Forty remain there to this very day.

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2021/05/04/will-americas-forever-offshore-prison-ever-be-closed

I say NO…..the prison should remain open and the convicted of the 06 January insurrection should be given the maximum and fine and prison time and be sent to Gitmo.

Since these cowards are traitors and terrorists what better place than Gitmo for them to serve their time and think about the treason they committed.

Since our domestic prison system is overcrowded the use Gitmo the prison infrastructure is already available.

Let Gitmo serve the purpose that we have come to know and hate.

Turn The Page!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

 

The “Al Qaeda 7”

For more than a week there has been a back and forth between the lunatics like Liz Cheney and the rest of the country….she got lots of play when her organization “Keep America Safe” put out an ad that calls those people that have defended suspected terrorists as the “Al Qaeda 7″…..shall we continue?

From thinkprogress.org:  Liz Cheney and Bill Kristol’s Keep America Safe organization released a web ad on Monday targeting yet-to-be named Justice Department lawyers who had worked on Guantanamo detainee issues as the “al Qaeda 7.” “Whose values do they share?” asked the ad over an image of seven silhouettes juxtaposed with images of Arabic men. When Politico’s Ben Smith first reported on the attack ad, he noted that it “questions the loyalties of Justice Department lawyers.”

The Lady Liz and her cohorts have forgotten their history….which is NOT unusual for the lunatic Right to do so if it helps their agenda……the history I am talking about is back in 1770…….in case your history is a little cloudy,,,,that was when the British opened up on colonialists it was called, “the Boston Massacre”.

March 5, 1770, a confrontation between an angry merchant and a lone sentry posted in front of the Customs House devolved into an angry mob hurling chunks of ice, coal, and stones against a group of quickly assembled reinforcements. One of the soldiers fell after someone threw a wooden club at him. Then from one in the crowd: “Fire!” That’s when the shooting began. Five Boston citizens were killed.
The British soldiers were put on trial. It was with great difficulty that a defense team was assembled. John Adams, a respected attorney from nearby Braintree, agreed to lead the defense. Adams knew he was risking his reputation, but firmly believed in the principle that every man deserves a fair trial.

This is what America is ALL about…..a fair trial for accused terrorists and the Brits from 1770 could be labeled terrorists.  If these Americans are trying to say that these lawyers were acting in an un-American fashion, then they are basically spitting on the Constitution and the very soul of the United States of America.

Murder Is Not Suicide

Do you remember the three Gitmo detainees that commited suicide on the same day in 2006?  NO?  Then let us review…….

After the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, the CIA set up several so-called ”black” sites around the world, where harsh interrogations of terrorism suspects took place.

The three Guantanamo detainees who died on the night of June 9-10, 2006, were Salah Ahmed al-Salami, 37, of Yemen; Mani Shaman al-Utaybi, 30, of Saudi Arabia; and Yasser Talal al-Zahrani, 22, of Saudi Arabia.

Everyone bought the excuse of their deaths as routine for crazed terrorists….but it seems there is more to this story than we have heard….now thanx to Harper’s magazine the truth is coming out…..

THREE Guantanamo Bay detainees whose deaths were ruled as suicide in 2006 were apparently transported from their cells to a secret site hours before they died, according to an article in Harper’s magazine.

The published account raises questions about whether the three detainees died by hanging themselves in their cells and suggests the US Government is covering up details of what precisely happened in the hours before the deaths.

Harper’s reports that the deaths of the three detainees, or the events that led directly to their deaths, most likely occurred at a previously undisclosed facility more than a kilometre from the main Guantanamo Bay prison complex.

Harper’s based much of its account on interviews with several prison guards who said they knew of the existence of the ”black” site and that they saw three detainees removed from Camp Delta several hours before the deaths were reported and they were in a white van proceeding towards the secret site.

As usual the soldiers involved were order not to divulge anything about this situation and the cover up began and those who murdered these people are walking the streets and may be shopping at your local Mall.

2009 Anal-Ocity

Lots of talk about closing Gitmo.  Lots of debate and most of it is just plain silly.  After reading what Sen. John Thune of South Dakota had to say about the closing he had to become an Anal-Ocity.

“The American people don’t want these men walking the streets of America’s neighborhoods.  The American people don’t want these detainees held at a military base or federal prison in their backyard, either.” – Sen. John Thune

Walking the streets?  Where do they get this stuff?  We already have some guys in prison in the US and so far they have not escaped or help form new US AQ cells.

Is it not about time to flush the whole fear thing down the toilet and come up with some REAL ideas?

One In Seven

A new report issued out of the Pentagon has said that one in seven released detainees has returned to their terrorist ways.  A total of 74 of the 500+ detainees that has been released.  That is about 14%.

This comes out when there is a massive debate going on in Washington about the detainees and where they will be housed if Gitmo is closed.  Of course, the Repubs are saying if they come to the US they will be on your street waiting to attack.  Or if they are put in a prison in your area, AQ will be targeting your community to win their release.  All so much noise and fear being thrown around.

This tactic is silly, it implies that the Fed Prison system is full of incompetent employees and there will be massive escapes from these institution.  That is GARBAGE!  Second, I heard of a newly built yet unused maximum prison in Montana that is willing to take 100 of the inmates from Gitmo.  You did read that it was NEW and yet UNUSED?  The town that is close to the prison has an unemployment rate of about 15+% and would be a boom for the town to put people back to work.  And the fear that these inmates would radicalize others would be moot, since everyone in the prison would be already radicalized.  So all the arguments by conservs is BS.  They just want to keep playing that damn FEAR CARD as long as they can.

Using the above mentioned prison would be a win-win—win for the town and win for closing Gitmo  and probably a win for getting other countries to take these people.

First of all, the media , especially the broadcast media, is focusing on the one in seven part of the report.  They focus on the guys will be walking on your street.  They seem to forget that there are many terrorist in the Super Max already.  Or that NO one has ever escaped from a Super Max.

The GOP is just reverting back to the Bush Admin and the days of fear.  Nothing the Repubs have said is accurate….but that never stopped them in the past, so why would it now?

It Was “A Lot Of Fun”

A “relaxing, calm, beautiful place” may not be everyone’s description of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where the United States holds about 240 prisoners in a detention center that has drawn condemnation from around the world.

But this was the opinion of reigning Miss Universe Dayana Mendoza of Venezuela, who visited the U.S. naval facility in eastern Cuba this month on a trip organized by the United Service Organizations (USO) which supports U.S. troops.

“I didn’t want to leave, it was such a relaxing place, so calm and beautiful,” she added.

Seems there is a bit of a disconnect between what Miss universe saw and what the detainees see.  Are there two Gitmos?

Or maybe it was the pack of drooling hard legs that followed her around dry humping everything in sight.

Who knows?

Give KBR More Time To Kill Americans

Recently I had several posts about the Americans that have killed in Iraq…not by IUDs or snipers or rockets…..no killed, electrocuted while taking as shower.  Now the company that is being investigated over these deaths gets a new contract.  Why?

Defense contractor KBR Inc. has been awarded a $35 million Pentagon contract involving major electrical work, even as it is under criminal investigation in the electrocution deaths of at least two U.S. soldiers in Iraq.

The announcement of the new KBR contract came just months after the Pentagon, in strongly worded correspondence obtained by The Associated Press, rejected the company’s explanation of serious mistakes in Iraq and its proposed improvements. A senior Pentagon official, David J. Graff, cited the company’s “continuing quality deficiencies” and said KBR executives were “not sufficiently in touch with the urgency or realities of what was actually occurring on the ground.”

Graff rejected the company’s claims that it wasn’t required to follow U.S. electrical codes for its work on U.S. military facilities in Iraq. KBR has said it would cost an extra $560 million to refurbish buildings in Iraq used by the U.S. military, including Saddam Hussein‘s palaces, which among other problems are based on a 220-volt standard rather than the American 120-volt standard.

KBR announced last week it won a new $35.4 million contract from the Army Corps of Engineers to design and build a convoy support center at Camp Adder in southern Iraq. It will include a power plant, electrical distribution center, water purification and distribution systems, wastewater and information systems and road paving.

Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., said the new KBR contract was inappropriate. Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., said he has formally asked the Corps of Engineers whether it was confident KBR could accomplish it and whether the Corps had any alternatives.

“KBR has not been debarred, suspended, nor have they been proposed for debarment from government contracting,” Corps spokeswoman Joan Kibler said.

KBR was previously owned by Halliburton Co., the oil services conglomerate that former Vice President Dick Cheney once led. Democrats have long complained it benefited from ties to Cheney.

Let me see if I have this about right?  We are holding people in Gitmo that have done little more than think about killing Americans and we have a company linked directly with American deaths and they some how get the benefit of the doubt.  Maybe it is time to rethink this whole “justice” thing.  Thoughts?

Gitmo To Close

President Barack Obama began overhauling U.S. treatment of terror suspects Thursday, signing orders to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center, shut down secret overseas CIA prisons, review military war crimes trials and ban the harshest interrogation methods.

With his action, Obama started changing how the United States prosecutes and questions al-Qaida, Taliban or other foreign fighters who pose a threat to Americans — and overhauling America’s image abroad, battered by accusations of the use of torture and the indefinite detention of suspects at the Guantanamo prison in Cuba.

The centerpiece order would close the much-maligned Guantanamo facility within a year, a complicated process with many unanswered questions that was nonetheless a key campaign promise of Obama’s. The administration already has suspended trials for terrorist suspects at Guantanamo for 120 days pending a review of the military tribunals.

In the other actions, Obama:

_Created a task force to recommend policies on handling terror suspects who are detained in the future. Specifically, the group would look at where those detainees should be housed since Guantanamo is closing.

_Required all U.S. personnel to follow the U.S. Army Field Manual while interrogating detainees. The manual explicitly prohibits threats, coercion, physical abuse and waterboarding, a technique that creates the sensation of drowning and has been termed a form of torture by critics. However, a Capitol Hill aide says that the administration also is planning a study of more aggressive interrogation methods that could be added to the Army manual — which would create a significant loophole to Obama’s action Thursday.

A task force will study whether other interrogation guidelines — beyond what’s spelled out in the Army manual — are necessary for intelligence professionals in dealing with terror suspects.

Gitmo And Detainees

A recent decision by the US Supreme Court stated that terrorists suspects may appeal their detention.   And boy did this open a flood gate of gum bumping!

Most of the people are saying that these people are not citizens and have no rights.  Or that they are terrorist suspects and have no rights.  Ok, my problem is the word suspect.  These people have not been convicted of a crime and should have all the rights of anyone in a US court.  To me these situations at Gitmo are a violation of the Bill of Rights, amendments 7,8 & 9.

Then there is the length of their detention and the reports of torture.  Those are separate issues that will be covered later.  I do not understand the uproar over this decision.  Several years ago an American citizen was tried and convicted of a crime in Singapore and was sentenced to punishment by caning.  There was an uproar  from Americans of cruel and unusual punishment .  My point is that we as a country should offer anyone being held for a crime to the same moral and legal standards.