New at Reason

Tim Cavanaugh | June 14, 2005

Why is Guantanamo necessary? Where is our Elite Republican Guard? Should Hotbar be barred? All the answers, in Reason Express.

Comments

Adam|6.14.05 @ 12:03PM|#

The Bush administration is not making it entirely clear why it feels the terrorist holding pens at Gitmo are a vital part of the War on Terror.

The Bush administration doesn't need to make it clear. Those rag-wearing skullfucks already took care of that.

|6.14.05 @ 12:07PM|#

Adam-
Too bad most of the folks in Gitmo had nothing to do with that. We just scooped up any Arab male we found over there.

|6.14.05 @ 12:10PM|#

For those who don't feel like clicking on Adam's link: he posted a photo of the World Trade Center on fire, as though that somehow justifies every single bullshit thing we do afterwards. And of course, the implication is that every single male in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as anyone who doesn't like what we're doing nowadays, is personally responsible for 9-11. "Why are we destroying civil liberties?" "9-11!" "Why are we torturing people in our prison camps?" "9-11!"

Adam|6.14.05 @ 12:34PM|#

Jennifer, it doesn't matter whether they had anything to do with 9/11 per se. The problem is that the people there have shown an intolerable likelihood of engaging in a similar event in the future.

If our troops say they were engaged in combat without playing by the rules of war, then what you or Joe Biden or anybody else thinks really doesn't factor into the equation. Your assertion that "We just scooped up any arab male we found over there" is baseless hyperbole that I'd expect from Michael Moore. Are you really convinced that our military is so inept that "most" of the people they detain are innocent?

|6.14.05 @ 12:38PM|#

Adam-
Well, our own military has admitted that the majority of people in Abu Ghraib and similar places (including some of the people we tortured to death while in custody) were just innocents who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Many people formerly from Gitmo have been released, sans trial, because it turned out they weren't dangerous after all. If you think the only people who oppose our current policies in regards to prisoners are people who hate America, then the next question is, "Why does the United States military hate the United States?"

Phil|6.14.05 @ 1:14PM|#

The problem is that the people there have shown an intolerable likelihood of engaging in a similar event in the future.

Can you quantify for me which people and how likely, and show your work? Thanks.

Also, does this include the innocent cab drivers that we beat to death, and the people we imprisoned because some rivaling warlords swore they were al Qaeda, and the ones we bought off the Pakistanis?

|6.14.05 @ 1:43PM|#

I was trying to find the article on the bidding war that went on: People trying to get funds to buy innocent people before they were sold to the US as "terrorists".

Here it is:

{http://www.counterpunch.com/roberts06022005.html}

Adam|6.14.05 @ 2:10PM|#

[Back after a brief satellite internet failure.]

For those who don't feel like clicking on Adam's link: he posted a photo of the World Trade Center on fire, as though that somehow justifies every single bullshit thing we do afterwards.

When did we go from talking about Guantanamo to talking about "everything"?

I'm 100% opposed to designating American citizens "enemy combatants"; 100% opposed to holding them without charge; 100% opposed to holding them without access to the evidence against them or courts to refute that evidence; 100% opposed to "administrative subpoenas" and self-written search warrants; 100% opposed to that crap where they "investigate" people and then bar those people from speaking about being investigated. etc. etc. etc.

If you think the only people who oppose our current policies in regards to prisoners are people who hate America...

I don't.

Phil - Can you quantify for me which people and how likely, and show your work? Thanks.

If our military decides to detain someone on the battlefield (so long as said battlefield isn't Battlefield USA and said detainee is not an American), that's good enough for me. They're professionals, whether you acknowledge that or not.

And that also gets back to Jennifer's point, that the military has released a bunch of these guys who got wrongly caught up. Sounds like the system works pretty damn well. "We make mistakes and subsequently correct them" does not equal "Close Guantanamo."

|6.14.05 @ 2:33PM|#

We just scooped up any Arab male we found over there.

This just proves how incompetent the military is. We sent them to the Middle East to pick up any old Arab males they found, and they only brought back a couple hundred. What are they doing over there? There's hundreds of millions of them.

Adam|6.14.05 @ 2:35PM|#

Feel free to add "torturing people to death" and "torturing people generally" to my list of things I'm opposed to; putting hoods on people's heads and scaring them with barking dogs aren't going to cut it as "torture" in my book, but "pulpifying" a cab driver's legs is certainly beyond the pale in my book, especially when it leads to death. That still isn't a good reason to close Guantanamo. My original point was that having a terrorist/suspected terrorist/enemy combatant holding pen on an island nation is a no-brainer that I certainly don't think needs explanation. I'll be the first to agree that a review of what went wrong, how things got to be so bad, and what's going to be done in the future to prevent such heinous incidents. The evidence I've seen so far leads me to believe that these are important and dangerous aberrations that need to be addressed, but we should be asking more relevant questions of the administration that go beyond "Why do we need Guantanamo?"

Phil|6.14.05 @ 2:58PM|#

If our military decides to detain someone on the battlefield (so long as said battlefield isn't Battlefield USA and said detainee is not an American), that's good enough for me.

So that includes the ones we bought without bothering to found out who they were? And what qualifies as "battlefield?" Everything within the borders of Afghanistan?

They're professionals, whether you acknowledge that or not.

My father spent 28 years in the Army. I'm well aware of the boundaries of their professionalism. 15-yard mindreading foul and replay of the down.

Adam|6.14.05 @ 3:18PM|#

Phil, we don't need to define what constitutes the battlefield to discuss whether or not the administration needs to further explain the purpose or utility of Guantanamo, and I challenge the call! There was no mindreading going on - "whether you acknowledge it or not" is significantly different from "despite your obviously al-qaeda lovin' commie islamofascist ass refusing to acknowledge it," which most definitely would have been grounds for the penalty.

|6.14.05 @ 3:33PM|#

That thing about bringing them off the battlefield does bother me. This means that any man in Iraq who is opposed to being occupied and takes up arms against opposition is an enemy combatant. He may or may not have any association with Al-Quaeda or any other terrorist group. Maybe some of those imprisoned just wanted us the fuck out of their country.

|6.14.05 @ 4:10PM|#

Adam,

I'll use that link the next time someone gives me crap about a rezoning issue.

Why do we want to change the zoning on this lot?

Look at this, fucker! You wanna ask me any more questions? I didn't think so.

|6.14.05 @ 4:18PM|#

Adam, if we eliminate everything you listed that you're opposed to from Gitmo, it becomes indistingugishable from an ordinary prison that operates within the rule of law, and the customs of human decency.

We've got plenty of those. The only reason to have Guantanamo is to pull the kind of crap you admit is wrong.

That, by the way, is why the archipelago of offshore prison camps operated by the Army was set up - to allow them to operate without the constraints of American law. You may recall, Ted Olsen walked into the United States Supreme Court and stated that the the binding legal standards in Gitmo were those of Cuba, because of its location.

God Bless America

|6.14.05 @ 5:04PM|#

This doens't have to do with Gitmo, but it does refer to reason express.

I never clicked on the "Stuff" link, where you can buy products with reason's logo on them.

Tim, has anyone ever bought a "Reason Thong"? If you're at the point where it's being modeled for a significant other, aren't most folks beyond reason?

|6.14.05 @ 5:11PM|#

Ira,

I'm wearing a reason thong right now. I can't allow myself to have unsightly panty lines at work.

|6.14.05 @ 5:13PM|#

uh, thanks for sharing....

|6.14.05 @ 5:59PM|#

I never clicked on the "Stuff" link, where you can buy products with reason's logo on them.

Hey, check out the reason cock rings!

|6.14.05 @ 7:27PM|#

Can we all at least agree that it is cruel and unusual to subject Gitmo inmates to Christina Aguilera songs before torturing them to death? It's one thing to annoy them by playing, say, Creed 500 times in a row (you know, the way radio stations did a few years ago). But Aguilera? That's beyond the pale!

Of course, it's worth noting that Kerry was in a band, and so undoubtedly his music would be worse. ;->

|6.14.05 @ 7:57PM|#

And why is the thong the only thing made in the USA? Too embarassed to make our magazine logo underwear in China?

|6.15.05 @ 7:30AM|#

For those who don't feel like clicking on Adam's link: he posted a photo of the World Trade Center on fire, as though that somehow justifies every single bullshit thing we do afterwards.

Of course, the Right has made all 9/11 footage our "Two Minutes Of Hate" and demand that it be shown and reshown at every oppertunity to make us "remember" (i.e. drive us into a fascist... I mean, patriotic frenzy) and shame us into not question the more jackbooted foreign and domestic policies of Big Dubbya.

|6.15.05 @ 10:15AM|#

Or is china too embarrassed to make Reason thongs?

|6.15.05 @ 5:09PM|#

Leaves-on-thong? Why you want leaves on thong?