"Prompt and appropriate disposition of the individuals currently detained at Guantánamo and closure of the facilities in which they are detained would further the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States and the interests of justice," Obama had said in his executive order, on the second day of his presidency, to great applause.
“Today is a great day for the rule of law in the United States of America,” John Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat and former presidential candidate, said that day. “America is ready to lead again — not just with our words, but by our example.”
Fine example, that Kerry. He was among the 90 senators who voted to rebuff Obama's order, ostensibly because Obama doesn't have a clear plan on how to dispose of the prisoners (as if due process wasn't a plan)--more accurately, because members of Congress are panicking at the thought of having to explain, at election time, why former Gitmoids are in their home state. Classic herding of political instincts trumping principle.
"I don't know of any city that would be thrilled to have Khalid Sheik Mohammed or Abu Zubaydah living down the street," Sen. Kit Bond, a Missouri Republican, sniffed in reference to two al-Qaida suspects at Guantanamo.
Actually, as many people know by know, Two Rivers Detention Facility in Hardin, Montana (a small town of 3,500 people east of Billings, at the edge of a Crow Indians reservation and along the route Lewis & Clark once took), would be glad to take the inmates. Two Rivers is a $27 million, 460-bed prison built in 2006 on the assumption that Montana would grant it an exclusive contract to hold sex offenders. That contract wasn't awarded, leaving the prison gasping for convicts. The facility's construction loans are in default. On April 21, the town council voted 5-0 to take in the Guantanamo prisoners. "Somebody has to stand up and put them in their backyards. It's our patriotic duty," said Greg Smith, director of the city's Two Rivers Authority.
To which Montana Senator Max Baucus, one of those Democrats who didn't mind singing the Guantanamo blues when it suited him, immediately replied: "Not on my watch."
No one expects Hardin to take in Gitmo's goners. But Hardin's symbolic vote made the point clearly enough: since when is the United States in the business of offshoring the rule of law? (Well, since 2001, and until the Supreme Court ruled the trick illegal.)
See Also:
- Guantanamo's Illegal Shame - Unlawful Detention and Gitmo
- The More Things Change: Obama Adopts Bush Policies on Detainees
- Obama Effect: Abuse Uptick at Guantanamo
- Re-branding “Enemy Combatants”
- Mayer’s The Dark Side: Review
- Swallowing the Whale: The Guantanamo Confessions
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