Comments on: Three Prisoners Released From Guantánamo: Two To Ireland, One To Yemen http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/2009/09/26/three-prisoners-released-from-guantanamo-two-to-ireland-one-to-yemen/ Author & journalist Thu, 18 Mar 2010 18:43:42 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.3 hourly 1 By: Andy Worthington http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/2009/09/26/three-prisoners-released-from-guantanamo-two-to-ireland-one-to-yemen/comment-page-1/#comment-49731 Andy Worthington Sun, 27 Sep 2009 21:32:16 +0000 http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/?p=5616#comment-49731 Thanks, TD. I shall try to take comfort from the correlation you drew between national bankruptcy, precipitated by the most startlingly dull but ambitious robber-barons in history, and the State's inability to maintain insanely bloated domestic prison populations and wildly expensive foreign gulags. Bring on the second economic crash! (the one hidden by the multi-trillion dollar sticking plaster stolen from the public last year). Hmm ... small comfort, I find, but at least no one will be able to accuse us of having been delusional and unprepared ... more tinned foodstuffs, Vicar? Thanks, TD. I shall try to take comfort from the correlation you drew between national bankruptcy, precipitated by the most startlingly dull but ambitious robber-barons in history, and the State’s inability to maintain insanely bloated domestic prison populations and wildly expensive foreign gulags. Bring on the second economic crash! (the one hidden by the multi-trillion dollar sticking plaster stolen from the public last year).
Hmm … small comfort, I find, but at least no one will be able to accuse us of having been delusional and unprepared … more tinned foodstuffs, Vicar?

]]> By: the talking dog http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/2009/09/26/three-prisoners-released-from-guantanamo-two-to-ireland-one-to-yemen/comment-page-1/#comment-49730 the talking dog Sun, 27 Sep 2009 21:20:03 +0000 http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/?p=5616#comment-49730 Great reporting as usual, Andy. Glad to see three more out... and then there were... 217? or whatever the number is, the vast majority of whom pose no threat to anyone, and have probably been already so determined by the military, courts, or both, and/or Obama's "executive review". The disconnect between the campaign rhetoric (and I think the initial executive order to lose GTMO within a year of inauguration can safely be counted as campaign rhetoric) and the actual policy of the Obama Administration, continues to be chasm width. Much of candidate Obama's support (and I include my own) was drawn by criticism of the many policies of Bush/Cheney/Addington/Yoo that he inherited. But apparently, the perennial fear of all Demoratic politicians that they are soft on defense, or terrorism, or anything else... and lo and behold, he finds <i>the politics</i> of his one-year-closure promise (led by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and other jerks from Obama's own party) to be close to untenable. Worse, of course, the "flexibility" to operate gulags, kidnap people, and indeed, the granddaddy of them all, to send <i>citizens</i> to the dungeon without recourse to law... continues to be discussed, even if, thankfully, "preventive detention legislation" appears to be going nowhere. American aggression and its companion the total national security state persist. The only "good news" is that it is more than likely in the coming few years that all of this will be remedied after all... not,of course, because of any kind of enlightened changes in policies, but simply because the United States's economy is on track to collapse, and we just won't be able to afford to do these things. Not clear what the GTMO census (or the broader gulag archipelago operated by American apparatuses) will be by then...but given cost concerns already causing American governments to start reducing their prison populations... one can extrapolate, I suppose. In the meantime, the human cost of our unenlightened policies continues to be staggering; glad to see anyone at all-- even if sadly still only a handful-- released from them. Great reporting as usual, Andy.

Glad to see three more out… and then there were… 217? or whatever the number is, the vast majority of whom pose no threat to anyone, and have probably been already so determined by the military, courts, or both, and/or Obama’s “executive review”.

The disconnect between the campaign rhetoric (and I think the initial executive order to lose GTMO within a year of inauguration can safely be counted as campaign rhetoric) and the actual policy of the Obama Administration, continues to be chasm width. Much of candidate Obama’s support (and I include my own) was drawn by criticism of the many policies of Bush/Cheney/Addington/Yoo that he inherited. But apparently, the perennial fear of all Demoratic politicians that they are soft on defense, or terrorism, or anything else… and lo and behold, he finds the politics of his one-year-closure promise (led by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and other jerks from Obama’s own party) to be close to untenable.

Worse, of course, the “flexibility” to operate gulags, kidnap people, and indeed, the granddaddy of them all, to send citizens to the dungeon without recourse to law… continues to be discussed, even if, thankfully, “preventive detention legislation” appears to be going nowhere.

American aggression and its companion the total national security state persist. The only “good news” is that it is more than likely in the coming few years that all of this will be remedied after all… not,of course, because of any kind of enlightened changes in policies, but simply because the United States’s economy is on track to collapse, and we just won’t be able to afford to do these things. Not clear what the GTMO census (or the broader gulag archipelago operated by American apparatuses) will be by then…but given cost concerns already causing American governments to start reducing their prison populations… one can extrapolate, I suppose.

In the meantime, the human cost of our unenlightened policies continues to be staggering; glad to see anyone at all– even if sadly still only a handful– released from them.

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