Obama: I Should’ve Shuttered Guantánamo On Day One
President Barack Obama says if he could start his presidency over, he would have closed the Guantanamo Bay prison his first day.
Instead, the president ordered the detention center for terrorism suspects closed within a year. He says the politics around closure grew increasingly tough and “people got scared by the rhetoric.”
He said Wednesday that “the path of least resistance was just to leave it open.” He’s been able to cut the population down to 122 detainees, but Congress has blocked closure.
Lawmakers have banned the Obama administration from bringing detainees to the United States for imprisonment or trial.
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Copyright 2015 Liberaland
By: dave-dr-gonzo
David Hirsch, a.k.a. Dave "Doctor" Gonzo*, is a renegade record producer, video producer, writer, reformed corporate shill, and still-registered lobbyist for non-one-percenter performing artists and musicians. He lives in a heavily fortified compound in one of Manhattan's less trendy neighborhoods.
* Hirsch is the third person to use the pseudonym, a not-so-veiled tribute to journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson, with the permission of his predecessors Gene Gaudette of American Politics Journal (currently webmaster and chief bottlewasher at Liberaland) and Stephen Meese at Smashmouth Politics.
26 responses to Obama: I Should’ve Shuttered Guantánamo On Day One
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Suzanne McFly March 19th, 2015 at 08:01
He is really not a very good dictator, a good one would ignore the Constitution and tell the Congress they have no say in what he does. I voted for a Kenyan usurper who would let the three branches be damned and do whatever he feels he needs to. Could you imagine? Everyone with health insurance and equal pay? OMG, the horror!!!
John Tarter March 19th, 2015 at 08:44
No, people lost their health insurance, policies that worked for them. And there are still uninsured folks, to the tune of what we started with except that now we have another big bill to pay. And equal pay? Not at the White House.
OldLefty March 19th, 2015 at 09:12
No, people lost their health insurance, policies that worked for them.
______
What was the excuse over the last decades?
And equal pay? Not at the White House.
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Look a little deeper at the actual jobs that get averaged in.
There is a standard pay grade that no individual administration may change.
Dwendt44 March 19th, 2015 at 18:50
To right wing nut jobs, facts are like pot holes, if you swerve enough you can avoid them easily.
Robert M. Snyder March 19th, 2015 at 23:21
“Look a little deeper at the actual jobs that get averaged in.”
Lefty, if Mitt Romney were president, would you interpret the same facts in the same way? Wouldn’t you be asking why there aren’t more women in the jobs at the higher pay grades? Wouldn’t you suspect that a glass ceiling was keeping women in the lower-paying jobs?
OldLefty March 20th, 2015 at 06:42
Lefty, if Mitt Romney were president, would you interpret the same facts in the same way?
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I believe so.
If Mitt Romney were president,wouldn’t you guys be saying, “The policies of this Republican administration have turned the economy around!!”?
We know that the reason why there are not more women in higher paying jobs is because it is more difficult for them to move their entire families for temporary positions.
If Mitt Romney were president, it would not be a talking point and it’s likely there would be less women.
He DID put in more women at the beginning of his term, but they decreased throughout the term, and he ended with less women.
Robert M. Snyder March 20th, 2015 at 13:29
“If Mitt Romney were president,wouldn’t you guys be saying, “The policies of this Republican administration have turned the economy around!!”?”
Many would, for sure. Personally, I sometimes wonder about the time lag between implementing policies and seeing results. I think it’s legitimate to ask how Bush/Cheney, Clinton/Gore, and previous admins. contributed to the current situation in the Middle East. What about the Camp David accords? What about Churchill? What about the Ottoman Empire? Some things take a long, long time to play out. Did Clinton single-handedly create the prosperity of the 1990’s? Didn’t Kennedy’s moon project have something to do with that, and Bletchley Park for that matter? How much control does any single president/admin actually have?
“We know that the reason why there are not more women in higher paying jobs is because it is more difficult for them to move their entire families for temporary positions.”
I don’t understand what you mean. Why would it be harder for a family to move when the women gets a job as opposed to when the man gets a job? Are you implying that husbands are more reluctant to pull up roots for a wife’s sake than vice-versa?
OldLefty March 23rd, 2015 at 06:40
I don’t understand what you mean. Why would it be harder for a family to move when the women gets a job as opposed to when the man gets a job?
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That is more frequently true, but in this case we are talking about jobs that last only as long as the administration , or for one term.
Fewer women than men will disrupt their families for that.
jybarz March 19th, 2015 at 09:22
I wish you can be more truthful and stop the BS that you fully know are BS. Don’t you have any shame and pride? Be a decent person for a change.
StoneyCurtisll March 19th, 2015 at 10:59
that’s asking a lot from Tarter…
dave-dr-gonzo March 19th, 2015 at 09:29
“No, people lost their health insurance, policies that worked for them.”
Wrong. These junk policies pretty much never provided adequate coverage. And in most cases the policies that were “lost” were replaced with better coverage (source: that commie rag The Wall Street Journal). The freelance art director at my label had just that happen to her: her “cancelled” insurance was immediately replaced by a policy that complied with federal law and reduced her premium significantly, lowered her copay, and increased coverage to include a preexisting condition.
What I’m saying, Tarter, is that you are either completely misinformed by misleading reactionary talking points or intentionally misrepresenting the Affordable Care Act, which DID let people keep their policies if they were _legal_.
What I am also saying is that the moderators are pretty much ready to banish you not only because you are obnoxious but that you appear to be an outright liar.
“And there are still uninsured folks.”
I’m guessing you’d support one payer, which, as practically any economist with an understanding of the dynamics and mechanics of health care costs not employed by the health care cartel will tell you, would slash health care costs, particularly on pharmaceutical products and medical devices. But I doubt you have the intelligence, honesty, or moral integrity to back one payer.
fahvel March 19th, 2015 at 12:58
couldn’t have said it better. When it comes to tooth decay I tend to use too many expletives.
whatthe46 March 20th, 2015 at 00:28
ha! i like that.
Suzanne McFly March 19th, 2015 at 16:49
Thank you for your reply, I don’t have the patience. He is just spitting the same crap you hear on faux entertainment. You would think after being proven wrong every time, eventually he would do some research before he speaks, but I guess that is the difference between thinkers and followers.
whatthe46 March 20th, 2015 at 00:27
LOL ” eventually he would do some research before he speaks,” i just said that the other night about this parasite. lol
Suzanne McFly March 20th, 2015 at 06:38
Well we have hope for him, I think that just makes us empathetic people. :)
StoneyCurtisll March 19th, 2015 at 10:58
I Just came from the grocery store with some cheese…
I bet it would go well with your Whine.
StoneyCurtisll March 19th, 2015 at 10:56
I remember Obama talking about closing down Gitmo early in his presidency…
I also remember the right wing freak out machine going bonkers, suggesting that “Obama wants to bring terrorist to America”, “Terrorist will be walking our streets after being released by US federal courts”, (for lack of charges or they may have been tortured)..
Then there was mostly right wing governors who feared their states would become “targets of Al-Queda terrorist attacks seeking release of terrorist held in their prisons”..
it’s pretty much the same thing when the DOJ wanted to put some Gitmo prisoners on trial in US federal courts..(the freak out was shocking)
All of it was just fear mongering..
And the topping on the cake is…
Right wingers bitch about Obama not fulfilling a campaign promise of closing Gitmo”.
fahvel March 19th, 2015 at 12:56
nice to see him with cajones but I believe it’s about six years too late. The man is just to ,kind and intelligent to be a political figure.
JimNauseam March 19th, 2015 at 18:54
Obama signed an executive order to close Gitmo his first day in office. The GOP freaked out and refused to fund it.
trees March 19th, 2015 at 13:26
“President Barack Obama says if he could start his presidency over, he would have closed the Guantanamo Bay prison his first day.”
So, the prez thinks that letting terrorists loose is a good idea. Yeah, I feel really good about having him negotiate with the Iranians…..wait is today 04/01/15?
Bunya March 19th, 2015 at 15:22
Do you have any proof that the detainees held in Guantanamo Bay are terrorists? Post your documentation, or I’ll just assume you got your information from notorious war criminal, Dick Cheney.
.
And I’ll say it again. If you have a hard on for killing Muslims, feel free to gather all your Christian friends and start another crusade. Just make sure you let them know you’re killing them in the name of Jesus, and not the USA.
Dwendt44 March 19th, 2015 at 23:57
You’re asking trees for facts? Really?
Bunya March 20th, 2015 at 00:20
What was I thinking???
JimNauseam March 19th, 2015 at 18:52
Over 700 prisoners were released by Bush. Did you have a problem with that?
William March 20th, 2015 at 00:50
The 2015 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) will mark the 5th year in a row that Congress will block President Obama from fulfilling his pledge to close the Guantanamo Bay prison