by Mark Silva
President Barack Obama was quick, within days of taking office, to announce that he will close the U.S. military-run prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- a symbol of past policies which the new president has abandoned.
But Republicans have been just as quick to warn that some of the most dangerous characters in captivity there could soon be coming to a half-way house near you. Sen. Kit Bond of Missouri has called it a matter of "symbolism over security.''
And, for lack of any real public groundswell of support for the closing of Guantanamo, the Democratic-run Senate is stripping money for the prison's closing ($80 million) from the war-funding bill ($91 billion) that Obama wants for Iraq and Afghanistan, until a clear plan emerges for what to do with all of the detainees at the island camp.
Even before Obama announced his plans for Guantanamo, public opinion leaned against closing it -- by 45 to 35 percent -- Gallup found. Members of Congress appear ready to go with the public, over Obama, on this one.
See Janet Hook's account of the Guantanamo showdown, a setback for the Obama administration, from Tribune's Washington Bureau:
by Janet Hook
WASHINGTON -- Bowing to anxiety among their constituents and pressure from Republicans, Senate Democratic leaders on Tuesday decided to drop plans to give President Obama money to close the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, detention facility for terrorism suspects.
The administration had asked Congress for $80 million to fulfill Obama's promise to close the prison, which has become an international symbol of unpopular U.S. anti-terrorism policies. The money was to be included in a $91-billion bill funding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Senate had been expected to approve the $80 million as long as the Obama administration explained clearly what it would do with Guantanamo's 240 remaining inmates. But as the bill came up for debate Tuesday, some Democrats balked amid Republican efforts to highlight what they said were dangers in bringing the inmates to U.S. prisons and communities.
The Senate is expected to vote today on an amendment to strip the $80 million from the war-funding bill and to indefinitely ban the transfer of Guantanamo Bay inmates to the United States and its territories. The amendment is expected to pass easily.
Senate Democratic leaders concluded that it made little sense to expose their members to the political risk of approving the money until Obama decided what to do about relocating the inmates.
"We were defending the unknown," Senate Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) told reporters. "We were being asked to defend a plan that hasn't been announced."
The White House said that Obama would lay out part of his plan in a speech Thursday, as well as address how long the closure of the Guantanamo facility might take.
"We're going to work with Congress on a timeline that makes sense for us and for them," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said Tuesday. The Senate ban on transferring inmates to the United States could be eased in later legislation.
Obama's moves to close the facility began during his first week in office, when he signed an executive order to close the Guantanamo Bay camp within a year.
The Senate action marked a rare victory for congressional Republicans, who oppose closing the facility and have mounted a concerted campaign to throw Democrats on the defensive.
"I'm pleased the majority has recognized that the president's policy of putting an arbitrary deadline on the closing of Guantanamo is a mistake," said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). "But this issue is not totally behind us."
The House version of the war-funding legislation also denied Obama money to close the prison. It said detainees could be brought to the U.S. only after Obama produced a plan for their transfer.
In a briefing with reporters, Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell said Tuesday that he did not believe the one-year timeline for closing Guantanamo was "in jeopardy."
"As far as I can tell, everything remains on track for action to be taken, with regards to the closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility," Morrell said.
Comments
Noted historian Victor David Hansen writes the best comment on this:
"With the Democratic no-go on Guantánamo (I'll leave it to the better informed to ascertain the degree that the Democratic Congress came to the rescue of an embarrassed Obama administration and cut off funding for the shutdown to allow him an out with the now familiar excuse of "they did it — not me, who keeps promises"), I think we now have come to the end to the five-year left-wing attack theme of Bush "shredding the Constitution."
Except for the introduction of euphemisms and a few new ballyhooed but largely meaningless protocols, there is no longer a Bush-did-it argument. The Patriot Act, wiretaps, e-mail intercepts, military tribunals, Predator drone attacks, Iraq, Afghanistan — and now Guantánamo — are officially no longer part of the demonic Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld nexus, but apparently collective legitimate anti-terrorism measures designed to thwart killers, and by agreement, after years of observance, of great utility in keeping us safe the last eight years.
Add in the Holder statements about Guantánamo in the 2002 interview, the Pelosi/Rockefeller/et al. waterboarding briefings, the need to consider torture in past statements by senators such as Schumer, and I think historians will now look back at these "dark years" as largely a collective, bipartisan effort.
All of which leaves us a final musing: If so, what was the hysteria of 2001-2008 about other than simple politics?
I doubt we get any more movies about ongoing renditions, redactions, any more Checkpoint-like novels, any more waterboarding skits and reenactments, any more late-night comedians doing their Bush tapped, intercepted, tortured, renditioned, tribunaled poor suspect X routines.
And I guess as well that the good old days of supposedly flushed Korans in Guantánamo and Omar the poor liberationist renditioned to Cairo are over. We are now in the age of a sober and judicious President Obama who circumspectly, if reluctantly and in anguish at the high cost, does what is necessary to keep us safe.
And we won't see a brave young liberal senator, Obama-like, barnstorming the Iowa precincts blasting a presidency for trampling our values with the shame of Guantánamo, wiretaps, intercepts, renditions, military tribunals, Predators, Iraq, etc. That motif just dissolved — or rather, it never really existed.
It short, all the fury, the vicious slander, the self-righteous outbursts, the impassioned speeches from the floor, the "I accuse" op-eds by the usual moralistic pundits — all that turned out to be solely about politics, nothing more." (from NRO)
Posted by: Speaking Truth to Power | May 20, 2009 10:18 AM
This is the craziest thing. Are you for real people? What...these radicals have super human strength and can walk through walls or fly? We have people in our prisons who have eaten people as their crime for crying out loud. To pre-emptively answer the bozos question obviously to come....yes...I don't give a rats *ss if they put them in a prison near me. There are much worse people already there. You build these idiots up to be much more than they are. Is it Bambi and Peter Rabbit the only reason you guys need AK-47s?
Posted by: bill r. | May 20, 2009 11:26 AM
Weird spot for Obama to dig his heels in. The detainees are going to be tried by military tribunals. Why not try them at Gitmo instead of spending millions to scatter them around the US? Is it worth it to back up campaign rhetoric and a naïve executive order from the first days of his presidency? Its form over substance. The rights of these detainees won't change one iota if they are moved.
The Dems in Congress raise a good point. How can we fund a plan when it doesn't exist? They should have used similar logic before budgeting 600 billion for a health care plan that also doesn't exist.
Posted by: Herbie H. | May 20, 2009 11:35 AM
I don't think it's his albatross. I think he has been in office about 5 months and he's got a lot to deal with, and that he'll find a way to deal with this in the best way possible at this point in time.
Posted by: Grandblvd03 | May 20, 2009 11:43 AM
"I don't think it's his albatross. I think he has been in office about 5 months and he's got a lot to deal with ..."
He made it his albatross when he precipitously and ill-advisedly signed the order to close the detention center as a purely political maneuver, without thought for the practical ramifications of his decision.
Posted by: The guy who hides behind false names (so sayeth Don) | May 20, 2009 1:51 PM
Its a no-brainer. Guantanamo Bay detention center needs to be moved to Texas--very near to where Bush now lives. GB is his baby. Second choice would be to move it near to where Cheney has a home or investments. Let the architects of GB look at it each day. I dare Bush or Cheney to say NIMBY.
Posted by: Vivian | May 20, 2009 3:01 PM
Every once in a while the President has to show the lower life forms who's boss.
Like, say, the SEALs rescuing the Captain.
Just put them in Marion IL and a few of the other Supermax prisons that we've been paying taxes to create for super obnoxious folk and get on to something else, ALREADY!
Posted by: ornery | May 20, 2009 10:00 PM