Please Rec if you believe Guantanamo should be closed on DAY ONE.

[FlyingSquirrel]

And then please go to http://www.change.gov/agenda/foreignpolicy/ and click on "Submit your ideas", and suggest this.

I've looked all through change.gov and found no suggestion that this is planned. I would have expected to find it under "foreign policy", or perhaps "civil rights", "defense" or "homeland security".

Nada.

This must be done as soon as feasible, to show the world that we do not condone torture; that we do not condone the holding of prisoners without charges; that we believe in the Geneva Conventions and plan to start following them again.

To show the world that we are America once again.

[baldguy]

1. First

[riverwalker]

2. thank you n/t

[Joe Chi Minh]

3. K&R

[PretzelWarrior]

4. great idea

[Danger Mouse]

5. I think this is a good idea.

[damonm]

6. Not first. but top ten, for sure.

FIRST is taking the secrecy lid off presidential documents that Bush clapped on first thing.

[lunatica]

7. Hell yes! And if there are any there who are proven terrorists

Bring them to a jail in this country and give them a friggin trial! That whole crap about enemy combatants not having rights is insane. WE ARE A COUNTRY OF LAWS. I've heard that said 10 million times in my lifetime.

[Wednesdays]

23. I think that was the whole point of keeping them there, from *'s POV

I think a hell of a lot of those prisoners will have interesting stories to tell.

:popcorn:

[invictus]

8. K&R

[PretzelWarrior]

9. OBAMA!!!! Not even in office yet and ADDING to his email lists for 2012

I LIKE IT!

[Bucky]

10. A bit naive. We can't fully close down Gitmo until we know where we'll be housing...

... the worst of these troublemakers. And their trained monkey should be housed with 'em.

[totodeinhere]

11. It should be closed and I think it will be, however...

it would probably be logistically impossible to close it on day one. They can start the process on day one but it will take a while.

[FlyingSquirrel]

13. Agreed - but they can at least announce on Day One

that they plan to close it ASAP. And then follow through, making it a top priority.

[moodforaday]

29. I don't think this is the point. Obama can

*announce* his decision to shut it down on day one though.

...only 63 recs so far? That's weak!

[QueenOfCalifornia]

12. My favorite number!

Lucky 13! recommended & kicked!

[here_is_to_hope]

14. Yep and throw it on eBay too! n/t

[HughMoran]

15. Executive order #1

I was just thinking this today.

Just close the place immediately, no ifs ands or buts.

[damntexdem]

16. Actually, day zero.

But I'll settle for one.

[Rocknrule]

17. It should...

...but its (actually guilty) residents, along with everyone who has even vaguely hinted at assassinating Obama or killing liberals should be given a one-way ticket to a federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison

[FlyingSquirrel]

18. Right after a fair trial, I assume?

I think compared to Guantanamo, a federal pmita prison would be a cakewalk for them. On the other hand, they might be immediately killed by their fellow inmates. (Though many of them would probably welcome death at this point). In reality, many of them probably at this point will need to be in a mental asylum, not a prison. Even if found not guilty.

[tosh]

20. It's hard, isn't it, to ponder the depth of the Bush crimes.

[mopinko]

28. rape is a crime. let's not go there.

prison rape is not a joke. prison rape is crime against humanity.
stop it.

[moodforaday]

31. It's a violent and despicable crime, but

a crime against one person is not a crime against humanity.

A crime against humanity is perpetrated by those who set up the prison system such that it permits rape to continue unobstructed and unpunished.

[mopinko]

36. and those that cheer it on. nt

[Hope And Change]

19. K & R!

[Jed Dilligan]

21. We need to keep it open for all the internet posters who talk about

assassinating the President.

[TheCoxwain]

22. It is hard problem though.... What do you do with those found not guilty

if native countries dont accept them?


But agreed - GITMO should be closed - No Question.


There are lots of implementation issues - so it will take longer than all of us would like. I just wanted to make that point

[pleah]

24. K&R!

[ItsTheMediaStupid]

25. We need Gitmo Open!!

So we have a place to put W, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Gonzales et al on January 21 when they are declared enemy combatants :)

[ClayZ]

26. K and R

[BlancheSplanchnik]

27. I'd put this on a list of priorities

One of *my* personal top ten or twenty would be LIFT THE GAG RULE...
you remember that one, b.'s first day? Surrounded by grinning white men? eeeeeeek, like they're giggling, "let's torture and kill women, yeah, huh huh, cool, huh huh huh....."

[moodforaday]

33. Soooo.... do you think

we can expect President Obama, through his Attorney General, to permit Sibel Edmonds to speak?

Honestly, I don't know if I should even entertain that hope.

[Maven]

30. Absolutely.

[renie408]

32. The process of dealing with the people there needs to begin ASAP.

The people there need to be dealt with fairly. They need to be treated like human beings. They need fair trials starting ASAP. I don't think we can just 'close' Gitmo, but we can start managing it in a fair and humane way immediately.

[Lugnut]

34. Yes, yes and yes! n/t

[rucky]

35. Give them 30 days to either try or free all of the prisoners.

Then transfer the convicted ones (unless time-served), and shut the place down.

[MNDemNY]

37. Not possible.

[TexasObserver]

38. I'll settle for day 30.

[KT2000]

39. Needs to be shut down

ASAP.

[TTUBatfan2008]

40. Keep it open...

Throw the crooks of the Bush regime in there.

[McCamy Taylor]

41. Bring them to US prisons, lawyer them up, charge them in x days or send them home.

And before they go home, allow their lawyers to take statements for a potential class action liability lawsuit. If anyone fears for their lives at home, start application for refugee status.

Ooops. Almost forget. Free medical exams by nonmilitary physicians. If anyone is suffering severe mental impairment from their incarceration, transfer to a mental facility to begin treatment. Document all injuries.

Bring in actual Muslim clerics to detox those who have been indoctrinated by other prisoners during their long incarceration. The Jordanians have had success using real Islam to convince people that the pseudo Islam of terrorists is messed up.

[EpicObama]

42. This is a must......

[Sirveri]

43. as long as you mean the prison and not the base.

[bagrman]

44. Oh yea.

[OnyxCollie]

45. FInding countries that will accept the prisoners will not be easy.

Releasing them here isn't a good idea, since they've been held for years without charges, tortured, etc. and now have every reason to participate in jihad against the United States. There is also the possibility that some of the prisoners may actually be Al Qaeda or the Taliban. Regardless of what we think of bushco's "war on terrorism", there is a group of people that really want to attack the United States and establish of global caliphate.

It's a big old shit sandwich.

[RagAss]

46. When is the lease with Cuba up?

[hangman86]

47. Whoever our new Attorney General shall be

this should definitely be in his "to do" list.

[uberllama42]

48. Maybe if they appointed a team now and worked every day for the next 74

they could close it in January. But we don't even have an attorney general yet.

The Bush people aren't keeping Gitmo open because it's working for them. They're keeping it running because closing it is going to be massive headache. Not least among Obama's troubles will be processing all the innocent people there, many of whom can't go back to their home countries. Gitmo is on a long list of Bush fuckups that will not be solved on day one, no matter how abusive they are or how much we want them to be over.

[Swagman]

49. maybe keep it open for Bush, Cheney &Co

[rpannier]

50. I read an article in a Japanese paper on some of the problems with closing GITMO

1. The most pressing is what to do with the Ughar's in Gitmo.
They're Chinese and if we send them home they'll be tortured.

2. For all the rhetoric and talk from our most...ahem...patriotic congress people, they've all proven to by NIMBY's. They don't want 'these suspected terrorists housed in their districts.'

3. Some, like the Yemen prisoners, if returned to their home country, would return to a fairly chaotic region.

I'm not saying keeping them in GITMO is the answer. But, there does have to be some thought on what we do with some of these guys (esp the Ughar population)

[jmowreader]

51. I believe it should be closed on day two.

It's going to take all of day one to lock up all the Bush criminals. I mean, come on: you gotta find them, perp-walk them, strap them to the floor of a C-17, fly them to Arizona and check them into Joe Arpaio's tent city. (Normally I'm against Camp Arpaio, but in this case I'll make an exception.)

After we do that, we can start closing Gitmo. We need to do it the right way, though: you know that among the thousands of shepherds, merchants and stonemasons who got thrown in there because someone made fifty bucks for turning in a "dangerous Al Qaeda terrorist," there are some real terrorists in there. We can't turn the real terrorists (I mean the ones who were terrorists before we put them in there) loose, but we've got to turn the shepherds and merchants loose, preferably with reparations.

[ulysses]

52. damn - too late to rec.

But yes. Some things will require nuance, but closing Gitmo is a no-brainer.

[jeff30997]

53. DOH!

Error: you can only recommend threads which were started in the past 24 hours
But this goulag should be closed ASAP !

[Thrill]

54. If they close it, where do the folks go?

[bobd0]

55. Too late to recommend but I would if I could. CLOSE GITMO!

Move the prisoners who have charges against them into the legitimate U.S. legal system and send those who are there without charges HOME.

The sooner this open wound on our democracy is cleaned out the sooner it will heal.

[sabrina 1]

56. Too late for me to rec

but this should be a priority along with shutting down the School of the Americas. Probably not on day 1, but the process should begin to end torture as a policy of the US on day 1 and to hold accountable those who violated US and International laws by making it so.

[AuntPatsy]

57. I can no longer recommend by I can kick this...

[paregdem]

58. Shut It Down & Prosecute

Shut it down and work like hell to never, ever repeat the disgusting, intolerable, inhumane acts that were performed there. Anyone left standing that participated in any way with torture and inhumane treatment should be punished to the fullest extent of the law.

We'll never be able to erase the stain that this has left on our history. Let it serve as an awful reminder of how crazed an administration can become if they are not held accountable to the world for their actions.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

59. I've always felt this is the most important first task for Obama. Particularly since

this is one that he can do fairly easily from a unilateral position as the executive.

It will end the injustice and send a signal to the world that we mean business about cleaning up our act.