Crooks and Liars » Colin Powell: Get rid of Gitmo and restore Habeas Corpus

Crooks and Liars » Colin Powell: Get rid of Gitmo and restore Habeas Corpus

Guantanamo has become a major, a major problem for America’s perception as it’s seen, the way the world perceives America. And if it was up to me, I would close Guantanamo, not tomorrow, this afternoon. I’d close it. And I’d not let any of those people go. I would simply move them to the United States and put them into our federal legal system. The concern was well, then they’ll have access to lawyers, then they’ll have access to writs of habeas corpus. So what? Let them…

Isn’t that what our system’s all about? And by the way, America, unfortunately, has two million people in jail, all of whom had lawyers and access to writs of habeas corpus. And so we can handle bad people in our system. And so I would get rid of Guantanamo and I’d get rid of the military commissions system, and use established procedures in federal law or in the manual for courts martial. I would do that because I think it’s more equatible and it’s more understandable in constitutional terms. But I’d also do it because every morning I pick up a paper and some authoritarian figure, some person somewhere, is using Guantanamo to hide their own misdeeds.

And so essentially we have shaken the belief that the world had in America’s justice system by keeping a place like Guantanamo open and creating things like the military commission. We don’t need it, and it’s causing us far more damage than any good we get for it. But remember what I started this discussion saying, don’t let any of them go. Put them in a different system, a system that is experienced, that knows how to handle people like this…

i'd be much happier if powell recognized that guantanamo was a problem because, you know, it was immoral and illegal and shall we say just plain wrong rather than because it hurt america's image. but i'll settle for whatever gets it closed.

and someone as well respected as colin powell saying he'd close it immediately, is a small step in that direction.