Obama Team Clears 75 Detainees For GITMO Release

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An Obama administration task force has so far cleared 75 of the remaining 223 Guantanamo prisoners for release as part of its effort to close the detention camp, a military spokesman said on Monday.

The review team is examining each prisoner's case to decide who will be held for trial and who can be sent home or resettled in other nations. President Barack Obama had set a January 22 deadline to shut the detention camp although Defense Secretary Robert Gates told ABC News in an interview broadcast on Sunday that "it's going to be tough" to meet the deadline.

As the review team makes its decisions, military officials at Guantanamo post an updated list in the camps to let the prisoners know how many from each nation have been judged free to go.

"It was an opportunity to just provide better communication," said Navy Lieutenant Commander Brook DeWalt, a spokesman for the Guantanamo detention operation.

"There's a lot of information out there and you get a lot of things from a lot of different angles. It helps put it in a more succinct context for them."

The prisoners are well aware of Obama's announcement that the camp would be closed and have heard piecemeal information from their lawyers and relatives during phone calls arranged by the International Committee of the Red Cross, he said.

The list is posted in Arabic, Pashto and English. The latest list of 78 prisoners includes two Uzbeks sent to Ireland and a Yemeni returned to his homeland on Saturday, an indication that some progress is being made in thinning the camp population of those who are not considered a threat.

"We are not focused on whether the deadline will or won't be met on a particular day," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said. "We are focused on making ... the most progress that is possible."

Some on the list are among the 30 ordered freed by U.S. courts but still awaiting transfer, including 13 Chinese Uighurs. The Pacific island nation of Palau has agreed to accept most of them.

Also on the list are 26 other captives from Yemen, nine from Tunisia, seven from Algeria, four from Syria, three each from Libya and Saudi Arabia, two each from Uzbekistan, Egypt, the West Bank and Kuwait, and one each from Azerbaijan and Tajikistan.
Most were captured in Afghanistan and Pakistan after U.S. troops invaded Afghanistan in 2001 to oust al Qaeda in response to the September 11 hijacked plane attacks on the United States.

Source: Reuters US Online Report Politics News

Liz Cheney Falsely Claims Bush ‘Did Not Say’ Gitmo Detainees Should Be Tried In U.S. Courts

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Last night, Vice President Cheney’s daughter Liz appeared on a mainstream American television news media outlet, this time on Campbell Brown’s CNN show. During a contentious “Great Debate” segment with Salon’s Joan Walsh, Liz Cheney was trying to argue that bringing Guantanamo Bay detainees to U.S. soil “makes us less safe” and that they should remain where they currently reside.
To make her argument, Cheney also continued her penchant for false claims. At one point in the debate, Walsh noted that military leaders want Gitmo closed and that even President Bush once said it should be closed and that some detainees should tried in the U.S. Cheney, however, disagreed:
WALSH: Liz, the top — the top military leaders of our country want Guantanamo closed. President Bush, in June 2009 [sic], gave a speech where he said he would close it, and he would bring people home and try them here.
CHENEY: No, I’m sorry.
WALSH: President Bush said that.
CHENEY: He did not say he would bring terrorists onto the homeland. Joan, no, he didn’t say that.
Watch it:

Walsh is right, Bush did say that. During a June 2006 press conference at a U.S.-EU summit, Bush called for Gitmo to be closed and to have some of the detainees tried in U.S. courts:
BUSH: I’d like to end Guantanamo. I’d like it to be over with. One of the things we will do is we’ll send people back to their home countries. [...] There are some who need to be tried in U.S. courts. They’re cold-blooded killers. They will murder somebody if they’re let out on the street. And yet, we believe there’s a — there ought to be a way forward in a court of law.
However, Cheney’s canards didn’t end there. She also offered the debunked claim that “14 percent” of Gitmo detainees have “returned to the battlefield,” a claim Walsh noted is “not true.” Indeed, last week the New York Times issued a correction to its story, saying that the number is closer to 5 percent.

Dick Cheney's Torture Program Exposed

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For all of Dick Cheney's recent efforts to defend his torture program, it all seem too little and too late now that orders to torture have been traced directly back to the former vice president himself.

Waterboarding Is Torture

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Author Christopher Hitchens undergoes the controversial drowning technique, at the hands of men who once trained American soldiers to resist—not inflict—it.

As you will see in the video below, the first drop of water hits his face at 3:15 on the clock and a mere 17 seconds later, he gave the predetermined signal that he was drowning. I would like to see every public official who says that this is not torture to under go the cruel process 138 time for 10 to 20 minutes per session as was done to Kahlid Shahk Mohommad. I wonder what "vital intel" we could extract from them.

Once upon a time, waterboarding was something that Americans were being trained to resist, not to inflict. It was endured, by those members of the Special Forces who underwent the advanced form of training known as sere (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape). In these harsh exercises, brave men and women were introduced to the sorts of barbarism that American Soldiers might find at the hands of a lawless foe who shows a total disregarded the Geneva Conventions. This is exactly what and where 8 years of the Bush – Cheney regime has lead our country.

After reading the piece in Vanity Fair “Believe Me, It’s Torture,” by Christopher Hitchens, I’ve had serious reservations about the torture tactic and I call it that because that it what it is, TORTURE! -- Hitchens submitted himself to a brutal waterboarding session in an effort to understand the human cost of America’s use of harsh tactics at Guantánamo and elsewhere. He hesitantly admits that he didn’t last very long and pointed out that unlike actual detainees, he had the luxery of ending the session immediately with a predetermined singal. A signal that Hitchens used only seconds into the torture session that he underwent. This is substantiated by the photo above that shows a couple of one gallon jugs of water on the floor. One is still full and the other is missing less than a quarter of it’s contence. The megor amount of water on Hitchens light blue shirt seem to substantiate his words and the photograph itself.

Hitchens goes on to explain that his particular handlers had only trained American G.I.’s how to resist the torture tactic and had never inflicted it on an actual dteainee. Yet these handlers boasted about how it was their understanding that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the so-called “Mastermind” behind the September 11, attack lasted only two minutes before he cracked. However, Hitchens adds a (By the way, this story is not confirmed) after that claim. You’re God Damn right it’s not confirmed because it’s not true. If he cracked after 2 minutes, why in the fuck would Khalid Sheikh Mohammed need to be waterboarded 183 more times? – While The Fox News Channels Sean Hannity was bullied into undergoing waterboarding by guest Charles Grodin, it’s safe to say that he doesn’t have the balls to actually go through with it.