Obama was vehemently opposed to the operation of Guantanamo Bay. Myself and like-minded others were pleased to see his stance as well as his moves to shut the facility down in due course.

I've been quite a fan of Obama's until I discovered this little titbit, which has given me quite the cause for concern.

In Afghanistan, the US has a prison at Bagram. Here, they have also suspended the right to trial and basically are doing the same things as were done at Guantanamo.

And allow me to be crystal clear - this isn't about locally caught prisoners, that would be pretty much par for the course and I could understand that.
The prisoners at Bagram are being flown in from other countries and then are being subject to the same legal black holes which characterised Guantanamo.

Worryingly, Obama's defending this practice, despite the fact that the Supreme court has ruled it unconstitutional.

You can read more here:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/04/11/bagram/index.html

This is indefensible. I've been trying to find a decent justification for this, but everything sounds like the same pathetic excuses I heard from the Bush supporters who tried to justify it when he did horrendous things.

Maybe somebody else can, however, I'm curious as to how this can be honourable for Obama but dishonourable for Bush.

Damnit. I actually thought Obama would be better, at least on this crucial matter.

I thought so too TRTL.

It makes Guantanamo Bay look like a political stunt if continuing illegal torture and detainment are just being moved elsewhere.

Maybe more information on this will come to light.

TRTL

'Damnit. I actually thought Obama would be better, at least on this crucial matter.' Your hatred for Bush obviously blinded you as it has millions of others.

runner, I would hope that this post would be evidence I'm willing to critically examine either side of politics, regardless of which one I favour.

Something you're clearly not capable of. So unless you've got something worthwhile to contribute, enough with your childish little temper tantrums huh?

Try weighing up both sides of an issue without your abortion-tinted glasses on for a change.

I like Obama – he still gets my vote.
--I like what he is doing on the renewable energy front –early days yet but it looks like big moves in the right direction.
-- I like his more conciliatory approach to Russia & Iran – it might just work.
-- But, what I like most of all is that it is now so much more difficult for the hate-America-brigade to explain everything in terms of Michael Moore’s ‘ol boy red necks’ & ‘big business’ clichés

Goes to show who REALLY is writing the script.

Obama needs to be pressured about it just as much as Bush was.

Obama has taken on one of the most difficult jobs at one of the most fraught times. He will held to scrutiny like no other before him. Any errors will appear huge, anything he does well will be hidden by real or imagined mistakes.

The issue of Guantanamo has more strings attached than a home and contents insurance policy. I am prepared to give benefit of doubt. One thing I am 100% sure of, he is not another Bush and he is far, far better than the previous administration, with that in mind I continue to be grateful.

We'll give him THIS one, eh Fractelle?. Good grief.

Extraordinary Rendition was at the TOP of indictable CRIMES against humanity engineered by the U.S. Just because Obama is PERCEIVED as better than Bush that doesn't make officially sanctioned kidnapping and imprisonment for YEARS without charge nor trial excusable.

That's retarded.

StG

I agree with you, I am not excusing Obama. There is no excuse or justification for the existence of Guantanamo - it will go down in history with other human horrors; detention camps, holocaust, Pol Pot.

But I am not privy to all the machinations behind Guantanamo - but it exists, it must be dealt with and I have enough hope in Obama to simply wait and see.

I agree with what Fractelle's said. This is disappointing, but it still has more than 7 years to unfold. I'll make my judgement at the end of Obama's first term.

Remember that the "Obama is a saint" rhetoric was purely a sarcastic invention of the Right to downplay his vast superiority over both Bush and McCain. Those of us who support him always expected a degree of realpolitik to balance the idealism.

I predicted last year that Obama will do as he is told.He is a false dawn.The creation of the ruling corporate elite that John Fitzgerald Kennedy talked about is real and has totally corrupted the US political process.

Obama also promised to repeal the Patriot Act,instead he has elected to extend indefinitely it's reign.This act allows for the FBI or CIA to record anyones phone calls or invade their computers on the slightest suspicion.It also allows the president to suspend the constitution and declare Martial Law if demonstrations break out as those in Thailand.

Support Ron Paul in the US at the first step in dethroning this corporate totalitarianism in the auditing of the US Federal Reserve.This private cartell of banks own the US currency and are the real instigatigators of this global economic collapse.

The Obama administration is making sound banks contribute to these failed bail out schemes by threatening them with with crippling audits,yet Congress cannot audit the Federal Reserve who are bleeding the US tax payer dry and destroying their economy!

http://www.ronpaul.com/

You can't expect consistency from a pathological narcissist.
Obama will go which ever way the wind blows.
His only goal is to consolidate his power base.

I agree with Fractelle on this.

Let's wait and see.

Obama has enough on his plate at the moment -
he's not been there long enough to warm the
seat.

He's inherited a dreadful detention legacy -
that he's got to deal with. - I'm sure this is only
a very temporary stance. I don't believe that
someone of his calibre, knowledge of international law,
and - whose ethos is, "transparency
promotes accountability," wouldn't realize - that
transparency is essential to accountability and
must be central to US Detention policy.

Obama would be fully aware that all US detentions anywhere,
must comply with Internation Law.

It is too early to judge to judge the man.

At least for now.

I note on OLO that those on the far right/Conservative side of politics are never as willing to criticise their camp. Or their icons - like Bush - they will defend him to the end of days no matter what ills come, but as soon as the 'other' side err they are in there like Flynn with harsh criticisms.

Have you noticed that the extremists will never self-doubt or accept the good and bad on both sides?

How an earth anyone could criticise Obama as a pathological narcissist eludes me. Obama's rise to power was more a backlash against Bush than an idol worship of Obama as his detractors often parrot.

KMB, we had 8 years of Rumsfeld and Cheney, and NOW you want to complain about pathological narcissists? Late to the party, my friend.

Fractelle,
Forgive me.
I missed your post equating Gitmo with the holocaust and Pol Pot.
How many millions were killed at Gitmo again?
Or were you referring to that video on youtube where one of the guards was manhandling one of the orange-suited freedom fighters?
Or perhaps it was the incident where a guard accidentally touched a prisoner's copy of the Koran without putting on his white gloves first?
Or was it the allegations that some of the guards were talking during prayer time?

Good point, KMB. And in memory of Pol Pot and the Holocaust, we must move to establish camps where Cambodians and Germans can be deposited after being kidnapped on rumour or suspicion, be subjected to torture, and have no legal recourse whatever.

Anything is justified if it buys me the illusion of security,

I'm amazed.No one gets it.Bush and Obama are tarred with the same brush!They are controlled by the the US Federal Reserve Banking system and their corporate hangers on.It is not about left v's right ,it is about power over the masses.

Go back to President Woodrow Wilson in !913.It was he who signed away the right of congress to issue currency and later lamented that he'd sold out his country.JFK tried to issue currencey in the name of Congress and actually had $400 million printed when he was assassinated.

Monetary power rests with those who own the currency.Real power exists with those who have the courage ,vision,love and passion for a better future.End the FED and their debt enslavement of our planet!

Sancho, Fractelle, Horus.

I agree - for a long time I followed the presidential campaigns compulsively, back before even the democratic nominees had made their faces known. I'd been hoping for an Obama victory.
I was happy with the Obama V McCain matchup, because in my estimation, those two options were the best of the bunch.

But I never even for a second accepted 'wait and see' for Bush or the Republicans. When something stinks, it stinks.

Obama's actively defending the right to fly people into Bagram prison from other countries, hold them without trial and give them an even less transparent process than was given to Guantanamo inmates. At least the Guantanamo inmates had a sham process to appease the public. Obama's not even doing that.

If it was just Afghani prisoners I'd accept it as an inevitable consequence of a war I support as necessary.
But flying them in from other countries?

Hell no.

I'm not saying Obama's worse than Bush, and I like many things he's doing. The reversals of Bush's stem cell decisions were fantastic and on most policy fronts I'd support Obama.

That doesn't mean this isn't disgusting.

I'd love to say all is well, but we can't accept this because we 'like' Obama. If you haven't already, I'd urge you to read the link I put in the first post. It explains a helluva lot more about this.

I checked the links and I'm also concerned about this -

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/04/08/criticism/index.html

Keith Olbermann, the left-wing equivalent of Bill O'Reilly (albeit more objective, naturally) who has been an ardent supporter of Obama's, is disgusted by this too.

Obama's arguing that patriot-act style surveillance on American citizens should not only continue, but that people burned by it shouldn't be able to sue the government. Ever.

I still think Obama's far better than Bush and I think it has the potential to be the best thing for the world in a quite a while.

But only if people force it to be.
In his campaign, Obama responded to the public mood. That needs to be maintained.

TRTL. Obama is a puppet of the Global corporates.In the next few months you will realise this.He promised to repeal the Patriot Act and has done the reverse.He promised to get out of Iraq and Afghanistan but has scaled up these wars.

War is all about money.What is the point of spending $ billions on R&D and not getting a return for their actual use?It is the Reserve Banksters who now control the US Congress and they loan all the money to the US Govt,who in turn buy the weapons from the dealers.

US contractors get paid for blowing up Iraq and paid again for the reconstruction.US oil producers will also get cheap oil in the process with a lot of backhanders and nepotism to keep everyone happy.

Andrew Jackson Pres of the US 1816-36."If the American people only understood the rank injustice of our money and banking system,there would be a revolution before the morning."

Abraham Lincoln printed $400 million in green backs [debt and interest free]instead of borrowing from the International Banks.He was assassinated and congress continued to borrow from them.

Thomas Jefferson." I believe the banking institutions are more dangerous than standing armies.If the American people allow private banks to control the issue of currency,firstly by inflation and then by deflation,the banks and corps that will grow up around them,will deprive the people of all prosperity until their children will wake up homeless in the continent their fathers conquered."

Woodrow Wilson who was conned into letting the modern Fed Res own and control the US dollar was later to lament that he'd sold out his country.Wilson instigated the modern Federal Res system of banking.

JFK had actually printed $4 billion green backs in the name of congress,he was also assassinated.

The Fed Res now has strangle hold on the US political system as witnessed by the fact that only 11% or 55 members of congress have the courage to push for an audit to see what they have been up to.

http://www.larsonsworld.com/library/articles/tschauf_fedres.html

Support Ron Paul in the Auditing of the US Fed Res. http://www.ronpaul.com/

Dear Right Turn Left Turn Tenhun,
I was watching the senate select comittee on alt energy. The dates and time fraims being discussed showed me that the public is treated like mushrooms. There is only 2 ways to control people. Love or Fear. Beurocrats and the media control the politicions not vise versa. The method in use at the moment is fear. So don't worry remember you are only told what they decide you need to know. As we let God work out the future remember, God works for the good of them that love him BUT not all things are good. We are all in the same boat regardless what we chose to believe.
It is far better to count your blessings then to give your self a heart attack over something you can't change.

TRTL,

I don't believe someone like Obama could, in his heart, support or condone what's going on at Bagram.

Maybe there's a reason why he's not shutting it down. Maybe he knows that officially vetoing such an operation will just mean it pops up somewhere else ... perhaps a little closer to home. Better the devil you know? I'm guessing he's trying to make the best of a bad situation.

Fear not TurnRightThenLeft,

From the latest "Obama knows best" report:

"Moving quickly to release Chinese Uighur terrorists into the United States, Obama administration officials have, for the second time, overridden objections of federal agencies responsible for national security.

"The first time the White House overrode the inter-agency panel it created from all the national security agencies to review all the cases of the Guantanamo Bay prisoners. That panel found that the seventeen Uighurs, members of the East Turkestan Islamic Movement captured at an al-Queda training camp in Pakistan, were too dangerous to release in the United States.

"Now according to a federal agency source who requested anonymity the White House has also overridden opposition to the release from both the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security.

"Beginning yesterday and continuing today, Obama administration officials are briefing key members of Congress on the release, which may happen as early as next week. There apparently has been no decision on where the Uighurs will be turned loose. Earlier reports suggested they could be released in Alexandria, Virginia or Washington, D.C."

http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/025911.php#respond

Obama knows better than the inter-agency panel he set up and the FBI and the DHS, which is comforting to all of us to have such an omniscient leader.

So you don't have to worry anymore because the terrorists will be safe now.

"He's gonna change things...
Rearrange things...
Obama's gonna change the world."

Good news at last on Guantanamo.....

"Senate Democrats threw cold water on President Obama's plans to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center Tuesday, pulling money for the closure from a $91 billion war spending request and publicly opposing the transfer of any detainees to U.S. soil.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Democrats not only oppose the release of detainees into the United States but also oppose the transfer of detainees to U.S. prisons.

"We will never allow terrorists to be released in the United States," he said, adding: "Part of what we don't want is for them to be put in prisons in the United States. We don't want them around in the United States."

On top of that, Senate Democrats decided to pull $80 million from the war spending request -- money Obama had requested to close the detention facility by Jan. 22, 2010."

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/05/19/senate-emergency-war-spending/