Mr. President, Close. Down. That. Prison...

The Government Accountability Office ("GAO") found that the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba can be safely closed and the remaining prisoners transferred to prisons on US soil with no ill effects. This should be done immediately. First off, this was a promise made by President Obama before his FIRST term in office, yet we are still discussing it (barely) four years later. One of the prime reasons for using Guantanamo was for security reasons and as a means to keep these enemy combatants from having the right to habeas corpus. With the GAO largely dismissing the security concerns and those combatants left are mostly being held without charges, why is it still open?

With everyone currently raving about Lincoln, rightfully so having seen it myself, there is an applicable part of the movie where President Lincoln is discussing with his cabinet the various things he has done because he felt them necessary and right despite the possibility of the actions being unconstitutional. He was mainly referring to the Emancipation Proclamation but of equal import was his suspension of habeas corpus using his powers as a war time President. These powers were again evoked, with a nod towards President Lincoln and the exigencies required by war, after the attacks of September 11th. The difference between the two, however, is that unlike the Civil War, the Authorization for Use of Military Force that followed the 9/11 attacks and preceded the official War on Terror is very open ended. Thus, the suspension of habeas corpus for those at Guantanamo Bay, and many previously at Guantanamo have been found to have done nothing related to terrorist activity but were simply picked up during the fog of war, remains open ended.

The point of that previous paragraph's aside being, President Obama did not open Guantanamo for that use and has no skin in the game. His promise to close the prison is now almost half a decade old and the GAO has stated that it is more than plausible to safely close it and transfer the prisoners to the continental U.S. So, does President Obama recognize the moral hazards of making decisions that may exist in the gray area where the President's war powers and the unconstitutionality meet like President Lincoln did? And, if so, why is the prison still open at the same time the President is winding down the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan?

Basically, Mr. President, please do as you promised and close down that prison.


IMAGE: Wikipedia.com

Addington, Yoo Have To Be Sharting Me

Look upon the above visages if you dare, as they are they are the physical manifestation of pure evil (he said with only a bit of hyperbole...). Recently, President Obama used recess appointments to appoint a new head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and two new members to the National Labor Relations Board. Appointments that were being blocked from a vote by Congressional machinations that would've shut down both agencies. Some Constitutional Law experts at Harvard, believe that the President acted well within the scope of his Constitutional powers in doing so. David Addington, he of the unitary executive theory, and John Yoo, the rationalizer of torture, however, are all up in arms about the appointments calling it "chilling" that the President is making such "sweeping claim[s]."

Keep in mind, these are two men who, during the presidency of George W. Bush, did everything they could to expand executive power. This includes institutionalizing torture during their administration and claiming that the President could do virtually whatever he wanted as long as it was during "times of war." But it is completely out of bounds that President Obama is using recess appointments? As recess appointments have along history dating back to the beginning of our country where a President would keep the work of government going by making appointments during a Congressional recess, a new method to prevent appointments has been utilize where only one Senator would show up for "pro forma" sessions of the Senate. The idea is that while there is an actual recess going on, recess appointments cannot be made because these pro forma appearances mean that the Senate is in session. It is a cheap way to make sure that there never has to be an up and down vote on Presidential appointments. Considering what those two ass clowns above instituted during the previous administration, they have some real brass balls to come forward with these asinine objections now. I almost respect it if I didn't think they are up there among the most evil, motherless rat bastards on this Earth...