Obama Gitmo Draft Executive Order Working Thread
As I indicated in comments, I have a copy of the supposed final draft of Obama’s Executive order on Guantanamo. Perhaps I will append the main post later, but i want to get it up now. Especially since William Ockham reports that the ACLU has beat me to the punch. That is what I get for actually driving home and opening a bottle of wine for my wife I guess. Go figure.
Here it is. See you in comments to dissect it. Hey, you know, this change stuff is a lot of fun eh?
I sometimes wish I were an attorney, but only sometimes. As I read the draft, I find some good, some bad, some obscure to me.
The good? It makes an effort to bring a “prompt” closing to Guantanamo, though whether that effort is prompt enough is another question. CCR doesn’t think it is. It claims that everyone — and that includes so-called unlawful enemy combatants — are subject to Geneva (although it states only Common Article 3, not the Civilian Convention to which all who aren’t official POWs are entitled).
The bad? Oversight rests too much with the Secretary of Defense and the intelligence agencies, especially as regards disposition of cases. The Attorney General, as the one in charge of such reviews, will play the key role, and maybe the others will be subordinated to only supplying documentation, but I’m not too sanguine.
Also, the Secretary of Defense is put in charge of determining that conditions at Gitmo meet humane standards (Geneva). This is the same Secretary of Defense who believes Appendix M of the Army Field Manual meets Geneva standards. Uh-oh.
The obscure? The question of trials for the defendants. The military commissions are effectively suspended, but not dismantled.
Also, what does it mean when it says:
All in all, an improvement for sure over what came before, but it’s far from being a full renunciation of previous policy, at least as practiced de facto.
Maybe others see more of the glass half full than I do.
Yeah, I saw Section (c)(4) as “we don’t know what to do with these types of folks yet, so check back later”.
And I suspect that a fair percentage of the current detainees are going to fall into this black hole.
It is almost a given that there are a few bad apples in Gitmo (how many, we don’t know), and also that because of their treatment, virtually all of the evidence against these bad apples is tainted.
Say you’re on the vice squad in Metropolis, and there’s a serial killer on the loose. He’s already killed at least 12 people, probably more, in some grisly and horrible way. And his victims are all Nice People. One of your vice squads cracks the case, but in such a way that the evidence for every single one of those murders is compromised.
Whaddya do? If you let him go, you know its just a matter of time before he kills again. And yet you’ve got no legal grounds to hold him, do you?
Maybe the answer is to release the villain– but without telling him, you put a tail on him. By now, with the tainted evidence, you know his M.O., so your tail gathers the evidence — cleanly, legally this time. Costs a fortune, but hey. You set him up, and then (hopefully) spring the trap before he actually kills someone.
But with our “guilty but tainted” prisoners, we don’t really have the assets to tail them like this, do we?
Wouldn’t we do better to go the “nice cop” route, help them in every way we can, shower them with kindnesses, and attempt to buy their cooperation? You know, the kind of stuff that actually works with these people? This would be the right time to try some of that. Do a complete change of contact personnel on them, send nice new “Obama cops and lawyers” to work with them, apologizing for the terrible things that Dirty Dick and Gruesome George did to them. Maybe even turn some of them into assets?
I haven’t seen much about this kind of “solution” to the “bad prisoner” problem. Maybe I don’t read the right blogs. What would work?
Bob in HI
You make him live with a guy who has killed at least 1.4 million people, possibly more, many in ghastly grisly ways. Many of his victims were really, really nice people. The evidence is sitting there, waiting to be assessed by a whole bunch of new hires after the police department went through thorough sweeping up of the old hands who could have given a shit, because a lot of his victims weren’t White.
You make him liv with George Bush.
I think you identified the key paragraph. This leaves wiggle room for something other than trial in the federal courts.
Along these lines in Section 3:
This would seem to leave open detention in another US facility not on US soil. I would think, for example, Bagram or Diego Garcia would qualify under this description.
You have confirmed my suspicions. Remember when Laurence Tribe floated an idea for a “hybrid” judicial system, i.e., “a new legal system to handle the classified information inherent in some of the most sensitive cases.” This sounded to me suspiciously like Mukasey’s call for “terrorist courts”, made in the WSJ back in August 2007. (I wrote an article on this a few months back.)
I smell a rat. I hope I’m wrong.
Your point about where they would send detainees is important, too. Note in Section 8 of the draft this lovely tidbit:
That is, not at Guantanamo. So if you are at Baghram, Diego Garcia, or on some prison ship, you’re hell out of luck. Also, it seems, if you were at the Charleston Naval Brig, for that matter.
Wife first, Guantanamo second. As it should be.
Are you suggesting that you didn’t have a glass of wine with your wife? Sure, blame it on her!
I don’t understand the document’s declaration that closing down Gitmo now (without first a prompt and thorough review of each detainee’s case) is not in the best interest of the United States, especially since by 1 year from today, when Gitmo SHALL be closed, any left over prisoners shall be moved somewhere else until we can figure out what to do with them.
I don’t understand why closing Gitmo should be the way Obama is judged on the detainees. There’s plenty of other places where he could make then disappear. Gitmo’s a symbol, but only a symbol.
agreed, but for the moment Gitmo is Bush’s creation. If I were Obama, I’d want to move the humans out of the gulag and into a proper legal venue. Symbolism counts.
Sure, symbolism counts, but not for much unless it is indicative of addressing the underlying problem. I also don’t understand why it will take a year to close Gitmo. None of the “reasons” so far advanced make any sense to me.
The new admin will get all the B.C. Bud it can handle … suddenly, giving up Nicotine doesn’t seem like such
a big deal.
This bud’s for you!
Good one. If only we could all have our bud and not be harrassed or arrested by the man. The top rated question for John Boener’s upcoming boner session at digg regards legalizing mj. A few Ron Paul supporters posit the question in varied ways.
I’ll trade you 65 kilos of Alaska sarah for a couple of ounces of BC bud – no questions asked.
OT – CNN shows that President Obama re-took the oath of office, again from Justice Roberts.
So there you fookin’ wingnuts! Spit!
I have a question about the last paragraph of the document. Paragraph C in Sec 8 General Provisions:
Does this mean if any torture videos, for example, are uncovered during the prompt and thorough review of a prisoner, said prisoner is not shuttled off to freedom with a copy packed in his bags to be used in a future world court?
Well none of this is startin’ until next week at the earliest.
Did you read your email?
No, but I will right now.
Check your email with my response.
That was for bmaz # 14.
Just catching the NewsHour, Jack Keane and Wesley Clark are on discussing Obama’s 16 month withdrawal and both are trying to walk it back as much as possible. Keane wants only 2 brigades out by the end of the year. Clark talks about how even after the removal of the 16 combat brigades troops will likely remain in Iraq. One of the more disingenuous aspects of this is that some combat brigades could simply be renamed.
All in all, two warmonkeys who don’t want to leave Iraq.
This executive order cannot be put into effect until we have an Attorney General.
The Atty General is to “coordinate” the review of detainees, assisted by
(
So, yes, the review cannot commence, I suppose, until Holder (or someone else) is confirmed. But that only delays things a few weeks or so. What is your opinion re the composition of this review committee. I think it is dubious, and only a good atty general could possible make the outcome something halfway trustworthy.
Actually I think the composition the committee is good. Bringing in all the relevant bureacratic players is essential to having a defensible solution. All these departments need to have skin in the game to prevent sandbagging or surprise problems down the road.
After eight years of the Bush Cheney regime, I understand everybody’s cynicism, but I think there’s reason to be more hopeful. This looks to me like Obama pushed the bureacracy as far as it’s capable of going right now. Much will depend on us and our representatives (even though one of my Senators is John ‘I just love me some torture’ Cornyn). We need to keep the pressure on. Part of Obama’s strategy for the FOIA memorandum is warn the bureacracy that we’ll be keeping our eyes on them. Untangling this mess will take time, but it’ll happen faster if and only if we push it.
Thanks. You make a good point. I wish there were someone from, say, CCR to observe this mess, and not have to wait for FOIA to monitor six or twelve months down the line.
W/O, I’m also a Texan. How do we make Cornyn understand that he represents US and no longer Bush/Cheney. I don’t believe that the majority of Texans approve of his obstructing the AG confirmation as he is doing.
When I write to him all I get back (weeks later) is a form letter which insults my intelligence. I told him so, too.
Is there an Acting Attorney General?
From wiki:
Filip was the Deputy Attorney General (No. 2) under Mukasey.
Just one last expression of disappointment that no Executive Orders have been put up at the White House site. I mean if they are being disseminated in other ways, they could still be put up there and just listed as drafts. What is so hard about that?
are they showing up in the federal register? That thing is all online
Executive Orders have been posted at whitehouse.gov now –
Re “national security courts” which is what seems to be possible under a reading of the draft, according to G. Greenwald’s column today such “national security courts” are being “aggressively advocated by newly-appointed Deputy Solicitor General Neal Katyal”.
Gotta go read that. Are they Article III courts??
Article III courts? I don’t know. I told you, there are times I wish I were an attorney. Who determines if a court is an Article III court? When I look at that section of the Constitution, it’s not clear to me.
Executive Orders So far executive branch ethics and document handling
My pressing question is:
What does this have to do with the NFC Champion(woo!woo!) Cardinals?
No matter what the entire location needs to be treated as a crime scene. I am very worried about retaliation fro guards on POWS. There need to be observers there now!
DMay there be light in all the black holes and the shame become a movement that will reform our national legal system.
Yep.
That phrase ‘other type of federal facility’ could mean in some cases mental institutions for those detainees whose minds have been destroyed by the torture and mind control methods they have endured at GITMO. What do we do with them?
Then, there are probably some (many?) who committed no chargeable offense prior to being swept up in mass arrests, but who now are dedicated Johadists as a result of their treatment and what they have observed at GITMO. What do we do with them?
I don’t trust Robert Gates. He was Director of CIA under Reagan when some of the dirtiest deeds were secretly done by CIA.