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Faith Leaders Laud Obama for Torture Ban

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sabra Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 11:23 AM
Original message
Faith Leaders Laud Obama for Torture Ban
Source: Christian Post

President Barack Obama won the praises of some religious leaders on Thursday when he signed executive orders to close the controversial U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, within a year, ban torture and end the CIA’s secret overseas prisons.

The executive orders signed by the new president on his second day at the helm sought to send a message to the world that the United States will not tolerate torture and will abide by domestic and international laws concerning the treatment of detainees.

“The religious community has labored faithfully for three years to end U.S.-sponsored torture,” said the president of the interfaith group National Religious Campaign Against Torture, Linda Gustitus. “We are grateful today for this important step. The dark, dark days of the past are behind us, and we all must work to make sure they never return again.”

NRCAT had urged Obama to issue an executive order to end torture on his first day as President. As part of their campaign to end U.S. practice of torture, the group featured a countdown clock on its Web site that counted up from Obama’s first day in office to track how long it takes the new administration to ban torture.

Read more: http://christianpost.com/Society/Ethics_rights/2009/01/faith-leaders-laud-obama-for-torture-ban-23/



http://jta.org/news/article/2009/01/22/1002460/jewish-groups-praise-orders-prohibiting-torture-closing-gitmo

Jewish groups praise torture ban, Gitmo closing


WASHINGTON (JTA) -- Two U.S. Jewish groups and an interfaith coalition hailed President Barack Obama's executive orders closing the Guantanamo Bay detention center and prohibiting torture.

"The decision to close Guantanamo and end U.S-sponsored torture gives us hope that we are on a path to restoring principles of justice that have been set aside for far too long," said Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, in a statement. "These executive orders send a clear statement of a return to the principles that have made the United States of America a beacon of freedom and democracy to the world."

The Jewish Council for Public Affairs, the umbrella body for public policy groups, also praised the orders, calling it a "welcome move toward restoring the American and Jewish ideals of human dignity and respect.

"By signing these orders during the first days of his presidency, President Obama has indicated that upholding human rights will be a central pillar of his administration’s national security and foreign policies," the group said in a statement.
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Hope And Change Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 11:33 AM
Response to Original message
1. K & R!
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BeFree Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 11:34 AM
Response to Original message
2. OMG!
They are coming out of the closet! Hide!
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bluestateguy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 11:35 AM
Response to Original message
3. I await the laudatory praise from the Southern Baptist Convention...
and I can wait a long time too.
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ck4829 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 11:49 AM
Response to Reply #3
5. I was about to post something on that
I wonder what Richard Land, the guy who wrote the "Land Letter" (the statement by Christian Right leaders which basically authorized Bush to pillage Iraq), has to say about this.
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LiberalFighter Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 01:55 PM
Response to Reply #5
12. Should be fair to pillage Land and his supporters.
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laissezfairesucks1 Donating Member (5 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 11:42 AM
Response to Original message
4. It's Not Exactly a Ban
I have read some of the finer print in the coverage of this and apparently there is a clause in the order allowing the Pentagon to review the methods of interrogation to determine if we need stronger methods, which some would interpret as a backdoor means of torture. Obama seems to be having it both ways. He could close Gitmo TONIGHT, and transfer all the "enemy combatants" to a Federal prison and grant them habeus corpus tomorrow, but a year is a long time. He has also suspended their trials for 90 days which seems counter intuitive for one whose promise was to be Constitutionally progressive. Maybe I'm wrong here but the media spin is clouding the exact nature of Obama's actions.
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Schema Thing Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 12:18 PM
Response to Reply #4
6. It is explicitly a ban, and no, he could not shut Gitmo "TONIGHT".


Deal with reality. Obama as to.
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Vattel Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 12:29 PM
Response to Reply #4
8. A post providing more details would be valuable
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azul Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 12:25 PM
Response to Original message
7. WTF were these voices of moral authority when we needed them?
Oh yea, they were screaming bloody murder but the MSM shut them out?
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4_TN_TITANS Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 01:19 PM
Response to Reply #7
9. “The religious community has labored faithfully for three years"...
I'm with you - WTF? Where were these voices before Nov. 09?
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shrike Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 10:00 AM
Response to Reply #7
14. Yes n/t
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apnu Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 01:23 PM
Response to Original message
10. I wonder how they'll feel about the reversal of the abortion ban?
:popcorn:
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nichomachus Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 01:31 PM
Response to Original message
11. Can we please dispense with the "faith" propaganda word from the Bush Crime Family
They invented that as a way to try to disguise the fact they were funneling taxpayer money to churches in violation of the Constitution. "Faith-based groups" "faith-based initiative" and various other crap.

Please say "church" leaders or "religious leaders"
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OneBlueSky Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-23-09 11:11 PM
Response to Original message
13. caution, friends . . . just because Obama says that torture is no longer permitted . . .
Edited on Fri Jan-23-09 11:11 PM by OneBlueSky
does not mean that our spooks and the renegade parts of our military are necessarily going to stop torturing . . . for some of them, it's just too much fun . . .
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