Jimmy Carter: Close down Guantanamo

[adigal]

http://www.macon.com/mld/macon/news/local/states/georgia/counties/houston_peach/11836536.htm

"ATLANTA - Former President Jimmy Carter on Tuesday called for the United States to shut down its Guantanamo Bay prison to demonstrate the country's commitment to protecting human rights.

"Despite President George W. Bush's bold reminder that America is determined to promote freedom and democracy around the world, the U.S. continues to suffer terrible embarrassment and a blow to our reputation as a champion of human rights because of reports concerning abuses of prisoners in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantanamo," Carter said in a news conference following the close of a two-day human rights conference at his Atlanta center.

In addition to closing Guantanamo Bay and two dozen other secret detention facilities, the former president said the United States needs to make sure no detainees are held incommunicado and that they all be told the charges against them.

His other recommendations included that the United States stop transferring detainees to foreign countries where torture has been reported and that an independent commission be created to investigate where terrorism suspects are held in U.S. custody.

Carter also said the United States should reaffirm its commitment to due process and international law, and assure that the Geneva Conventions on the treatment of prisoners are enforced."

OOOOHHH, Chimpy is not going to like this and Limbaugh and Hannity's hair is going to be on fire.

More: "Carter said many countries, including the United States, are using the campaign against terrorism as an excuse to restrict freedoms and silence human rights activists.

"In fact, combating terrorism, defending human rights and ensuring our collective security go hand in hand," Carter said."

Watch the screaming begin, folks.

[WI_DEM]

1. Carter is right as usual

Also, we shouldn't be condeming other nations elections when our own elections are full of irregularities.

[Spectral]

3. Yes he is. Carter is such a good man. Recommended

Go Jimmy!!

[Jack Rabbit]

2. "Limbaugh and Hannity's hair is going to be on fire"

Get ready for some vicious ad Hominem attacks from Limbaugh, Hannity and other stars of right wing hate radio.

They'll call Carter every name in the book and point out that he wasn't a terribly effective President (and I'll even agree with them on that up to a point, but it's still a red herring).

They'll do everything but address the charges that the US is engaging in crimes against humanity in Bush's network of offshore prisons, that this network is in and of itself a violation of the Geneva Conventions, that "illegal combatant" is not a term found in any body of international law and that the Third Geneva Convention unequivocally states that until a court rules otherwise, any combat detainee is to be regarded as a prisoner of war.

[ieoeja]

4. As to Carter's ineffectiveness while President ...

... I have a friend who was stationed in the Pentagon in 1980. He said people were NOT happy with Carter. He was still in touch with people there in the early 90s when they started singing a different tune.

When the Arab nations rallied behind the United States against Iraq during the Gulf War, the refrain they heard over and over again was, "we trust the United States because of all the great things Carter did in the Middle East when he was President".

It turns out that sometimes being nice to people ends up paying dividends. What a weird concept.

[Jack Rabbit]

5. Thank you. That is worth mentioning

I won't retract my statement. Effectiveness, after all, is not a toggle switch; it is a something that can be measured.

Carter was far from being one of our truly great presidents. It seemed that he spent four years spinning his wheels and never quite getting a handle on things. I was in my late twenties while he was in office and I remember being frustrated at out-of-control rising prices while trying to start a family; his inability to get his initiatives through a Congress controlled by his own party left me believing that it would not be hard to find somebody better. If the Republicans had nominated any candidate other than Ronald Reagan in 1980, I would have seriously considered voting for him.

In Carter's defense, he wasn't handed a rosy economy when he took office. Nevertheless, he didn't deal effectively with the problems and there is no one he can blame for it but himself.

Yet Carter also had his triumphs, most notably at Camp David. Making human rights a centerpiece of US foreign policy made me proud to be an American, even if at times I thought he was backsliding on that commitment.

Carter is a decent man whose only real competitor for the title greatest former president ever is John Qunicy Adams, another remarkable man whose tenure in the White House fails to make him a serious candidate for Mt. Rushmore.

[Lisa]

6. "being nice to people" -- who'd a' thunk it?

Great post, ieoeja. Despite the current administration's efforts to paint the rest of the world (especially the Middle East) as irrational ingrates, they forget (or more likely, don't want anyone to remember) that there was a time when many, many countries looked up to the US. The high regard for the US was such that, even when the CIA or US business interests indulged in dirty tricks overseas during the Cold War, a lot of people simply refused to believe it.

My friends in Iran, for example, loathed the British as colonial occupiers -- but thought Americans were fair-minded, generous, and would surely help their country achieve democracy. Even after it was revealed that CIA people like Kermit Roosevelt had been instrumental in getting rid of their left-leaning (elected) government and bringing in the Shah as dictator -- the moderates were convinced that the British had conned the US into helping them. It took decades of repression by the CIA-backed Shah before people became suspicious and resentful of the US.

During the rebuilding of Europe and Japan after the war -- other countries saw how much money the US was spending. Not just that, but there were all those graveyards full of GIs who'd died liberating tiny European villages. And the Americans weren't going around demanding money from the recovering countries, or insisting that US companies get fat juicy contracts (hear that, Halliburton?).

Bush's people are swaggering around, acting as if their ideas (plus a big arsenal) made it all happen. But having lots of friends is far more important for becoming a cultural and economic superpower than bullying the rest of the world -- and Bush can't take credit for that. Quite the reverse, in fact. As a non-American, I find it upsetting that Bush is coasting along on the goodwill created by previous generations of Americans. Instead of building on it, he's trashing it -- but is seemingly oblivious to the damage.

[jean]

7. they'll defame our venerable Dems and we'll let them. If we so much

as look sideways at any of theirs, like Reagan, the reaction is overkill.

We need to be exquisitely touchy about the right wing defaming our people - and react with outrage, just as they do.

[babylonsister]

8. All great posts! You've pointed out more reasons to

hope Bolton is not confirmed; he will exacerbate the ill will. That's one of my major fears.