Posting for David Goldstein:
Guantanamo was one of the issues du jour on the Sunday talkfests today.
National Security Advisor Jim Jones said the White House has “every intention” of meeting President Obama’s January deadline to close the detention camp in Cuba and relocate the prisoners to an American facility.
“I think we will,” he said on CBS’ Face the Nation. “I think there are some things on the table we can’t talk about right now.”
On Fox News Sunday, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky warned that Guantanamo was “not broke” and that the president would meet resistance.
“I think Congress will be on, a bipartisan basis, aggressively opposing efforts to change it,” he said.
The military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Ks. and a maximum security prison in Michigan have emerged as two potential replacement sites for Guantanamo.
But the political leadership in Kansas, including its two Republican senators, Pat Roberts and Sam Brownback, is strongly lobbying against the idea.
Democratic Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan said on CBS that his state would accept the detainees. He said he didn’t see why a maximum security facility couldn’t handle them.
Levin said he agrees with the White House that the detention camp should be shut down. Former President George W. Bush, leading military officials and several former secretaries of state back the idea as well, he
noted.
“Guantanamo has been used by terrorists as a training tool,” said Levin, who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee. “It is a security threat as long as we keep it open.”
Does our country have no maximum security pension? What is the need for Guantanamo to stay for some very few numbers of terrorists or others? The more Guantanamo stayed the more we pay for unnecessary cost and the more haters to America is continuing.
Posted by: Girma | August 18, 2009 at 01:29 PM
Good for you, Senator Levin. We need not fold to those with cartilage as backbone. We have to demonstrate that our rule of law will guide us and not the fear of terrorists. The fear of our enemies appears to drive those who would resist the closure of Gitmo.
Posted by: Bill Keller | August 10, 2009 at 09:24 PM