At 10:23 PM -0700 18/2/09, Chris Gehlker wrote:
>On Feb 18, 2009, at 9:27 PM, David Cake wrote:
>
>> Charles is right. The 88% figure is an upper bound on the
>> number of Gitmo inmates who were innocent.
>
>History is replete with examples where imprisoning moderate opponents
>of a given regime radicalized them.
True. I guess it depends on what he meant by "returns to".
Given that you'd have to be more or less insane to reconnect with a
covert terrorist network when you've just got out of Gitmo (no matter
what your commitment to the cause, you'd have to conclude you are
going to get undue interest from security services), I suspect what
he means is 'goes back to working for the Taliban', which is what
most of them were doing before they were picked up.
It is certainly possible that some of them used to just
casually hang out with the Taliban, and now are hard core terrorist
for the Taliban, but it is pushing it.
But I think there is way too much emphasis on examining the
numbers inplied by an off-hand remark from the prince of darkness --
my point was that even if he is right, Gitmo was still unjustifiable,
so why argue about exactly to what extent he is right?
>
>> Indeed, desperate acts of grotesque inhumanity often have
>> that effect. They are probably now occupied with, say, rebuilding
>> their shattered lives, recuperating from torture, or maybe
>> campaigning for justice.
>
>Many may indeed have been too debilitated to engage in actual armed
>resistance but that was just Chuck's spin. Cheney said ""gone back
>into the business of being terrorists." Cheney has made it clear that
>he considers anyone who lends financial or even moral support to any
>organization he considers terrorist is himself a terrorist.
Indeed.
For the most part those in Gitmo were those picked up
actually in Aghanistan, but exactly what they were doing there is
another question. There are certainly organisations which proclaim
humanitarian goals that Cheney at least would consider terrorist.
Cheers
David
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