"Other than the political motivations possessed by those
determined to destroy this administration, there is no reason
at this time for public hearings on this matter, especially
ones held by preening politicians."
Gitmo Will Remain An Issue For A While, Despite Tears And Apologies
By Lorie Byrd
PoliPundit.com
Everyone isn’t buying the sincerity of Dick Durbin’s apology. Still others, like Andrew Sullivan, don’t think he needed to apologize for anything in the first place. I think that the apology went far enough to remove the topic of Dick Durbin’s Gitmo comments as the top item for discussion on the conservative blogs, talk radio and the cable news shows.
The topic of Guantanamo Bay will be around for a while, though.
I watched Special Report with Brit Hume last night and saw the segment on the statements from Nancy Pelosi and some other House Democrats calling for an investigation into the Gitmo Gulag. The tightrope act they are attempting to walk is one worthy of Ringling Brothers. It is obvious that they are trying not to suffer the same fate as Dick Durbin, but the resulting statements they made were completely nonsensical. To watch them do the contortions necessary to repeat several times that they are not blaming the troops for anything that might have happened at Gitmo, but that they are interested in the “chain of command” and those administration policies that led to the purported abuses there was laughable.
Michigan representative, Republican Pete Hoekstra took to the floor of the House and made some excellent points in response to the calls for a public investigation into Gitmo abuses. He reminded Democrats that there is already an investigation going on in the Congress into abuses at Gitmo. I agree with him. I am all for investigating claims of abuse wherever they exist, but what Democrats are calling for is a televised circus where politicians could grandstand and preen and attack President Bush and Donald Rumsfeld and the rest of the Nazis they detest.
The result of such a spectacle would be to broadcast unsubstantiated claims to a world audience from a branch of the U.S. government, which would give them an air of authenticity that many of the claims, no doubt, do not deserve. No matter how hard Democrats would try to insulate “the troops” from their accusations, it would not fly. It is hard to imagine how George Bush and Don Rumsfeld could abuse prisoners, or Korans, or anything else, from long distance without involving “the troops.” Even if all the accusations were eventually found to be without merit, by giving so much television time to the claims of abuse, the world audience would be painted a picture of widespread systematic abuse by members of the American military and that would make their already difficult jobs much more dangerous and difficult to perform.
There are already lawsuits addressing the policies of holding detainees indefinitely, and other legal issues, and there are investigations underway into specific claims of abuse. Other than the political motivations possessed by those determined to destroy this administration, there is no reason at this time for public hearings on this matter, especially ones held by preening politicians.
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