Obama promised to close Gitmo; so why is it worse?

Posted by Kromey at 3:51pm Mar 12 '13
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A further demonstration of the Obama administration's resolve to keep open Guantanamo and maintain the indefinite incarceration its prisoners came in the reassignment, in January, of Special Envoy Dan Fried. The man tasked with finding new homes for Guantanamo prisoners -- a role described as "the most thankless job in Washington" -- was notified early this year of his impending transfer and the abolition of his former post. In closing the special envoy position and transferring its portfolio to a State Department legal department ill-equipped to handle it, Obama has sent a clear message that he intends to maintain the present situation at the prison indefinitely.

Furthermore, the continued denial of access to Guantanamo prisoners for UN torture investigators has made clear that there will be neither a change in detainees' conditions nor any accounting for abuses. For the men at Guantanamo, the message is straightforward: whether they have been cleared for release or not, their freedom will not be forthcoming and their circumstances at Guantanamo will only get worse under this administration.

The hopelessness of indefinite detention -- characterized by permanent separation from family and the banishment of the prospect of returning to a normal life -- naturally has a deleterious effect on prisoners' well-being. Coupled with increased harassment and humiliation by camp guards, this situation is today manifesting in the supremely desperate act of protest represented in the present mass hunger strike by detainees. That this increasingly draconian reality at Guantanamo has occurred during the tenure of Barack Obama, a man who based his very election in part on a pledge to close the prison, is a tragic irony. It also represents a moral failure on the part of Obama's liberal supporters who excoriated George W Bush for his operation of the camp, but have remained largely acquiescent with President Obama's entrenchment and intensification of his predecessors policies. [Emphasis added.]

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For those who have experienced and borne witness to beatings, torture, and even death at Guantanamo Bay over the past decade, Barack Obama has ensured that the prospect of freedom will remain as remote as ever.

This is the man who has increased raids on medical marijuana dispensaries and raw milk farms, introduced us to indefinite detention, ramped up drone strikes (outside of any war zone, and while somehow managing not a hint of irony in his condemnation of "constant missile strikes" at Israel), re-authorized the PATRIOT Act, defended and even accelerated domestic spying, ramped up the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan despite promising the exact opposite, and hypocritically dove into a war in clear violation of the War Powers Act -- after denouncing Bush for doing the same!

Yet more evidence that Obama is an enemy of civil liberties -- unless it's re-election time and you happen to be gay, of course.