libertango | Entries tagged with guantanamo

From Clay Shirky (tweeting as @cshriky), I learn Newt Gingrich tweeted the following:

"Rendering Miranda rights to terrorists on foreign soil is amazing We are in a war The terrorists are enemies not criminals"

At which point, I have to employ Cameron's Skepticism:

"You can tell me all day that you believe that there's a giant, pink, flying dragon chained up in your back yard, but if you never go in your back yard and put food and water out, I'm going to assume that you don't actually believe that."

That is, Newt can tell me all day he thinks terrorists are enemies not criminals, but if he never calls for Roeder and Von Brunn to be shipped to Guantánamo as terrorists, I'm going to assume that he doesn't actually believe that.

"1 in 7 Detainees Freed Returns to Terrorism, Pentagon Says," reads the headline.

So the alternate headline (studiously avoided): "6 out of 7 Detainees Freed Either Don't Return to Terrorism, Or Were Never Terrorists From Start, Pentagon Says."

Also buried well into the article:

"Terrorism experts said that a 14 percent recidivism rate was far lower than the rate for prisoners in the United States, which, they said, can run as high as 68 percent three years after release. The experts also said that while Americans might have a lower level of tolerance for recidivism among Guantánamo detainees, there was no evidence that any of those released had engaged in elaborate operations like the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks."

So to recap:

* Joe Criminal from the US, let out of jail: more than 2 out of 3 times, goes back to crime.

* Alleged "worst of the worst" Guantánamo detainee: goes back to crime only 1 out of 7 times. Or almost 5 times less often.

{blink}

This must be some new-found definition of "worst" I wasn't previously aware of.

I've long thought the best approach to the Cuba problem was to throw open the commercial floodgates, and essentially kill them with kindness.

But this piece in Newsweek by Patrick Symmes goes one better by leveraging an asset we already have on the island: Guantánamo.

Hey, if it worked for Hong Kong vis-à-vis China...

"The way to bring radical change to Cuba is to return Guantánamo Bay to the Cubans—but not to the Castros. The Miami-based diaspora of some 1.6 million Cuban-born people and their offspring could turn the base into something many of them love dearly: a business opportunity. As a tax-free, duty-free, open-trade zone run by Cuban-Americans for the benefit of their brethren on the island, Guantánamo Bay could become a model for a new Cuba, a place where fair dealing, the rule of law and free speech are the norm. By starting businesses catering to Cubans, and later opening factories to employ them, Cuban-Americans would bring normal rights onto Cuban soil. Open the border at Gitmo, initiate trade and the Castro regime's stranglehold would start to crumble."

*^*^*

Originally posted at my blog on business matters, Not That Kind of Operation.

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Hal O'Brien

Slipping on the fatal floor.

Entries tagged with guantanamo

Hypocrisy strikes again

Innumeracy in action

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