Former Club Gitmo Guest Killed in Afghan Raid

This is one of those terrorist celebrities used as a mascot by the so-called "human rights" groups, decried by the left as an anonymous victim. Of course, as soon as we go and free the guy he takes up arms against us once again.

Well, not any more.

A former Guantanamo Bay detainee sent home to Afghanistan took up arms with al Qaeda -- and, like Osama bin Laden, he ended up shot dead by US soldiers, military officials announced.

Sabar Lal Melma was killed when he emerged with an AK-47 on Friday night as US soldiers scaled the walls of his home in Jalalabad, officials said.

Melma, 49, was a "key affiliate of the al Qaeda network" in contact with senior members of the terrorist network in Afghanistan and Pakistan, according to a NATO statement.

Melma was said to have been one of bin Laden's commanders during the anti-Soviet jihad in Afghanistan.

After the demise of the Taliban, he became a brigadier general in the Afghan army, responsible for border security in Kunar province.

He was seized in August 2002.

He was questioned on suspicion of being involved in rocket attacks on US troops and of helping bin Laden flee his stronghold in the Tora Bora mountains.

Info From Club Gitmo Detainees Eventually Led to bin Laden Killing

For all the caterwauling over the years about "harsh" interrogation techniques at Guantanamo Bay, it must pain the New York Times to acknowledge that information obtained there eventually led us to Osama bin Laden.

Detainees at the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, had given the courier’s pseudonym to American interrogators and said that the man was a protégé of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the confessed mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.

American intelligence officials said Sunday night that they finally learned the courier’s real name four years ago, but that it took another two years for them to learn the general region where he operated.

Still, it was not until August when they tracked him to the compound in Abbottabad, a medium-sized city about an hour’s drive north of Islamabad, the capital.

C.I.A. analysts spent the next several weeks examining satellite photos and intelligence reports to determine who might be living at the compound, and a senior administration official said that by September the C.I.A. had determined there was a “strong possibility” that Bin Laden himself was hiding there.

It was hardly the spartan cave in the mountains where many had envisioned Bin Laden to be hiding. Rather, it was a mansion on the outskirts of the town’s center, set on an imposing hilltop and ringed by 12-foot-high concrete walls topped with barbed wire.

The property was valued at $1 million, but it had neither a telephone nor an Internet connection. Its residents were so concerned about security that they burned their trash rather putting it on the street for collection like their neighbors.

While the death of bin Laden came on Barack Obama's watch, let's not forget George W. Bush remained steadfast all those years while the left whined and moaned about Club Gitmo.

Stunner: Berkeley Moonbats Vote Against Welcoming Club Gitmo Detainees

Don't worry, though, they've still got their anti-American street cred. They did vote to support Wikileaks traitor Bradley Manning.

In a marathon meeting Tuesday night, Berkeley's City Council split on two controversial resolutions, unanimously approving a measure in support of alleged Wikileaker Bradley Manning, but narrowly voting down one that would invite former Guantanamo detainees to settle in the city.

Neither measure — both of which have drawn national attention, not to mention making Berkeley quite a few friends at Fox News and its ilk — was even discussed before the four-hour mark, but when they were, it was about as much of a nail-biter as a city council meeting can be.

A slightly revised version of the Manning measure, which still called for an end to the alleged mistreatment of the Army private but broadened the language to clarify support for all human rights, not just Manning's, passed unanimously. (That version was itself a revised edition: the original, which was introduced in December, called Manning a "hero," but was since watered down.)

Good thing they support all humans. Except those on the right or who work for the evil Fox News.

The second measure, which called for an end to the US's policy disallowing Guantamo detainees from living in the United States and invited two unspecifiied detainees (who'd been cleared of wrongdoing) to settle in the city, didn't fare so well, however. After another long public comment session, at which all but one person expressed unequivocal support for the measure, Councilmember Linda Maio, with three minutes left on the clock, introduced a substitute that essentially acknowledged the incompatibility between Berkeley's proposed measure and the US government's stance and amended the measure to say that the council would re-examine the matter when it was possible to take action under federal law.

After the meeting, Maio told The Express that she proposed the substitute precisely because of the outsize scrutiny the city and the council has been getting. "I wanted the media to get a message from Berkeley that wasn't a one-liner," she said.

She's misunderstood. Berkeley isn't a one-line. It's a punchline.

NY Times: Club Gitmo a Violation of International Law Under Bush; Under Obama: 'A Step Toward Fairness'

Someone needs to send a team of chiropractors over to the New York Times. After bending over backwards and contorting themselves into pretzels there's going to be a lot of spinal damage. This rationale and excuse-making for Barack Obama is astonishing.

This country continues to pay a high price in both security and reputation for the Bush administration’s many violations of international law at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. After more than a year of review, the Obama administration is preparing an executive order intended to resolve the situation of four dozen prisoners in the prison there who are caught in a legal limbo: they cannot be freed because they are considered a potentially serious terrorist threat, and they cannot be tried because the evidence against them is classified or was improperly obtained, often through torture.

The proposed order could give these prisoners a form of legal representation and a system to review their cases. It would not remove the tarnish to the American justice system of holding prisoners without trial. But it could represent a significant step forward in dealing with these cases and possibly reducing their number.

The order, which could be signed by the president as early as next month, would require periodic review of each prisoner’s case by a kind of parole board drawn from agencies throughout the executive branch and not just the military.

So now after dithering for two years, Obama's accomplished nothing toward his declared goal of closing down Club Gitmo and will leave these monsters in limbo. Yet according to the Times, it's the fault of the Pelosi Congress or something.

President Obama’s plan to close Guantánamo — thwarted by Congress — had always recognized that there would be a small core of prisoners who could not be tried because of the nature of the evidence against them or the illegal way that evidence was obtained.

Thwarted by Congress? Huh? They fail to explain how Congress thwarted anything, and Obama could have issued an executive order two years ago to close it, yet he lacked the courage to do so. But now, in keeping with all the sugar-plum fantasies of the NY Times editorial board, Obama's plan to keep the joint open is, ahem, fairness.

To continue with military operations, the president will probably have to swallow his objections and sign the bill. Over the next year, he must work harder to persuade Congress not to interfere with the work of bringing fairness to the justice system at Guantánamo. As Mr. Obama rightly argued when discussing the detentions last week, “We have these core ideals that we observe — even when it’s hard.”

That's right. Our national security be damned. We must have fairness in dealing with wanton killers.

Naturally, they ignore the tremendous recidivism rate of freed Club Gitmo guests. I guess that doesn't help their argument for fairness.

H/T Spitfire Murphy.

Gibbs: It's Up to GOP to Help Us Close Club Gitmo or Something

Apparently one the of the major promises made by Barack Obama is being held up by those old meanie Republicans.

These people really have no shame.

Closing the Guantanamo Bay prison was one of then-Sen. Obama's major campaign promises during the 2008 presidential race and it has been a key issue for members of his liberal base, which has at times been put off by the White House's plans of action on their priorities.

The Obama administration had spent much of 2009 attempting to find a way to close the military prison that houses 174 detainees, but were unable to find enough support in Congress to open a prison on the U.S. mainland or settle on a location to hold civilian trials for some prisoners.

Gibbs said that President Obama is looking for Republican cooperation to close the prison.

"I think part of this depends on the Republicans' willingness to work with the administration on this," he said.

Obama could issue an order to close up shop tomorrow yet he doesn't have the guts to do it. That's self-evident after two years of vacillation and dithering.

'It's Like They're Bringing al Qaeda Lawyers Inside the Department of Justice'

The most honest, ethical, transparent administration ever, blah blah blah.

The Justice Department's disclosure that nine of President Obama's appointees had either represented or advocated for Guantanamo detainees has touched off a firestorm of criticism.

The surprising admission came three months after Republican Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa asked Attorney General Eric Holder for a list of names of Obama DOJ appointees who had been involved in legal work for Gitmo prisoners.

Holder, in a letter to Grassley, admitted that nine of the agency's appointees had done some kind of work on behalf of terror suspects.

"To the best of our knowledge, during their employment prior to joining the government, only five of the lawyers who serve as political appointees in those components represented detainees," said Holder in the letter, which is dated Feb. 18.

Only five? Why, I feel better now know only five of Obama's appointees represented these monsters. Now if it were, say, six or seven, then I might have a problem with this insanity.

"Four others either contributed to amicus briefs in detainee-related cases or were otherwise involved in advocacy on behalf of detainees."

Holder refused to reveal the names of any of the DOJ lawyers who worked on behalf of terrorists or their positions in the department, except for two officials whose advocacy for Gitmo detainees had already been reported.

Neal Katyal, the department's principal deputy solicitor general, was once the lawyer for Osama bin Laden's driver. Jennifer Daskal, part of Obama's Detention Policy Task Force, advocated for detainees at Human Rights Watch.

Nice to see we have terrorist advocates in or Justice Department, huh?

But the revelation that the DOJ had staffers who had once backed America's enemies left many critics fuming.

"It's like they're bringing al Qaeda lawyers inside the Department of Justice," said Debra Burlingame, who lost her brother on 9/11 and a board member of the advocacy group Keep America Safe.

Long Island GOP Rep. Peter King said he was perplexed why Holder didn't reveal the names of appointees who had worked for terrorists.

A DOJ rep reiterated that no ethics codes were broken.

"The department's attorneys are subject to ethics and disclosure rules . . . which are the strongest in history," said spokesman Matthew Miller.

It's historic!

If the disclosure rules are so strong, how come we don't know their names? We pay their salaries so we deserve to know who these people are.

'To Me, It's a Sign of Maturity, Strength and Intellect'

To me this entire exercise has been a sign if immaturity, weakness and stupidity, but hey, I'm just some guy with a blog and not a renowned expert.

The trial of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed won't be held in lower Manhattan and could take place in a military tribunal at Guantanamo Bay, sources said last night.

Administration officials said that no final decision had been made but that officials of the Department of Justice and the White House were working feverishly to find a venue that would be less expensive and less of a security risk than New York City.

The back-to-the-future Gitmo option was reported yesterday by Fox News and was not disputed by White House officials.

Such a move would likely bring howls of protest from liberals already frustrated that President Obama has failed to meet his deadline for closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay.

Let them howl all they want. Those of us in the New York area should be the ones Obama is listening to, not some whiny, self-serving bunch of babies more concerned with the rights of killers than innocent civilians.

It would also indicate that after years of attacking the Bush administration for its handling of the war on terror, Obama officials are embracing one of the most controversial aspects of it.

The administration is likely considering Gitmo because Congress is moving to cut off funding for holding the expensive trials in civilians courts.

Rep. Peter King (R-LI) has introduced a bill that would prohibit the use of Justice Department funds to try Guantanamo detainees in federal civilian courts, and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said he would introduce a similar bill in the Senate next week.

The Washington Post, meanwhile, reports that wherever the terror trials are eventually held, it is virtually certain that they will not take place in New York City.
...
Bloomberg said yesterday that he would not brand Obama a flip-flopper over his turnabout.

"To me, it's a sign of maturity, strength and intellect," Bloomberg said on WOR radio yesterday.

Way to kiss Obama's tush, Mikey. If this towering intellect was so brilliant, he'd have seen what a firestorm this idiotic decision would have caused.

Naturally, some "experts" don't see it that way.

There are limits to where the U.S. can try the self-professed Sept. 11 mastermind outside of New York City - especially if murder is in the mix, experts say.

Bowing to critics who want the trial of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed out of Foley Square, the Department of Justice Friday appeared close to abandoning plans to bring the case in lower Manhattan.

If the attacks had taken place outside the U.S., prosecutors could bring the case in any federal court in America.

Because the crime occurred in the U.S., the trial has to happen where at least one part of the conspiracy took place.

"The trial has to occur in the venue where the crime was committed," said James Benjamin Jr., a former Manhattan federal prosecutor who handled the appeal of World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef.

Complicating matters is that prosecutors would likely want to bring murder charges against Mohammed and his four co-defendants for the deaths of 3,000-plus.

That, experts said, would restrict the location to the three places where blood was shed: the Southern District of New York, the Eastern District of Virginia or the Western District of Pennsylvania.

OK, then how about trying them at the Pentagon?

Even Enemy Combatants Are Down on Obama

Heartache at Club Gitmo as a failed Obama promise leads to frustration for the poor, misguided souls who woke up one day only to find themselves terror suspects by the evil Cheney/Bush regime.

Unless he decides to change course, to close Gitmo the president must still find support in Congress to pay for a super-secure prison in Illinois for some of the detainees he wants to continue holding. He must also get additional money, likely hundreds of millions of dollars, to provide extra security to put some suspects, including Mohammed, on trial in federal courts.

Since Obama took office a year ago, more than 40 detainees have been removed from the naval base in Cuba - sent off to their homelands or to other countries. If the administration cannot quicken that pace, it would take until a hypothetical second Obama term to actually empty the site.

A hypothetical second Obama term? Heck, I thought that was carved in stone just a year ago. Nice to see because of Obama's moral preening and pandering to the rest of the world we have to spend hundreds of millions of dollars that we don't have rather than following what was working. And not only is the left crushed by the demise of Hopenchange, now even the terrorists have their laments.

The Obama administration, which sent a group of Yemenis home from Guantanamo just days before the failed airliner bombing, has halted any further transfers to Yemen for the near future.

Len Goodman, a Chicago lawyer who just returned Tuesday from a visit to the prison, said the delays have only embittered his client Shawali Khan, an Afghan detainee who was captured in 2002 and has long claimed he is innocent.

"His level of frustration is greater than I've ever seen it," said Goodman. "Everyone had high hopes for Obama, but sadly I think nothing has changed from Bush to Obama, except the conditions are better inside for the detainees. But all in all, it's just promises made and promises not kept."

Here We Go: Judge Tossing Evidence In Gitmo Terrorist Trials

Here we go, folks. It has started. Our wonderful judicial system in action. A federal judge has begun tossing evidence in the trial of a terrorism suspect because the confessions or evidence were coerced.

A federal judge has tossed out most of the government's evidence against a tarrorism detainee on grounds his confessions were coerced, allegedly by U.S. forces, before he became a prisoner at Guantanamo Bay.

In a ruling this week, U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan also said the government failed to establish that 23 statements the detainee made to interrogators at Guantanamo Bay were untainted by the earlier coerced statements made while he was held under harsh conditions in Afghanistan.

Yes, the AP has trouble even spelling the word terrorism much less being able to apply it. I didn't change it, that is how it originally appeared.

This ruling, of course, will now be used by future defense attorneys to get even more evidence against their clients thrown out. They will continue to nibble away at it until terrorists like this one, who was captured after a 2 1/2 hour firefight, are made out to be some sort of momma's boys just walking home from the corner grocery with food for his six orphaned siblings.

Jihadi Art Class

Aw, isn't this cute? Bloodthirsty terrorists show off their mad art skillz. This would be funny if it weren't so insane.

A cushy Saudi Arabian "rehab" center where terrorists are encouraged to express themselves through crayon drawings, water sports and video games is under scrutiny after one of its graduates re-emerged as a leader in the al Qaeda branch claiming responsibility for trying to blow up an airliner on Christmas.

Said Ali al Shihri -- a former Guantanamo Bay detainee who now heads the terror group al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula -- obviously didn't get to the bottom of his America-hating issues while undergoing the controversial rehab for jihadis.

Inmates like Shihri are supposed to while away the days playing ping-pong, PlayStation and soccer in hopes that the peaceful environment will help them cope with their jihadist rages.

Bomb-makers and gunmen participate in art therapy to help them explore their feelings non-violently.

In between tasty picnic-style meals of rice and lamb and snacks of Snickers along with dips in the pool, participants practice Arabic calligraphy, produce dizzying Jackson Pollack rip-offs and imagine the aftermath of car bombings in crayon.

Some 1,500 al Qaeda terrorists have "graduated" from the program, including 108 former Guantanamo Bay detainees, the Washington Post reported.

The art therapy worked wonders with Shirhi, now the purported handler of the Detroit wannabe plane bomber.

Wonderful. Why don't we just give them Play-Doh and they can pretend it's plastic explosives?

Did Holder's Law Firm Represent Christmas Bomber Mastermind?

Don't mind us, just trying to connect some dots.

At least one leader of al-Qa'ida's branch in Yemen, where the failed bomber of a US-bound Christmas flight was allegedly trained, was freed from the US prison in Guantanamo, Cuba, a Pentagon list reveals.
The list, released in May, names 27 former prisoners who resumed terrorist activities after being released from Guantanamo, including Said Ali al-Shihri, who was transferred to Saudi Arabia in 2007 and later implicated in the bombing of the US embassy in Yemen's capital, Sanaa, last year.

ABC television named Muhammad Attik al-Harbi, a former al-Qa'ida leader in Yemen, as another unrepentant former Guantanamo prisoner.

Hmm. That name seems familiar.

The emergence of a former Guantánamo Bay detainee as the deputy leader of Al Qaeda’s Yemeni branch has underscored the potential complications in carrying out the executive order President Obama signed Thursday that the detention center be shut down within a year.

The militant, Said Ali al-Shihri, is suspected of involvement in a deadly bombing of the United States Embassy in Yemen’s capital, Sana, in September. He was released to Saudi Arabia in 2007 and passed through a Saudi rehabilitation program for former jihadists before resurfacing with Al Qaeda in Yemen.

Considering he's a Saudi, that rehab program must have been hell.

Though it's not as if al-Shirhi's been keeping a low profile. In fact just this year he announced his intentions.

In the Internet statement, Al Qaeda in Yemen identified its new deputy leader as Abu Sayyaf al-Shihri, saying he returned from Guantánamo to his native Saudi Arabia and then traveled to Yemen “more than 10 months ago.” That corresponds roughly to the return of Mr. Shihri, a Saudi who was released from Guantánamo in November 2007. Abu Sayyaf is a nom de guerre, commonly used by jihadists in place of their real name or first name.

A Saudi security official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said Mr. Shihri had disappeared from his home in Saudi Arabia last year after finishing the rehabilitation program.

A Yemeni journalist who interviewed Al Qaeda’s leaders in Yemen last year, Abdulela Shaya, confirmed Thursday that the deputy leader was indeed Mr. Shihri, the former Guantánamo detainee. Mr. Shaya, in a phone interview, said Mr. Shihri had described to him his journey from Cuba to Yemen and supplied his Guantánamo detention number, 372. That is the correct number, Pentagon documents show.

“It seems certain from all the sources we have that this is the same individual who was released from Guantánamo in 2007,” said Gregory Johnsen, a terrorism analyst and the editor of a forthcoming book, “Islam and Insurgency in Yemen.”

Mr. Shihri, 35, trained in urban warfare tactics at a camp north of Kabul, Afghanistan, according to documents released by the Pentagon as part of his Guantánamo dossier. Two weeks after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, he traveled to Afghanistan via Bahrain and Pakistan, and he later told American investigators that his intention was to do relief work, the documents say. He was wounded in an airstrike and spent a month and a half recovering in a hospital in Pakistan.

The documents state that Mr. Shihri met with a group of “extremists” in Iran and helped them get into Afghanistan. They also say he was accused of trying to arrange the assassination of a writer, in accordance with a fatwa, or religious order, issued by an extremist cleric.

Yet our "leaders" now want to prosecute the acts of the Christmas jihadi as some sort of criminal act.

Which leads us to our Attorney General, Eric Holder, noticeably absent from the news the past few days. Since Holder plans on prosecuting Khalid Sheikh Mohammed like a common criminal, it figures the Christmas jihadi will also be treated will all due rights.

So where is Holder? Doesn't seem like he's much in the news.

Maybe this is why.

There is an additional and intriguing angle involving Yemen, creating a confluence between, that country, Ft. Hood and the Obama administration, in that U.S. AG Holder's former law firm, Covington & Burling, represented a number of Yemeni detainees who are/were being held in GITMO.

It was meddling by committed lefty attorneys which made military prosecution of the GITMO detainees so difficult. Relentless pressure applied by these advocates is what ultimately led to the Hamden decision [Hamden vs. Rumsfeld, 548 U.S. 557, 2006] in which the military tribunal system established by the Bush administration - relying upon long historical precedent - was overturned on a 5-3 Supreme Court decision, which for the first time in American history applied principles codified in the Geneva Accords to terrorists to which Geneva was long understood not to apply.

As we noted in a February piece [Former Partner Of Eric Holder's Law Firm Represents Cole Bomber And 14 Other GITMO Detainees, http://www.pipelinenews.org/index.cfm?page=holder1id=2.9.09%2Ehtm] the involvement in this process by Holder's old law firm was substantial.

"On Thursday Army Col. James L. Pohl the military judge presiding over the trial of Abd al Rahim al Nashiri [suspected of masterminding the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in the port city of Aden, Yemen as well as being heavily implicated in the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Kenya - Mohammad Ali al-Makki a cousin of al Nashiri's was a suicide bomber in that attack] refused to go along with the Obama administration's request to postpone the prosecution for 120 days, saying that such a move would not serve justice and was as a result, "not reasonable."

Al Nashiri [born in Saudi Arabia] is part of a group of 15 Yemeni GITMO detainees who are represented by David Remes a member - until he was either booted or saw the handwriting on the wall and "resigned" on July 18, 2008 - of Attorney General Eric Holder's law firm, Covington & Burling,

"Remes, who represents 15 Yemeni detainees, announced his resignation on July 18, saying that he plans to devote himself exclusively to human rights litigation...My departure is the inevitable outcome of my human rights work at the firm in the past four years, which became a consuming passion," Remes said in a statement." [source, http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2008/07/16/to-protest-gitmo-punishment-covington-parnter-drops-trou-in-yemen/]

The status of many of the GITMO Yemenis is unknown at this point, despite continued demands by Congressman Frank Wolf and others for the administration to state who among them might have been released, whether there has been a threat assessment made regarding them, and if they have been released, where, when and under what conditions.

I think it's fair Eric Holder and his former law partners release all relevant documents pertaining to their representation of former Guantanamo detainees. All in the interest of transparency, of course.

By the way, has anyone in the media inquired as to to wherabouts of the Eric Holder the past few days? Doesn't seem like anyone is interested.

Revealed: Brutal Club Gitmo 'Torture' Techniques

Thank goodness Barack Obama has restored our image around the world. Considering these harsh interrogation tactics, he's got a lot of fences to mend with the international community.

Was the theme to "Sesame Street" really played to torture prisoners held at Guantanamo and other detention camps? What about Don McLean's "American Pie"? Or the Meow Mix jingle? Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the U.S.A."?

What, no Barney? No Wonder Pets? Making them watch Boohbah?

Seriously, though, what we find interesting about this story is here we have a sanctimonious brigade of musicians so outraged and offended that we would subject these monsters who don't even allow people to listen to music to be subjected to such inhumane treatment by audio.

A high-profile coalition of artists -- including the members of Pearl Jam, R.E.M. and the Roots -- demanded Thursday that the government release the names of all the songs that were blasted since 2002 at prisoners for hours, even days, on end, to try to coerce cooperation or as a method of punishment.

Dozens of musicians endorsed a Freedom of Information Act request filed by the National Security Archive, a Washington-based independent research institute, seeking the declassification of all records related to the use of music in interrogation practices. The artists also launched a formal protest of the use of music in conjunction with torture.

"I think every musician should be involved," said Rosanne Cash in a telephone interview Wednesday. "It seems so obvious. Music should never be used as torture." The singer-songwriter (and daughter of Johnny Cash) said she reacted with "absolute disgust" when she heard of the practice. "It's beyond the pale. It's hard to even think about."

It's hard to even think about!

I can only imagine the indignities Ms. Cash would suffer if something bad ever really happened to her, like getting a parking ticket. Still, she comes off looking stable. Check out these weaklings.

Other musicians, including Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails and Tom Morello, formerly of the band Rage Against the Machine, also expressed outrage.

"The fact that music I helped create was used in crimes against humanity sickens me," Morello said in a statement. "We need to end torture and close Guantanamo now."

Crimes against humanity? Huh?

A White House spokesman said music is no longer used as an instrument of torture, part of a shift in policy on interrogations that Obama made on his second full day in office.

Thank goodness. I'd hate to see one more crime against humanity in the form of a Mew Mix commercial ever again be committed.

It's too difficult to even think about.

Also revealed was perhaps the most brutal interrogation method known to man.

Another former prisoner, Binyam Mohamed, told Human Rights Watch that he had been forced to listen to the rapper Eminem's song "The Real Slim Shady" for 20 days.

Another 'Victory' For Democrats: Club Gitmo Guests On Their Way to America

You have to just shake your head and laugh at the blatant bias in this piece from the Associated Press. Here we have Republicans as the last line of defense against the insanity of bringing these subhumans into America and it's portrayed like a game. Ha ha ha--those stupid Republicans lost! Plus, it's a "win" for the Democrats?

Really?

Republicans in the House have lost a bid to block the transfer of any detainees held at the Guantanamo Bay prison to the United States.

Instead, the House stood by a Democratic plan to allow suspected enemy combatants held at Guantanamo to be shipped to U.S. soil only to be prosecuted for their suspected crimes. President Barack Obama has ordered the facility closed in January but has yet to offer a plan to accomplish that.

Democratic leaders had to push hard for the win because many lawmakers see political danger in voting to move detainees from Guantanamo. The Republican plan failed on a 193-224 vote.

Democrats pushed hard for the win. Just remember that if this blows up in their faces.

Peter King calls this “is a time bomb waiting to happen.”

Stunner: Former Club Gitmo Guest Busted on Terror Charges

His sponsors at the ACLU remain unavailable for comment.

A terrorism suspect recently detained in Pakistan is the same Swedish national once held by the United States at Guantanamo Bay, police said Monday. He and others in his group were reportedly trying to join al Qaeda in the country's lawless tribal areas.

The development appeared to underscore the difficulty with predicting the path that detainees at the U.S. Naval Base Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, will take upon their release, with the Pentagon having acknowledged that a small but notable percentage of one-time inmates have joined, or rejoined, militant groups.

Dera Ghazi Khan police Chief Mohammad Rizwan told the Associated Press that authorities made the identification after interrogating the man, Mehdi-Muhammed Ghezali. A copy of his Swedish passport obtained by the AP showed that his face matched that of previously published photos of the man held at Guantanamo.

"I do confirm that he is the same person. He is a very dangerous man," Chief Rizwan said.

PROTECTION SOURCES

So who would have thought that Hillary Clinton deserves kudos for standing UP for US intelligence agencies against enemies abroad, in this case the UK?

It's reported that La Clinton has told British FOREIGN Secretary Mr Bean (aka David Milipede) that America would consider cutting security co-operation with the UK if a British court releases information about a former Guantanamo Bay detainee, Mohammad Binyam.

US readers may not be fully aware that the British left wing media have turned Binyam into a martyr and poster boy for innocence ever since he was released from Gitmo. In true Jihadist tradition, he has claimed that he was tortured him after he had been captured having accidentally wandered into a Jihad training camp in Afghanistan. He is now claiming redress through the UK liberal courts

and there is the possibility that US intelligence may be made public so compromising sources. Clinton is absolutely right to have made this threat and I trust that the UK Judiciary get their priorities right and ensure they protect sources and friends abroad.

Former Club Gitmo Guest Now Taliban Leader

Yet another reminder to those out there who've agitated nonstop for years about Guantanamo Bay and our detention of these terror vermin: You've got a lot of blood on your hands.

A former Guantanamo Bay inmate is leading the fight against U.S. Marines in the Helmand province of Afghanistan, a senior U.S. defense official confirmed to FOX News on Tuesday.

Mullah Zakir, also known as Abdullah Ghulam Rasoul, surrendered in Mazar-e-Sharif in Northern Afghanistan in 2001, and was transferred to Gitmo in 2006. He was released in late 2007 to Afghan custody.

Now as the United States is pushing ahead with the massive Operation Khanjar in the southern province of Afghanistan, Zakir is coordinating the Taliban fighters. Some 4,000 U.S. Marines and hundreds of Afghan forces have faced some resistance as they sweep across the province, reclaiming control of districts where Zakir and his comrades were running a shadow government.

Zakir was released from Afghan custody around 2008, according to the New York Post. He re-established connections with high-level Taliban leaders in Afghanistan and Pakistan after his second release.

Taliban chief Mullah Omar appointed Zakir in mid-2008 as senior military commander, according to the newspaper.

Zakir quickly became a charismatic leader, helping establish an "accountability commission" to track spending and monitor activities of Taliban leaders in the districts where they held power and were running a shadow government, according to the Post.

Ah yes, we know full well about those charismatic leaders. Probably helped charm his ACLU handlers with some sob stories before being released.

Of course, we didn't ever have to release this monster, except for the fact the world community was outraged at our handling of these poor naifs.

It's funny how the media never returns to those who helped facilitate their release and ask them for reaction.

Explaining why Zakir was released from Gitmo, the defense official said, "We were under incredible pressure from the world to release detainees at Gitmo. You just don't know what people are going to do.

The Taliban must be salivating at the the promise our own charismatic leader plans to shutter Club Gitmo.

'Therapy Isn't Going to Cause Terrorists to Change Their Mind'

Sure, maybe not therapy, but that smooth Obama charm no doubt will.

Won't it?

Mr. Bush weighed in on some of the most pressing issues of the day: the election in Iran, the closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention center in Cuba, and his administration's interrogation policies of terrorists held there and elsewhere. The former president has not commented on Mr. Obama's decision to ban "enhanced interrogation techniques" such as waterboarding, which the current president has called "off course" and "based on fear."

"The way I decided to address the problem was twofold: One, use every technique and tool within the law to bring terrorists to justice before they strike again," he said, adding that the country needs to stay on offense, not defense. On Guantanamo, which while in office Mr. Bush said he wanted to close, the former president was diplomatic.

"I told you I'm not going to criticize my successor," he said. "I'll just tell you that there are people at Gitmo that will kill American people at a drop of a hat and I don't believe that persuasion isn't going to work. Therapy isn't going to cause terrorists to change their mind."

How long this morning until the left collectively flips out over the fact George W. Bush has something to add to the debate?

Repeating a mantra from his presidency, he called the current war against terrorism an "ideological conflict," asserting that in the long term, the United States needs to press freedom and democracy in corners across the world.

Would be nice if the Great Flyslayer helped push for democracy in Iran. Actually, why do that when you're busy stripping away freedom and democracy in this country?

Mr. Bush did not directly address Mr. Obama's response to the election in Iran, which some critics have called tepid, but he did make clear that the outcome is very much in dispute. For a fifth straight day, as the Obama administration walks a tightrope by issuing little criticism, protesters gathered in Tehran to demand a new election.

"Clearly, there's a level of frustration on the Iranian streets," Mr. Bush said. "It looks like it's not a very fair election."

Whatever happened to Obama's spine of steel?

When the Iranian regime begins slaughtering protesters, will Obama come out from under his desk and issue another call for dialogue?

'This Document is Toilet Paper For the Americans If They Want It'

On second thought, maybe we ought to close Club Gitmo.

THE Pentagon now confirms that at least 74 former Guantanamo detainees have resumed terror ist activities after claiming they weren't terrorists.

Such recidivism points up an alarming intelligence failure.

These dangerous prisoners should never have been cleared for release. Why did interrogators fail to find the cracks in their stories and alibis?

Why wasn't more intelligence gathered to predict they'd rejoin al Qaeda or the Taliban?

In a word, politics. Gitmo interrogations have been emasculated to placate critics of waterboarding and other "torture," say two senior officials there.

Even known terrorists are spared high-pressure techniques -- tactics that have worked before in squeezing out information.

For that matter, Gitmo doesn't even do "interrogations" anymore. They're now called interviews, and they're voluntary.

Many recidivists used the interviews as an opportunity to argue for release, spinning familiar excuses for why they were in Afghanistan after 9/11. They were freed after interrogators, many of them inexperienced, for the most part bought their sob stories and review boards judged them least likely to return to jihad.

"We have on numerous occasions gotten literally straight-from-the-schoolhouse interrogators who are being stuck in with these hardened jihadists," a top security official at Gitmo told me. "And they essentially look at them and laugh."

He says many are 19-year-olds who lack battlefield skills and don't understand the first thing about jihad and militant Islam.

"They get played by detainees, who end up getting released because the interrogators believe them when they say they don't know anything and just want to go home and be a goat herder," he says.

As a condition of their release, the Gitmo detainees signed pledges to renounce violence and enroll in "reintegration programs" in countries that agreed to repatriate them.

Terrorist Said Ali al-Shihri went through the resort-like Saudi program after his release in 2007.

Afterward, he helped plan last year's deadly attack on the US Embassy in Yemen as al Qaeda's operations chief there.

Another Gitmo recidivist, Slimane Hadj Abderahmane, laughed at the anti-violence agreement he signed. Once free, he re-engaged in terror and said, "This document is toilet paper for the Americans if they want it."

Read the rest if you want to become really depressed this afternoon. And don't forget to send a word of thanks to Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and their merry band of idiots who helped make this happen.

Hot Air links. Thanks!

Tale of Two Club Gitmo Polls

Well, this is rather interesting. Just Monday we saw a USA Today/Gallup poll that said America were overwhelmingly opposed to closing Club Gitmo.

Americans are strongly opposed to shutting the doors of the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay and moving terrorism suspects to detention centers in the U.S., according to a recent poll.

A USA TODAY/Gallup Poll released Tuesday found that those surveyed oppose the closing of Guantanamo by more than 2-1.

By more than 3-1, respondents oppose moving the detainees to prisons within the U.S., according to the poll.

Sixty-five percent of Americans polled said they do not support closing Guantanamo and sending its detainees to U.S. prisons while just 32 percent said they did support the idea.

Naturally this didn't receive much notice since it doesn't meet the Obama media template.

Well, now here comes a poll today claiming numbers completely at odds.

On Obama's plan to close the Guantanamo prison, 47 percent approve, while 47 percent disapprove. Again, the country is divided on partisan lines, with most Republicans disapproving and most Democrats approving. Independents are evenly divided.

Now which poll do you think will be touted more by Obama's adoring media horde?

The latter poll, reported by the Associated Press, is an Associated Press/GfK poll.

Nothing like AP creating their own news.

So rather than hearing Americans are overwhelmingly opposed to closing Guantanamo Bay, every news outlet in the country using AP reports will tell us we're evenly divided.

Nope, no media bias here.

Club Gitmo Guests Get Laptops, Email Lessons

This harsh detention just has to stop. What kind of monsters have we become?

These captives already get to order fast-food takeout from the base and have access to a phone booth for weekly calls. Now some 17 Uighur Muslims awaiting a nation to grant them asylum are about to go high-tech, with laptops and web training.

While awaiting details of President Barack Obama's order to close the prison camps by Jan. 22, commanders here have ordered 20 laptops for the captives of Camp Iguana.

''As you know, detainees are leaving this place,'' said Army Lt. Col. Miguel Mendez, who oversees detainee classes, a multilingual library and now-emerging virtual computer lab. ``We're getting them computer classes to prepare for their return.''

E-MAIL LESSONS

The Uighur detainees won't be sending electronic mail to their lawyers or family members back in communist China anytime soon.

Instead, the military is setting up an internal intranet web at the half-acre compound ''to teach them how to e-mail,'' Mendez said.

A federal judge last year ordered that the men be set free after reviewing the American military's reasons for holding them in habeas corpus petitions that reached the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C. by order of the Supreme Court.

But the Chinese citizens in exile have no place to go.

As devout Muslims, they fear religious persecution in their homeland, in part because of the stigma of having been held at Guantánamo for allegedly getting paramilitary training in Afghanistan before Sept. 11, 2001.

Attorney General Eric Holder said some could come to the United States for resettlement, triggering protests from members of Congress around Virginia, where other Uighurs live and have offered to settle them.

Nury Turkel, a Washington, D.C.-based Uighur rights activist, hailed the computer training development. Internet access could allow the men to listen to Uighur broadcasts of Radio Free Asia, he said.

Moreover, laptops would help the men ''be reintroduced into a modern society,'' said Turkel, who noted that after eight years in U.S. custody the computer training ``also would give hope to the men that their freedom is nearing.''

What, like we didn't have email eight years ago?

WTF?