Jefferson Morley explains that while the GOP has its panties in a bunch on Nazis, the world is looking at the substance, the US's unacceptable detention policies and prisoner abuse:
In the U.S. media, the debate about Guantanamo often focuses on the propriety of the language used to describe the treatment of prisoners. The White House, conservative columnists and his Senate colleagues criticized Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) for saying U.S. interrogation techniques were reminiscent of Nazi Germany. The Post's Anne Applebaum, a Guantanamo critic, rebuked Amnesty International for likening the prison camp to the Soviet gulag.
In the foreign media, the debate is more likely to focus on the propriety of the treatment itself.
Indeed, the propriety of the "treatment":
The Yemen Times reports that an Amnesty International lawyer told families of prisoners about "legal measures they said were designed to pressure the U.S. administration to give detainees fair trials and release those who prove to be innocent of the charges of terrorism."
A columnist for the news site adds that the response of Bush administration officials to criticism about Guantanamo suggests those official think they have a " God given hold on infallibility and their rights are only governed by the evil interests they serve rather than the desire to enhance and uphold the rights and welfare of people all over the world."
Clinton talks about it in the FOREIGN press:
In his interview with the FT, Clinton struck a pragmatic note about the abuses, citing "two huge problems" that have nothing to do with morality.
"Practical problem number one. If American or British troops get the reputation for abusing people in their prisons, " Clinton said, "it puts are own soldiers much more at risk" when they are serving overseas.
"The second problem is, if you rough somebody up bad enough they'll eventually tell you, most of them, whatever you want to hear to get you to stop doing it.
"And if you run a dictatorship, maybe all you want is for somebody to say they are guilty. If you are trying to preserve and expand freedom you want to convict the guilty and exonerate the innocent. If people are abused and they confess, or the finger other people [sic], and you gather up those who are not guilty, then as a practical matter you've let the guilty go free."
The US Media proving yet again how horrible they really are. But this is the new reality:
If only for practical reasons, Washington has now joined the global debate about Guantanamo.
