The Gitmo No-Go - Ongoing

It's the time of year to make New Year's resolutions we will later break.  Obama's notion of sending the Gitmo prisoners to Illinois hits a speed bump and now we are hearing about 2011:

WASHINGTON — Rebuffed this month by skeptical lawmakers when it sought finances to buy a prison in rural Illinois, the Obama administration is struggling to come up with the money to replace the Guantánamo Bay prison.

As a result, officials now believe that they are unlikely to close the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and transfer its population of terrorism suspects until 2011 at the earliest — a far slower timeline for achieving one of President Obama’s signature national security policies than they had previously hinted.

While Mr. Obama has acknowledged that he would miss the Jan. 22 deadline for closing the prison that he set shortly after taking office, the administration appeared to take a major step forward last week when he directed subordinates to move “as expeditiously as possible” to acquire the Thomson Correctional Center, a nearly vacant maximum-security Illinois prison, and to retrofit it to receive Guantánamo detainees.

But in interviews this week, officials estimated that it could take 8 to 10 months to install new fencing, towers, cameras and other security upgrades before any transfers take place. Such construction cannot begin until the federal government buys the prison from the State of Illinois.

The federal Bureau of Prisons does not have enough money to pay Illinois for the center, which would cost about $150 million. Several weeks ago, the White House approached the House Appropriations Committee and floated the idea of adding about $200 million for the project to the military spending bill for the 2010 fiscal year, according to administration and Congressional officials.

But Democratic leaders refused to include the politically charged measure in the legislation. When lawmakers approved the bill on Dec. 19, it contained no financing for Thomson.

The administration will probably not have another opportunity until Congress takes up a supplemental appropriations bill for the Afghanistan war. Lawmakers are not likely to finish that bill until late March or April.

Interesting - the Afghanistan supplemental will be a bit sticky for many Dems of the left.  Republicans aren't interested in de-funding troops in combat, but they don't like the Gitmo transfer to the States and they aren't virgins on faux-sacrificing the troops to score points.  Obama seems to have found a funding ploy that could annoy everyone.

Comments

[pagar]

Has anyone figured out why we are planning to spend the billions we are going to spend to buy, upgrade the security, hire a new bunch of government employees etc, to move the terrorists? Can someone Name one thing that is to be gained by all the BS involved?

[pagar]

Why does the State of Illinois have an empty prison they want to sell anyway? It cannot possibly be because there are not enough criminals in Illinois.

[bunky]

Pagar: the only thing to be gained is that it is anti-Bush. Everything he put in place must be repudiated.

[Extraneus]

They've been pretty consistent on not identifying the problems being "solved" so far, pagar. Can anyone recite the purpose of the health care bill, for example? Even Obama?

Wait, Harkin did yesterday.

Iowa Senator Tom Harkin is among those trying to push the health care reform bill through...This morning Harkin defended all the dealmaking and says Senate Democrats must do what they have to, to secure the votes needed for victory...Sen. Harkin says, "We have to keep our eye on what we are trying to do here. We are trying to cross a demarcation line. On one side is healthcare as a privilege. On the other side is Healthcare as a right. With the vote before Christmas, we'll say health care is a right of all Americans."Harkin also says he'll fight to get the public option put back in the final version of the bill.

Sorry to go OT so early in the thread, but I think this blurring and camouflaging of objectives serves their purposes quite well.

[Walter Ronten]

Why don't we sell the Guantanamo prison to Cuba? They can always use more space for political dissidents. They would have to pay us in cigars and sugar cane, though.

[narciso]

Because we need one corner of that isle to be free territory Walter, I admit we may need that exception here, sooner or later

[Otto Schaden]

Il. Gov. Quinn is releasing prisoners for lack of space --- why does he not use the Thomson jail?

All smoke & mirrors, it seems, The One rrally wants to release them all .... It
may have slipped by some, but He is clearly on the Other Side!

[Steve C.]

Prediction:

The DoJ will announce a plan to "lease" the prison from the state. The state of Illinois will use "stimulus" funds to bring the prison up to the standards required.

Senator Durbin will issue a press release proclaiming the creation of dozens of "high paid" union jobs with "excellent health care benefits" and claim the "creative" financing reduces the federal deficit.

[Captain Hate]

Wait, Harkin did yesterday.

I heard that on Rush yesterday. Even if he doesn't get the pubic option in there he's got his eye on it for the long haul; this is merely Step 1. Once this POS legislation is in we're stuck with it forever. For all the claims of how great Reagan was, how many of FDR's garbage did he get rid of? LBJ's? DOE? Hell, even Nixon's EPA?

The future campaign ads are being written now: "You paid for it already; why are they trying to take YOUR health care away?"

[Rob Crawford]

Il. Gov. Quinn is releasing prisoners for lack of space --- why does he not use the Thomson jail?

Because his goal is to release prisoners.

[Clarice]

"pubic option"? Heh--why didn't they say so?
Just another case of the unicorn hitting the windshield.

Here (OT) is a good article on why a nuclear Iran cannot be contained:

LUN

[narciso]

There are some disturbing typos when you don't preview, in the LUN, a closer look at that Israeli pacifist lobby that every one seems to drool over

[Captain Hate]

Some typos are more intentional than others; I thought you guys knew that...

[narciso]

I was trying to avoid that possibility, Capt,
'these goggles they do nothin'

[pagar]

"Here (OT) is a good article on why a nuclear Iran cannot be contained:"

I thought that was the whole goal of all this leftist tripe we've been reading lately; Just go ahead and let Iran have the nuclear capability and they will solve all the leftist problems in that part of the world. The anti-israeli propaganda (IMO) is designed to insure that people understand that the Obama administration does not consider Israel as a nation they would defend during the fiasco

[Ignatz]

--For all the claims of how great Reagan was, how many of FDR's garbage did he get rid of? LBJ's? DOE? Hell, even Nixon's EPA?--

That's the biggest problem I have with Repubs, CH; they run on an almost wholly defensive platform.
If one side's platform is to propose endless new government and the other side's is "we can cut taxes and still have enough money for the endless new government or maybe a slightly slower growing endless new government" guess which way things will always trend. That's right, toward endless new government, sometimes faster, sometimes slower.
There is an entire giant constituency out here who only want government to do those few things the private sector can't and there is an even larger one that will develop when they learn how easy it is to live without an endlessly growing state.
There are millions of Californians learning that right now.

[jimmyk]

It cannot possibly be because there are not enough criminals in Illinois.

Many of them have relocated to the Washington, D.C. area.

[PD]

Senator Durbin will issue a press release proclaiming the creation of dozens of "high paid" union jobs with "excellent health care benefits" and claim the "creative" financing reduces the federal deficit.

I have indeed heard Durbin speaking exactly like this when extolling why it's a good idea to relocate the GITMO detainees.

It's pretty disgusting: Trafficking in terrorists for the economic benefits.

[PD]

That's the biggest problem I have with Repubs, CH; they run on an almost wholly defensive platform.

That's right. We need an aggressive, long term, sustained platform of CUTTING GOVERNMENT. Government itself has become the biggest problem we face, in its size, its regulatory activity, its bureaucratic overhead, and the taxes required to finance it all.

We need to slash government jobs, slash government regulations, slash bureaucracy, and slash taxes. But it requires an electorate of the mindset that we should have the self-respect to be doing things for ourselves, working and paying our own bills, and not expecting other people to do so for us. That's a tough nut to crack.

[Ignatz]

--But it requires an electorate of the mindset that we should have the self-respect to be doing things for ourselves, working and paying our own bills, and not expecting other people to do so for us.--

Leaders and statesman bring the electorate with them.
Pols and careerists assume beforehand what can't be done.

[Jane]

Leaders and statesman bring the electorate with them.
Pols and careerists assume beforehand what can't be done.

I love that Ignatz.

[PD Shaw]

I believe the Republicans running for Illinois Governor oppose the Gitmo deal; I wonder if it's possible that if the delay continues long enough, there will be a Republican in Springfield, IL refusing to sell?

[jimmyk]

Leaders and statesman bring the electorate with them.

Exactly. I hate to keep invoking Reagan, but no one believed someone with his views could be elected, much less accomplish what he did in his first few years in office. Even the 1994 version of Newt should be mentioned here. Of course it helps to have a Carter or a 1993-94 Clinton in office to reinforce the point. So where is the Republican leadership now that we have Carter^2?

[cathyf]

The only time I have ever been in the same room with Obama he was introduced by Dick Durbin. How can I say this... Dick makes Barack look like Einstein.

[Old Lurker]

"The only time I have ever been in the same room with Obama he was introduced by Dick Durbin."

How long did you have to shower before feeling clean again?

[MayBee]

I keep thinking about how Durbin cried on the Senate floor about the Gulag that was Gitmo.
Now he wants to host these prisoners, and subject them to life of a federal prisoner.
How ironic.

[Flodigarry]

It will never happen because the terrorists will get the ACLU to claim it's cruel and unusual punishment to be be sent from a tropical [semi] paradise to rural, [email protected]$$ Illinois.

[Frau Neugier]

>Will the federal guards be subjected to the scrutiny/abuse the military received?
>Will there be conjugal visits?
>Will ACORN run the halal certification?

BTW I would gladly throw my shoes at Durbin,too, if I had the opportunity.

[dick]

You gotta love the media. Zero sets the date of Jan 22 specifically to close Gitmo. The media talks about how he may not make the date he HINTED at. Did that sound like a hint to you?