The Bush Administration took a major step forward in advancing human rights and then took two steps backwards with a plan to hold onto detained people for the rest of their natural lives without having to charge them with a crime.
Human Rights advocates were cheering early last week but were crying the blues by the end of the week, so it was a mixed message that the Administration sent out.
It started with an announcement that the Bush Administration was enlarging their definition of what “torture” constituted, which now includes some of the things that the military, CIA and FBI have done in Cuba, Afghanistan and Iraq. This was cause for celebration in some quarters.
Then a few days later, unnamed sources claimed that the Bush Administration was preparing legal briefs to hold some prisoners for the rest of their lives without so much as charging them with a crime. Thank you very much.
Sometimes Administrations leak information to the media to get a reaction from the general public to see if it would enjoy support on one issue or another, and this appears to have been the case for the “life sentences without a trial” situation.
This needs to be resisted.
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