Teh stoopid. Teh hippocrissy. It burns!!!

by: Adam L

Wed Feb 11, 2009 at 02:00:00 PM EST

The sooper-tough talking NJ House republican delegation has nearly outdone itself with the latest stew of trying to sound tough while exposing their hypocrisy, disingenuousness (or stupidity, your call) and contradictory views as it relates to the proposed closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility.

A recipe of one part NIMBY-ism, two parts "tough sounding words that say so little", five parts hypocrisy (since there are only five of them left) and three parts of head smacking "WTF???", this latest gruel is not for those who have had their fair share from this crew already.  The full text of the letter is below:

Dear President Obama:

We are writing in regard to your recent Executive Order closing the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base within one year and its lack of any provision for a definite disposition of those detainees who are not releasable to their own or other countries.  We are concerned this could result in the detainment of the terrorists at facilities within the United States. As such, we request you not send any of the Guantanamo Bay detainees to the State of New Jersey.

In addition to the enormous legal problem issues which will arise from bringing the Guantanamo detainees into New Jersey, we are very concerned about potential security issues related to the detainees.  The federal prison system in New Jersey is already severely understaffed and underfunded.  Adding several hundred special prisoners of any kind would be a severe risk to the safety and security of the staff and other federal prisoners.  Further, our constituents who live near the prisons could be placed in danger to the presence of the detainees.

We are also strongly opposed to any Guantanamo detainees being transferred or housed on any military base in New Jersey.  Housing the detainees on military bases would create an unnecessary and egregious threat to the men and women of the Armed Services who serve the United States on New Jersey military bases.  Fort Dix has already been the target of a terrorist plot; the presence of detainees at any military base would certainly increase the probably of a future attack on the base or the surrounding population.

Thank you for your consideration of this request.

Let's start with a question.  The republican party is historically notorious for the emphasis on punishment as opposed to rehabilitation - when it comes to drug offenses as well as violent offenses.  And while I agree that there are many situations where rehabilitation is not a fitting remedy for a crime, especially with certain violent crimes, I want to know why the NJ republican House delegation is not more concerned with the relative lack of funding and staffing at our Federal prisons?  

And when it comes to these detainees, Obama is not just going to release them as there is another Executive Order that deals specifically with coming up with a plan as to where the detainees will be housed - and the four main maximum security prisons being mentioned, including one that already houses convicted 9/11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui and Olympic bomber Eric Rudolph are NOT one of the two Federal prisons in NJ.

Last I checked, Moussaoui and Rudolph haven't escaped from the Supermax prison.

But why stop there?  We didn't feel the need to detain and torture Timothy McVeigh or Ramzi Ahmed Yousef after their roles in the Oklahoma City and first WTC bombings.  Both were tried and convicted - McVeigh was executed and Yousef was returned to the US by Pakistan for his trial, where he is STILL in the same Supermax prison that houses Moussaoui and Rudolph.  So when it comes to terrorists - you know, REAL terrorists who have done things as opposed to those who may or may not be guilty of anything other than being brown skinned and in the wrong place at the wrong time - there is a pretty good track record of locking them up and keeping them locked up.

Now if the head splitting lunacy hasn't gotten to you yet, there is the NIMBY argument that I haven't addressed yet.  It just so happens that Colorado - you know, the state with that Supermax prison, has seen decreases in the crime rate in most of their cities, and the overall crime rate in the state is 10% below the national average.  

What it really comes down to is that the republican party has become so associated with fear, hate and finger pointing that there is no other plan when it comes to, well pretty much anything.  Once a gasbag blowhard, always a gasbag blowhard - but it is evident that these arguments not only don't make sense but are really just being done for the sake of trying to sound relevant.

Good luck with that one, guys.