Guantanamo tribunals are unconstitutional!
Today the Supreme Court ruled that the tribunals used to try prisoners at Guantanamo Bay are unconstitutional. It’s high time the courts stepped in and said that the US needs to follow both the Geneva Conventions and its own laws about military trials. However, some people are outraged that the courts have limited the power of the Bush administration. The ruling did not indicate what should be done with the prisoners, except that the current system won’t work. Still, some groups are calling this a success, going so far as to say that this might even force the prison to close (though I doubt that will happen any time soon). The tricky thing is that most of the subsequent trials are out of the jurisdiction of US courts (including the Supreme Court). Consequently, it seems like from here on in there will be nothing that the Supreme Court can do regarding the constitutionality of the prison.
Steven Colbert brought up an interesting point last week—if we let the prisoners go (even if it’s just the ones who were originally innocent), they surely hate America at this point, and are more likely than ever to try to attack the country. and yet, if we don’t let them go, the rest of the world will grow to despise the US even more. Either way, it’s a nasty quagmire, and I doubt it will be resolved for years to come, unfortunately.