I’m a very middle of the road guy, and I can’t stand that craziness. Just look at the whole debacle during the campaign, with the first bailout package, or whatever that was supposed to be. The two parties had apparently reached an agreement, but the Democrats came right out and had their own press conference, congratulating themselves, instead of thinking of how much more beneficial it would be to demonstrate solidarity, both for the image of their party, and for the spiritual health of the nation.

Naturally, the deal then fell through. Just like the outgoing Republicans, they threw away their first opportunity to steer this ship in a new, enlightened direction. They didn’t do Obama any favors there, and unfortunately for him, it doesn’t look like they’re going to anytime soon, either.

But that’s just me. I have this insane notion that it would be better to pursue a steady path toward mutually beneficial solutions, than to continue to give privileged politicians and ideologues from both sides more encouragement to keep the good ol’ spoils game going.

As for us, we really need to be mindful of the danger in being overly partisan, and therefore too tolerant of the inappropriate things that people who share our politics say and do. Garrett may be shooting himself in the foot with some of his rhetoric, but calling him “hater” or “kid”, just shoots your foot, too.

I wish the best for President Obama, as I did for President Bush. I’m happy for African-Americans, but leery of others, who react to him like he’s the liberal ideology’s Elvis, or something. He’s a politician, who probably did his own share of questionable things on his way up the ladder. A grain of salt is always needed with these people. Let’s wait and see.

But we can definitely take heart in the fact that we, as a nation of people, have indeed become more tolerant. We’ve come a long way, including major leaps in how, for example, gay and lesbian people are perceived. But these things take time, and patience. Don’t be so quick to start a war, in order to get the rest right this minute. People don’t react well to being bullied. Let’s just appreciate how far we’ve come, continue to encourage constructive dialog, and keep hope for the future.

Guantanamo detainee still has faith in America
Chicago Sun-Times

Publication Date: January 15, 2007
Author: Spaulding, Douglas K.
The 28-year-old Saudi flashed a broad smile and greeted me warmly as I entered the small hut. He was in leg irons, chained to the floor. He had been locked up for five years — since he was 23 — in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

He and more than 400 other prisoners still jailed there have never been charged with any criminal offense or violation of the laws of war. He never took up arms against the United States, and yet he is labeled an “enemy combatant.” He has been robbed of the very prime of his life, imprisoned and deprived of even the most rudimentary of human rights and dignity. I did not expect that he would be the one to explain so clearly how, and indeed why, America will win the war on terrorism.

But then again, a year ago, I would not have guessed that today I would be representing on a pro bono basis three of the Guantanamo Bay detainees. I grew up in a Marine Corps family. My father was a career Marine officer who left a young widow and seven children when he was killed in Vietnam in 1966. My mother was a Marine in World War II, and when I graduated from college in 1970, I served four proud years as a Marine infantry troop leader.

For the last 30 years I have been a lawyer, representing at times some of the largest companies in the country. Sitting next to me in the hut was my partner Bernie Casey, a former Army lawyer who served in Vietnam before embarking upon a distinguished career in private law practice spanning more than 35 years.

Through our interpreter we explained to our client that we had volunteered to be his lawyers, and that we had filed a petition for habeas corpus, asking the court in Washington, D.C., to require the government to show why it is detaining him. We also told him that the president, as we spoke, was at a Rose Garden ceremony signing a new law that would strip the court of jurisdiction to hear our case. We assured him that we, and lawyers for other detainees, were challenging the new law as an unconstitutional suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, and we told him about our independent judiciary and how the Supreme Court’s prior rulings rejected the Bush administration’s efforts to take away the rights of detainees to have lawyers and challenge their confinement.

At this point our client interjected, and in a strong, clear voice he began to articulate how, and why, the United States will defeat the forces of terrorism. He told us that he knows about America — from his father, who worked for the Arab American Oil Company, and his father’s American friends, and also from his own education and reading. He is college educated, and for a period of time was an elementary school teacher.

In his own direct and powerful words, this Saudi detainee shared with us his vision of America, a vision that for me was beginning to slip away. He firmly believes that the injustice of Guantanamo cannot continue because “America is the flag-holder of freedom and democracy.”

Even though now he is imprisoned and deprived of basic rights, he nonetheless believes that there is “a good side of America … that is not happy with what is happening here. Even if the president himself challenges freedom, everyone has to abide by that which they fought for. American democracy was won as a result of American bloodshed. In the end, the right side must win.”

From his prison cell in Guantanamo, this young Saudi still clings to the vision of an America that Ronald Reagan once described as the “shining city upon a hill whose beacon light guides freedom-loving people everywhere.” We will ultimately win against the forces of terror not because we are militarily stronger or because we lock up more young men in Guantanamo, but because we must, and we will, rediscover our moral compass and the basic principles of freedom and democracy that lie at the core of who we are.

In so doing we will extinguish many of the fires that fuel anti-American resentment and rekindle a vision of America that so many people around the world want so desperately to believe in — a vision so strong it still shines in the mind of a young man that our government has accused of being a terrorist.

His faith in America has renewed my own commitment to press for a return to our core values. He has reminded me that doing so will make us stronger as a country — not weaker. We have the might to defeat terrorism. Now let us restore America’s righteousness because, “In the end, the right side must win.”