This article is more of an opinion piece, but i agree with most of it. While i do feel that Obama has done exceptionally well in the short of amount of time in dealing with the economy...i felt he kinda stumbled here....He keeps stating that while he released the reports, he doesn\'t feel like looking back, but to look forward....and when pressed about would he prosecute those responsible, he wimps out and leaves it up to the attorney general?.....:rolleyes:...that\'s a cop-out. What\'s the point of releasing them in the first place then? He could have easily done things differently regarding his policy without causing an uproar by releasing this report.
My take on this? He should\'ve never released these papers, I think he was trying to gain some brownie points by doing this, but doing so he\'s also have some nuts that want to prosecute folks from the former administration....i think releasing these papers possibly could put future american hostages at risk,...now i do understand that most terrorists don\'t give a s**t about int\'l laws that restrict torture, but now you have some of those in that camp in cuba that actually want to sue us because of it. It absolutely makes no sense. If the u.s. was sayin\' one thing and doing another in regards to torture, then i felt that this whole situation should\'ve been handled from behind closed doors. Now you have lawyers lookin\' for a big payday in representing these folks in cuba and you have the present admin. possibly thinking about going after folks, who at the time where only tryin\' to get info and protect us.
If you\'re going to release the papers..fine, but he could\'ve put this thing to rest by saying that he\'s not going to pursue prosecuting folks from the last admin and display by his actions that he\'s going to be different(he\'s already doin\' things far different from bush already)....but he puts his hands up and states..."uhm nope i\'m leaving that up for somebody else to decide"...he needed to be firm at that moment..you\'re the president for crissakes, but he looked indecisive.
Lastly,..i hear there are alot of folks criticizing him over his behavior with the south american folks....now here i will disagree....while he did state that he wanted to listen to these countries, some of whom the former prez didn\'t give the time of day, he also stated that this isn\'t a one way street, and that if any reforms from these regimes aren\'t met, then the u.s. simply will not act. Even when that venezula prez made those comments and gave Obama a book, Obama kept his cool and acted professionally, he lent out his hand to these folks down there, it\'s up to them to respond.
Overall, i feel he\'s doin\' a great job given what\'s he\'s been handed, but i think he was trying to have his cake and eat it too by releasing these reports. There\'s more important issues to worry about than to go back and prosecute folks who back then were high off the 9/11 tragedy,..and honestly could you blame them?...EVERYBODY wanted the u.s. to do something when that event happened.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/23/rollins.obama.torture/index.html
