Torture Acknowledgment Highlights Detainee Issue
by William Glaberson: New York Times
When the senior official for the Pentagon’s military commissions
said this week that interrogators tortured a detainee at Guantánamo
Bay and that therefore he could not be prosecuted, she highlighted
the hard question at the center of the incoming Obama
administration’s effort to form a new detention policy.
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Casey Signs 7,000 Letters Of Apology To Families Of Fallen
By Jeff Schogol: Stars and Stripes
ARLINGTON, Va. — Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey has
personally signed letters apologizing to about 7,000 families of
fallen soldiers who received letters last month that all began "Dear
John Doe."
"There’s some things that you just have to personalize, and that was
too personal," Casey said Wednesday.
Printed by a contractor, the letters were intended to inform
families of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan about private
organizations that can help them, but the names of the families did
not transfer when the contractor combined the letters with a list of
families’ addresses.
The Army announced the mistake and issued an apology on Jan. 6.
Calling the incident a "terrible mistake," Casey said the Army has
since suspended all mass mailings and e-mails pending a quality
control check.
"We are working on what’s the appropriate action against the
contractor right now," Casey told reporters after speaking at an
Association of the United States Army event Wednesday.
Casey said he did not know the name of the contractor that printed
the "John Doe" letters.
The Army has refused to release the name of the contractor,
prompting some Stars and Stripes readers to ask why.
"The decision not to release the contractor’s name is because,
ultimately, it’s the Army’s responsibility, sir, not the
contractor’s, to maintain quality control," explained Army spokesman
Paul Boyce on Monday.
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Spokesman: Obama Will Lift Ban On Gays
Washington Times
(Pg. 2)
January 15, 2009
The incoming White House press secretary reiterated Wednesday in
unusually blunt terms his boss' vow to allow openly homosexual
persons to serve in the U.S. military.
Robert Gibbs made the statement in a video during which he answered
members of the public who sent him questions via YouTube.com.
"Thadeus of Lansing, Mich., asks, 'Is the new administration going
to get rid of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy?'" Mr. Gibbs said.
"Thadeus, you don't hear a politician give a one-word answer much.
But it's 'Yes.'"
President-elect Barack Obama has long opposed the "don't ask, don't
tell" policy, which President Bill Clinton established as a
compromise after a public furor in the opening days of his
administration led him to back off his campaign promise to repeal
outright the military's ban on gays.
The Washington Times reported in November that the Obama team did
not expect to move against "don't ask don't tell" for months and,
perhaps not until 2010.
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Immigration prosecutions surge under Bush's watch
By Dianne Solis: The Dallas
Morning News
Tuesday, January
13, 2009
Immigration prosecutions in the federal courts more than quadrupled
during the eight years of the Bush administration and Texas' two
border districts led the nation in the surge, according to a new
report by a Syracuse University research center. Even the
Dallas-based Northern Judicial District of Texas was part of the
increase, though the number of prosecutions – 357 in the 2008 fiscal
year – was a fraction of the 25,061 prosecutions in the Southern
district of Texas. The report by the Syracuse group known as the
Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, or TRAC, also showed a
decline in certain types of prosecutions such as white-collar crime
and narcotics filings. The Justice Department defended its record on
Monday and questioned the Syracuse's group analysis of federal
data...
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