Kafka and Uighurs at Guantanamo

My friend and mentor, Dean Brackley, S.J., distilled the Bible, long before he left for El Salvador to take the place of one of his brother Jesuits slain in November 1989, into this observation:

Yes, there is still much to celebrate this Thanksgiving.

A new president-elect, a lawyer with a sense of justice—and a new beginning. A person who not only claims to be, but also seems, so far, to be what he claims—a follower of Jesus of Nazareth, who was tough on hypocrisy: "How terrible for you teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites…" (Matthew 23: 13ff)

What we can be grateful for is a Constitution that provides for a change in government on a periodic basis, so that even when a president is allowed by cowardly politicians to ignore that precious gift of our Founders and amass king-like power, he can be dethroned by vote of the people.

We can be thankful for Barack Obama’s pledge to close the Guantanamo prison, and for the fact that we are free to keep pressing him to proclaim liberty to captives and set free the oppressed—including, of course, Uighurs and others in similar circumstances.

As the National Lawyers Guild has urged, Obama must ensure that all prisoners at Guantanamo are released, repatriated, resettled, or (if there is probable cause to believe any have committed a crime) brought to trial, in strict accordance with international and national law, and the principles of fundamental justice regarding criminal proceedings.

I would add the suggestion that we as a country make an open apology and ask the rest of the world for forgiveness for our straying so far from the ideals upon which our country was founded. Then there can be true thanksgiving for real closure, and an end to a particularly disgraceful chapter in our country’s history.

And then we shall ALL be set free—not only the Uighurs.

This article first appeared on Consortiumnews.com.

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