Taking the privilege...

....of replying to a comment on the "moral equivalency" post--else, what's a comments section for? Here's the one that caught my eye:

Hmm. I'm shocked that you c/d/won't see the lack of "moral equivalency" between Guantanamo Bay and the Soviet's gulags. The Soviets locked people away in the gulags because their opinions didn't conform to the doctrines endorsed by the Central Committee. The US has locked people away because they raised weapons against, or planned to raise weapons in defense of terror organizations.

Posted by: Travis at June 7, 2005 12:27 PM

Dear Trav: how do you, or the US government, know that the people locked away at Gitmo raised even a finger in defense of terror organizations? Because the Army said it? Because, as has been reported, Afghan warlords sold them to the Americans? The point AI was trying to make, in its possibly clumsy way, was that Gitmo represents an abandonment of the Western liberal ideal of justice, where evidence has to be presented, and confronted, before an impartial magistrate, in a speedy and fair manner, before such conclusions are drawn about a person. That's what links the Gitmo project to far worse depradations like the Gulag.

FYI: the people who've been released thus far from Gitmo have been viewed by the US military as a non-threat. Where do they go to get their two years back?