Guantanamo is a dirty word.  First, it is a piece of Cuba owned and operated by America as either a “gulag” or a “Devil’s Island.  No matter how you look at it or what your politics are, this place and what is going on there have no social, political or economic values to America.  It is not only an economic drag on our economy but the focus of the entire world is on the way prisoners are treated without the benefit of the Rights of Americans who may become afoul of our system of laws and jurisprudence.

I visited Panama recently and our cruise ship entered into the canal and we crossed the isthmus to get close to the Pacific; but were not scheduled to go into Panama City on the western shore.  From what I could see, the American presence was a mighty one that lasts to today but Panama is now self governing and for good or ill, it runs itself and our presence since the building of the great ditch and military installations do not cause the kind of reaction that Americans at the southern end of Cuba cause.

I say, close it down and give it back to Cuba.  We have plenty of places in America to make prisons where the eyes of Americans can see better what we do to our enemies who come under our “protection”.  Our own prison systems where in some prisons the prisoners rule are a disgrace.  The whole idea of prison as punishment is one thing but our sages showed us a long time ago that they could at least be reformatories where criminal tendencies could be changed by decent treatment and education. Rational thinking tells us this is better than retribution.

Custodial institutions, and I worked in one for a year after I graduated from Rutgers, are built with the intention of protecting the general population but that idea is soon jettisoned for the immediate needs of the managers and guards who find that repression works well as it has throughout history.  Throw the miscreant in jail and forget about him is the practice.  Instead of reforming the criminal we prefer to torture him and make him worse if he ever gets the chance to leave and reenter life outside bars and walls.

This is once again an appeal to think of the “crime of punishment”.  It would be more economical to either execute convicted murderers, rapists and enemies of our country or to mark them in such a way as to have them seek caves on mountain tops on which to live than to have them reenter society unchanged and most probably worse than before. We do not think we rehabilitate them before we let them go. We do not let them become citizens again – instead they bear the mark of Cain. Guantanamo is a disgrace and no use as a military base any more.