Nobody wants to have convicted child molesters living in our neighborhoods.  These are persons who have had trials by peers, were convicted and, after serving their sentences, were set free.  But that is a lie.  No one wants a "former" child molester to live near where our children live and play.  Justice done does not seem to mean justice delivered.  That child molester is branded with the deed although the punishment was decided upon and the punishment was given.  But, although a trial of peers made the decision and all the rest followed, that child molester is still a child molester in society's eyes. Forcing them out of neighborhoods and, here in Florida, groups collect and live under bridges. They are routinely rousted out by Police for living there illegally.  This proves that this system does not work.

An ethical decision was made to deal honestly with child molesters.  We want to seek them out and punish them.  But the punishment in their case seems never to end.  A comparison may be made about the confusion that rests like a miasma of bad smell over the treatment of "alleged" terrorists.  No one wants a terrorist living in their neighborhoods. Some care they are subject to torture.

Our "Devil's Island", at the end of Cuba - a place called Guantanamo - is exile and imprisonment for "suspects" who have not been given the Constitutional provided protection of a trial by jury.  In the case of suspected terrorists, they are imprisoned in a "Devil's Island" and, it is freely admitted by governments since 9/11, that torture has been and is being used before trial - but wait, there is no trial.  There is suspicion that the suspect is a terrorist and therefore the Constitution is suspended, torture used to extract information and then incarceration in said "Devil's Island.

It is now that debate rages about where to place our internal Devil's Island - maybe somewhere in the wilds of Colorado.  This is all based on suspicion, not proved and then not moved to a trial by "peers". But a sentence carried out.

My concern is that there is no trial by peers.  This is one step below neighbors who are the peers of child molesters.  Who are you going to get to judge a terrorist when the evidence used in a "trial" is extorted by means of torture? My judgment is that the whole procedure is un-American and unethical.

The debate about what we are doing is right and good; that torture can be used and indeterminate incarceration in a place distant from neighbors be meted out - goes against the grain of what is ethical and just. What is obvious is often not seen as such.