A Return to American Justice

[impik]

Terrific New York Times editorial this morning:

Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. took a bold and principled step on Friday toward repairing the damage wrought by former President George W. Bush with his decision to discard the nation’s well-established systems of civilian and military justice in the treatment of detainees captured in antiterrorist operations...

...From that entirely unnecessary policy (the United States had the tools to detain, charge and bring terrorists to justice) flowed a terrible legacy of torture and open-ended incarceration. It left President Obama with yet another mess to clean up on an urgent basis...

...Regrettably, the decision fell short of a clean break. Five other Guantánamo detainees are to be tried before a military commission for the 2000 bombing of the Navy destroyer Cole, including Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who is accused of planning the attack...

...Still, this much is clear: the Obama administration has yet to completely figure out how to rectify the disgraceful Bush detention policies, but it is getting there...

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/14/opinion/14sat1.html