<story><title>Germans Loved Obama. Now We Don’t Trust Him</title><url>http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/30/opinion/sunday/germans-loved-obama-now-we-dont-trust-him.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>mpyne</author><text>While I agree in essence with your characterization of the job done by Obama, I do want to point out (again) that it will take quite some advances in physics before we&amp;#x27;re able to locate the parallel universe where Obama may have been able to shut down the prison at Gitmo.&lt;p&gt;I think it&amp;#x27;s hard to imagine the sheer and total resistance to shutting down that prison if you haven&amp;#x27;t been in the country to see it yourself. I still don&amp;#x27;t understand the reasoning to this day. But there was never a chance, with the Congresses Obama was handed with, that the prison would be completely shut down.&lt;p&gt;I don&amp;#x27;t know whether it&amp;#x27;s a bunch of representatives attempting to look &amp;#x27;Tough on Terror&amp;#x27; or what... but you have to pin Guantanamo on the people as a whole.</text></item><item><author>DoubleMalt</author><text>Well written. Being myself an Austrian (not only by economic affiliation) with ties to the USA I just today contemplated that in a way Obama will do much more damage to the American reputation than Bush (2) ever could.&lt;p&gt;Bush could be seen as an anomaly. He was not elected by a majority of the American people for his first turn, and even if everybody shook their head about the obvious oilgrab in the Iraq based on blatant lies, people could somehow understand that you don&amp;#x27;t change an administration amidst a war.&lt;p&gt;Obama was seen as a return of the USA that was always admired by many if not most people in Europe.&lt;p&gt;Like someone coming to their senses after a violent fit, Europe was ready to embrace an America that put effort in preserving and spreading civil rights, peace and democracy with means that did not involve letting countries descend in mayhem that bloody dictators would envy.&lt;p&gt;Then 
- he did not shut down Guantanamo (and he could have done it if he had acted fast and spent time to convince his party)&lt;p&gt;- he did not Veto a continuation of the Patriot Act&lt;p&gt;- he let his administration spy on the press to an unprecedented extent&lt;p&gt;- he defends spying on everybody outside or with ties to outside the country&lt;p&gt;If this is the rational, the civilized America, then we are in deep trouble.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>gruseom</author><text>&lt;i&gt;But there was never a chance, with the Congresses Obama was handed with, that the prison would be completely shut down.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;You&amp;#x27;ve added a critical word there with &amp;quot;completely&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;Congress blocked Obama from bringing Guantanamo inmates to the US for imprisonment or trial. But 86 of the 166 inmates are never going to be tried. They&amp;#x27;re already cleared for immediate release. Everyone (CIA, DoD) has agreed to this. Obama has the power to release them with the stroke of a pen, and the State Dept. apparently has a plan to do it and is just waiting for the go-ahead. So while Obama may not have the power to close Guantanamo completely, he does have the power to free more than half of the prisoners there, the ones who are not accused of anything. Yet there they stay, for no discernable (other than political) reasons.&lt;p&gt;Pinning the blame on Congress has worked for Obama politically, but if it&amp;#x27;s true that he&amp;#x27;s the one keeping more than half of the prisoners there, and with weaker justification since they are the ones unanimously agreed to be innocent, then it seems fair to say that Obama is more at fault than Congress is.&lt;p&gt;Source: &lt;a href=&quot;http://ianmasters.com/sites/default/files/mp3/bbriefing_2013_05_23a_carlos%20warner.mp3&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;ianmasters.com&amp;#x2F;sites&amp;#x2F;default&amp;#x2F;files&amp;#x2F;mp3&amp;#x2F;bbriefing_2013...&lt;/a&gt;, which is an interview (starting at 1:36) with one of the public defenders involved.</text></comment>
<story><title>Germans Loved Obama. Now We Don’t Trust Him</title><url>http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/30/opinion/sunday/germans-loved-obama-now-we-dont-trust-him.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>mpyne</author><text>While I agree in essence with your characterization of the job done by Obama, I do want to point out (again) that it will take quite some advances in physics before we&amp;#x27;re able to locate the parallel universe where Obama may have been able to shut down the prison at Gitmo.&lt;p&gt;I think it&amp;#x27;s hard to imagine the sheer and total resistance to shutting down that prison if you haven&amp;#x27;t been in the country to see it yourself. I still don&amp;#x27;t understand the reasoning to this day. But there was never a chance, with the Congresses Obama was handed with, that the prison would be completely shut down.&lt;p&gt;I don&amp;#x27;t know whether it&amp;#x27;s a bunch of representatives attempting to look &amp;#x27;Tough on Terror&amp;#x27; or what... but you have to pin Guantanamo on the people as a whole.</text></item><item><author>DoubleMalt</author><text>Well written. Being myself an Austrian (not only by economic affiliation) with ties to the USA I just today contemplated that in a way Obama will do much more damage to the American reputation than Bush (2) ever could.&lt;p&gt;Bush could be seen as an anomaly. He was not elected by a majority of the American people for his first turn, and even if everybody shook their head about the obvious oilgrab in the Iraq based on blatant lies, people could somehow understand that you don&amp;#x27;t change an administration amidst a war.&lt;p&gt;Obama was seen as a return of the USA that was always admired by many if not most people in Europe.&lt;p&gt;Like someone coming to their senses after a violent fit, Europe was ready to embrace an America that put effort in preserving and spreading civil rights, peace and democracy with means that did not involve letting countries descend in mayhem that bloody dictators would envy.&lt;p&gt;Then 
- he did not shut down Guantanamo (and he could have done it if he had acted fast and spent time to convince his party)&lt;p&gt;- he did not Veto a continuation of the Patriot Act&lt;p&gt;- he let his administration spy on the press to an unprecedented extent&lt;p&gt;- he defends spying on everybody outside or with ties to outside the country&lt;p&gt;If this is the rational, the civilized America, then we are in deep trouble.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>tedivm</author><text>I disagree. Obama had a lot of oppertunity here, but more importantly he never intended to actually stop indefinite detention. Rather than go through all the reasons here I&amp;#x27;ll just point out one of many articles that debunks this reasoning-&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.salon.com/2012/07/23/the_obama_gitmo_myth/&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.salon.com&amp;#x2F;2012&amp;#x2F;07&amp;#x2F;23&amp;#x2F;the_obama_gitmo_myth&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>