Stop Gitmo Detainee Transfer to US Soil Petition - National Protest with Car Alarms

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Comment by Jeff McQueen on October 25, 2009 at 11:07am

We are at the 11th hour. If we don’t stop the Gitmo detainees from coming to our shores, from being relocated here to Michigan, we will have turned a corner from which there is no turning back. For years, it seemed our country was fighting the war on terror in some distant theater of operations “over there.” Well now the stage has been moved to a theater right here in our own backyard…and for many in Michigan, our front yards!
We are sounding the alarm because you should be alarmed.

Standish, now cited as the likeliest town to house the Gitmo detainees, is not Guantanamo Bay and Michigan is hardly Cuba. If you’ve ever been to Standish, you know it is not the hardened, isolated fortification within a fortification that Gitmo is, a 45-square-mile base buffered on one side by ocean and on the other by 17 miles of fence, over which on the Cuban side is a minefield. Standish Maximum Security Prison is tucked right into the community, next to farms, homes, businesses, churches and schools. It is one minute off of I-75, gateway to our northern tourist destinations. It is wedged between major population centers, in close proximity to Flint, Midland’s Dow Chemical with some 40 plants and 5000 employees on site, the Detroit metro area, the bridge and tunnel to Canada, and the Mackinac Bridge.

Moving to Michigan the Gitmo detainees, including the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks and the abduction/beheading of Daniel Pearl, poses untold security, economic and legal risks --- threats recognized by communities across the US which have acted to stop the detainees from being located to their states. (For info on detainees and dangers of transferring them, see attached flyer). A bipartisan wall of opposition from Kansas -- including its governor, its two US Senators, its full US Congressional delegation and a united front of civic, business and school leaders – successfully stopped the transfer of the detainees to Ft. Leavenworth. What do they know in Kansas that we don’t in Michigan?

And then there is the very real risk that the stateside shift of the detainees is but a prelude to their inevitable release into our society. Andrew McCarthy, former Assistant US Attorney for the Southern District of New York who led the terrorism prosecution against Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and 11 others for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and other plots against NYC landmarks, lays it out in today’s NRO, http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MWY4NWE0YTZjM2RkNzhhYmIzMjkxNDZmY2ZjNGM3MTM=

We have been left in the dark on purpose. The stonewalling and steamrolling of Michigan must end. We must mobilize now to stop this impending disaster.

Call Governor Granholm @ (517) 335-7858. Thank her for her repeated opposition to this on homeland security grounds. Ask her to share the status of her discussions with the White House on the Gitmo transfer. Ask her the progress of her plan to approach all other states to offload their excess prisoner capacity to keep our prisons open. Ask her why, in the midst of a probe into $800 million of unaccounted outlays from our state Human Services Department, and why, given the infusion of millions and millions of federal TARP/bailout monies, couldn’t the state help the small, desperate town of Standish. The closing of its prison will result in lost annual revenues of roughly $350,000, chump change in light of all the millions squandered to fraud, abuse and mismanagement (look at Detroit alone!).
Call State Rep. Mark Meadows, chair of our Michigan House Judiciary Committee: 517-373-1786. Insist that he expedite discussion and vote on Resolution 165 http://www.legislature.mi.gov/(S(0lnixyiejjik1xqywn5heh55))/mileg.aspx?page=getObject&objectName=2009-HR-0165 which seeks to block the transfer of Gitmo detainees. Our state Senate has already voted unanimously that there has not been sufficient transparency, disclosure of information, or due diligence. To proceed otherwise is unconscionably irresponsible, committing our state to a reckless course of unsupported action
Call your state rep http://house.michigan.gov/replist.asp?lstcounty=&txtdistrict=&txtzip=&sortby=2 .
Sign our statewide petition to STOP GITMO NORTH at http://www.petitiononline.com/gitmo123/petition.html
Register with our coalition for more info and updates at stopgitmonorth@gmail.com
Join our Facebook group at http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=155859636294&ref=mf

Comment by Woodey on October 22, 2009 at 8:06pm

you only have 450 signatures that's many is it?

Comment by Jeff McQueen on October 22, 2009 at 5:39pm

Good Idea . . . get your car alarm ready to light up America!

Comment by Lynn Bryant DeSpain on October 22, 2009 at 4:51pm

People have fallen out of planes before! More people have fallen off of boats! You have to stop and feed them lunch and he tries to escape, I know he was.
I say, try him at the head waters of the Amazon! Just drop him off there, naked, and let the jungle judge him.