President Barack Obama said during his inaugural address Tuesday that
Our founding fathers faced with perils that we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations.
Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake.
Just hours after the speech, the new president took the first step toward reinvigorating the “charter,” bringing back the rule of law and ending the era of expediency:
(T)he administration of the newly inaugurated president, in one of its first actions, instructed military prosecutors late Tuesday to seek a 120-day suspension of legal proceedings involving detainees at Guantanamo — a clear break with the approach of the Bush administration, whose term ended at noon Tuesday.
It’s expected that Obama will follow up by closing Guantanamo:
In Washington, meanwhile, aides to President Obama were preparing an executive order that would begin the process of shutting down a detention facility at the Guantanamo Bay naval base for captured terrorist suspects. According to the Associated Press, the draft executive order calls for closing the detention center within a year. It was not immediately known when Obama would issue such an order.
Hank Kalet 