Ex-Navy Loser Leaker Lawyer Properly Disbarred

Surreptitiously shipping classified lists to a left-wing group will get a sailor/lawyer sunk real fast.

Mathew M. Diaz apparently never got the lesson on "Loose lips sink ships", not to mention how divulging classified information is a surefire way to sink your career and future prospects.

And it was not just any classified list either:

The Kansas Supreme Court has disbarred a former Navy lawyer who mailed a classified list of Guantanamo detainees to the Center for Constitutional Rights.

Ex-Navy Lawyer Is Disbarred for Sending Secret Names of Gitmo Detainees to Legal Group

It was also clearly not a mistake or spur-of-the-moment stupidity:

Diaz had printed the detainee names, cut the list into strips, and placed them in a Valentine’s Day card to Barbara Olshansky, the deputy legal director for the Center of Constitutional Rights, according to findings of fact cited by the court.

This was far from being some act of heroic dissident. He admitted that he was too much or a coward to even take this up with his chain of command, or do an open act of disobedience and take the consequences for his beliefs and acts, instead he decided to try to surreptitiously leak his way to glory:

The court noted, however, that Diaz did not take his concerns to higher-ups because, by his own testimony in court-martial proceedings, “I wasn't really to put—willing to put my neck on the line and jeopardize my career.” The information he disclosed also could have been used to identify detainee interrogation teams, putting them at potential risk, the court said.

Disbarment is appropriate, the court said, given the nature of Diaz’s criminal violations and his “admitted selfish reasons for the clandestine disclosure of classified information.”

So Diaz ended up with 4 felonies, 6 months in confinement - which seems a little light, and a disbarment, not to mention dropping from the rank of Lt. Commander to nothing. All on behalf of Guantanamo detainees who would likely kill him and other Americans if they got half a chance.

He chose....poorly.

With All Deliberate Speed, But Not Yet

The Detroit Free Press: Obama administration insists on Guantanamo closure

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said today that the Obama administration will do its utmost to close the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay before next year's presidential elections despite political opposition.

Holder said at the European Parliament that even if the current administration fails to close it ahead of elections, it will continue to press ahead if it wins the November 2012 presidential vote.

After all, they've been doing their utmost to close it the past four years, really they have, nudge nudge, wink wink - know what I mean?

The campaign promise to close Guantanamo has been a major problem for President Barack Obama since he took office. He had promised to close the prison within a year but it remains open as his campaign for re-election gets under way.

That delay over the past 4 years failure to close it has been all Bush's fault.

"We will be pressing for the closure of the facility between now and then — and after that election, we will try to close it as well," Holder said. "Some people have made this a political issue without looking at, I think, the real benefits that would flow from the closure of the facility."

Ah, the old push it through after an election during a lame duck period trick. Nice way to make someone else clean up the mess of your politically correct decision to shut it down on the way out.

Ed Morrissey at HotAir also has a take on this latest pronouncement from Mr. Holder.

The Perils of a Catch and Release Combatant Policy

Fox News: NATO Kills Ex-Gitmo Detainee in Afghanistan

NATO and Afghan forces killed a former Guantanamo detainee who had become a key Al Qaeda affiliate after returning to Afghanistan, officials said Saturday.

Sabar Lal Melma, who was released from Guantanamo in 2007 after five years of detention, had been organizing attacks in eastern Kunar province and funding insurgent operations, NATO spokesman Capt. Justin Brockhoff said.

That brings us to over 151 detainees confirmed or suspected of returning to the fight after their being released from Guantanamo.

Catch and release of enemy combatants tends to present problems, but this one finally resulted in a happy ending.

The Obama Administration Really Intends That It Means It This Time......

Reuters: Attorney General vows to close Guantanamo

Although we have not closed Guantanamo within the time period that we initially indicated ... it is still the intention of the president, and it is still my intention, to close the facility that exists in Guantanamo," Holder told a joint news briefing with French Interior Minister Claude Gueant.

Well, at least Holder and Obama still intend to do it, so perhaps the headline that Holder is vowing to close it is a bit of an overstatement. Good and noble intentions, after all, are all that matter when every promise comes with an expiry date.

When pressed for an exact date of closure, Holder allegedly replied "ad kalendas graecas".

Obama Administration Backs Away From Holding 9/11 Trials In New York

Obama, faced with the overwhelming costs and objection of New Yorkers to having the trial of the 9/11 potters in their city seems to be dropping the idea: U.S. Drops Plan for a 9/11 Trial in New York City:

The Obama administration on Friday gave up on its plan to try the Sept. 11 plotters in Lower Manhattan, bowing to almost unanimous pressure from New York officials and business leaders to move the terrorism trial elsewhere.

“I think I can acknowledge the obvious,” an administration official said. “We’re considering other options.”

The reversal on whether to try the alleged 9/11 terrorists blocks from the former World Trade Center site seemed to come suddenly this week, after Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg abandoned his strong support for the plan and said the cost and disruption would be too great.

After all $200 million plus per year in security costs and massive disruption to New York City just to play image politics suddenly sounds like a bad idea when New Yorkers, particularly some pretty key and influential Democrats among them, realized what such a trial and its attendant risks would mean.

By Friday, Justice Department officials were studying other locations, focusing especially on military bases and prison complexes, and no obvious new choice had emerged.

May I suggest a convenient and very secure military base that has a great deal of expertise in holding such terrorists?