It Does Matter

When I traveled to Canada last summer, the Montreal and Ottawa talk radio stations' topic number one was America's treatment of prisoners in the War on Terror. CBC-TV covered it thoroughly, too. The U.S. administration was not scoring many points in the discussion. Here's a friendly next door neighbor that shares our involvement in the Afghan war, yet our reputation as a champion of human rights seemed to be on the line. If that's the case there, what could our standing be in nations closer to the Muslim world? President Obama's efforts to close Guantanamo Bay prison, and bring these captured combatants into the U.S. for justice, have been called by critics an attempt to appease a few foreign governments. Colin Powell, Secretary of State under President Bush, sees it as more than that. He's right. After the Abu Ghraib prison disaster, the U.S. needs to show the world we practice what we preach. Defend waterboarding and Gitmo if you like, but these perceptions about American justice run deep. Perceptions do matter. There are plenty of experts who believe we can fight the War on Terror without resorting to torture and bending the rules about detaining enemy combatants. We're better than that.