It is dispiriting to witness Rush Limbaugh and his ilk attempt to suck the hope out of the electorate who so recently embraced Barack Obama, and his message of changing the course of the United States of America back to one of lawfulness. That electorate which was sick unto death of former president Bush’s unlawful navigation into arrogance, secrecy, greed and certainly not least, the abrogation of the Geneva War Convention’s international agreements.

While it is a given that cynicism by no means began with Limbaugh – or Bush, or Rove, or Cheney it is worth noting – but, the advent of radio, television, and more recently the catholical nature of the Internet have made the purveying of these lies mere child’s play. So the twin messages of fear and hatred are capable of deposit into our consciousness in the proverbial “twinkling” of Limbaugh’s scornful eyes.

As is Limbaugh’s style, he makes no distinction between truth and falsity. He warns us that the closing of Guantanamo’s prison and the transferring of prisoners to the United States entails “danger” to that very electorate which rejected that well-practiced lack of distinction.

Terrorists have not attacked Colorado’s Supermax facility, where Omar Abdel Rahman was prosecuted and convicted for his part in the first bombing of the World Trade Center. Terrorists have had such “targets” as the Supermax for 20 years.

As for his claim that the United States’ criminal justice system cannot handle holding and prosecuting suspected terrorists – that is naive at best, and frankly, slanderous at worst; our justice system is fully capable of processing sensitive national security issues and is at its best when not compromising fundamental – or “constitutionally guaranteed” – rights.

He would have us believe that detainees released from the custody of the United States are rejoining al-Qaeda and “returning to the battlefield.” The fact of the matter is that it was the Bush-Cheney disregard for human rights and the laws of the United States which lathered the Muslim world to so cancerous a degree.

Obama’s actions represent a return to lawfulness and a prudent response to the realities of the 21st century. Among which realities is

the recognition that there is more than one dangerous and powerful nation, or confederacy of nations. Concurrently, we are less dangerous and powerful to our enemies since our several trillion dollar attack on Iraq.

There is no historical military figure of eminence, from Eisenhower to Alexander The Great, who has not cautioned against the untoward influence of the military.

The Pentagon’s own data and prior reports belie its claim that detainees have rejoined the battle: its having produced duplicate names, the names of people who were never imprisoned in Guantanamo, as having been so, and indeed, instancing the names of people who have never even left their homelands.

So, to attempt to counter Limbaugh’s screed – on the long-since penned advice of Edmund Burke – I’ve written this letter to my fellow citizens. Thank you for printing it.

Brian Sullivan

Enumclaw