Guantanamo Bay Detention Center Should Be Shut Down.

Being brief is always a tremendous challenge for me, but I'll do my best. Thanks to my opponent for the opportunity. I accept Pro's definitions, excepting the definition of terrorist. A terrorist does not merely "uses violence" for political purposes, but "uses violence against civilians" for the purpose of winning political objectives through intimidation. Pro's sole argument is the Supreme Court decision of 2005 that ruled the military tribunal system planned for use at Guantanamo (GITMO) was unconstitutional. I content: 1. Whether the terrorists are given trials by military tribunal or civilian courts is irrelevant to shutting down GITMO. GITMO is open today and the Obama Administration is proposing trying some terrorists in civilian courts in the US. 2. Taxpayers paid $200 million to construct a modern prison at GITMO. It works fine, and the investment should be used to continue to hold prisoners. This avoids the expense of preparing new facilities to hold them. 3. GITMO keeps terrorists isolated from domestic criminal populations. If intermixed, they will preach jihadism and successfully recruit new terrorists. Intermixing terrorists could be potentially avoided, but at best at substantial expense and only if legal challenges to their special treatment were overcome. 4. The Supremes invalidated the system of military tribunals that was then in place in 2005. .In 2007 Congress enacted a new system of military tribunals to meet the Court's objections. The legislation was adopted on a bipartisan basis. The system was further revised by the Military Commissions Act of 2009, which President Obama endorsed and signed. http://writ.news.findlaw.com... and the Obama Administration plans to use the new system of military tribunals to try 200 detainees. http://www.pbs.org... Military tribunals could be used either at GITMO or in the US. A civilian trial in New York City is expected to entail $200 million per year for four years in increased security costs. http://www.securitymanagement.com... There would be no added security costs to having trials in GITMO. Keeping GITMO open preserves that option. 5. If terrorist detainees are brought to the United States, there is a risk that the Supreme Court could extend additional rights to them which would cause them to ultimately be released. So far, the Court has only extend rights of habeus corpus to GITMO detainees. Detainees might for example, get the right to know the names and sources of confidential information, whose identities, once known, would cause their deaths. President Obama acknowledged this risk, saying ""It is more difficult than I think a lot of people realize" to balance an adherence to a rule of law without "releasing people intent on blowing us up." http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com... 6. Finally, the detainees if GITMO is closed the detainees must be put somewhere in the U.S. No matter where they are put, there will be significant objections by the local populace that terrorist allies of the detainees will try to free them. Raising that issue is an unnecessary distraction to the Administration at a time when there are many other things to worry about. In summary, Pro's argument is wrong because closing GITMO and using military tribunals for trials are completely separate issues, and in any case the current system of military tribunals has not been ruled invalid and is planned for use to try 200 detainees. Keeping GITMO open saves at least $200 million in facility construction costs, could save $800 million in trial security costs, avoids security risks within US prisons, and avoids the risk of having to let terrorists free. The resolution is negated.