"[E]very morning I pick up a paper and some authoritarian figure, some person somewhere, is using Guantanamo to hide their own misdeeds. [W]e have shaken the belief that the world had in America's justice system by keeping a place like Guantanamo open ... We don't need it, and it's causing us far more damage than any good we get for it," -Colin Powell [from Andrew Sullivan]
It's unfortunate for Powell and for America the he decided to be such a 'team player' in the build-up to the Iraq invasion. It is his nature to be the voice of reason for an Administration with too little reason. If he had stood on principle, many Americans may have been more suspicious of Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld claims and more likely to ask serious questions about the propriety of the war. Failing to do so helped lead us into war, and destroyed the credibility of someone who I would generally be inclined to trust. Powell's story, to me, is a sad one, but not overwhelmingly so, because his wounds are self-inflicted.
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