The Hysteria Over the Five Men Released....

As the world falls apart around us because five members of the Taliban were traded for an American Soldier I would just like to point out two things- The narrative regarding the 5 men comes from the military's initial assessment of those men when they were taken into custody. As anyone who has been paying any attention (inotherwords not the majority of the American people or the majority of the media.....) those initial assessments were categorically wrong for just about every man being held at Guantanamo---the men were taken in exchange for bounties and the military did no independent background checks. It was only after lawyers got involved and started doing the background checks that the falsity of the accusations (for almost every man at Guantanamo) started to become known.

As to the American soldier-- really? I mean WTF--because a couple of the guys in his platoon are claiming the guy said some things that makes them think he deserted we should have just left him there forever? My my.

Marcy over at emptywheel has an interesting look at the situation.

Some other looks at this issue are here, here, here and here.
I am not including links to the hysterical and inaccurate.....