An exit strategy for Guantanamo?

How did British PM Gordon Brown use the capital he achieved by being an economic expert in charge when the global economy tanked? He went to Saudi Arabia and met with ex-Guantánamo prisoners:

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown met former Saudi inmates of the US prison at Guantanamo Bay as he toured a deradicalisation facility on Sunday.

Brown spoke to six men at the facility near the capital Riyadh and shook hands with two inmates who had each spent six years at Guantanamo Bay as a result of their al-Qaeda links.

Saudi officials claim their efforts at rehabilitating extremists using months of reasoned argument against radical Islam have a success rate of 80 to 90 per cent; only 35 people out of 3200 in the program have been rearrested for security offences.

When the men are released, they are given jobs and other support.

An official at the centre, Dr Abdel Rahman Hadlaq, said it was a key step to break the inmates' links with radicals.

"If we don't support them, someone else will support them," he said.

Preventing young British Muslims, particularly those with family ties to Pakistan, from embracing violent extremism has become a key priority for Britain's security services since four British men killed 52 commuters in suicide bomb attacks on London's transport network in 2005.

Should the United States open a "deradicalization facility" as a prelude to closing both Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib -- or let one of our "allies" do it?

American Idol-atry

Did American Idol give our youth a taste for small-d democracy? If so, shame on them!

There are important differences between "American Idol" and our constitutional American system. "Idol" is a direct democracy, for one. (And, like in Chicago of yore, "Idol" watchers can vote as often as they desire.) But, at the end of the day, they are both about voting. And as much as some might scoff at the deleterious effects of "Idol" on our culture, it has created a culture of voting among our young people. Where past generations of youth might have felt cynically about their ability to affect change, the millions of "Idol" voters can see the palpable impact of their vote -- live in prime time and with Ryan Seacrest as their Walter Cronkite.