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 Gosh, I Don't Finger-Point - White House Press Briefing by Robert Gibbs 5/21/09 — Thursday, May 21, 2009 —  MR. GIBBS: Chip.Q He said at one point in the speech, no time for finger-pointing, which he often says. But then at 12 different -- 12 or 15, depending on how you interpret them -- points in the speech he pointed the finger directly at the Bush administration. And of course he's going to do that because he's changing their policies, but why even talk about stopping the finger-pointing when he does so much of it in the speech? MR. GIBBS: Well, Chip, I think part of this was for an understanding about -- I don't think we can talk about where we're going without establishing how we got to this point. You can't set up the decision to close, the decision to go through the cases, making the decisions about bringing people to justice or transfer, without setting the stage on how you got there. I also think -- Q Why kind of hold himself up as, gosh, I don't finger-point; Washington has this culture of finger-pointing, I wouldn't do something like that -- MR. GIBBS: You can read me the reference that he's -- I don't have it off the top of my head, but is it in the latter part of -- Q I understand that "It's no secret there is a tendency in Washington to spend our time pointing fingers at one another. And our media culture feeds the impulses that lead to a good fight." (Laughter.) MR. GIBBS: Aiding and abetting is the likely charge. (Laughter.) Well, look, is that I think in the -- is that in the section of the speech where we're discussing whether or not we should look backwards and have a commission? Q Exactly. MR. GIBBS: I think he lays out the argument fairly cogently in that section about why looking back -- leaving the media culture aside -- why looking back he doesn't think would be that beneficial in using that commission to make some of those determinations. But I do think it is important -- I mean, I think he sets up in many parts in the speech, again, the same thing that I had talked about the last few days, is we've talked about this as a decision solely as one that the administration or this President made via the executive order on January 22, 2009, right? He talked in the speech today, though, about the fact that there are detainees that American courts ruled, not since the 20th or the 22nd, but in previous years, that we don't have the evidence -- we don't have enough evidence to hold individuals that are currently detained. We talked -- again, I'll use the example I used yesterday that Jake asked me about last week. On Friday there was an individual transferred to France, a detainee that a George W. Bush federal judge had ruled the administration didn't have -- this government didn't have the evidence to back up a charge and ordered that person to be transferred. I think there are obviously a confluence of events that led us to the decision first to close Guantanamo Bay, but also a confluence of events obviously that were had over the course of the past few years and a discussion about changing the way our country looks at our policies even as the President discusses the first and foremost job that he has each day in protecting the security and safety of the American people. And I think that's -- that's the way he looked at the speech today, and I think that's what he laid out. Guantanamo | President Obama | Press Briefing | Robert Gibbs | War on Terror | White House Press Corps Labels: Guantanamo, President Obama, Press Briefing, Robert Gibbs, War on Terror, White House Press Corps >> Full Story
Posted by White House Press Corps @ 7:12:00 PM
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