To the Editor:

Some of you, and I hope only a very few, pushed real hard in November, 2007 to get terrorist prisoners released from Guantanamo. You wanted Bush out of office and what better way than to show that this country stands for abuse of human beings as symbolized by GITMO. It worked. You fooled some of the people. You got Obama.

Some said it was unfair to detain GITMO terrorist without trial. Others that they might be innocent and it was wrong for Americans to keep terrorists locked up.

Well you were wrong.

Because of your calls for pris- oner release, prisoner No. 333, Muhammad Attik al-Harbi, and prisoner No. 372, Said Ali Shari, got sent to Saudi Arabi where the government put them into an art therapy class . (ABC news Dec. 28)

Leaving their crayons and pas- tels behind, Mohamed and Ali somehow skipped town for Yemen where they became Al Qaeda ring leaders.

Their art was now applied. They sculpted plastic explosives into a jock strap bomb. Art thera- py had gone hog wild.

Some 300 passengers almost lost their lives as a result of these men being freed from GITMO. Your good intentions at getting them and many others out may yet result in a deadly tragedy.

Obama ran on the closing of GITMO. Many, including me, called the goal stupid, something that would come back to bite him.

The news that these GITMO terrorist are behind the jockey strap bomb should give every American pause. We are still at war. There are bad people who can inflict massive harm on us. Our actions have consequences. And one of the first consequences should be to send a message to Obama that GITMO should stay open for business and no more prisoners should be released until we have won a victory in the war on terror. The trial of the 911 ter- rorists in NYC should be post- poned indefinetly. When someone tells us terrorist have rights, we should laugh them out of the room or off the airwaves. Until each of us gathers the will to put down ridiculous notions, we are not going to win this war.

Alan Stein
Mendocino