Fall 2009 Critical Thinking Student Sample Work

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Practice Recon #1

Student #1

Reconstruction - Closing Guantanamo will be a mistake

The author of this article argues that Obama’s executive order to close Guantanamo Bay will be a mistake. Her main rationale to support this claim was that the assumptions of the prison being unsecured, poorly maintained, and will resolve the torture prisoners endured are not accurate. She supports this by illustrating her visit to the prison. When she went to Guantanamo proved to be a “state-of-the-art, climate-controlled, clean facility.” Moving detainees to another prison location, for example, Camp X-Ray may be much worse as the facility has not been in function in the past years based on her research. Therefore, keeping the detainees at Guantanamo would better since it is the best they have. She disproved the assumption that Guantanamo was a threat to national security by witnessing that there was tight security over the detainees as she saw security guards checking on them every three minutes. She explains that it would be more dangerous to move the location of the prison and moving the prisoners, first because another location would make it more for a target for terrorists. Guantanamo’s location at the tip of Cuba makes the prison geographically isolated. The movement of detainees does not change the horrors that may or may have not happened in the prison. The torture of prisoners that occurred in Abu Ghraib is similar to that of Guantanamo, therefore the location of the prison does not change what did and can happen in other prisons. The trials for suspects may never happen because the transferring to a different prison will only delay it, already since the most highly secured, most technologically advanced courtroom in the world has already been built at Guantánamo.

Student #2

P: The torturous perception of Gitmo is based on old facts and photos. P: Moving Gitmo into the U.S. could cause the new site to be a target for terrorist attacks. P: The most technologically advanced courtroom is already at Guantanamo. P: Moving everyone to a different location would delay justice for some inmates.

GC: Closing Guantanamo Bay would be wrong for everyone and would not make the U.S. safer.

The general conclusion that the author was trying to convey was that there would be no winners if Guantanamo Bay was closed, and moving it would not make the U.S. safer. Her main argument is that moving inmates into the United States would endanger U.S. citizens as well as inmates. She also argues that there is no torturing going on at Gitmo and that the public perception of the camp is based off of old facts and photos of a different camp before renovations. The author claims that by moving the inmates to a different location, some of them would not receive justice like fair and speedy trials. She states that the Obama administration has considered creating a camp with a state of the art facility to hold courtroom sessions. The author argues that we already have a state of the art courtroom that is already at Guantanamo.

Student #3

The rationale of this article is that “closing Guantanamo will be a mistake.” The premises for this rationale are the following: the injustices that the prisoners endure will not end, there is no geographic improvement for Gitmo, it will slow the court processes for the inmates even more, the current location in Cuba is safer for both the inmates and American Security than any other territory in the United States, and the facilities at Gitmo are already the most technology advanced in the world. The torture and mistreatment that the inmates endure will not end with the closing for Guantanamo, but rather they will just be followed by the inmates to the next location. The further conclusion for this premise is that there is mistreatment at detention facilities everywhere; therefore, closing this facility will not be beneficial to this cause. Changing the geography of Gitmo, or rather moving the inmates somewhere else to a new facility, will not correct the issues that Obama recognizes. The process of going to court and getting a trial is already very difficult and some inmates don’t even get their trial heard. Moving the inmates with the closing of Gitmo would cause more extensive work to be done. In conclusion to this premise, the work that would have to be done to move the inmates would cause the future trials to be put back even longer, and this is extremely unfair to the inmates. Gitmo is currently located on the southeastern tip of Canada. Moving the inmates would make them more susceptible to terrorist attacks in the U.S. This would also put the lives of Americans at risk when the new facility is on American soil. Creating a new facility would require technological courts and facilities. Gitmo already has the most advanced of these in the world. Thus, the closing of Gitmo would be anything but beneficial for anyone.

Practice Recon #3

Student #1

Rights of Corporations The author’s conclusion in this article is that the Supreme Court should not grant corporations the same rights as human beings in matters of politics. He argues that corporations have not been allowed to contribute financially to political campaigns by Congress since 1907. Congress has upheld this ban repeatedly. Another argument is that a corporation’s influence in politics would be overwhelming if they had the same rights as humans. Americans are worried about the influence that corporations already have with elected officials. The author’s last argument is that even though some of the conservative justices are pro-corporation’s rights, the constitution and the framers did not intend for corporations to have too much power or rights near those of humans. All of these arguments validate the conclusion that corporations should not have the same rights as humans.