One of the negative effects of changes in national security policy during the Bush administration was the advent of “indefinite detention” as a way of handling potentially dangerous terrorists. (Or, in some cases, people who were picked up for being in the wrong place at the wrong time with a name having too many vowels in it.) Out on the campaign trail last year, one of the things I liked about candidate Obama was his seemingly unflinching loyalty to the rule of law and the basic belief that America was a place where the accused would get their day in court. He was hard on George W. Bush over this, and rightly so in my opinion. I have consistently maintained that these people should be brought up in some sort of court, (even if it’s a private, military one without press access if national security secrets must be aired) given a trial and either released if innocent, or executed / sentenced to life without parole if guilty.

Apparently, now that the campaign has ended, President Obama has either decided he no longer agrees with me or no longer has the stomach for the fight. Ed Morrissey reports on the subject.

Bush’s opponents screamed about human rights and due process, and claimed that Bush had abused his power. Those critics included Barack Obama, who regularly castigated the Bush administration for its failure to provide his idea of due process to detainees at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere, as well as blasting Bush for his argument that he didn’t require Congress to act to maintain that power.

Now? Change you can believe in, baby:

The Obama administration has decided not to seek new legislation from Congress authorizing the indefinite detention of about 50 terrorism suspects being held without charges at at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, officials said Wednesday.

Instead, the administration will continue to hold the detainees without bringing them to trial based on the power it says it has under the Congressional resolution passed after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, authorizing the president to use force against forces of Al Qaeda and the Taliban.

There are two views on this change making the rounds. One is that Obama has simply changed his mind and that the war powers act gives him the authority to hold suspects forever without benefit of a trial. The second is that he hasn’t actually changed his mind, but doesn’t want to get into a legislative battle over it while he’s in the middle of the fight of his life over health care and spending us into an economic black hole. Neither holds any water with me.

If he’s not going to follow through on this, then we were fed a bill of goods during the campaign and, as Ed is so fond of saying, all of his promises actually do have an expiration date. I have tried to point out the various areas in matters of foreign policy where I agree with and support the president, (since I find little or nothing to agree with him on domestically) but there’s no free pass to be given here. Stick to your word, sir, and put this system of indefinite detention out to pasture.