Enhanced Evasion
11 December 2007 12:11 am by Taylor Marsh
For the record, we
torture. Now please go about your Christmas shopping as usual. Presidential
campaigns, please proceed.
Well, just one thing before you make your lists or prep for that next debate.
Are we really going to buy that the Bush administration can investigate themselves?
“They told us we had everything they had on the detainees … You don’t
expect not to be told the truth, but we weren’t told the truth.” – Tom
Kean, 9/11 Commission Chair
We can’t even trust our own to cop to torture when they find out about it. They don’t hold a press conference and bust Bush out. They write letters.
I have no idea what to make of Senator Jay Rockefeller, whom I’ve had doubts
about before, but who clearly now has set off alarm bells with his recent stories
on what he knew when. I’m equally unimpressed with Rockefeller saying destroying
evidence of torture doesn’t rise to the level of a special counsel. Then what
the hell does? Additionally, what’s the point of getting briefed if you’re just going to nod and go along with horrendous acts without standing up. Because your lawyer won’t let you? Some things take courage to blow the whistle on and that’s just what should have been done in this case.
Torture is a crime by U.S. law. By international law it’s a war crime. Neither
are minor points.
Senator Joe Biden disagreed strongly with Rockefeller. Let me just state that
I trust Biden on intelligence and national security matters far more than I do Mr. Head In the
Sand, who has clearly covered for Mr. Bush and the boys who torture.
“It appears as though there may be an obstruction of justice charge
here, tampering with evidence, and destroying evidence. And this is _ I think
this is one case where it really does call for a special counsel. I think
this leads right into the White House,” Biden said. “There may be
a legal and rational explanation, but I don’t see any on the face of it.”
– Senator
Joe Biden
Of course, Mr. Bush has “no recollection” of being told about the
tapes being destroyed. Shocking, I know.
“The cable traffic back and forth was extremely specific,” he said.
“And the bottom line was these were very unusual authorities that the
agency got after 9/11. No one wanted to mess them up. No one wanted to get
in trouble by going overboard. So it was extremely deliberate.”“That’s why so few people were waterboarded. I think the agency has
said that two people were waterboarded, Abu Zubaydah being one, and it’s because
you really wanted it to be a last resort because we didn’t want these false
confessions. We didn’t want wild goose chases,” Kiriakou said.Coming
in From the Cold: CIA Spy Calls Waterboarding Necessary But Torture
John Kiriakou now thinks it not only saved lives, but also compromised what
we stand for in this country. Ya think? As for saving lives, I’m going to disagree, because when you balance it with losing hearts and minds we lose in the long run.
Marty
Lederman posted Michael Hayden’s letter to C.I.A. employees last week. Love
this starter:
Message from the Director: Taping of Early Detainee Interrogations
The press has learned that back in 2002, during the initial stage of our
terrorist detention program, CIA videotaped interrogations, and destroyed
the tapes in 2005. I understand that the Agency did so only after it was determined
they were no longer of intelligence value and not relevant to any internal,
legislative, or judicial inquiries–including the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui.
[What about the 9/11 Commission? What about the failure to tell the Moussaoui
judge about these tapes? What about the obvious future legislative and judicial
inquiries? (Note that the destruction likely occurred just after Dana Priest
broke the story of the CIA black sites in 2005.)] The decision to destroy
the tapes was made within CIA itself. The leaders of our oversight committees
in Congress were informed of the videos years ago and of the Agency’s intention
to dispose of the material. [Yes, and what did they say about that?]/ Our
oversight committees also have been told that the videos were, in fact, destroyed.
… ..
So as others have covered, leading Dems knew of the torture with Rep. Jane
Harman and Senator Rockefeller writing letters urging the C.I.A. not to destroy
the tapes. Those letters are classified. Now here we sit not knowing what is
going on. But Rockefeller doesn’t want to look into it with a special counsel.
Harman has asked for her letter to be declassified, a
letter that Speaker Pelosi evidently agreed with at the time, when Harman
was taking over as ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee. However,
former Senator Bob Graham said he didn’t know about the tape destruction.
I don’t know about you, but I smell c.y.a. in action. Oh, and for the record, it’s way too late for snitching, though that certainly doesn’t mean it’s a bad idea. It’s just that it doesn’t do any good at this point. It also doesn’t get the Democrats who knew off the hook.
