CIA

Right before speaking with the Senate today, Mukasey sent a lawyerly letter to Judiciary Chair Pat Leahy saying essentially, 'You're going to ask me about torture and I'm not going to answer your questions.' ("There are policy initiatives that the department supports that some members of this committee vigorously oppose, and vice versa. There also are situations where the interests of the executive branch and the legislature will be in some tension.")

Which is to say, 'as a member of the executive branch, now, my opinion about laws, as "top law enforcement officer in the land" is not as important as... well, providing cover for the executive branch, which is now my job. btw thanks for that sweet ass confirmation, clowns.'

Leahy reponded, "Attorney General Mukasey knows that this will not end the matter and expects to be asked serious questions at the hearing tomorrow." Oh my stars! Whatsoever shall happen?!

First up, Chuck Schumer who helped Michael Mukasey become Attorney General because Mukasey is from New York, and also because Chuck Schumer is a moron.

Schumer told Mukasey that he is disappointed in him because now that Mukasey is in the Cabinet, he won't stand up to the Bushists when it comes to telling the rest of the Administration that waterboarding is torture and it's "repugnant" and "cruel" (as Mukasey himself called the torture technique in his confirmation hearings where Schumer bounced in his chair and clapped, oh so impressed).

Schumer pouted and said "You have an opportunity here to be something of a leader, and you are going to be asked whether we should pass a law," Schumer begged of Mukasey. In response, Mukasey shrugged and told him that it's not his job as Attorney General to do anything on his own accord.

SCHUMER: I need to tell you how profoundly, in this particular situation, I disagree with you.

MUKASEY: I'm happy to hear that I lived up to expectations. I'm very sorry to hear that I lived down to them.

And with that, Schumer stopped the pursuit. Because Schumer is a moron and a coward. Come on! Asking a former judge to render a legal opinion based on a policy/political preference is a stupid line of questioning.

Waterboarding isn't repugnant, it's torture. A better line of questioning would hew to establishing that illegality. Based not on public policy--the province of the legislative branch, not the enforcement powers of the executive---but on legal precedent.

Biden fucked up in the same way, drilling down into the Nichomachean ethics of torture. Like anybody cares that Biden when to Catholic school and learned latin. To Biden's stupid questions, Mukasey said the DOJ would have to "balance the value of doing something (torture) against the cost of doing it." Cost? "I mean the heinousness of doing it, the cruelty of doing it, balanced against the value.... balanced against the information you might get."  Information "that couldn't be used to save lives," he explained, would be of less value.

What this reveals is that Bush's DOJ has concluded that waterboarding is necessary and therefore must be not considered torture, so also it must not be termed 'cruel treatment' under the Consitution, Common Article 3... even though Mukasey admitted that it was "cruel" when he asked to be confirmed.

Biden responded, "You're the first I've ever heard to say what you just said.... It shocks my conscience a little bit."

Schumer is disappointed. Biden is shocked.  Big surprise, idiots.

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, who was a United States Attorney, on the other hand understood where all of the previous back and forths failed, he saw the endgame of the argument the Bush Administration was sticking to, and he wouldn't lay off.

WHITEHOUSE: You are the top law enforcement officer of the United States and prosecutors do look back. Prosecutors do investigate things that have happened in the past. They do dredge up the past in order to do justice...Now the president has said that we will investigate, prosecute all acts of torture and you've just said today, "if someone is guilty of violating the laws of the United States," they get prosecuted...There is jurisdiction over the activity prohibited if the alleged offender is a national of the United States and a person who conspires to commit an offense under this section is subject to the same penalties other than the penalty of death..." So, we have a statute on point, you are, I believe, the sole prosecuting authority for that statute, correct?

MUKASEY: I am as the top of the Department of Justice, which is the sole prosecuting authority. [...]

When it comes to past conduct, one of the many questions involved in past conduct in addition to what was done, is, what authorizations were given, what authorizations were reasonably relied on. My current evaluation of the statute, if there is one, has only tangentially to do with that because if it has directly to do with that, then the message is, your authorization, you who did whatever you did, your authorization is good only for so long as the tenure of the person who gave it and maybe not even for that long...

WHITEHOUSE The message you send otherwise is that 'I was only following orders' is a fine response.

MUKASEY: It's not a fine response. It was a response at Nuremberg that was found unlawful, we both know. Ummm...

WHITEHOUSE: And yet it's the one that you're crediting right now. 'I had authorization and therefore I'm immune from prosecution.'" Isn't that where that analysis leads?

MUKASEY: No, it's, I had authorization and let's take a look at the authorization. If the circumstances under which it was given and what was done have a whole wide range of variables that I don't have before me.

WHITEHOUSE: Has that been done? Has there been a thorough, independent analysis under your administration of whether or not any national of the United States is potentially in violation of Section 23-40A as the result of...

MUKASEY: I don't, I don't start investigations out of curiosity. I start investigations out of some indication that somebody might have had an improper authorization. I have no such indication now. [...]

WHITEHOUSE I don't see how that resolves the Nuremberg defense problem. If the reason that you're giving us for investigating the destruction of the tapes, but not investigating the underlying interrogation, is that it appears that the interrogators were following orders and it appears that the destroyers were not, isn't that the Nuremberg defense?

MUKASEY: No, because you're assuming what was on the tapes, you're assuming that the interrogation was unlawful...

WHITEHOUSE: I'm not assuming any such thing, anymore than you'd be assuming that the destruction was unlawful. What I'm suggesting is that you should investigate it and there should be at least somebody who at least takes a look at this in a principled, thoughtful way, and if the answer that comes back is, no, there was not a crime and here's why, then we can lay the question to rest. But if you're telling me that this hasn't even been investigated although the destruction of the tapes is being investigated, it strikes me that there is a split standard there and I'm trying to understand why.

War crimes trials, anyone?

Rush Holt called for Special Counsel over CIA tapes. Sure, Senator Biden had previously called for one publicly in a Q&A, but nothing is official in Washington unless the statement is on letterhead and stamped "received."

In a letter to Attorney General Mukasey, Congressman Holt of NJ requested the immediate appointment of a special counsel to investigate the creation and handling of two CIA interrogation tapes. Holt is a member of the Select Intelligence Oversight Panel. Meanwhile, down the hall, Silvestre Reyes, sat on his greased palms.

Holt said that neither the CIA nor the Justice Department can be trusted to take on the probe, and his letter lays out what he believes should be the focus of the special counsel's work:

1) the circumstances surrounding the CIA's creation, handling, destruction, and representations regarding its video or audio recording of detainee interrogations to the federal courts, the 9/11 Commission, and the Congress;

2) the legality of the activities contained on the recordings, considering the identity of the detainees involved, the reasons for their detentions, the nature of the information sought, and the methods used in the interrogations;

3) who within the executive branch had knowledge of the CIA's destruction of these records, including who authorized their destruction and who was informed of their destruction; and

4) whether any federal laws were broken as a result of the CIA's creation, handling, destruction and representations regarding said video or audio recordings of detainee interrogations to the federal courts, the 9/11 Commission, and the Congress.

Nothing will come of it, probably, but it's on the record now, future historians will be able to add this CIA tape thing to the list of scandals and crimes.  Keep them on the defensive about everything and keep feeding evidence into the narrative of lawbreaking Republicans run amok.  Well done.

After it was revealed that the CIA obstructed justice by destroying evidence - video of Americans torturing people - Senate Intelligence Chair / General Idiot, Jay Rockefeller stumbled around yesterday dropping things and mumbling that he knew about the tapes... oh, wait. No he didn’t. Sorta, kinda.  {seriously - can him...}  Then Russ called and told him the plan, eventually.

Across town, area retard Michelle Malkin chirped that the Democrats are as much to blame for the destruction of this evidence as those who actually destroyed the evidence because "they knew and they did nothing." She's got a fucking point, Harry!

First, if the Democrats in Congress knew about the CIA’s destruction of torture tapes and did nothing about it, why do conservatives like Malkin hate the Democrats so much?

Rep. Harman clears things up for the retard Malkin:

In early 2003, in my capacity at Ranking Member of the House Intelligence Committee, I received a highly classified briefing on CIA interrogation practices from the agency’s General Counsel. The briefing raised a number of serious concerns and led me to send a letter to the General Counsel. Both the briefing and my letter are classified so I cannot reveal specifics, but I did caution against destruction of any videotapes.

Given the nature of the classification, I was not free to mention this subject publicly until Director Hayden disclosed it yesterday. To my knowledge, the Intelligence Committee was never informed that any videotapes had been destroyed. Surely I was not.

This matter must be promptly and fully investigated and I call for my letter of February 2003, which was never responded to and has been in the CIA’s files ever since, to be declassified.

To side with Harman the public needs to sympathize with a member of congress who's being stymied by abuse of the classification procedure.

That might work if there wasn't a long history of Democrats in key positions where they could do some good sitting on their hands instead.  Jay Rockefeller is the worst offender.

Jay Rockefeller is constantly learning of legally dubious (at best) CIA intelligence activities, and then saying nothing about them publicly until they are leaked to the press, at which point he expresses outrage and incredulity -- but reveals nothing (other than how he wrote a letter and sealed it in his safe). Really, isn't it about time the Democrats select an effective Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, one who will treat this criminal administration with the seriousness it deserves? I nominate Whitehouse.

Members who find themselves in the position Harman is in -- and the position that Dick Durbin, Carl Levin, Ted Kennedy, Harry Reid, Jay Rockefeller and others like them need to realize is that on some level acquiescence in these kind of abuses winds up legitimizing them.

A member who believes he or she is in possession of evidence of crimes being committed by a dangerously unhinged Executive and covered-up through illegitimate classification ought to seriously consider civil disobedience.

As Matthew Yglesias put it: "Our political leaders have responsibilities to the country and to the constitution" and bragging to disgusted voters that they abdicated responsibility to red tape, that they declined to make the tough calls, and that the main thing they did was make sure their asses were covered.

Because it's always the cover-up and not the crime that gets you in Washington, White House-shiny-lying-robot Dana Perino positively crapped her pants today.  The count for her most commonly used phrases today was: “I don’t know” — seven times; “decline to comment/not commenting” — 10 times; and “still gathering facts/gather the facts” — 11 times.

If compromised accomplices like Rockefeller don't keep slipping the press good questions to ask, they'll stop asking the questions. 

Ted Kennedy got himself some camera time on the floor of the Senate chamber and accused the CIA of a cover up, evoking the 18 1/2 minute gap of tap from the Waterate Tapes of disgraced crook Tricky Dick Nixon.

Why is this so good? There are elements that have proved themselves quite ready to torpedo this Administration. There are elements in the intelligence apparatus that despise Dick Cheney and wouldn't cross the street to piss on him if he was on fire.

He rhetorically asks:

"What would cause the CIA to take this action? The answer is obvious -- cover up. The agency was desperate to cover up damning evidence of their practices. In a letter to agency employees yesterday, CIA Director Michael Hayden claimed that the tapes were a security risk because they might someday “leak” and thereby identify the CIA employees who engaged in these practices.

But that excuse won’t wash. I am second to no one in wanting to protect the brave men and women of the CIA. But how is it possible that the Director of the CIA has so little faith in his own agency?*

Does the Director believe the CIA’s buildings are not secure?*

Would it be beyond the agency’s technical expertise to preserve the tapes while hiding the identity of its employees?*

Does the Director believe that the CIA’s employees cannot be trusted not to leak materials that might harm the agency?*

Or does he know that the interrogation techniques are so abhorrent that they could not remain unknown much longer?"

The last question has to do with the crime itself, and will therefore go unpunished, the other questions are about the cover-up - and the answer for each "* question" is that it was an order from somewhere not in Langley.

Kennedy is teasing out an answer to each "* question" somewhere along these lines: "Cheney made me do it."

Usually when this Conservative Administration does something illegal there is some huffing and puffing from Democrats, but no Houses are ever blown down.  Today, a story came out about another crime of Bush's and while I figured that this news would be met with awkward thumb twiddling by Democrats (akin to when a transcript of a Downing St. meeting from July, 2002 was leaked to The Sunday Times stating that Bush and Blair conspired to get an Iraq war no matter what, and that it effectively began a year before the March 2003 invasion)

Well, I was wrong: Chris Dodd is demanding our new "non political" Attorney General Mukasey investigate a White House cover up that goes right to Bush himself.  I'll tell you why this is important in a moment.  First, the outrage.

It started when I read this post over at Wonkette about former WH spokesman Scott McClellan's "my job as a liar" memoir and the oopsie bombshell he drops in the book.  Which specific lies, you ask?  There are so very many to choose from -- no, the big one Scottie describes in his book is the about the CIA leak case.  Where our Executive Branch jeopardized National Security...

“I had unknowingly passed along false information. And five of the highest ranking officials in the administration were involved in my doing so: Rove, Libby, the vice president, the president’s chief of staff and the president himself.”

Hey, whoa, what? Our bitter snitch explains that he trusted this president: "The most powerful leader in the world had called upon me to speak on his behalf and help restore credibility he lost amid the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.” Cry me a fucking river, asshole. 

Wait, but what?  George Bush thought that lying about him breaking the law...  would get his credibility ...back? 

So George Bush made the decision to break laws and undermine the security of the nation in a time of war by exposing the identity of an operative working in South Asian nuclear non-proliferation - and by extension, he cut loose all of of the operative's associates and informants.  All to get his credibility ...back?

Holy retarded Texan shit.

And that's the thing.  If any of us hope to survive another year we have to keep this posse in the White House occupied.  This is a great way to do it.  Because if we leave them alone, they are going to take an ax to everything on their way out.  The next president will find a government wholly dismantled with key screws missing - safeguards removed, you name it... 

The big things will be the plants, conservative movement loyalists plugged into key offices, there will be moles, rules changed by executive order, holes opened up in the framework.  Dozens of executive orders destroying everything from our national parks, to regulatory agencies, to international treaties, to vital Departments in government like Justice, for God's sake. 

The mind boggles. The forces of destruction work much faster than the forces of creation.  It takes longer to build a city on a hill than it does for a Tsunami to wash it away.

The other thing is that we can't allow these criminals to shred every piece of paper in the place - an investigation with an subpoenas will save much of it.  We also can't let this conservative presidency get away with not being remembered as the most hated, criminal, and destructive band of crooks since, well, ever.  This will help. 

America needs to have daily reminders that if you put conservatives in government, they destroy everything.  Too often, Democrats complain that the country is being destroyed by conservative policy, but let it happen anyway.  

Guys, follow Dodd's lead: investigate everything.  Bush already made clear he is going to veto any legislation constructive in nature, he's hell bent on destruction...  so tie him to a chair under oath and grill him for the next 425 days.  Hell, waterboard him.