Political Wire

Obama Should Prosecute the Torturers

· 111 Comments

The New York Times has a blistering editorial calling on President Obama to prosecute those who committed torture and the officials who authorized them.

“The nation cannot move forward in any meaningful way without coming to terms, legally and morally, with the abhorrent acts that were authorized, given a false patina of legality, and committed by American men and women from the highest levels of government on down.”

“Starting a criminal investigation is not about payback; it is about ensuring that this never happens again and regaining the moral credibility to rebuke torture by other governments. Because of the Senate’s report, we now know the distance officials in the executive branch went to rationalize, and conceal, the crimes they wanted to commit. The question is whether the nation will stand by and allow the perpetrators of torture to have perpetual immunity for their actions.”

Quote of the Day

· 8 Comments

“I’m going to end on a note of gratitude — something I never thought that I would say. George W. Bush, thank you for not dying while you were in office.”

— Jon Stewart, on former Vice President Dick Cheney’s defense of torture during the Bush administration.

Why Obama Isn’t Abandoning CIA Chief

· 4 Comments

CIA Director John Brennan “has been as close as anyone to President Obama on his most sensitive national security decisions, from drone strikes to the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden,” Bloomberg reports.

“That helps explain why Obama isn’t abandoning his Central Intelligence Agency director despite some calls for his resignation following release of a Senate report detailing the CIA’s brutal interrogations of terrorism suspects during President George W. Bush’s administration. Brennan was a top official at the agency under Bush and then served as head of the National Counterterrorism Center before going to work for Obama.”

Cheney Says Bush Wasn’t Kept in the Dark on Torture

· 59 Comments

Former Vice President Dick Cheney said that President Bush was not kept in the dark on the CIA’s interrogation techniques, calling the Senate Intelligence Committee report’s claim a “flat out lie,” according to The Hill.

Said Cheney: “I think he knew certainly the techniques, we did discuss the techniques, there was no effort on our part to keep him from that. That the president wasn’t being told is just a flat out lie.”

Obama Stays Out of Torture Debate

· 30 Comments

“The C.I.A. maintains that the brutal interrogation techniques it used on terrorism suspects a decade ago worked. The Senate Intelligence Committee concluded that they did not. And on that, at least, President Obama is not taking sides,” the New York Times reports.

“That debate, after all, has left Mr. Obama facing an uncomfortable choice between two allies: the close adviser and former aide he installed as director of the C.I.A. versus his fellow Democrats who control the Senate committee and the liberal base that backs their findings.”

Udall Discloses Classified Info to Prove CIA Is Lying

· 38 Comments

“In a career-defining speech, Sen. Mark Udall (D-CO) took to the Senate floor Wednesday to disclose classified information regarding an internal CIA investigation into the agency’s Bush-era ‘enhanced interrogation techniques,'” National Journal reports.

Udall “began revealing key conclusions from the so-called Panetta Review, written in 2011 and named after then-CIA Director Leon Panetta. Udall says that the Panetta Review gives evidence that the CIA is still lying about the scope of enhanced interrogation techniques used during the Bush administration.”

[speech_bubble type=”std” subtype=”a” icon=”pwdome.jpg” name=””]Now, that’s a memorable way to leave the U.S. Senate [/speech_bubble]

Quote of the Day

· 62 Comments

“The United States of America is awesome, we are awesome. We’ve closed the book on torture, and we’ve stopped doing it. And the reason they want to have this discussion is not to show how awesome we are. This administration wants to have this discussion to show us how we’re not awesome.”

— Fox News co-host Andrea Tantaros, quoted by Gawker.

Bush Administration Paid $80M for Torture Consultants

· 21 Comments

“The CIA contractors who helped develop and operate the ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ that the agency used on terror suspects, including waterboarding, were paid more than $80 million,” NBC News reports.

“The contract was for more than $180 million, but the contractors had only received $81 million when their contract was terminated in 2009.”

Bush Was Worried He’d Leak CIA Secrets

· 32 Comments

Here’s a curious note in the Senate’s report on torture pertaining to President George W. Bush:

“The presentation also noted that the President of the United States had directed that he not be informed of the locations of the CIA detention facilities to ensure that he would not accidentally disclose the information.”

[speech_bubble type=”std” subtype=”a” icon=”pwdome.jpg” name=””]What else did he prefer not to know? [/speech_bubble]

Bush Officials Challenge Torture Report

· 17 Comments

“A long-awaited Senate report condemning torture by the Central Intelligence Agency has not even been made public yet, but former President George W. Bush’s team has decided to link arms with former intelligence officials and challenge its conclusions,” the New York Times reports.

“The report is said to assert that the C.I.A. misled Mr. Bush and his White House about the nature, extent and results of brutal techniques like waterboarding, and some of his former administration officials privately suggested seizing on that to distance themselves from the controversial program, according to people involved in the discussion. But Mr. Bush and his closest advisers decided that “we’re going to want to stand behind these guys,” as one former official put it.”

Democrats Lash Out at White House Over Torture Report

· 12 Comments

“The White House’s briefing to Democrats on immigration Thursday erupted instead into a confrontation over the Senate’s classified torture report,” Senate sources told the Huffington Post.

Senate Intelligence Chair Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) “waited for the immigration discussion to end and then pulled out a prepared speech that she read for five or six minutes, making the case for the release of the damning portrayal of America’s post-9/11 torture program…. Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), who served as intelligence committee chair before Feinstein, was furious after the meeting, and accused the administration of deliberately stalling the report.”

[speech_bubble type=”std” subtype=”a” icon=”pwdome.jpg” name=””]This may be one area where the White House will be glad when Republicans take control of the Senate in January. [/speech_bubble]

Taegan Goddard

Taegan Goddard

Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire -- which for more than two decades has been one of the nation's most influential political news sites.

More about Taegan Goddard →