Reid splits from Pelosi on torture.

[JoeChalupa]

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0409/21634.html

Senate Democratic leaders continue to resist calls for creation of an independent commission to investigate the interrogation tactics authorized by the Bush administration.

“I think it would very unwise from my perspective to start having commissions, boards, tribunals until we find out what the facts are,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), reiterating his support for the Senate Intelligence Committee to investigate the interrogations.

Reid’s statement puts him at odds with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who has called for a formal “truth commission” to probe into the interrogations and legal justifications for tactics like water boarding. And President Barack Obama opened the door to creating a bipartisan commission similar to the one formed after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Reid denied that there was any split among Democrats.

But it’s clear that Senate Democrats want to go slowly on what has become a volatile issue.

“It is in our best interest if we are going to do this sensibly, prudently to wait until Sen. Feinstein completes this investigation,” said Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.).

After the Intelligence Committee finishes its inquiry, Reid said he would be open to forming a bipartisan panel similar to ones proposed by Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.).

“We must get the information. It’s spotty now and I think that a few months waiting to determine the right way to go about this is certainly not going to hurt us.”

Reid said “it would be wrong” to discuss the details of the classified briefings he received on the interrogations, adding that he didn’t remember exactly when he was briefed.

Durbin said the Senate should wait for a Justice Department report about the involvement of the agency in authorizing the tactics before deciding if Congress should sanction Bush administration attorney Jay Bybee, now a judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

A Tuesday evening report released by the Senate Armed Services committee found that Bybee played a key role in crafting the legal justifications, legalizing techniques previously deemed illegal by U.S. and international law.

“If people had known his involvement in either drafting or approving these memoranda then I think the hearing would have taken a lot long,” said Reid. “But this of course, come out later.”

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) plans to hold hearings investigating the role Bush administration lawyers played in justifying the interrogating techniques.



We'll have to see how it all plays out.

[boutons_deux]

"until we find out what the facts are"

Does he mean the "fact finding" as exemplified by the 9/11 Commssion? :lol

[FaithInOne]

I'm going to enjoy watching them try to focus on "torture" while the economy continues to get owned.

[ChumpDumper]

So you hope the economy gets worse.

[George Gervin's Afro]

I'm going to enjoy watching them try to focus on "torture" while the economy continues to get owned.

Nice! The more people suffer conservatives gain from it!

[jack sommerset]

I'm going to enjoy watching them try to focus on "torture" while the economy continues to get owned.

It won't last long. Obamas team is going from one thing to the next to keep the minds off the trillion dollars they wasted. He has gone to far. Leaving the thought of actaully putting a former USA president or his administration in jail for protecting our country is far beyond politics.

[JohnnyMarzetti]

It won't last long. Obamas team is going from one thing to the next to keep the minds off the trillion dollars they wasted. He has gone to far. Leaving the thought of actaully putting a former USA president or his administration in jail for protecting our country is far beyound politics.

Bush and Cheney would go to jail for lying and hiding behind the "protecting our country" won't cut it.

[Yonivore]

Does anyone honestly believe Pelosi is telling the truth when she says she didn't know about waterboarding?

C'mon, really?

[ChumpDumper]

Does anyone honestly believe Pelosi is telling the truth when she says she didn't know about waterboarding?

C'mon, really?When they were in the minority?

That is very believable.

[Wild Cobra]

I'm going to enjoy watching them try to focus on "torture" while the economy continues to get owned.
Good point. That must be why this is in the news again, to take people away from the real disasters.

[Wild Cobra]

It won't last long. Obamas team is going from one thing to the next to keep the minds off the trillion dollars they wasted. He has gone to far. Leaving the thought of actaully putting a former USA president or his administration in jail for protecting our country is far beyond politics.
No kidding, especially since the programs being implemented will more than double the national debt real soon!

[ChumpDumper]

Yeah, everyone got really upset the last time the deficit went up.

[Wild Cobra]

Yeah, everyone got really upset the last time the deficit went up.
Deficits for war time spending and recessions do not bother me. This administration is implementing unsustainable fiscal policies.

Whopping big difference.

[clambake]

Deficits for war time spending and recessions do not bother me. This administration is implementing unsustainable fiscal policies.

Whopping big difference.

are you upset because you don't have money to pay your whore?

[ChumpDumper]

Deficits for war time spending and recessions do not bother me.We're in a recession.

Quit whining.

[Nbadan]

I see no reason not to prosecute Alberto Gonzalez and John Yoo now...some things are just to heinous to leave un-prosecuted..

[Winehole23]

Does anyone honestly believe Pelosi is telling the truth when she says she didn't know about waterboarding?

C'mon, really?No, not really.

[Winehole23]

Ms.Pelosi's alibi is tissue thin. She says that waterboarding was mentioned among the panoply of approved tactics, but that no disclosure of its actual use was made.

IMO it's a distinction without a difference. Speaker Pelosi was put on notice that waterboarding (for which US Marines were court martialed in 1898 and some Japanese [faced execution for -Ed.] after WWII) was an approved tactic. It beggars credibility -- though it may be technically correct -- for Pelosi to say that she had no "knowledge" of its use. On the contrary, she was notified of its probable use.


In a Thursday press briefing (http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Pelosi_denies_prior_knowledge_of_waterboarding_042 3.html), Pelosi flatly denied that she was ever told waterboarding would be used.

"My colleague [Porter Goss], the chairman of the committee, has said 'if they say that it's legal you have to know they are going to use them,'" she said. "Well, his experience is that he was a member of the CIA, later went on to head the CIA and maybe his experience is that if they tell you one thing they may mean something else. My experience is that they did not tell us they were using that. Flat out. And any -- any contention to the contrary is simply not true."

"Pelosi said her recollection was, 'They told us they had opinions from the [Justice Department’s] Office of Legal Counsel that they could, but not that they were' using so-called enhanced techniques, 'and that if and when they were used, they would brief Congress at that time,'" reported Congressional Quarterly (http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?docID=news-000003101913). "She said she was never told that such techniques were actually being used."I agree with Mr. Goss's gloss.

[JoeChalupa]

Does anyone honestly believe Pelosi is telling the truth when she says she didn't know about waterboarding?

C'mon, really?

No, I do not.

[jack sommerset]

Do die hard Democrats even like Pelosi?

[Nbadan]

...Pelosi may be guilty of not doing her homework on weatherboarding, but there were other 'enhanced techniques' like stress positions, cold rooms, hanging from ceilings which in and of themselves could constitute torture....

...all these techniques could be legal, but when abused or used in tandem they could also constitute torture....

[Winehole23]

...Pelosi may be guilty of not doing her homework on weatherboarding.... I think she fudged her answer. She tortured language until it gave a false confession.

[Nbadan]

..probably went something like this....

Remember when she was on Air Force One with the Chimp and said he wasn't such a bad guy.

Nancy: "So George we don't do waterboarding?"

George: "Heh, heh...of course not (wink, wink). That's against the Genevia Convention."

Nancy: "Whew, well that's a relief. Now I can sleep without guilty feelings hanging over me."

George: "Trust me. I'm the decider."

[ducks]

We're in a recession.

Quit whining.
so they can do anything they want since it a recession?
could a rebublican if he was in office instead to then?

[ChumpDumper]

so they can do anything they want since it a recession?
could a rebublican if he was in office instead to then?I would expect nothing less. Maybe some more tax cuts but shitload of spending nonetheless.

The problem with the "rebublicans" is that they practiced recession spending in times of economic growth.

[DarkReign]

Do die hard Democrats even like Pelosi?

I frickin' hope not. Partisianship has to have limits, doesnt it?

Dont know anymore reading around here for 4 years...

[ChumpDumper]

While I am certainly open to the possibility Pelosi is lying, I am confused why board Republicans would care when Pelosi knew about waterboarding.

That implies there is something wrong with the practice.

[clambake]

republicans don't like her pretending not to be as sadistic as they are.

[jack sommerset]

While I am certainly open to the possibility Pelosi is lying, I am confused why board Republicans would care when Pelosi knew about waterboarding.

That implies there is something wrong with the practice.

No it doesn't.

[ChumpDumper]

No it doesn't.So why is it a big deal to you?

[Yonivore]

It just reveals the Speaker for the political opportunist she is. It's of the same ilk as all those that declared Saddam Hussein a threat and possessor of weapons of mass destruction -- right up to the day they saw President Bush was serious about eliminating the threat and would, therefore, gain a political advantage.

With Democrats, it's all political.

[ChumpDumper]

It just reveals the Speaker for the political opportunist she is. It's of the same ilk as all those that declared Saddam Hussein a threat and possessor of weapons of mass destruction -- right up to the day they saw President Bush was serious about eliminating the threat and would, therefore, gain a political advantage.

With Democrats, it's all political.If the Republicans didn't operate exactly the same way, there might be a point to that.

[DarkReign]

If the Republicans didn't operate exactly the same way, there might be a point to that.

aaaaaand, game.

Thats the story in a nutshell. The sooner people accept this fact, the faster something might change (not you, CD).

[Winehole23]

CIA releases document (http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/briefings.pdf) detailing Congressional briefings on torture.

Pelosi was briefed about the techniques. Maybe its time for the Reaganesque *I don't recall* routine.

Only Harman and Rockefeller registered any formal protest. they wrote letters. Speaking out publicly about the briefings at the time would've been a criminal offense.


Via Raw Story (http://rawstory.com/08/news/2009/05/08/democrats-were-routinely-briefed-on-bush-torture-techniques-document-shows/) and WSJ (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124174688873899443.html)

[Winehole23]

Lagniappe:

Then SECDEF Cheney withdrew (http://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/22/world/old-us-army-manuals-for-latin-officers-urged-rights-abuses.html) at least seven School for the Americas training manuals in 1991 for their *inconsistency* with US law.


The manuals were mistakenly based on what the Pentagon called ''old material'' reflecting policies of the 1960's that have been scrapped.


The Pentagon said it destroyed all the manuals in its possession -- except for one copy of each kept by its general counsel -- after the passages were discovered. The Army's Southern Command notified governments in Latin America that ''the manuals contained passages that did not represent U.S. Government policy,'' according to the statement
.

[Winehole23]

Leon Panetta refuses to guarantee (http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/2009-05-06-reyes-eit-letter0001.pdf) the reliability of the document in #34.


(UIIFOUO) This letter presents the most thorough
information we have on dates, locations, and names of all
Members of Congress who were briefed by the CIA on enhanced
interrogation techniques. This information, however, is drawn
from the past files of the CIA and represents MFRs completed at
the time and notes that summarized the best recollections of
those individuals. In the end, you and the Committee will have
to determine whether this information is an accurate summary of
what actually happened.

[FaithInOne]

For the love of Saint Pete, please leave my Pelosi out of this :nope

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

When they were in the minority?

That is very believable.

There were stories about waterboarding detainees in the press, and yet Pelosi didn't know? :lol

[ChumpDumper]

We're talking about briefings, before the news reports. The administration was pretty selective about what it told congressional leaders of both parties -- so I would believe it either way. If it matters, I'm completely fine with calling Pelosi out if she's lying about this.