Buck Naked Politics

US State Department "Angrily Denies" that It Failed to Take All Possible Precautions to Ensure Bhutto's Safety

by Damozel | According to this article, the US provided intelligence to Benazir Bhutto regarding plots against her life, though---sadly---she seems not to have heeded them.(Yahoo)

The officials said Bhutto and her aides were concerned, particularly after the October attack, but were adamant that in the absence of a specific and credible threat there would be few, if any, changes to her campaign schedule ahead of parliamentary elections.

"She knew people were trying to assassinate her," said an intelligence official. "We don't hold information back on possible attacks on foreign leaders and foreign countries." The official added, however, that while the U.S. could share the information, "it's up to (the recipient) how they want to take action."

"We gave them a steady stream of intelligence," one official said.(Yahoo)

In Defense of Benazir Bhutto

Posted by Damozel (photo from Wikimedia Commons) |  At Mercury Rising, Charles has written an eloquent  and thought provoking post  (Who Was Benazir Bhutto?) in response to the negative tone of some of  the media coverage of her death. 

Politicians are often the blank slates on which we project our own madness.  A recent article by the New York Times Company was so filled with resentment against Benazir Bhutto that I feel compelled to protest. The piece, which can still be read in the IHT, was a very personal attack against Bhutto as a woman and a Muslim. ..

The worst instance was the choice of the phrase “the dance of the seven veils” to characterize Bhutto’s management of Pakistani political matters. The Dance of the Seven Veils is a well-known metaphor for sexual seduction, being associated with the dance Salome performed for Herod to get him to agree to murder John the Baptist.

Benazir Bhutto Assassinated

By Damozel  |  At the moment, all that is really known is that she was killed, possibly by a suicide bomber and possibly by gunshot wounds. (CNN)    A number of others died as well. (CNN)  

Bhutto, 54, was being driven from the rally in her bulletproof vehicle when she asked that the rooftop hatch be opened so she could bid supporters farewell, according to several aides, including one who was sitting next to her.

As she leaned her head through the hatch, between three and five gunshots rang out, aides said. Bhutto sank back into her seat, just as a large bomb detonated to the left of her vehicle. Those inside the car said her face was badly bloodied. It was not clear whether she'd been hit by bullets or shrapnel from the bombing. She lost consciousness, aides said, and never regained it.

Despite Veto Threat, Retired Generals & Admirals Support Bill Restricting CIA’s Detainee Treatment; Bush Demands Freedom from Restrictions on Torture (Updated)

posted by Damozel | Whatever the media may want you to believe about Congressional Democrats, no one can say that they "bowed to Bush's will" on the intelligence bill that passed in the House today (Intelligence Authorization Conference Report.).  By a vote of  299-199 the House passed a bill which (1) "authorizes the largest amount for intelligence programs ever authorized"  (The Gavel); and (2) includes an amendment that would severely restrict intelligence agencies (including their use of tactics such as waterboarding). (Yahoo)    Only five Republicans supported the measure.(Sam Stein ; roll call is here).

The Administration has sent a lengthy letter threatening a veto and highlighting eleven areas of disagreement.(Yahoo) 
 

More on the John Kiriakou Interview and "Enhanced Interrogation"

Posted by Damozel | According to ABC News, the CIA is pretty upset with John Kiriakou. (ABC) They reportedly aren't going to prosecute him for revealing classified information, "cooler heads" having "prevailed, but that doesn't mean they aren't upset about it.  (ABC).   Based on what I've seen and heard so far I don't think---as some initially suggested---that Kirakou was a CIA surrogate foisted on the public to implant disinformation.  I hate to admit it, but it never even occurred to me to wonder about this when I was writing my earlier post.

Partly this was because many of the things Kiriakou said appeared to me to be inimical to the public image of the CIA, the Bush Administration, and "the program."  Mainly, though, the whole story struck me as a bit too much of a round unvarnished tale---too awash with sincerity and riddled with obvious logical inconsistencies---to be a deliberate attempt to influence public opinion. 

CIA Lawyers Authorized Destruction of Tapes?: The Plot Thickens (Updated)

Posted by Damozel | A "senior intelligence offiicial," sympathetic to designated scapegoat Jose Rodriguez, says that the CIA's own lawyers gave written approval to the destruction in 2005 of the interrogation tapes.

Lawyers within the clandestine branch of the Central Intelligence Agency gave written approval in advance to the destruction in 2005 of hundreds of hours of videotapes documenting interrogations of two lieutenants from Al Qaeda, according to a former senior intelligence official with direct knowledge of the episode...(NYT).

The anonymous source says that he is concerned that Rodriguez is being "unfairly singled out" (scapegoated) for destroying the tapes.(NYT)

"Necessary Torture": The Interview of John Kiriakou (Updated)

Posted by Damozel  | According to this ABC News report (and this later report in The Washington Post), a leader of the CIA team that tortured Abu Zubaydah has surfaced to explain to the public that yes, waterboarding is torture, but that it was necessary torture in that particular case.(ABC News)  The gist of his argument seemed to be that it's important to know when to compromise American principles by using torture to get information, since he concedes that waterboarding (1) is torture; and (2) compromises American principles. Sometimes the exigencies of the situation just might outweigh mere rule of law. (ABC News)  On the other hand, he also said, "We're Americans, and we're better than this. And we shouldn't be doing this kinda thing." (Talk Left)  Um....

Did Congressional Democrats Condone the CIA's Secret Interrogation Program? (Updated)

Posted by Damozel  | Today's Washington Post reports that certain Congressional Democrats (including Pelosi and Rockefeller) were briefed in 2002 on the CIA's special program for extracting information from detainees. (WaPo) 

[F]our members of Congress met in secret for a first look at a unique CIA program designed to wring vital information from reticent terrorism suspects in U.S. custody. For more than an hour, the bipartisan group, which included current House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), was given a virtual tour of the CIA's overseas detention sites and the harsh techniques interrogators had devised to try to make their prisoners talk. 

Captain Ed: "An Executive Branch that Can Do Whatever It Pleases"

Posted by Damozel | Re: the missing CIA tapes, we've addressed this issue here (CIA Destroyed Evidence of Torture Sessions); here (Bush:  No Recollection of Being Made Aware of Any Tapes (Updated); and here (CIA Advised Not to Destroy the Tapes (Updated).

Meanwhile, the Captain would like conservatives and interested others to know that the White House has been cleared of complicity in any cover-up, but conservatives need to jump on the "fear the unchained executive" bandwagon right about now (Memeorandum). 

CIA Advised Not to Destroy the Tapes (Updated Again)

Posted by Damozel | According to The New York Times,  the Justice Department, and senior Congressional officials advised the CIA in 2003 not to destroy "hundreds of hours of videotapes showing the interrogations of two operatives of Al Qaeda, government officials said Friday." (NYT via Memeorandum)

In 2003, the agency's general counsel, Scott W. Muller, told "a small group of senior lawmakers"  that the CIA wanted to destroy the intelligence tapes because they were "no longer of any intelligence value" and also because "the interrogations they showed put agency operatives who appeared in the tapes at risk."  (NYT )  One of the Congressional leaders who told Muller not to do this was Porter J. Goss, who was Director of the CIA at the time the chief of the Directorate of Operations ordered them to be destroyed.(NYT ) 

Bush: No Recollection of Being Made Aware of Any Tapes (Updated)

  Posted by Damozel| All together now:  What did Bush know, and when did he know it?

President Bush has no recollection of anyone telling him about any CIA tapes showing "severe interrogation of detainees" (a/k/a "torture") or of being told that any CIA tapes were being destroyed. (White House via Memeorandum)   I actually don't find it difficult to believe this and it isn't crucial as far as I am concerned to the question of responsibility.  Whatever those tapes showed that it wanted to expunge from the record, the tapes would have shown the CIA implementing policies condoned---explicitly, implicitly, tacitly, or through interpretive dance---by the Bush administration.    

In the Midst of a Tourist Boom, US Foreign Tourism on the Decline

Posted by Damozel | With the dollar tanking, you'd think tourists from abroad would be flocking to the US for the mega-malls and discount outlets even if not for everything else we have to offer.  But according to this article by Fareed Zakaria, America is imposing so many obstacles on foreign travel in the name of security and imposing such excessive penalties when unfortunate travelers overstep, that people are staying away in droves.Apparently foreigners looking for a place to spend their euros and pounds increasingly view the US as the last place to go if you want a fun, stress-free trip abroad.    

After 6 Years and $20+ Billion, Airport Security Still Lacking

Posted by D. Cupples |  When we ordinary folk fly, airport security staffers make us wait in lines, take off our shoes, and throw out our tweezers.

Somehow, investigators from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) managed to get past airport security carrying ingredients that could be used to make explosives....

National Security: Not the GOP's Property (Updated)

Posted by Damozel | At The Moderate Voice, centrist blogger Joe Gandelman discusses a recent report concerning a possible---Christ knows we've heard this one before--- plot by Al Qaeda to attack US targets (in this case shopping malls during the Christmas season). (TMV)  Gandelman is concerned about the effect of the "political contamination" of the issue and its perceived (his word, not mine) exploitation by the Bush Administration on public vigilance. "A jaded public could mean a serious warning could be shrugged off when and if it comes." (TMV) 

Exactly.  And this is a problem for everyone.  The issue of national security belongs to the American people; it is not the property of the Bush Administration, the Republican party, Michelle Malkin, or the far right.

A Tortuous Matter

Posted by Nicholas | The new Attorney General, Michael Mukasey, says that he is against torture but that he doesn’t know if waterboarding is torture or not. Well, gosh, yes, that is a tricky question.  Let’s see if we can help him here.  Now then, in the old days, if a regime wanted information, or to force a confession, they had a variety of inventive means at their disposal:

Another Expert Explains Waterboarding to Congress (Updated)

Posted by Damozel | With Mukasey confirmed, we now need legislation that bans waterboarding with sufficient backing to override the inevitable veto.  Will Malcolm Nance succeed in shocking the conscience of a sufficient number of members of Congress to make this possible?   House members have introduced a bill that "would extend a ban on severe interrogation tactics by military personnel to all employees of the U.S. government, including the CIA's."(WaPo via Memeorandum)  Will House members who, like Mukasey, aren't sure waterboarding is really torture allow themselves to be persuaded by experts?

Waterboarding (simulated drowning) most definitely is torture and those who experience will say anything at all to make it stop, Malcolm Nance told a House oversight committee on torture and enhanced interrogation techniques. (WaPo) Such information is therefore useless.   Nance---who spoke out earlier this week---is a counterterrorism instructor who taught at the Navy's Survival, Evasion, and Resistance School (SERE). (WaPo)  His opinion might therefore be presumed to mean something.

"In my case, the technique was so fast and professional that I didn't know what was happening until the water entered my nose and throat," Nance testified yesterday at a House oversight hearing on torture and enhanced interrogation techniques....

Military Interrogator: Torture isn't Operationally Effective

Posted by Damozel | I can't believe citizens of this country are still debating this issue.  But yesterday, Professor Alan Dershowitz, writing in The Wall Street Journal, presented the Democrats with a poser---a/k/a "the ticking time bomb scenario."  TPM: "The ticking-bomb case -- depending on where you sit on the torturet question -- is either the hardest test of someone's sense of balance between human rights and national security or a rhetorical trap designed to box opponents of torture into saying that it's better for Sheboygan to be nuked than someone be waterboarded."

Today in front of the House Judiciary Committee, Republican Representative Trent Franks of Arizona---who says he is against torture--- presented U.S. Air Force Reserve Colonel Steve Kleinman, a longtime military interrogator and intelligence officer, with this Socratic .  If you capture an uncooperative detainee whom you (somehow) know has knowledge of an imminent attack, may you torture him if you can't get the information any other way? 

According to TPM, Kleinman said that torture is the wrong call. "[I]t'd be unneccesary to conduct our affairs outside the boundaries...." According to him, experience "proves the legal and moral concerns to be almost immaterial, because what we'd need to do to be operationally effective" wouldn't involve torture.  (TPM)

Waterboarding: Learn What It's Like & Why It's Good for You in Two Easy Lessons (plus bonus Jon Stewart)

Posted by Cockney Robin |  First the hard part.  Watch the Kaj Larsen (former Navy SEAL) demo with Keith Olbermann.  It's just like in a gangster film, only real.

Now watch Matt Lauer hold George Bush's feet to the fire (figuratively).  Even when the president gently and repeatedly tells him that anything he does is to protect Matt Lauer's family (yours as well, of course), Lauer will not back down.  How unkind!

Finally---because if we don't laugh we'll cry----here's Jon Stewart:

Sen. Leahy on the Mukasey Nomination

Posted by Damozel | To no one's great surprise, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 8-11 to send Mukasey's nomination forward to the full Senate.

Senator Patrick Leahy, the chairman of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, who voted in opposition to the nomination, perfectly articulates the reasons why I am so disappointed in the Democrats who voted in Mukasey's favor.  Leahy---a former prosecutor himself and anything but a kneejerk liberal---has a history of bucking the Democrats when he thinks the party is wrong.  And it is for exactly this reason that Americans---not just Democrats---should listen to him when he takes a stand.

Nothing is more fundamental to our constitutional democracy than our basic notion that no one is above the law.  This Administration has undercut that precept time after time. They are now trying to do it again, with an issue as fundamental as whether the United States of America will join the ranks of those governments that approve of torture.  This President and Vice President should not be allowed to violate our obligations under the Convention Against Torture and the Geneva Conventions or disregard U.S. statutes such as our Detainee Treatment Act and War Crimes Act.  They should not be allowed to overturn more than 200 years of our Nation’s human rights and moral leadership around the world.

US Military & Intelligence Officials Weigh in on Torture Issue (Deaf Ears Dept)

Posted by Cockney Robin | Two dozen military and intelligence officials, diplomats, and law enforcement officials have written to the Senate asking that the Senate Judiciary Committee hold the nomination of Michael Mukasey to attorney general until such time as he has gained sufficient information on waterboarding to determine his position. In a letter addressed to Senators Specter and Leahy, they wrote:

Values that are extremely important to us as former intelligence officers are at stake in your committee’s confirmation deliberations on Judge Michael Mukasey. With hundreds of years of service in sensitive national security activities behind us, we are deeply concerned that your committee may move his nomination to the full Senate without insisting that Mukasey declare himself on whether he believes the practice of waterboarding is legal.

We feel this more acutely than most others, for in our careers we have frequently had to navigate the delicate balance between morality and expediency, all the while doing our best to abide by the values the vast majority of Americans hold in common. We therefore believe we have a particular moral obligation to speak out. We can say it no better than four retired judge advocates general (two admirals and two generals) who wrote you over the weekend, saying: “Waterboarding is inhumane, it is torture, and it is illegal.” (quoted in No Quarter)

Hello?  Is anyone listening?  In the previous few weeks, a number of people who know what they are talking about---including one former instructor at SERE----have weighed in on the issue of waterboarding and every one of them has made exactly the same point:  waterboarding---i.e., "simulated death by drowning"---is torture and illegal.  How can any sane person go on saying that there isn't enough information to reach a reasoned conclusion on this score?  (And why---given that it is illegal among civilised nations elsewhere in the world---was the question ever in doubt?)