Day: May 15, 2009

If the Harsh Interrogation Tactics Were Not Torture, What Difference Does It Make What Pelosi Knew?

Jon Ponder

In all the murkiness around what Karl Rove calls Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s “complicity” in the Bush-Cheney torture crimes, two things, at least, are clear.

Early torture incidents that were undertaken without even the flimsy cover of the bogus legal rationales written by Yoo and Bybee were inarguably illegal.

The first is that Republicans are trying to have it both ways. On one hand, they say that because Pelosi was briefed on the Bush administration’s “harsh interrogation tactics” program in 2003 but failed to make a big public stink about it — even though she was merely the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee and despite the fact that the briefing was double-super top secret — she is equally as guilty of war crimes as Dick Cheney and the rest.

Conversely, though, Republicans are equally adamant that the HITs were not torture. If waterboarding and the other tactics were not torture, ergo there was no war crime.

So why are they rushing in front of every available camera to insist that Pelosi is guilty of … war crimes?

The answer, of course, is because they can. Using the “liberal media” as their foils is one of the few things they’re good at. It’s also quite nearly all they’ve got left. Plus, it works. The news cycles this week have been dominated by cable news readers and pundits parroting the Republicans’ question, “What did Pelosi know and when did she know it?”

But by putting the bum’s rush on Pelosi, aren’t the Republicans tacitly admitting torture was wrong, if not illegal?

This brings us to the second thing that’s clear in this scandal: Republicans are desperate — so desperate, in fact, that it’s they, not the Democrats’ liberal base, who are goading Congress to do the very thing Republicans don’t want them to do: Investigate the Bush-Cheney torture regime.

All this recklessness prompts another question: What are Republicans so desperate to hide?

[…]

Quote du Jour

Buck Banks

The truth of the matter is, being secretary of war in a time of war is a very painful thing … How can you like a job when you go to Walter Reed and you know you sent those young men and women in harm’s way? Every single person in combat today I sent there and I never forget that for a second. I don’t enjoy my job.

— Defense Secretary Robert Gates, in a 60 Minutes interview scheduled to air this weekend.

Repugs to Cheney: Shut Up Already!

Buck Banks

In this week’s National Journal poll of Washington Beltway insiders, 57 percent of Republican said that former vice president and current torture industry spokesperson Dick Cheney has hurt the party with his current round of press appearances. Only 33 percent thought he had helped the cause, while 5 percent said he’d had no effect and another 5 percent gave a cryptic “don’t know” answer.

Here are some comments Cheney’s fellow party members made about his media blitz and its negative effects:

“The message on interrogation techniques is right. The messenger is not.”

“He seems determined to vindicate his decisions and policies even if it damages the GOP’s recovery. And it has.”

“Anything that reminds the public of the Bush administration harms the party’s ability to turn the page. If he’d had any concern for his public image when he was in office, he wouldn’t have to worry as much about defending his reputation now.”

“There is nothing Dick Cheney can say or do to help the Republican Party today. The best thing he can do is disappear for the next 10 years.”

“Let’s face it: The guy doesn’t know anything about winning elections outside of Wyoming.”

“Not even a close call. With Cheney out there, Obama doesn’t even need to remind the American people about the mess that was the Bush years.”

“Cheney represents the grumpy intolerance that has come to characterize the GOP. Get off the stage!”