Street Prophets

“History will not judge this kindly”

by Rain

Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 10:36:23 AM PDT

From Democracy Now!:

Report: Top Admin Officials Approved Assault, Waterboarding of CIA Prisoners
ABC News is reporting senior Bush administration officials personally discussed and approved how top al-Qaeda suspects would be interrogated by the CIA. The group agreed on controversial interrogation techniques including physical assault, sleep deprivation, and waterboarding. The officials were all members of the Principals Committee on the National Security Council. They included Vice President Cheney, former National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin Powell, as well as CIA Director George Tenet and Attorney General John Ashcroft. It’s the first time senior White House officials have been linked to an explicit group authorization of the CIA interrogation program. One top official recounted Ashcroft was the lone cabinet member to raise doubts. The official quoted Ashcroft as saying, “Why are we talking about this in the White House? History will not judge this kindly.” In the summer of 2004, amidst the controversy over the Abu Ghraib photos and the withdrawal of a controversial memo approving harsh interrogations, the Principals Committee again approved new techniques on a CIA prisoner captured in Asia. Condoleezza Rice is said to have provided decisive support, reportedly telling CIA officials, “This is your baby. Go do it.”

Here is the ABC report.

David Swanson, who has become somewhat weary and cynical in the course of the long struggle to get Mrs. Pelosi to put impeachment back on the table, asks the wry question,

Do the Democrats who place making Obama the next emperor ahead of all other concerns want to aim for a narrow squeaker subject to theft, or would a landslide be acceptable?

Mr. Ashcroft was quite correct.  History is not going to judge this regime kindly.

I have an irresistible urge to pick up the phone and call my Reps -- especially Mr. Blumenauer who has been so slow to support  impeachment of the Vice President.  This isn't just an issue of the laws of the land -- it's a moral one.

You too?


Tags: torture, waterboarding, Principals Group, Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, John Ashcroft, Colin Powell, George Tenet, Donald Rumsfeld (all tags)

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  • It is said (13+ / 0-)

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    ogre, Aunt Em, dirkster42, The Werewolf Prophet, Thirst, Sarea, StarWoman, Marko, Parthenia, linkage, Absit Invidia, karenh, Danish Brethern

    that truth will out.  But, boy, it has had a struggle in recent years.  Bravo, ABC.  

    Please let me know you came by.

    by Rain on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 10:38:43 AM PDT

    • I have nothing but contempt for just about (4+ / 0-)

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      everyone concerned. Not just for Chimpco, but for their doubleplusgood duckspeakers, the SCLM...for the fecocephalic Amurrikin public who enabled them, either from being scared absolutely sh__less, or from a slavering desire for revenge, or from unwillingness to admit being wrong, or for whatever effing reason one chooses to suggest. How many have died or been maimed or made homeless because of Dubya and Dick and Condi and the Incomparable RUMMY? Where the f___ was ABC when it mattered? Or Ashcroft, or that man of honor, Colin Powell?

      Not only that, this latest revelation will make no difference. NONE. More people than we imagine have known something like this was up at the highest levels of gummint, and they don't care. The Dems have had countless opportunities to expose Chimpco and they haven't taken a single one of them. Why should I believe that this situation is any different?

      by Gig Harber on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 11:24:21 AM PDT

      [ Parent ]

      • I only read tea leaves (5+ / 0-)

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        in the Tea and Fortune Parlor -- but I suspect this story may indicate a big, upcoming shift.  And maybe it ties in somehow with the dire situation the whole world is finding itself economically -- mostly thanks to this regime.

        Remember what happened to Dan Rather after the story he broke about Bush's National Guard service.  I imagine all the major media is very, very careful when reporting something of this nature.

        I'm happy it is coming out at all.  We are seeing that a free society just doesn't function properly without a properly functioning free press.

        And I think it will have an impact -- because people are not happy with the way in which anything has gone.  Homes being lost, incredible debt (personal and public), high prices at the gas pump and in the grocery store, the plight of returning vets (or of the families of those who fell) -- there is a background buzz of unhappiness in 2008 that is quite different than the shock this country was in just post 9/11.  I think more people see an emperor with no clothes than you think.

        by Rain on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 11:55:34 AM PDT

        [ Parent ]

        • Here's hoping, Rain. Although I (5+ / 0-)

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          personally believe that hope is the foulest, cruelest thing in the known universe.

          Haven't we seen high gas prices years ago? I remarked to someone that the Amurrikin sheeple had no problem with 19-yr-olds coming home without legs or faces (since you can't make an omelet without breaking eggs and Saddam Was A Very Bad Man), but raise gas prices and we'd have an insurrection on our hands. Didn't happen. My Republican friends are as defiant and smirkalicious as the day we started shocking and aweing 'em in Eye-rack.

          Yeah, ABC had better check the kerning on that report.

          by Gig Harber on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 12:03:42 PM PDT

          [ Parent ]

  • Neither will (7+ / 0-)

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    history judge kindly the American people who, by and large, gave the administration a pass.  So many people I know oppose these policies, but feel completely helpless and do nothing rather than even a little bit.

    I suppose since street protest proved so divisive in the 60s, we might be kind of at a loss for other strategies for getting maximum visibility, but we need to come up with something better than the organization we've got now.

    Any word from the Barack and Hillary show on this?

    (And is it just me, or has the site been spotty in terms of access in the last 24 hrs?)

    The Wine of Youth ferments this night in the veins of God - Alfred de Musset.

    by dirkster42 on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 10:55:56 AM PDT

    • It's not just you. (7+ / 0-)

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      As for your comment, I agree.

      by loggersbrat on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 10:58:05 AM PDT

      [ Parent ]

    • I haven't seen anything yet. (5+ / 0-)

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      In fact, most of the news sources I regularly check have not picked this up yet.  I expect that as the day progresses, we will hear Barack and Hillary weigh in.

      I called Blumenauer's office.  "I'm appalled!" I said -- and quicker than quick, the staffer said, "We are, too!"

      How many times...how many, many times, has the President told the American People, "We do not torture."  This administration has not only been secretive, it has been untruthful -- about the reasons for war, about this, and who knows what else.  I don't think we will discover quickly just how untruthful it has been -- it will take time for all the truth to come out.

      It's going to take time to heal.

      by Rain on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 11:15:47 AM PDT

      [ Parent ]

    • Sitting here with a pile of unspent cookies. (4+ / 0-)

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      n/t

      Both the Oak and the Maple are trees; we need not decide which is the correct version....Simplexity.

      by Aunt Em on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 12:44:50 PM PDT

      [ Parent ]

    • The people (4+ / 0-)

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      American people who, by and large, gave the administration a pass.

      As much as I loath our leader, he is my president. He speaks for me. And history will judge us by his actions. History won't judge us kindly because we are republic.

      "Why are we talking about this in the White House? History will not judge this kindly."

      I'm not sure what bothers me more: the revelations or that I had no emotional reaction whatsoever other than "sounds about right for this crowd." I didn't get mad at all. That's how immunized I've become against the horrors committed by this misadministration. It's the downside of being a political junkie.

      Doug.

      Meddle not in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.

      by risasperson on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 02:32:23 PM PDT

      [ Parent ]

  • Deep down... (3+ / 0-)

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    I comprehend the rage that leads to a population putting leaders against the wall and shooting them, extra-judicially.

    It wouldn't be right.  But in some profound sense, it would feel just.

    They've taken the most fundamental goods and values and either destroyed them prostituted them, or crapped on them and asked us to believe it's chocolate.

    I can leash my anger and keep it in the bounds of civilized behavior.  But I understand and feel that deep rage.  

    I want those bastards impeached, convicted and charged, tried and convicted... then extradited to The Hague to face war crimes and crimes against humanity charges... and convictions.

    Nixon was a piker by comparison.

    Pelosi?  Pelosi is a coward.

    The light is at home in the darkness. -- Parmenides

    by ogre on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 11:44:37 AM PDT

    • Which is to say... (4+ / 0-)

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      Rain, Aunt Em, Thirst, linkage

      "History will not judge this kindly?"  No, Ashcroft, you err--the present isn't judging it kindly.  History will rank you folks up there with the great spirits who disappeared Argentines and who ran death camps.  Faced with a basic legal and moral issue... you opted for the illegal and immoral option.

      Damned.  Damned in the eyes of your countrymen and the world.

      If there's a hell, you belong in it.  Given your comment, I think I know which circle Dante would consign you to.

      The light is at home in the darkness. -- Parmenides

      by ogre on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 11:47:32 AM PDT

      [ Parent ]

    • Exactly. (4+ / 0-)

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      And I want every last cowardly sheep who cares more about BRIT'S AGONY and ANGIE'S BABY BUMP than American boys coming home shattered, or innocent Iraqis losing everything, to stand ashamed and disgraced before God and men. I want them to pay dearly for what they allowed, nay, DEMANDED happen. Let them see in no uncertain terms what sort of monsters they so eagerly have supported and encouraged.

      I want Rush and all the others who sneered and impugned the patriotism of those who opposed this tragedy to have to beg on street corners in the worst part of the city, or be put in a tiny jail cell with a 6 foot 8 gorilla named Tiny (or Bubba). Let them be disgraced and spurned for the rest of their useless lives by all decent people.

      And I want to awaken one fine spring morning to learn that all of this was merely a nightmare, not reality.

      by Gig Harber on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 11:56:13 AM PDT

      [ Parent ]

      • My brother (5+ / 0-)

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        shares your rage.  He would like to see the return of tar and feathering and running people out on rails.

        It's a bit authoritarian for my taste.  I'll settle for proper checks and balances and fair trials!

        The bottom line is, there must be accountability.

        by Rain on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 12:00:30 PM PDT

        [ Parent ]

        • Speaking of rage, it's telling that people who've (5+ / 0-)

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          known me for years find nothing remarkable about my feelings. I've been a complainer and a melancholy soul my entire life, but even I have never hated anyone as much as I hate the Son of Poppy and His holy minions. I've never felt such incandescent, unalloyed rage before, and yet my friends have not taken note of it; to them, I'm just doing my usual tiresome spewing. "Have you ever seen me so angry before?" I've occasionally asked. "No," they say, but that's as far as the discussion goes. Amazing.

          by Gig Harber on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 12:09:28 PM PDT

          [ Parent ]

        • Tar and feathers (4+ / 0-)

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          isn't authoritarian.  It's more of an outbreak of the angry side of "pure" democracy.  Mob rule.

          I'm with you--as long as it happens.  If it doesn't, then I'm going to unhappily accept that cruder methods became necessary and join your brother.

          The light is at home in the darkness. -- Parmenides

          by ogre on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 12:10:48 PM PDT

          [ Parent ]

          • The system isn't letting (3+ / 0-)

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            me give you cookies at this moment, ogre.  I'm trying.

            I think anyone who holds the principle of justice dear and who is at all informed about what has been happening is feeling very betrayed by their government right now.

            The one I am particularly unhappy with is Nancy Pelosi.  There is a remedy provided in our Constitution for rogues in high office -- and she is interfering with its use

            by Rain on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 12:20:52 PM PDT

            [ Parent ]

            • tripped over this, so apropos... (3+ / 0-)

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              If such a government cannot be overthrown otherwise than by dynamite, then thank God for dynamite.
              —Mark Twain, speaking of Czarist Russia

              Not that I think that we're like Czarist Russia.  No, we're a nightmare of another sort--let us remember that there appear to have been a million--a million--Iraqi people who have died becuase of Bush's acts in our names.

              Which leads naturally to this:

              Why, it was like reading about France and the French, before the ever memorable and blessed Revolution, which swept a thousand years of such villainy away in one swift tidal-wave of blood — one: a settlement of that hoary debt in the proportion of half a drop of blood for each hogshead of it that had been pressed by slow tortures out of that people in the weary stretch of ten centuries of wrong and shame and misery the like of which was not to be mated but in hell. There were two "Reigns of Terror," if we would but remember it and consider it; the one wrought murder in hot passion, the other in heartless cold blood; the one lasted mere months, the other had lasted a thousand years; the one inflicted death upon ten thousand persons, the other upon a hundred millions; but our shudders are all for the "horrors" of the minor Terror, the momentary Terror, so to speak; whereas, what is the horror of swift death by the axe, compared with lifelong death from hunger, cold, insult, cruelty, and heart-break? What is swift death by lightning compared with death by slow fire at the stake? A city cemetery could contain the coffins filled by that brief Terror which we have all been so diligently taught to shiver at and mourn over; but all France could hardly contain the coffins filled by that older and real Terror — that unspeakably bitter and awful Terror which none of us has been taught to see in its vastness or pity as it deserves.
              —Mark Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court

              h/t to http://shetterly.wordpress.com/2008/... for those quotes.  I'm not sure what motivated his posting them.  I'd seen both, sometime long ago, reading Twain, but they didn't leap to mind.

              Unlike the http://www.lexrex.com/informed/other....  I've heard that read from our pulpit in the last year. Literally, read.

              The light is at home in the darkness. -- Parmenides

              by ogre on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 03:20:28 PM PDT

              [ Parent ]

    • Thanks for the statement, Ogre. (5+ / 0-)

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      I tried for an "Amen" - cookie, but I think I achieved a record of sorts....three failed symbols.  Maybe Pelosi has control over the 'net today.

      Both the Oak and the Maple are trees; we need not decide which is the correct version....Simplexity.

      by Aunt Em on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 12:48:03 PM PDT

      [ Parent ]

  • I am about out the door (3+ / 0-)

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    Thirst, Marko, linkage

    for a few hours -- but I have a request.  Should any of you reading this place a call to your Representative's office about this, would you let us know what the reaction is?

    For the record, Earl Blumenauer's office is aware of the story and is apparently as appalled as we are.  What Mr. Blumenauer will do as a result of it remains to be seen.

    by Rain on Thu Apr 10, 2008 at 12:59:09 PM PDT

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