The bottom line:
Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the committee’s top Republican, said at a hearing Wednesday that any statement by Mr. Mukasey that waterboarding is torture could fuel criminal charges or lawsuits against those responsible for waterboarding.
“The facts are that an expression of an opinion by Judge Mukasey prior to becoming attorney general would put a lot of people at risk for what has happened,” Mr. Specter said.
Yes. And?
Isn’t that what justice demands?
HAHAHA!
I wonder if these people even know how stupid they are.
nalbar
they want a complete mulligan for all the crimes.
Domine, domine, you’re all Blackwater employees.
But what does Arlen Specter know about justice?
He’s the one who foisted the “single bullet theory” of the JFK assassination on an all-too-gullible public.
That he continues to get elected is testament to either a) the gullibility of people, b) the rigging of elections, or c) both.
almost everyone in the cheney adminstration will some day have to be charged with crimes against humanity, torture and war crimes. etc. we might as well start cleaning house now
i want justice.
but i dont expect to hear just words or see just actions from the likes of specter or Mukasey.
Well, we can’t have people thinking that government employees can actually be held responsible and prosecuted for their crimes can we? Obviously, this (admitting that waterboarding is torture) would totally disqualify him from being the AG for the Bush Administration. Can’ t have any investigations that might lead to something beyond a sharply worded letter from Waxman or Conyers that fails to receive even a response from the WH.
I hope brendan calls Specter’s office about this one…
quotes of the day:
“it is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.”
— upton sinclair
“it is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument.”
— william g. mcadoo
So if any government officials commit murder, rape, extortion, kidnapping, arson or whatever, Mukasey gets to say he’s repulsed but not sure if its illegal lest some government bigwig might be prosecuted. Gimme a break.
The common thread is no accountability for ANYTHING.
Obviously that includes homicide.
And mass murder.
If the Democrats are permitted to return to the White House, the police state powers will never be rolled back. Only a goggle-eyed hick right off the turnip truck would ever believe the State would move to limit its power.
Read Ann Wrights article on Truthout. The important part about the whole article isn’t how Canada played hardball about letting her in as a visitor with a political record… the deeper truth is she is under a new form of House Arrest as an agitator and enemy of the state.
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/103007A.shtml
Accountability is only for teachers and students.
From the NYT article
There is no “theoretically” to it. That is why he will not say. The President has authorized torture and he is not to be held accountable, no matter the cost. Mukasey is the firewall. Just like Gonzales was a firewall, and Scooter Libby was a firewall. There is no shortage of people willing to be the buffer between this administration’s lawlessness and accountability for their actions. Mukasey would not be where he is in the process if he had not bought in 100% to David Addington and John Yoo’s arguments on the validity of unitary executive power.
I’m afraid that in spite of the efforts of the Democrats on the Judiciary Committee, it is likely they will again be sabotaged by the efforts of the Lieberman-esque turncoat Diane Feinstein.
An interesting post on waterboarding can be found at Small Wars Journal.
Let’s see the reaction when a video appears on You Tube or is released to Al Jazeera which shows an American citizen/soldier who has been seized by insurgents somewhere and is being subjected to waterboarding in some Middle Eastern country.
This is another one of those cases where the reality of what is happening is obscured by the purely political side of the argument.
Until people are faced with what truly goes on in a case like this they are just talking out their asses.