Pelosi's Tortured Denials

Pelosi is splitting hairs. She at least knew waterboarding MIGHT be used - and since the US has previously executed Japanese soldiers for waterboarding American prisoners of war someone in Congress should have told the CIA not to do this. Let's also not forget Abu Ghraib - the encouragement of prisoner abuse came straight from Cheney and Rumsfeld's offices and anyone paying attention should have by that time known what the Bush administration was up to. She waited several years to become indignant about waterboarding. Just as was the case with the Iraq war, the Democrats at the time had no spine to stand up to Bush for the fear of being called weak. This is why no one wants to prosecute these crimes - Bush was smart enough to include the Democrats into what he was doing, thus making them accomplices who are now reluctant to let the chips fall where they may. The problem for Obama is that refusing to prosecute war crimes is criminal in itself - so I suspect eventually he will have to allow a proper criminal investigation by the Justice Department.

Ok, so she lied. Expecting truth from a politition? You'll be expecting mercy from a banker next!

I say, you cannot go after her without also going after the people that created it and authorized it. Should she resign, sure. Then we should start criminal proceedings for everyone involved in breaking the law, from Wall Street on the financial mess to the prior administration for the torture mess. Only by holding these idiots directly responsible for their action, actions they purport to take in our names, will the next generation realize that against the law means exactly that.

Pelosi is incompetent. She means well but she is thoroughly in over her head. Can anyone imagine the old lions of Congress like Sam Rayburn, Daniel Monyihan, Lyndon Johnson, or Tip O'Neil being as befuddled and clueless as Pelosi is about what happens on her watch. She is completely disconnected with what happens even in her own party and with the appointments she made on the committees as watchdogs.

This country should not be listening to the likes of Newt, Sean and Rush: they represent the extreme rabid Right that has been muzzled by the voters of this moderate country. I don't give a hoot if Pelosi knew of not, the issue is a RUSE to divert from the facts regarding who created the policy, who pushed the policy and who should be held responsible. This is the same stupid argument from the GOP about how Republicans have kept America "safe" for the last 7 years. SAFE??? R U kidding me, the single greatest attack on American soil happened during a Republican Administration, a Republican House and a Republican Senate. The simple fact is that the GOP is responsible for the development of this policy and it's use: PERIOD.

Quote from this article: "It is clear that Pelosi has contradicted herself, and that she knew as early as 2003 that waterboarding was in use, long before she raised any public or private objection."

What part of Joe Miller's article does the left not understand?

You must ask Mr. Terrorist to put down his gun and remove the explosive vest,PLEASE. Don't be rude!
Do not search Mr. terrorist. Just take his word for it he has no weapons. Ask him to step into the transport vehicle and give him 100 US Dollars because if you don't, it's torture because everyone would like 100 dollars. Dollar deprivation is torture--IF one is a terrorist. But not if you are a US tax payer!
No cuffs! No questions! In fact... don't bother. Just let them kill and everyone step over and around the bodies of your countrymen! Don't be judgmental! Unless you think ill of your dead countrymen. It's cool to be a liberal.

Pelosi should step down and take a position of power in organizing the Democratic National Committee. She's always been a divisive figure in Congress, she's not terribly popular, and her real strength and forte is logistics and rallying her party, not policy or working with Congress as a whole.

What we see from the constantly shifting stories by Pelosi is that even FACTCHECK is unable to keep up. Pelosi overplayed her hand and is in the political gutter with her constituants garnering less than a 37% approval rating, down from her 54% in January [ GALLUP ] Two things that make it important to realize that this is a self-inflicted deal by Pelosi and not by a nefarious ''GOP'',though her blinded defenders [ who we may now call the ''30 Percenters''] would have it so.

1. Her chief critic is no Republican. It is long-time friend and Democrat Leon Panetta,CIA Director.

2. Pelosi has in the wake of the partyline vote by Democrats to shut all investigations down on getting the CIA to release more memos that would further damn Pelosi [or the CIA. At this point we do not and may never know. The cowardly ACLU is a Democrat creature and will not force FOIA release], that she ''has said all that I am going to say on this subject'' at todays CSPAN presser.Thus far, from what we can see from the FACTCHECK timeline, and this weeks polls, is that Americans have already rendered judgement and have found her guilty of lies and innuendo,hence her falling approval ratings,even in her Frisco, the worst of her political career.

www.politico.com May 22,2009

What a tangled web we weave when we practice to deceive. We need to be careful of how we treat people. The hole Nancy was trying to dig for someone else will be the very same hole she falls in. Her credibility is shot!

II strongly agree with the statement ... We are Americans... We don't lie.

To TomMariner:

This has nothing to do with any sort of "payback" about Bill Clinton and everything to do with the GOP desperate to score political points by deflecting their tacit approval and continued defense of ineffectual torturing techniques into a dialog about whether a prominent Democrat is a hypocrite, or worse, a "traitor" for daring to accuse the 2002 CIA of deceiving the American people.

I have absolute confidence that in two months the media cycle will have thoroughly washed this nonsense out of the air and we can go back to addressing real issues. I just wish the Democrats would show a little more spine. It was their spinelessness and desire to massage the xenophobic security-minded paranoids in our country that lost them the elections 4-6 years ago.

Nobody claims Pelosi wwas told how many times Abu Zubaydah was waterboarded prior to Pelosi's first briefing. It doesn't look like (from what I read here and elsewhere) that Pelosi was told the technique had been used. "Briefed on the techniques used" means only that: briefed on the techniques. The "technique" is waterboarding and she says she was briefed on that. What she says she was not told was that the technique had already been used. It is reasonable for others to say "she should have known" the technique was being used but that she should have recognized that in Washington the fact that the CIA mentions a technique is strong indication they are using it is not in any way evidence she was directly told the technique was being used. Perhaps a reporter might bother to ask Porter Goss if saying Pelosi should have realized the technique was being used would still be his assessment even if she were told it was not being used. That is, would Goss say she should see through the lie. I pretty much agree with Goss (if that's his attitude) but that doesn't make it not a lie. Goss, also at that briefing, has not been quoted as saying he was told the technique was being used.

Its a shame to see a talented Speaker of the House sacrifice herself on the altar of partisan politics. This has less to do with a violation of international law than it is scoring points on the other team. This was supposed to be payback for the Republicans and their stupid attack on Bill Clinton because of personal behavior.

The best (and probably only) good thing to come out of this is the understanding that power of a party in total control can be abused, that these things can backfire. Maybe, just maybe, our representatives will decide the safer course of action is to do what we elected them to do -- legislate.

But you do have to admire the arrogance of our Speaker when she knew that she was involved up to her eyeballs and figured her position and her party's dominance would let her do whatever she pleased.

ancy did nothing wrong, the CIA and Bush and Cheney and every other republican idiot have absolutely no proof they told her about Gitmo at the time they claimed they did. The burden of proof is on them, not her. She said there is no evidence of them telling her, if there was and she is lying then they need to prove with evidence they in fact did tell her on the dates she said they did not. Instead what we have here is the republicans out of desperation, playing their little republican games trying to spin it on Nancy and saying she has to prove they lied? that's pretty easy, there is NO PROOF they told her what they claim, therefore their claim is false or in other words it is a lie, the burden is on them not her. If they can show, she was informed when she said she was not, then she lied, so far that has not been proven, there is no evidence showing this the case, Nancy did nothing wrong.

I strongly agree with the statement ... We are Americans... We don't torture. It does not matter whether torture worked or did not work. The point is the Constitution was violated & International laws were broken.

We do not torture, and torture is a crime, not a technique . If you want to work for a government and want to torture someone, you need to find another country. Government employees take an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution. If you are a government official and torture someone, you have failed your oath to defend the U.S. Constitution and you have broken the law. We do not need or want people working in our government that conducted torture.

There is no way anyone can respect the CIA if it rewards torture interrogators with their job. Abscense of morality in any government agency will not result in respect, ether now or in the future. This controversy is not about legal opinions & the CIA its about the CYA mentality of the Bush Administration.

At the Nuremberg trials in 1946, the U.S., England, and France decided that just taking orders is not excuse for torture. Concentration Camp commander's defended their actions as just taking orders. No doubt Nazi lawyers declared their actions both necessary and legal under German Third Reicht Law. At Nuremberg in 1946, the decision by the U.S., France, and England was unanimous, that a person is responsible for their own actions. No orders or shadow legality is a defense against a complete loss of morality. The trials at Nuremberg set the standard. Just taking orders does not give anyone, not even an American, the right to torture another person . We do not want our country to have Nazi morality standards.

I hope we still have today as much moral strength as our fathers that fought WWII to save our country and save our Constitution. If government officials today trash our Constitution to gain immediate ends, then we have lost any meaningful difference between our enemies and ourselves.

We are America, and We don't torture. Our Constitution and our morality are worth far more than any information obtained from torture. The ends do not justify the means . The Bush Administration motives may have been honorable but their actions were criminal !
We should also keep in mind that who knew what & when is irrelevent & who did what and when during the Bush Administration is what is important ! This is a diversion from asking the important questions. Wake up America before it's to late ! !
We are Americans, and We don't torture. NO IF ANDS OR BUTS ABOUT IT ! See title 18 sec. 241 & 242 if you do torture, this is what you can expect from the law. Also see sec. 2441 war crimes . Eventually the US Government will have to do the right thing and bring all those involved in this criminal behavior to justice ! NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW ! Then & only then can we put this dark pain full period behind us & move forward .

I strongly agree with the statement ... We are Americans... We don't torture. It does not matter whether torture worked or did not work. The point is the Constitution was violated & International laws were broken.

We do not torture, and torture is a crime, not a technique . If you want to work for a government and want to torture someone, you need to find another country. Government employees take an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution. If you are a government official and torture someone, you have failed your oath to defend the U.S. Constitution and you have broken the law. We do not need or want people working in our government that conducted torture.

There is no way anyone can respect the CIA if it rewards torture interrogators with their job. Abscense of morality in any government agency will not result in respect, ether now or in the future. This controversy is not about legal opinions & the CIA its about the CYA mentality of the Bush Administration.

At the Nuremberg trials in 1946, the U.S., England, and France decided that just taking orders is not excuse for torture. Concentration Camp commander's defended their actions as just taking orders. No doubt Nazi lawyers declared their actions both necessary and legal under German Third Reicht Law. At Nuremberg in 1946, the decision by the U.S., France, and England was unanimous, that a person is responsible for their own actions. No orders or shadow legality is a defense against a complete loss of morality. The trials at Nuremberg set the standard. Just taking orders does not give anyone, not even an American, the right to torture another person . We do not want our country to have Nazi morality standards.

I hope we still have today as much moral strength as our fathers that fought WWII to save our country and save our Constitution. If government officials today trash our Constitution to gain immediate ends, then we have lost any meaningful difference between our enemies and ourselves.

We are America, and We don't torture. Our Constitution and our morality are worth far more than any information obtained from torture. The ends do not justify the means . The Bush Administration motives may have been honorable but their actions were criminal !
We should also keep in mind that who knew what & when is irrelevent & who did what and when during the Bush Administration is what is important ! This is a diversion from asking the important questions. Wake up America before it's to late ! !
We are Americans, and We don't torture. NO IF ANDS OR BUTS ABOUT IT ! See title 18 sec. 241 & 242 if you do torture, this is what you can expect from the law. Also see sec. 2441 war crimes . Eventually the US Government will have to do the right thing and bring all those involved in this criminal behavior to justice ! NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW ! Then & only then can we put this dark pain full period behind us & move forward .

This reminds us of another, " I did not have sexual relation with that woman,. . . .", or refering to N. Korea by its official name of DEMOCRATIC People's Republic of Korea. Can we expect any less from polietics? Who's the unnamed aide? I know, that Panetta is a turcoat, we'll have to 'work' on him, he'll be sorry!

It is a sad day when personal integrity, just basic character, is not considered important. What has happened to us?

Pelosi and Reid were Cheney's puppets for the last 8 years, why would anyone believe them now???