With the Eric Holder confirmation hearing today, and various recent news stories, the torture question is coming back with a vengeance. Will the Bush administration be held accountable for torture/illegal wiretapping, etc.

I don't know the answer to this question really, but I think it's incredibly important that we answer the unanswered questions, and hold lawbreakers accountable as a message to the current and future administrations.

It seems we're getting conflicting messages from Obama. On one hand we have him saying:

But on the other hand, we have appointments like Holder, who today stated without equivocation that water-boarding is torture(Something the outgoing AG never did). Leon Panetta (who has been anti-torture) appointed as CIA chief is outside the intelligence community, and thus won't be entangled in possible revelations that may come. We have the Bob Woodward interview with top Bush administration official Susan Crawford, who states we in fact did torture Mohammed al-Qahtani. Then there's reports of officials chomping at the bit to spill the beans once 1/20/09 rolls around.

Will Obama be willing to have these stories potentially derail his massive agenda? Certainly you'll find opposition from many Democrats in Congress who will be found complicit in these revelations as well. Sen. Rockefeller, Sen. Feinstein, etc, officials who knew the deal and enabled and/or ignored what was going on.

But part of Obama's platform has been restoring America's moral standing in the world. This is how we do it, and I sure hope we do.

I should plug Glenn Greenwald's post today too: Establishment Washington unifies against prosecutions

Ain't gonna happen. Least of all the way folks think it will. The idea of a sitting President bringing charges against a past President or his administration for actions taken in office is outside the realm of possibility. The best we're going to get is a condemnation of x, y, or z action and a new policy preventing it.

Regarding Congress, complicity is too weak a term to use here. If the matter were brought to scrutiny you would know who did and did not support it behind closed doors. Some Democrats within Congress did far more than 'hear about bad things and do nothing'. The discussions of the what's and how's of torture were conducted with active participation on both sides of the political spectrum.

There should be a serious investigation, but there ＮＥＶＥＲ will be one that amounts to anything.　

I think I remember Obama saying it would never happen and something about presidents not using their office to go after their predecessors. If there is an investigation it will be bi-partisan and the republicans will protect their own (and themselves).

If Obama wants to see his administration crash and burn - waste the next 4 years chasing old demons.

Does anyone think that chasing down and prosecuting people will actually make people who hate us think "wow, Americans are good now".

Does anyone think there woudl be meaningful prosecutions? No, one or two Scooter Libby types will get thrown under the bus.

This is the type of thinking that will get the Dems out of power just as quick as the Repubs incompetence got them in.

Not quite so starkly after one set of actions, no, but it is the net effect of many actions that will end up in us being seen in a better light. This would be one of many things we can do to show the world that we're learning from our past mistakes. Certainly I don't think we're alone in the world in that we enjoy seeing wrongs righted and brought to face justice.

That being said if Obama were to go after him and others responsible for wrongdoing, I do agree that it would be damaging politically. That's the world of politics for ya - try and do the right thing and you'll get burned for it for appearing partisan and people generally getting bent out of shape over it.

I just think it's a pointed reminder that the law only applies to those of us who are less equal than the others.

He won't "go after" Bush because he will continue many of the same policies. He may condemn them in a speech or whatever but will not end the practice.

Obama wouldn't be in charge of ANY of these investigations if they were to happen.

Ideally, Obama will appoint or charge someone with investigating the ways in which the Bush administration damaged the constitution and other laws/treaties with an aim to restoring equality to the seperate branches of government and bring us back into compliance. If in the course of that investigation they found clear illegalities (and I think they would), they should most certainly pursue the guilty. But I don't think it would be helpful to pursue any investigation that's aim is prosecuting previous office holders. I also think this should not be done by anyone who already has jobs and duties. Name a new, temporary office.

I think this poll is showing the liberal slant of these boards. I get the sense that most American's don't give a shit and just want to move on.

But the thing about it is, I get the feeling some of the whistleblowing that may happen will require investigations. And w/o an AG to stonewall it, it seems inevitable. If we get an influx of whistle blowing, it may shift public opinion too.

And thanks for the douchebag vote.

Do I want them held accountable? Yes.
Do I think it will happen? Probably not (being realistic).

There are certain members of the Administration who should live out the rest of their lives in jail as war criminals. John Yoo, who is still acting as Torture Apologist Numero Uno, tops my list.

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Hope is the new black.

The thing that irks me about this post and the whole liberal "hold them accountable" junk is that people are jumping to the conclusion that crimes were committed.

That's a HUGE leap.

For many of the things that happened, there is a great deal of debate over what was legal and what was illegal. That is why it won't be pursued.

If Gitmo is illegal, then Obama should shut it down DAY ONE, otherwise he too is supporting illegal activity. BUT, he has already acknowledged that doing so is not possible.

I understand that crazed liberals who thinks Bush is evil incarnate, but the fact is these are debatable "crimes". It is a dangerous precedent to say "we will prosecute the preceeding administration for behaviors we think might be criminal."

A better practice is for the legislative branch to explicitly pass laws prohibiting questionable conduct and then if the executive branch continues to defy them take it to the judicial branch.

Checks and balances and bears oh my!

I think a majority of those "crazed liberals" are merely asking for an investigation into it, not an automatic leap to prosecuting the guilty without warrant. If we are to really seek justice, we can't merely make laws after the fact and allow potential crimes to go unchecked.

There's a massive difference between these so called crazed liberals who think he's evil incarnate (which I'm not seeing much of) and criminal actions of the Bush administration. It comes off as though you're attempting to paint anyone with such concerns as a craaaaaazy liberal whackjob...which does nothing to address the actual issues that people have.



People aren't prosecuted for actions that MIGHT be criminal.



The judicial branch is exactly where criminal actions are handled. Which is what many/most people would like to see.

It's questionable whether or not we'll see a real investigation or whether the Bush administration's actions will be just swept under the rug with a shrug towards the 'greater good' and hopes that such abuses will not occur again (ala Nixon). Though unlike Nixon, I don't think Bush can expect a pardon.

Many have wondered if he'll preemptively pardon himself and most of his administration though. Personally I don't think he will, because I believe even in areas where he may have committed criminal acts, he believes he was absolutely right to do so. That is at least one trait he shares with Nixon.

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Read your sentence and try again. We can't make laws after the fact and allow potential crimes to go unchecked.

That's funny. Just a note: a law has to be made before it can be broken.

Here's the problem nobody seems to address in these various rants: What laws were broken? I get the whole torture thing. Is it a crime? Did the president and his staff intentionally break the law?

The administration felt it was acting within its rights. Some people do not. These are muddy waters and a certain latitude is afforded to the administrative branch. You are going to be hard pressed to prosecute people in this situation.

I am assuming you just didn't get your meaning correct here. People are prosecuted all the time for actions that MIGHT be criminal. Eventually it is determined it was or was not criminal.

Again - there must actually be a specific LAW that was broken. Then, once that law is identified, a counter-point is made to say "that law is not applicable."

For example, I have heard that the Geneva Convention is the basis for the torture being illegal. The administration said the GC did not apply. Don't bother telling me why the GC applies, I don't care - just saying that's the point/counter-point I've heard. So if there is ambiguity, Congress should have passed a law saying "at no time is any US agency permitted to torture." THEN if the administration continues you have something to talk about. As for International Law, I don't know how that's applied.

But, you are not going to prosecute a president for making a reasonable interpretaion of the law and acting on it. Had he openly defied and a law, you have a different case.

[qoute]It's questionable whether or not we'll see a real investigation or whether the Bush administration's actions will be just swept under the rug with a s{snip}
Many have wondered if he'll preemptively pardon himself and most of his administration though. Personally I don't think he will, because I believe even in areas where he may have committed criminal acts, he believes he was absolutely right to do so. That is at least one trait he shares with Nixon.[/quote]Quoted for ridiculousness. To compare Bush and Nixon is a little laughable.

Don't have time to address the rest atm but:



No. The action is deemed criminal or it cannot go to trial. Whether or not the person committed the act, THAT is at question. Whether or not it was a crime...is not.

It may seem like semantics, but it is not.

Example: Man kills a woman. He is charged with murder. While the 'act' of killing may not be in despite, the act of MURDER is. The man may claim many defenses, but let's assume he does not dispute he killed her.

He does dispute it was murder. Perhaps he's addressing only which type of murder it is. Perhaps he will claim self defense, battered spouse syndrome, or insanity.

But the criminal action is not in dispute. Whether or not he committed the act that is what the judge or jury will decide. The state *must* claim a crime has been committed. The state has the burden of then proving that crime. If they cannot, there will not be a conviction.

The job is not determining whether or not there's a crime. The job is determining whether or not the state can prove the crime they're charging.

Whether or not something is or is not a crime is a completely different area of law, and involves the law in and of itself, and will not impact cases that already exist (negatively). It can positively if the law is read differently (such as overturning all death penalty cases current and past based on new law or new interpretation of law). It cannot go back and lengthen or convict though (IE: abortion if it were criminalized people who had them in the past could not be prosecuted)...not without a major overhaul of our justice system of course.

One big aside on that, it's not uncommon in other governments for such things to occur. Hitler was perhaps ironically extremely 'pro-life' on the abortion issue, and past abortions were criminalized and prosecuted. Obviously that govt. being quite different from ours, but it's not unheard of with a major overhaul...generally with massive loss of freedom. Just an aside though.

And sorry if it seems like it's a word game, but its really not. Or rather perhaps all of law is, in it's own weird way. :\

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One last note: My own quote: The job is not determining whether or not there's a crime. The job is determining whether or not the state can prove the crime they're charging.

The job of determining whether or not a crime has been committed is an actual legal process, but it's one that takes place before trial. When it's in question or the charges are serious (and for various other reasons) an indictment may be gotten from a grand jury. Most of the time that doesn't happen though, but there is an indictment process outside of that (involving hearings and whatnot).

Just for clarification.

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Try reading it again, but this time read it within the context of what we're talking about. You can make laws that *specifically* target something after the fact, OR you can utilize existing laws that essentially encompass the same act and make it illegal ALREADY and get it over with. It's not as if you can't break more than one law at the same time =) I think most lawyers will also agree that various laws often overlap each other a bit.

And so with that being said, your suggestion was that we work on legislation after the fact. You make no mention of there being any need for an investigation into whether actual crimes occurred that are already on our books. It's a big leap to go from "those crazed liberals think he's already guilty!" to "let's just make some laws afterwards". You've entirely skipped the concept of criminal investigation, which is unlikely given the political climate anyway, but it's a rather important step if we actually intend to do anything about what may or may not have been criminal.

Tarot, I understand what you're saying. I think it's wrong /shrug
And at this point it is semantics so I'm not getting too worked up about it.

There are cases all the time where the facts of the case are not in dispute. The only question is whether the act was criminal. That is - was there a law that specifically prohibited the action.

I tried to spell that out in the torture example. There is little question about whether people at Gitmo were tortured. The question is whether that's criminal.

Anyway, not going to hammering this to a pulp on word play.


Venen - as usual, you're just not worth it. You don't actually make an effort to read or understand what other people write. Can you identify the laws that were broken?

The crazed liberals need to identify specific laws that were broken. You cannot just prosecute because someone did something that seemed wrong.

And as a side note, in general I think torture is wrong and mostly pointless. If it could be proven that torturing proven enemy combatants could yield information that saves people's lives I might be swayed. But, the core problems there are these people have not been convicted and nobody has proven conclusively that torture actually works.

Either way, wanted to point that out. I'm not really supporting torture, but rather following the existing system. I think it is cowardly after the fact to try to prosecute people. The Bush Administration made little bones about what it was doing and if Congress had a backbone, they could have shut it down. But, they didn't.

I don't understand this comment. Does this mean that our entire justice system is cowardly? It's difficult to prosecute people before they commit a crime....


Just asking for some clarification here.

Maybe I should say politically cowardly. The Bush administration did not really cover up the torture all the much. If someone explicitly defied a statute, we have something to talk about. Nobody seems to be identifying what that law is. But, to wait for their power base to leave and go for their heads after the fact doesn't seem right.

I don't know enough about what laws were allegedly broken to say whether they should be pursued. But, I feel that if there was a flagrant violation, people would have gone after them during the last 8 years when it could have resulted in more politcal power.

As I just demonstrated via what I wrote, tis you that is not worth it, but I prefer to indulge anyway. I explain precisely why your accusation of contradiction is wrong, and you fall back on the tired "You're just not reading what I wrote". Not that I expected anything more, you did the exact same thing with what Tarot wrote above. "It's just semantics!", but you were wrong. It's a rather important distinction to note that to be prosecuted you have to have been charged with a crime.



The facts are almost always in dispute, or in need of evidence in a court of law. Simply because it "seems obvious" does not mean the facts are not in dispute. As for the case of Gitmo, as far as I know it's not considered a legal fact that they were tortured until the case is actually brought forth in court. Course, there are other issues in Gitmo as well given that they don't follow the same guidelines had they been in the U.S. and gotten arrested.

I could be wrong, Tarot knows more about the law than I do, but I think at least some of that falls within the basic principles of law in the U.S.



Again, speaking of not reading what is written. Please read the title of the poll - "Should we investigate alleged Bush admin crimes?". Key word: Investigate. Not prosecute.

You can call it cowardly if you want, but that has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not we should go after them. Absolutely nothing. You either have interest in seeing justice being done, or you don't.

If he did violate the Geneva Conventions, that's a pretty serious matter. I don't know how precisely you define the legality of it on his end, but I would guess that it's pretty close if not already illegal given that our constitution specifically states that it is the law of the land to uphold treaties we sign on to. There is, of course a caveat to that in that the constitution also makes clear that a treaty cannot override parts of the constitution and cannot override our soverignty. So, would torture to gain intel fall under that? That's what would ultimately be a question of such an investigation, though it also depends on what Bush authorized and oversaw as well.

But anyway, hopefully that "clearly identified" what the law is which is in question.

You wrote all that, yet said nothing new. You did not identify a law that was broken. You rambled for 3 paragraphs saying "if he broke the Geneva Convention it's serious." Serious how? Also, there is a question whether it applies. Lastly, what's the penalty for violating it.

This is what makes you sound ridiculous. You're calling for someone's head, but you have no idea why. Torture is bad!! So is lying - but it's legal. There has to be a LAW prohibiting it, you do understand that, right? The whole concept of a law? I guess not, or you wouldn't write things like "we don't need to pass a law to prosecute!"

I thought the argument was an investigation to see IF a law was broken? I mean, it's not like the administration was exactly an open book. A lot of shit was done behind the scenes, and an investigation is going to be needed in order to find out exactly what was done.

Serious because it may very well be in violation of our Constitution. I consider that a serious breach, you may not. Besides that, I still believe it's important to live up to our word when we sign a treaty.

I already addressed that the question of whether it applies would be potentially answered in a... investigation. The penalty for breaking the law(which is what it would be, the Constitution states that it is the law of the land) would be largely up to a judge since it would probably require some legal interpretation.



Like Bza pointed out, an investigation is hardly unwarranted to determine the facts. I can't find anyone in this thread calling for an immediate prosecution without one. Again, look at the title of the poll. Calling for someone's head is slightly different than asking for an investigation. Just slightly. In short, please read before posting.

Exactly.

Here's my problem with the whole "let's just move forward and forget the past"....it means that so long as you get ENOUGH power to prevent being looked at while in office, you will NEVER be held accountable to the american people...while leaving them the legacy of cleaning up your messes.

Until they are held accountable, nothing is going to change.

I'm terribly curious to know how those people who scream "witch hunt" would react to similar investigations into wrong doing in just about ANY other situation, from work to parenting.

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boldness mine.

The time to stop/investigate the behavior of the Bush administration was while they were in office. Nancy Pelosi was/is a cowardly, craven incompetent. The administration had no power to stop congress from either bringing articles of impeachment or at least investigating the possibility of bringing them. She chose to not allow any discussion of impeachment from the day she became Speaker. Moving forward, the Obama administration AND congress have a duty to reinstate constitutionality to our federal system. THAT is their job, and if crimes are discovered in the course of that job to prosecute the offenders. But to investigate the prior administration with the intent of finding crimes and prosecuting members of the administration is a continuation of spinelessness.

Moving forward I have to say that by re-electing Pelosi to the Speaker position, the Democrats have not inspired confidence that they might decide to get spines and force co-equality of the branches of government.

[quote]But to investigate the prior administration with the intent of finding crimes and prosecuting members of the administration is a continuation of spinelessness.[quote]

The intent is your bias reflected upon the argument. I wouldn't want to change shifts as a Burger King manager without finding out what happened the previous shift, because if shit went down I'm probably going to be the one that needs to fix it, and being blindsided by surprise bullshit isn't going to help.

WHAT LAW WAS BROKEN?

Jeebus Frenchie Krishna.

I am not a law student, but how can you people have absolutely no clue about our Constitution? You are aware that one of the foundations of our country is that we do not investigate people just because we feel like it, right?

A law that might have been broken has to be identified first.
Crikey. I am not saying Bush is not guilty of something, but our country does not work on "investigate him, you'll find SOMETHING."

You people get that, right?

laws bush may have broken

googled that and came up with a dozen articles, everything from the CIA leak, to failure to comply with intelligence briefings, false statements to Congress, communications privacy laws, torture, ....

not hard to find a pretty good list.

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Oh yeah and the mass firings that took place...forgot about those. There's lots of other shit. Seriously, you don't have to dig deep. And shall we get into Cheney's repeated refusals to comply with lawful orders based on his bullshit claims that HE had/has executive privilege?

Shit, get into 'laws the Bush administration may have broken' and you could spend a month probably just listing all the potentials without ever having to overreach.

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While I would love to see it happen, noone is going to jail over anything.

Anyone who is not aware of the alleged Bush administration crimes is simply woefully uninformed. You've certainly been ignoring just about everything I've posted the last 8 years.

warrantless wiretapping, torture, pre-war intelligence, 16 words in the State of the Union and Valerie Plame. Scooter Libby convicted of obstruction of justice. Obstruction of justice means Libby was a firewall against the prosecutor finding out the truth.

I'm not at all surprised about the poll results. It would be more lopsided if we were to poll the nation I believe.

But if there's whistleblower(s), investigations could be forced, and public opinion could change quickly.

Fuck that. I am more interested in his presidential pardon list he puts out tomorrow.

I seriously hope he pardons those border guards. At least that would be one thing he did right.

PS: after reading a bit he didn t pardon them but he commuted their sentences.

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"Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit upon his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats." -Henry Louis Mencken
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VEGETARIAN -Noun (vej-i-tair-ee-uhn): Ancient tribal slang for the village idiot who can't hunt, fish or ride.

Agreed, sucks it took two years but I'm glad they're out.

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Holy crap our justice system would be crazy if we could prosecute on hindsight.

Again I'm confused. How can you NOT prosecute based on hindsight? I certainly can't prosecute based on foresight...

Agreed. We should have one of you guys opposed to such actions talk to the families of some of the victims of 50's/60's cold case crimes that were based on racism which were not prosecuted(but rather buried under the rug) until later on after the system was fixed(i.e., police departments full of racists themselves had to be cleaned out, and only then could investigators dig deeper into some of those cases).

Ask the families of those victims whether they give a flying shit about whether it's viewed as "cowardly" to seek justice served so long after the fact.

Justice is to be sought for its own sake, regardless of how its perceived or how it is attained. Preferrable to seek it sooner rather than later? Certainly, but there's no reason not to seek it just because the time of a certain group's control has expired.

Prosecutor: "I contend the defendant brutally stabbed his wife 27 times with a kitchen knife."
Defense: "Objection, your honor! This happened last week. It's absurd to think we can prosecute on hindsight. We need to look forward!"

There will be no prosecution or punishment. Why would a new administration seek to limit itself by imposing new laws or limitations on government that they themselves would have to follow? They see what has happened and they know it gives them more flexibility. The political fallout over expanded executive power has already happened. The ship has sailed, folks.

You’ve already seen that with the warrantless wiretapping and Obama’s support of it during the primary. Why would he limit his ability to prosecute suspected terrorists? Bush has already fought the battle over it and gotten the black eye, and has effectively given Obama a free pass to keep doing it.

Pretty sure, in fact I'm damn sure if any of us knew what really went on, you could bring charges and dig up illegal activites by every US administration, idk, probably post circa 1900.

I served 22 proud years retired in 2005 and in combat tours in Somalia, Iraq, Afghansitan , I can tell you black and white principals

get GREY really fast.

investigate sure, reprimand possibly, convict of criminal charges ?, then just plan on hanging every president as soon as they leave office.

Nobody has actually cited a law.

But keep typing, it's good reading.

"Law of the land".

Next.

Are you implying that military, police, and people in positions of power should some how be above the law due to their positions?

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No I'm implying that the Geneva Convention is out of date, and needs revised for the 21st century ruls of warfare and while I'm against blatant debasing of human rights

ie shit like posing them and spraying them with hoses like they did in Gitmo is unacceptable.

but if the fate of thousands of people is at stake based on putting thrumb screws to an interrogation, I have no problem with securing that information.

In all honesty Draconi, can I
get

the specs on your computer and
monitor?

or is it a browser
issue?

actually its just a me issue, I hate crammed text for some reason, so I push the space bar when its really not needed to facilitate my own selfish desires

Haha, well, I do admit it's refreshing, I can't say I mind it too much =)

Walls of text are indeed annoying.

Hindsight I speak of is the standpoint from our intelligence community. Hard decissions made come from "foresight"/intel they provide. The daily presidential intel updates for a over a decade (throughout the Clinton years even) warned of Hussains WMDs.

What I mean about this... The biggest grimp I've heard about Bush has been "he lied about WMDs". So I figure... if we had found WMD Bush wouldn't need to be "held accountable"? If he was to be held accountable for bad intel he would needed to be impeached and removed from office, too late for that now.

As for actual criminal intent and corruption, maybe something can be found on some other issues I don't know. But as for all the young teenagers all red faced mad about "Bush lied". Meh

Man, I love it when your psuedo-intellectual persona falls through the floor. You're crying for people's heads, and you don't know why.

I wish I could drink your tears.

Orme, you're standing behind a bullshit semantic wall of, "omg quote me the exact law code that he broke," and yet your making fun of his "pseudo-intellectualism?" Fucking hypocrisy is what that is.

You've been given a quick list by Tarot of several... several laws that he possibly broke. You can do a simple google search and find 100s. You just choose not to, to keep up your bullshit line.

I bet you're having fun!

I can google 100 sources that UFOs are real.

So you maintain that the possibility that Bush broke the law is as remote as the possiblity of the existence of UFO's?

Not really a surprise, coming from you sir :p.

Not at all. I maintain that the use of Google to find the exact law codes that Bush broke is as good as finding scientific sources for the existence of UFO's.

I'm not disputing that there were not laws broken. But the rhetoric, that there were, is plentiful but flimsy, like proof of UFOs.

The only touted charge I think is BS is "Bush lied about WMDs." Which I already posted about. Strangely enough, that is the one people seem to think has the biggest proof of wrong doing.