Obama’s DNI reminds Obama that “enhanced interrogation” worked
posted at 8:44 am on April 22, 2009 by Ed Morrissey
Barack Obama’s top man in the intelligence community sent the President a memo defending the use of enhanced interrogation techniques, which the White House edited before releasing to the press de-emphasizing that defense. Dennis Blair, the Director of National Intelligence, pointed out that most of what we know about al-Qaeda came from using those techniques on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah, countering leaks last week from the Obama administration that claimed the methods produced no data:
President Obama’s national intelligence director told colleagues in a private memo last week that the harsh interrogation techniques banned by the White House did produce significant information that helped the nation in its struggle with terrorists.
“High value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qa’ida organization that was attacking this country,” Adm. Dennis C. Blair, the intelligence director, wrote in a memo to his staff last Thursday.
Admiral Blair sent his memo on the same day the administration publicly released secret Bush administration legal memos authorizing the use of interrogation methods that the Obama White House has deemed to be illegal torture. Among other things, the Bush administration memos revealed that two captured Qaeda operatives were subjected to a form of near-drowning known as waterboarding a total of 266 times.
The New York Times, which got a copy of the memo, also notices some odd redactions from the version released by the White House:
Admiral Blair’s assessment that the interrogation methods did produce important information was deleted from a condensed version of his memo released to the media last Thursday. Also deleted was a line in which he empathized with his predecessors who originally approved some of the harsh tactics after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
“I like to think I would not have approved those methods in the past,” he wrote, “but I do not fault those who made the decisions at that time, and I will absolutely defend those who carried out the interrogations within the orders they were given.”
In other words, the Obama administration covered up the fact that even their own DNI acknowledges that the interrogations produced actionable and critical information. When Dick Cheney demanded the release of the rest of the memos relating that information, he wasn’t just going on a fishing expedition. Cheney filed a request to declassify those memos in March, and the CIA has yet to decide on his request, but we can no longer doubt that records exist showing the success of those interrogations.
Obama has occasionally suggested a truth-and-reconciliation approach to probing the use of torture by the Bush administration, but this establishes that Obama isn’t terribly interested in “truth”. Withholding the truth that waterboarding produced information that saved hundreds of American lives, perhaps thousands, shows that Obama values public relations more than he does the truth. He wants to argue that none of this was necessary to secure the nation against terrorist attacks. In order to make that argument, he redacted Blair’s memo, including his defense of his predecessors, whom Blair acknowledges had to face some tough decisions to uncover plots against America.
Maybe Obama could learn a lesson from Blair in that regard.
We need to have an honest debate on interrogation techniques and securing America against attack from radical, committed terrorists. Conservatives should stop pretending that waterboarding isn’t a form of torture that the US has opposed for decades when used abroad, especially against our own citizens. But everyone else should stop pretending that it doesn’t work, and that we would have been safer without its use. The real question — the one Obama wanted to avoid in his cover-up of Blair’s memo — is how many American lives is it worth to say we don’t waterboard? Ten? A hundred? Three thousand? Fifty thousand, the intended result of 9/11 and presumably the Second Wave waterboarding stopped?
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Hey get-a-wife, let me ask you what I asked Grow Fins 30 times yesterday:
What legal protections do these folks have?
blatantblue on April 22, 2009 at 9:36 AM
I don’t.
I do believe in the rule of law and nobody is above the law.
getalife on April 22, 2009 at 9:36 AM
****Stop feeding the retard troll****
BadgerHawk on April 22, 2009 at 9:37 AM
Okay. Do a favor and tell all of us how un-uniformed, illegal combatants fall under law
blatantblue on April 22, 2009 at 9:37 AM
Always great to start off a morning with a good horselaugh.
tru2tx on April 22, 2009 at 9:34 AM
If you accept that getaclue long ago fell into a deep well of stupidity and never climbed back out, you will be better off. You would have better luck reasoning with a pile of sand.
Bishop on April 22, 2009 at 9:37 AM
There was a Stool from the CATO Institute on O’reilly last night who actually said essentialy that.
thomasaur on April 22, 2009 at 9:38 AM
It’s going to be viewed by moderates, I think, as a witchhunt.
That’s because there was no legal ruling that prevented the administration from going forward. It may well have been wrong-headed. Perhaps people will wonder if anything really was prevented or if the prisoners just made up something. That’s the problem with torture. You never know if the info is any good or not.
But I personally think that moderates loathe the waste of energy and money over these witchhunts. You want to change? Change. Then move on.
We’re becoming very similar to crummy little countries that spend all their life hunting down the other side to punish and prosecute for “war crimes.”
Those countries also never get a lot done.
AnninCA on April 22, 2009 at 9:38 AM
The really hilarious part is that the NYT’s is reporting the ommission.
But looking at their revenue stream, I don’t think anyone read the story.
PappaMac on April 22, 2009 at 9:39 AM
If I thought the intelligence I could get from some terrorist animal would save even one American life (even GALs) I’d do the procedure myself.
(I’m rethinking about whether I’d do it for GAL or not)
hawkdriver on April 22, 2009 at 9:40 AM
Exactly. But our counterparts on the left don’t seem to want to admit that. Weren’t you the other commenter helping me destroy GrowFins in the headline thread yesterday?
BadgerHawk on April 22, 2009 at 9:40 AM
Okay. Do a favor and tell all of us how un-uniformed, illegal combatants fall under law
blatantblue on April 22, 2009 at 9:37 AM
Visions of bullet-pocked walls and firing squads just flitted through my mind.
Bishop on April 22, 2009 at 9:40 AM
So you DO believe that Tim Geithner should be in prison. Thanks for clearing that up.
PappaMac on April 22, 2009 at 9:40 AM
On the other hand, this is the moron who wanted to hire Chas Freeman.
Attila (Pillage Idiot) on April 22, 2009 at 9:41 AM
yep, he was an idiot.
but the far-left moonbats infiltrated Libertarianism a long time ago, on this stuff.
jp on April 22, 2009 at 9:41 AM
They can’t be prosecuted because they were tortured.
getalife on April 22, 2009 at 9:41 AM
yep, enjoyed every minute of it
jp on April 22, 2009 at 9:42 AM
It seems that Mr. Shipley is also playing the “cheery-picking” game. Why did you leave out this part Tom?:
And, of course, we must certainly trust that the New York Times hasn’t slanted the story to produce their typical baised liberal effect.
I still can’t decide whether this quote above was made by Blair’s spokeswomen, Blair himself, or the NYT’s deceptive writing skills.
Rovin on April 22, 2009 at 9:42 AM
Tim is going a great job and the economy is on the mend. The adults are in charge and…..
BWAWHAHAHHA!!!
She won’t answer that for you so I tried.
hawkdriver on April 22, 2009 at 9:43 AM
So you DO believe that Tim Geithner should be in prison. Thanks for clearing that up.
PappaMac on April 22, 2009 at 9:40 AM
Along with the rest of the ‘rat gang who can’t seem to pay their taxes.
Game. Set. Match. Well played sir.
Bishop on April 22, 2009 at 9:44 AM
Sorry to ask the opposite, but where’s the torture?
Nobody lost a head. Nobody lost or broke a limb. Nobody lost any teeth. Nobody lost a johnson or a teabag; nobody got shocked on his johnson or his teabag.
Why are we even wasting government time and money on this?
BuckeyeSam on April 22, 2009 at 9:44 AM
Obama has taken on an issue he can’t win.
No body, but a few left wing piggies, would ever want the U.S. to be “un-secure”.
Poll after poll has shown that Americans do not like the idea of not being safe in their home.
We shudder at the thought of a “driving rain storm” that is “storm tracked” for 24 hours, we don’t have the stomach to wonder if we are safe or not.
All that is needed is just the hint that we are open to attack, and Obama has to retreat.
Cheney has that information, and it will see daylight.
Obama, not surprising, took on the wrong issue…Americans will not allow ourselves to be attacked. This isn’t like taxes, where you can take from the rich and give to the poor, and make a heartfelt plea for equality.
This is the soccer mom wondering if her shopping mall, or her husbands office is going to be bombed…is her child’s school bus the target?
If they worry about a “storm watch 2009″ with angst, how do you think citizens react to potential bombings, at anytime, anyplace.
There isn’t a mother alive who wouldn’t say “rip his tongue out, to save my child”…
right2bright on April 22, 2009 at 9:46 AM
Morning all.
Just my 2 cents, but I believe that Obama stumbled into Cheney’s trap. I think Obama was originally going to take the high road on this issue, but became mightily p**sed when Cheney started criticizing him for his foreign policy as well as the interrogation methods. Now, with Obama looking weak as hell from his apology tour, he couldn’t stand the affront to his pride that Cheney was hurling so a deflection had to be found. So, as a shot across the bow, Obama opened up the possibility of prosecuting the Bush administration for the enhanced interrogation. However, his attempt at deflection and stroking his wounded ego is going to blow-up in his face because he is whipping up a very explosive problem.
Weve seen this play before when he purposely (or maybe accidentally knowing how incompetent he is) whipped up populist frenzy over the executive compensation. That, too, was an attempt to deflect from the lie that Obama knew about the executive pay prior to it becoming public. It quickly turned into a debacle that he himself had to tamp down because he needed businesses and executives to buy into his financial rescue plan.
A few things are becoming very clear about Obama:
1. He BELIEVES he is like royalty and as such he will bestow upon the peasants his affability and good-will as long as they never forget their place.
2. He cannot endure any criticism. His pride will simply never let him do any real self-examination. Thus, he remains a shallow individual with no real convictions.
KickandSwimMom on April 22, 2009 at 9:47 AM
I truly hope that they have trials and investigations and make this as ugly as possible. I really do. With the constant apologies for America, the bow to the Saudi King, the outrageous spending, and the list of administration tax cheats, there will soon be a coalesence of opposition.
TOTUS is going to reap an ugly harvest if there is ever another attack on American soil. People will not be tolerant of change when the images of dead Americans are everywhere. The MSM won’t be able to control it and dumbass trolls won’t be able to stifle the backlash.
I do not want an attack, to be clear. I pray that we will be safe. However, if there is one, there will be no soft place to land for these criminal anti-American scum.
John D on April 22, 2009 at 9:47 AM
Going one step further here, I also am predicting an interesting backlash to Obama from moderates over a basic fact. They may poll and say they “hate” torture, but I honestly doubt it. 9-11 was horrible. I do not think many people harbor much sympathy for these terrorists. They may not say that out loud, but I’d be willing to bet money that’s exactly what they are saying privately.
This issue has painted Obama as a far-left type, particularly after smiling when Chavez is insulting him and failing to even make a single remark that speaks to American pride of country. Moderates think worrying over a handshake is silly. They also don’t agree that we need to grovel.
He’s popular, so this question mark may not show immediately, but I think he’s fallen apart as far as remotely pretending he is anything but far left.
AnninCA on April 22, 2009 at 9:48 AM
Me too. My favorite part was how he realized he had the losing argument and completely shifted tactics for the main post thread. “I can’t win this thing, so I’m just going to accuse everyone who disagrees with me of loving torture”. Weak sauce.
BadgerHawk on April 22, 2009 at 9:49 AM
Thanks for that, I had a hard time deciphering that also…I just thought it was because I didn’t have my first cup of coffee.
Blair has always been against these techniques, any change of policy is a huge shift for him.
right2bright on April 22, 2009 at 9:49 AM
I know it was issued before you were born, but the 1998 Federal indictment of bin Laden, issued by the (Democrat) Clinton Justice Department, specifically cited a working relationship between al Qaeda and Iraq, 3 years before 9/11. Read the document yourself.
http://www.fas.org/irp/news/1998/11/98110602_nlt.html
And in 2003, a US Federal Judge in New York City-who was in fact appointed by Bill Clinton-ruled in a lawsuit that Iraq played a role in the 9/11 attacks.
You really need to have Begala give you some honest facts, instead of the lies you regularly post here.
Del Dolemonte on April 22, 2009 at 9:50 AM
getalife on April 22, 2009 at 9:41 AM
Hmm..they were on a mission to kill. We stopped them, extracted info to save lives…
and because we scared him/hurt him in the process…it’s all even now?
Set him free? no harm, no foul?
Evil exists and it wasn’t the people in Bush’s world that were evil.
Those men are still alive because we value life.
bridgetown on April 22, 2009 at 9:50 AM
Only the cons are scared to death to allow torture, no prosecutions and breaking the law.
It has been a proven recruiting tool and when they have to be let go, they kill Americans because they were tortured.
Your religion can’t save you after supporting torture and you will spend eternity with the enemy.
getalife on April 22, 2009 at 9:51 AM
Does that include felony perjury about sex?
And before you answer and make a fool out of yourself again, remember that the CLinton Justice Department succesfully prosecuted a female government employee for lying under oath-about sex.
Del Dolemonte on April 22, 2009 at 9:51 AM
Aw, come on now. Cut the guy some slack. It’s not like he’s ever fought a war before… (though he loves his country so very much*)
/sarc
*Note: No, I am not questioning the patriotism of men who are incapable of serving their country in such a capacity.
Send_Me on April 22, 2009 at 9:51 AM
Del Dolemonte on April 22, 2009 at 9:51 AM
Ah, the Clinton card.
Please try to stay on topic.
getalife on April 22, 2009 at 9:53 AM
Kickandswim…..He took my breath away when he was willing to rip open race relations in the primary over virtually nothing. I thought then that he showed a lack of authentic sense of responsibility toward people.
I agree 100% about the idiocy of the executive compensation stuff. That sure worked well, huh? And now, this.
It’s frankly true. We’re being run around by a dang community organizer.
AnninCA on April 22, 2009 at 9:53 AM
Once again The Big O throws someone under the bus to cover his incompetence, this time it is the CIA. This is getting old, to cover up for his disastrous foreign, hug a dictator tour, Obama make’s our intelligence gathering return to pre 9-11 levels… in one day The CIA has gone from gathering intelligence to an SOP of CYA….I feel sooooo much safer today.
train on April 22, 2009 at 9:54 AM
Thank Allah I’m a kuffar, then.
blatantblue on April 22, 2009 at 9:54 AM
You do realize that there are no actual legal statutes to back up your claim, wouldnotwontyourlife? Or are you still in Con Law 102 and your hippie-dippie professor has not gotten to it yet?
Branch Rickey on April 22, 2009 at 9:54 AM
I don’t think so. Good interrogators cross check information. I assume that’s why the the procedure was used so many times on a couple of guys. They were lying at first and the info didn’t check out. But, eventually it did. Double agents routinely feed false info and they aren’t even under interrogation. We’re all laymen in this area and the word torture is becoming almost as mind numbingly overused as a trillion dollars.
a capella on April 22, 2009 at 9:55 AM
We are being run around by a narcissist who is truly sick.
He will sacrifice anything to make himself look kingly. We are in big trouble.
I’m just glad that middle America, even though they voted for the king, are starting to see.
ORconservative on April 22, 2009 at 9:56 AM
And libs are like the a$$hole friends that you have sitting in the car while you’re out next to a busy highway changing a tire and they’re bitching about how long it’s taking. GAL, you should thank “cons” for having the courage to do the things that still make our enemies fear us.
It hasn’t been proven to me. Link, quote cite something.
No one is going to He11 for standing up against evil.
hawkdriver on April 22, 2009 at 9:56 AM
I think they’ll have a good example, as you say, a capella, to use. And I sure hope they do it, too.
I was actually meaning in the public opinion world, where things tend to be fuzzier.
AnninCA on April 22, 2009 at 9:57 AM
EXACTLY.
People think these interrogators are just f*ckin morons. They are mental gymnastics masters. They know how to cross list intelligence with other intelligence. They also know when someone is lying. You don’t become a CIA interrogation specialist for nothing
blatantblue on April 22, 2009 at 9:57 AM
And libs are like the a$$hole friends that you have sitting in the car while you’re out next to a busy highway changing a tire and they’re b1tching about how long it’s taking. GAL, you should thank “cons” for having the courage to do the things that still make our enemies fear us.
It hasn’t been proven to me. Link, quote cite something.
No one is going to He11 for standing up against evil.
hawkdriver on April 22, 2009 at 9:57 AM
Translation-I’ve been busted by facts I can’t refute, so will try to change the subject.
Clinton is totally relevant to this discussion, because he was the one, not Bush ir Cheney, who first claimed a working relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda, and his judge found Iraq complicit in 9/11.
And as for my other post about Clinton, I will simply responding to his defenders whi said he was above the law.
Federal Judge Richard Posner said that any normal citizen who did what Clinton did would get 3 and a half years in the pokey. Tell us why you felt he was above the law.
Del Dolemonte on April 22, 2009 at 9:57 AM
train on April 22, 2009 at 9:54 AM
Exactly, part of what reminds me of “The Third Terrorist” book. We have gone back to pre 9/11 in 3 short months.
ORconservative on April 22, 2009 at 9:57 AM
Rovin on April 22, 2009 at 9:42 AM
Well, yeah, that was in January. And he’s saying what he thinks now.
Tom_Shipley on April 22, 2009 at 9:58 AM
“… but this establishes that Obama isn’t terribly interested in “truth”.”
“There are now
threefour kinds of lies: lies, damned lies,andstatistics and Obamas.Dusty on April 22, 2009 at 9:59 AM
I can’t help wonder how this national conversation would go following a WMD event that took several thousand lives in liberal enclaves like San Francisco, Berkley, Washington DC, vs more conservative areas like Omaha, Houston, or St. Louis.
Star20 on April 22, 2009 at 9:59 AM
Hot Air needs to set up a Lie-O-Meter to acknowledge the lies that continuously flow from this administration from all angles. It seems they try to create a reality that doesn’t exist into one where the perception of the public is one they want perceived and not what is actually happening. Joseph Goebbels, anyone?
volsense on April 22, 2009 at 10:00 AM
Well, more to come on this story, eh? Now, even Castro spoke up and told him to knock off taking too much credit over Cuba changing. LOL*
That was one of the funnier stories yesterday.
AnninCA on April 22, 2009 at 10:01 AM
That sort of excludes you from ever making a comment about a Conservative changing his stance on an issue.
Noted.
hawkdriver on April 22, 2009 at 10:01 AM
Obama is uneducated in these matters and surely inexperienced. Cheney had experience from the first gulf war. Obama was 8 years old. Cheney had inside knowledge. Obama didn’t till recently. Water is scary for these desert rats. Remember they are afraid of bathing.
No. It will take a little time, but the leftists will come to grips when they leave office, they will have to face the law. Unless the dictator pulls a chavez and removes term limits.
seven on April 22, 2009 at 10:02 AM
Could we see Church Commission 2. I hope not because our intellegence service may not recover for aleast another 20 yrs.
Clyde5445 on April 22, 2009 at 10:03 AM
+1!!!
4shoes on April 22, 2009 at 10:03 AM
Was just talking about whether or not they would get to term limits.
They’ve just created their massive army.
ORconservative on April 22, 2009 at 10:05 AM
Only GETALIFE is scared to come up with a technique that replaces waterboarding that would work. I have asked her repeatedly and she refused to answer and she also refuses to say if she would give up her city in order to get rid of waterboarding.
garydt on April 22, 2009 at 10:06 AM
Thank Allah I’m a kuffar, then.
blatantblue on April 22, 2009 at 9:54 AM
Casual believers/skeptics like me can do all the “torturing”.
What’s so odd is the libs who tell everyone that God is just a figment of our imagination, then tell us that we are going to go to hell for what we do. Dissonance.
Bishop on April 22, 2009 at 10:06 AM
Pack of F’ng LIARS.
marklmail on April 22, 2009 at 10:06 AM
Yeah because they have a history of following the Geneva convention, before it came out that we were water boarding.
So what was their recruiting tool going back to the 1960′s??
And the only reason it would probably be a recruiting tool is, : Hey Akbar, I went and fought the infidels in Afghanistan, I got caught, and do you know what happened? You aren’t going to believe this. They took me to a tropical island, they fed me good food, they let me bathe, and they splashed some water in my face. Then they let me come home. It was like a vacation. I am healthier now and in better shape, than i was before I joined the Jihad. Time to go back out and fight the infidels again.
MDWNJ on April 22, 2009 at 10:07 AM
So can swimming, SCUBA diving, water skiing, jumping in the water, drinking water when someone says something funny……..
Johan Klaus on April 22, 2009 at 10:07 AM
Star20 on April 22, 2009 at 9:59 AM
At this rate, it will happen and then all of this won’t be simply an academic discussion.
I’m sure it will end up with the blame on Bush anyway.
tru2tx on April 22, 2009 at 10:07 AM
So say your kid or someone you love is kidnapped. You find someone who has information but refuses to tell you. The only way he would tell you where your that person is is by waterboarding. I guess you wouldn’t do such a thing even to find out where that person is and perhaps save their life?
deidre on April 22, 2009 at 10:07 AM
Just one attack, and this will ruin his entire presidency.
AnninCA on April 22, 2009 at 10:07 AM
Another thing about Obama that we have to expose is the way he takes responsibility for NOTHING. Even though he is involved in the decisions of the administration, the democrats have set it up so that there is always someone else to take the fall or responsibility for policy. Thus, we have all these czars for everything under the sun. This is why Obama still has a high personal favorability rating. I am constantly hearing people give Obama a pass on everything and instead blame either the prior administration or the democrats surrounding him. His part in the policy must be exposed and once it is his star will fade.
KickandSwimMom on April 22, 2009 at 10:08 AM
Beheadings on u-tube are allowed? *puzzled*
AnninCA on April 22, 2009 at 10:08 AM
I’m down! I’m in!
blatantblue on April 22, 2009 at 10:10 AM
Did anyone hear Col.Hunt last night before those two doubts talking about torure on OReilley?
He said that the pirate situation was so long because Obama couldn’t figure out what to do.
Not his exact quote but…………..again, he came out smelling like a rose but this won’t keep happening.
ORconservative on April 22, 2009 at 10:11 AM
Yes, but I am not as cynical as most people. I think, kick-and-swim, that people gave him the benefit of the doubt because he was virtually unknown. Now, they are starting to know him. His lack of forthright acceptance of responsibility is piling up, and people are noting it.
I’m convinced this type of shift doesn’t show on polls for a long time and sometimes not at all. It’s just a shift away from trust.
I’m fairly convinced already that there will be a shift back to putting Republicans in the house and senate to balance him off.
The winners will be the Republicans who can steer around all the more inflammatory rhetoric going on.
AnninCA on April 22, 2009 at 10:12 AM
doubts=dopes
ORconservative on April 22, 2009 at 10:12 AM
The left would blame it on Bush or the Jews. Oh wait……..
Johan Klaus on April 22, 2009 at 10:13 AM
In other words, I don’t think people give a rat’s *a* about handshakes. They DO care about witchhunts. They don’t care if we open up with Cuba. That’s been coming a long time. They DO care about Chavez’s insults not being met with some type of American pride.
AnninCA on April 22, 2009 at 10:15 AM
I’m am a strong believer and will do what is necessary to defeat evil. If in the end I am wrong then I will pay the price for doing what I feel is right. (see: Col. Oliver North)
thomasaur on April 22, 2009 at 10:16 AM
That’s how his defenders see it. They couldn’t care less about how many Americans such an attack would kill, however.
Del Dolemonte on April 22, 2009 at 10:18 AM
Good points. I like visuals though.Especially this one.
canditaylor68 on April 22, 2009 at 10:20 AM
How the heck is waterboarding torture? Seriously Ed? They have a doctor standing there. It’s done for what no more than a minute or so. I think we have officially changed the definition of torture to anything that is more than talking to the detainee. This is ridiculous.
youngO on April 22, 2009 at 10:20 AM
+100
Johan Klaus on April 22, 2009 at 10:22 AM
Heh. The corporate media is utterly and completely controlled by the left, and staffed by the left well above 90% at every outlet you can name except Fox.
(Fox comes in closer to 50%, so it naturally becomes the “mouthpiece of the right wing”.)
Jaibones on April 22, 2009 at 10:23 AM
I don’t believe that, Del. Incompetent? Yes. Uncaring? No.
AnninCA on April 22, 2009 at 10:23 AM
PS Getadick Godwin’s itself again.
Jaibones on April 22, 2009 at 10:23 AM
I wonder if Obama is having fun yet? He makes a big show about eliminating “torture” (which it wasn’t) and then his own guy basically admits it worked to save lives. This guy is so unqualified to run this country it is pathetic.
echosyst on April 22, 2009 at 10:25 AM
Then maybe you or one of your loved ones will be one of those killed in the next terrorist attack because we couldn’t get the information we needed to stop it in time. How appropriate! Here lies getalife…who no longer getsalife. Killed by the rule of law.
sdd on April 22, 2009 at 10:25 AM
What you excerpt here, Tom, is, to me, a strawman. Either we “know” from all of our other efforts used over time and the past successes of such, and thus “know” based on based on probability and informed by the timelines believed necessary to acquire the information, or we don’t.
To me, left unexplained an un-detailed, Blair is veiling this equivocation in the full set of “knowing” that also includes no way of knowing if we asked them nicely each and every day for 25 years; no way of knowing that the plots would be successful; no way of knowing that AQ would go through with them, and no way of knowing that AQ wouldn’t just surrender and beg mercy of the courts, or give up and disappear into the mountains forever.
Dusty on April 22, 2009 at 10:25 AM
It is sad that Obama and the Left care more about our “image” and how other nations “feel” aboout us than they do about the lives of Americans.
katiejane on April 22, 2009 at 10:28 AM
yep, another example of the right grabbing the ankles and conceding language to the Left to meet their political ends.
Its dangerous, you simply can’t use the same word to describe cutting off hands and tounges and also what you describe above. They are not the same things
jp on April 22, 2009 at 10:30 AM
Except I’m sure in the case of Bill Clinton. Because it was only sex. And on the necessary probes of Dodd, Murtha, and Frank because that’s only money.
Or rather is it that you are for the rule of law only when it suits your party? I’ll go with the latter because its evident by everything you say here.
theguardianii on April 22, 2009 at 10:31 AM
You are engaging in an impossible hypothetical, because no one will ever breed with her.
BadgerHawk on April 22, 2009 at 10:32 AM
Hey cut the poor guy some slack. It takes time to get input from all the 300+ foreign policy mavens who advise him.
ProfessorMiao on April 22, 2009 at 10:33 AM
Hi, Liar!
“proven recruiting tool”? Great, let’s have the proof. Link in this thread.
Spirit of 1776 on April 22, 2009 at 10:33 AM
Never too early to politicize a terrorist attack!
Tom_Shipley on April 22, 2009 at 10:33 AM
I would like to add to your point Del Dolemonte concerning
the blatant lie liberals like getalife spout concerning the “Bush lied” drivel.
There is mountains of evidence that shows that Iraq/Al-qaeda worked together before we invaded.
Ironically,The best evidence is provided by democrats in their majority lead 2008 Senate Intelligence Report:
WaPo: Bush “substantiated by intelligence” – UPDATED
http://theanchoressonline.com/2008/06/09/wapo-bush-substantiated-by-intelligence/
Getalife is so wrong about so much she probably needs to be reminded that Rockefeller is a democrat,not one of Bush’s cronies.
Abu-Musab Al-Zarqawi left the leadership of Osama Bin Laden
to start cell in Iraq after he was hurt in battle in Afghanistan.
Abu-Musab Al-Zarqawi leg was operated on in Saddam’s personal hospital,he was set up with a safe house,moved into N. Iraq to work with Al-Ansar,and launched attacks from there where one resulted in the killing of a top official in Jordan.
All before we invaded.
Al-Zarqawi ended up becoming one of the most lethal terrorist in history with tens of thousands of deaths associated with his quest to start a civil war in Iraq.
According to getalife and the liberal sheep,somehow this does not count.
Kind of like Obama not knowing what the he!! was going on in a church he supported and attended for 20 yrs.
Liberal pretzel logic.
More evidence that the getalife crew can’t comprehend:
Bush Did Not Lie!… Saddam Officials Had “Good Relationship” With Zarqawi …Update: Sen. Bond Responds
http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2008/06/bush-did-not-lie-saddam-officials-had.html#comments
This document discovered after the invastion shows photos of Al-Qaeda leader Al-Zarqawi. (Dread Pundit Bluto)
ISGZ-2004-019920
More evidence that Bush did not lie.
This time from one of the leading liberal papers in the country,second only to the NY Times:
Bush never lied to us about Iraq
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-kirchick16-2008jun16,0,4808346.story
From the Los Angeles Times
And of course the evidence was so strong against Saddam that leading democrats like Rockefeller considered Saddam an
“Imminent threat”,something Bush did not even go so far as to say:
getalife has got to be a plant of some kind,nobody is stuck on stupid this much so often.
Baxter Greene on April 22, 2009 at 10:33 AM
Care to cite just one section or paragraph of the US Code to show exactly which law was violated?
coldwarrior on April 22, 2009 at 10:34 AM
Will the CIA wage a campaign of leaks and disinformation against Obama as they did under Bush? I don’t think so. It’s just going to roll over and let Obama walk over them.
Lefties I understand. What I don’t understand is the bureaucratic sniper fire that’s trained on the Republicans in office. I don’t think they are secret lefties so why do they hammer Repubs but go soft on the Dems?
promachus on April 22, 2009 at 10:34 AM
This position allows Ed to maintain what he referred to yesterday as a “pristine conscience.”
BigD on April 22, 2009 at 10:34 AM
hawkdriver on April 22, 2009 at 10:01 AM
Uh, no, not really. In January he said he didn’t know if “enhanced interrogation techniques” yielded valuable information. Now he’s come out and said that, though he believes it yielded valuable background information on AQ — though, notably none tying Iraq to AQ — that he still is against these techniques because of the damage they do to our ideals and reputation.
Tom_Shipley on April 22, 2009 at 10:38 AM
A lot of this comes from Obama’s fear of alienating his base — He’ll go after all the Republicans and conservatives you can throw at him, but for someone who’s supposedly the most popular president in the history of the universe, he’s unwilling to risk any of his personal capital by challenging his core supporters on the left, who were salivating Tuesday afternoon at the thought of Bush and Cheney on trial until Blair’s memo was released.
Which is also why they’re going nuts about that this morning as well as The New York Times’ story supporting the fact that waterboarding helped stop the Asian plane hijackings as part of a terrorist attack on West Coast cities. In their minds, this was Fitzmas times 100 — They could picture Bush and Cheney on the gallows (andthoseotherCIApeopletoo,butwhoreallygivesadamnaboutthem) with the trap door opening, and then this $%#@#$%@#!&* Blair and those conservative ^&^#$%#$ at The New York Times go and try to ruin everything (“conservative” New York Times? Yea, that’s what the left is thinking today, that the Times had to have run that because they’re doing the bidding of their right-wing lackeys, just like those Judith Miller Iraq stories. I’d hate to be the one having to read all the e-mails to the paper’s national desk or the op-ed page this morning from all those betrayed liberals).
jon1979 on April 22, 2009 at 10:41 AM
Sorry Ed, gotta disagree with you here. If this really is “torture”, wouldn’t it be a little strange that we torture our own soldiers? In SERE training, not only do we waterboard our own, and we also do much, much worse.
Besides, how many people volunteer to get tortured?
CultureWar on April 22, 2009 at 10:42 AM
Must read on the subject at NRO:
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NzI2ZTA1MDUzYjU0MjVhMDFiOWIwMzFhNjIyYmRjOTE=&w=MA==
ProfessorMiao on April 22, 2009 at 10:44 AM
Does anyone here care to define torture for us? Ed, you wanna take a crack at it?
CultureWar on April 22, 2009 at 10:44 AM
I doubt there will be the same sort of leaks we saw during the Bush years…that’s a typical cowardly Left tactic.
Will CIA let Obama walk all over them?
On the operations side, you will see fewer officers trying to do a lot more with less…and maintain focus on what they’ve been tasked to do. No fanfare, no parades, professionals doing what they do best and enjoy most. Just a lot less of them.
But, from what I’ve seen, there may well be a new exodus from CIA by a number of officers who are at an age where they can either retire early, or resign to obtain more lucrative employment in the private sector, parroting the exodus seen during the Clinton years.
Just as the Hadley reforms started to come about, and morale at the Agency was on the rise, and new recruiting efforts among non-traditional sources of talent have just gotten underway…along comes this.
Obama is not doing CIA any favors…and doing no favors at all for the citizens of the United states.
Remember…always remember the words of Sabine Ehrenfeld.
“It is all about the “O”.”
coldwarrior on April 22, 2009 at 10:44 AM
That’s more of stating the obvious than politicizing a potential attack, yes? Or do you disagree that an attack would be devestating towards President Obama’s legacy?
BadgerHawk on April 22, 2009 at 10:45 AM
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