Did DiFi just defend waterboarding?
posted at 12:12 pm on May 13, 2009 by Ed Morrissey
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In the rush to defend Nancy Pelosi after the Speaker lied about her knowledge of enhanced-interrogation techniques and got caught by a CIA leak in the falsehood, Dianne Feinstein offered a defense that certainly looks broad enough to cover the Bush administration as well. She insisted that Pelosi’s acceptance of waterboarding and other EITs should be considered in the context of the aftermath of 9/11 — which is, by the way, what Dick Cheney and other members of the Bush administration have said all along (via The Corner):
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat, backed Pelosi.
“I think it’s a tempest in a teapot really to say: Well, Speaker Pelosi should have known all of this, she should have stopped this, she should have done this or done that,” she said.
“I don’t want to make an apology for anybody, but in 2002, it wasn’t 2006, 07, 08 or 09. It was right after 9/11, and there were in fact discussions about a second wave of attacks.”
Well … yeah. In fact, that’s why the CIA and the Bush administration felt that they had to get the information they needed in a hurry. Al-Qaeda had conducted major operations against American targets at least every two to three years since the first World Trade Center attack in 1993, and in 2002-3 the presumption was that another was on its way — and apparently it was. Cheney has strongly implied that waterboarding KSM stopped a major attack on Southern California, and DNI Dennis Blair and the CIA have corroborated that in general terms.
Under those circumstances, the CIA conducted the interrogations under the purview of Congress, and specifically Nancy Pelosi, Jane Harman, Jay Rockefeller, and other Democrats as well as their Republican counterparts. Not until much later did anyone register serious objections (Jane Harman), and Pelosi refused to add her name to Harman’s memo.
Pelosi lied to keep her left-wing support in place. Feinstein tried to defend Pelosi, but this may wind up damaging both of them among the MoveOn/International ANSWER wing of the Democratic Party. At least Feinstein did the damage telling the truth.
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Wow. Amazing! That’s what VP Cheney has been saying all along.
TN Mom on May 13, 2009 at 3:58 PM
Saddest thing about this:
It has to come to the point that a democrat needs to defend a partisan ally in order to acknowledge the context in which these decisions were made. And suddenly it’s ample justification.
Scrappy on May 13, 2009 at 4:00 PM
THE DEFINITIVE ANSWER ON WATERBOARDING.
UNIFORM CODE OF MILITARY JUSTICE
Subchapter 10:
Section 924, Article 124;
Any person subject to this chapter who, with intent to injure, disfigure, or disable, inflicts upon the person of another an injury which–
(1) seriously disfigures his person by a mutilation thereof;
(2) destroys or disables any member or organ of his body; or
(3) seriously diminishes his physical vigor by the injury of any member or organ;
is guilty of maiming and shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.
Read it and weep idiots, waterboarding is NOT illegal and WAS NOT illegal.
Waterboarding is conducted in SERE to this day and if waterboarding was torture, under this article of the UCMJ, would be illegal to even conduct in SERE.
Lindsey Grahamnesty has just threatened ANY military personel who conducts waterboarding with prosecution.
Grahamnesty, what are you going to charge them with?
Grahamsty, sit down and SHUT UP while you still can.
nelsonknows on May 13, 2009 at 4:21 PM
Are these libs upset about incarceration? If I had the choice between 83 “pours” and a year in prison many, many people would take the pours.
Does that mean keeping someone incarcerated for over a year is torture? If not, then why not?
blink on May 13, 2009 at 5:01 PM
These clowns are spinning so fast they have no idea which direction is up. If you tell the truth DiFi, you don’t have to try to remember what you said. You’ll know.
oakpack on May 13, 2009 at 5:28 PM
Somewhat OT: what are we to make of the various left-wing claims that KSM was captured in 2003 — after the 2002 “Second Wave” plot was thwarted?
I don’t have an answer — what’s the story?
Paul_in_NJ on May 13, 2009 at 8:18 PM
What I make of it is that it is great to be able to make those claims while living in 2009 while knowing what we know now, and not early 2003 when we didn’t.
BTW, what evidence is used to show the plot was “thwarted” in 2003? Becoming aware that there is a plot before KSM was captured is not thwarting.
Dusty on May 14, 2009 at 7:20 AM
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