Heh. Change is coming with Obama. Don’t believe yer lyin’ eyes.

JEBUS, Spence!!

and there’s all discussion as to whether to investigate the Bu$h cabal, exactly WHY?????

IMPEACH
INVESTIGATE
INDICT
IMPRISION

only then could the rest of the world even consider thinking well of America now and into the future.
Thanks for this.
*sigh*

What’s up with Crawford? She was such a good Cheney protégée and now she’s talking torture? Any ideas on the change in tone? With it looking like Gitmo and probably the current commissions process being closed out in the next year, is there some pre-emptive reputation rehabilitation going on here?

So, what happens now to the judges and others who do not “turn on a dime” and decide it all was just a bad Bush dream?
And what happens to the men who put the nightmare in motion?

Digg it while I go make soup for lunch.

Well, wasn’t it Woodward who mentioned that post 1/20/09 there would be a flood of craven people now willing to come forward on Bush/Cheney crimes?

-G

As to torture, the ruling mantra among the dessicated Republican minds is WWJD? What Would JackBauer Do?

A couple of issues get lost in the discussion of Torture. One is the presumption of guilt, i.e. guilty until you prove you’re innocent; the other is the number of people killed or disappeared by us or our agents (Contractors and cooperating Governments).

Obama is too smart by half in his weasel words concerning FISA, warrentless wiretaps and holding Bushco accountable for these extra Constitutional efforts, including murder, Torture and maiming. That said, in the last couple of days, I read an interview (I forget where and whom :-[ ) by a Obama insider who stated Obama wants accountability by Bushco, but if his Whitehouse pushed it, he’d get nothing through Congress because GOP would effectively shut down Congress. So instead he appears reluctant in hopes someone in Congress is pissed enough to stand for the rule of law. That someone might be Senator Whitehouse.

GregB @ 6: that’s Seymour Hersh who has recently said that … i think there will be no end of people like Crawford telling the truth now AND there will be others who have been disgusted but too afraid to speak until Bush and Cheney leave town.

I read an interview (I forget where and whom :-[ ) by a Obama insider who stated Obama wants accountability by Bushco, but if his Whitehouse pushed it, he’d get nothing through Congress

Sounds like temporizing and a rationalization not to act. Of course the opposite argument could be put forth that investigating the Republicans would so put them on the defensive that they would be desperate to show they were something other than the party of spying, stupid wars, torture, and a destroyed economy.

Yes, except Crawford is not a secret critic. She was chosen because of her connections to Cheney. In her case, this is about something else.

Not quite off topic, as they wouldn’t be torturing these people if it hadn’t been for this guy – OBL.

I put up a Kos Diary this morning (and a related Oxdown Gazette diary), asking people if they know of “proof of life” on Osama bin Laden. The Kos Diary also has a poll on whether one believes OBL is alive, dead, doesn’t matter, or don’t know.

They just keep kicking the cases down the road at Gitmo. This morining too, the charges against the child soldier Omar Khadr are being changed! To fit the evidence they THINK they have … which they probably don’t … because the evidence that he’s a murdurer is conflicting??? Oh, and he was tortured too.

What Crawford says is amazing: ”The techniques they used were all authorized, but the manner in which they applied them was overly aggressive and too persistent. . .” So, the policy was find but it was done badly. This is really another version of ’a few bad apples.’

By discussing the medical impact of these procedures and that his health was hurt ”pushed” her ”over the edge” to call this torture, Crawford is introducing a new definition of torture that, as far as I know, breaks with past discussions by the administration. This part is very bad for BushCo. And if this guy was ’coerced’ they all were, oh, unless it was the ’bad apples’ …

I also read that psychologists were called in to determine NOT whether harm was being done but whether detainees were fit to be treated in coercive-but-not-torture-wink-wink ways. That’s another rock with some very ugly things squirming around underneath.

The fact that this is Woodward is a sea change of amazing proportions.

Yes, I often thought that the first question that should be asked about bin Laden is is he alive. I think it is pretty clear Zawahiri is. Zawahiri seems to move around some. Osama not so much. If he is alive, there are some places where he might be that have not been adequately explored.

So instead he appears reluctant in hopes someone in Congress is pissed enough to stand for the rule of law. That someone might be Senator Whitehouse.

I feel this sums up Obama’s approach to many issues. It’s not rocket science or even model rocket science. It’s a community organizing tactic to make sure you get everyone active and involved as much as possible. I’ve felt this might be what’s happening with the Rick Warren stuff, and now that seems to be true given his recent selections of a gay pastor and another Liberal clergywoman for the inauguration. Also, LGBT groups are fired up even more so now, he’s probably won over some religious people who didn’t vote for him, or at least softened them up for potential future support, and it’s a win all around when all is said and done.

The more people are fired up and taking initiative, just as Sen. Whitehouse at least says he’s going to do, the stronger “We the People…” will be, rather than just expecting some great saviour to come down and solve everything for us. This is an element that was missing when Clinton took over in 1992, and the Loose Newts were able to drop a bomb on America in 1994 that we’re still trying to recover from.

It’s going to take years and years to fix our Constitutional Crisis, and we especially will need to make sure that we continue gaining “More and Better” for the long-term. Some have mocked this opinion I’m expressing as faith in some sort of 3-D chess board jiu jit su skills Obama has to see around every corner, but it’s really fairly basic. Some veteran community organizers I know predicted exactly what’s happening since that’s what they’re taught in Organizing 101. Seems to be the case so far, but of course we’ll see for sure in the next few months, as long as people step up, like Sen. Whitehouse for instance, or perhaps Alan Grayson and so on.

Hugh @ 10: yes there will be people like Crawford AND secret critics as well.

Perhaps Cheney’s Victory Tour advisories are seen as astonishingly creepy and dangerously confessional in many circles … not just by us. I can imagine being a loyal subject and hearing some of the things he’s saying and realizing I am in deep moral and legal shit when before I was being a good team player. The armiture of group think is being eroded, perhaps most significantly by Cheney’s own hubris.

It is an interesting question for sure. Certainly, if you look at the tapes of OBL over the last few years..they are not the same person. He did, it was rumored, to have suffered from the need of kidney dialysis…hard to do in a cave…

He could be alive…in an apartment in France, where all the thugs go…like Baby Doc, living and dining in an Armani suit..

He could be dead.

He is NOT the person they keep saying is making the OBL tapes…that is not OBL.

He has served admirably as Bushco Neocons as the boogieman in order to rally the public to go to war..perhaps forever…

His family was flown specially out of the country following 9/11.

His family was never interrogated.

His uncle was meeting with GWB Sr. in NYC, when the towers were struck.

His brother, was GWB43’s roommate.

GWB43 was bailed out financially by the Saudis.

So…OBL???

Humpf.

If he is alive, what advantage is afforded him by not posing with yesterday’s New York times, for instance?

IMO, the floodgates will open and Obama will have no choice. He will also have the ”cover” of saying he has new information that he didn’t have until the floodgates opened. This shit is such a mess, I really don’t care how it happens or how he tries to squirm away. At some point he will not be able to deny it. I still think better of Obama than that, but I don’t see how he will have a choice even if he wants one.

Perhaps OBL is living in Saudi Arabia with his mommie and daddy.

When I read Woodward’s article late last night online, the first thing I thought was that the pardon people must be busy today. This is huge, and puts everyone at risk. Crawford’s last statement in the article is devastating:

She said Bush was right to create a system to try unlawful enemy combatants captured in the war on terrorism. The implementation, however, was flawed, she said. “I think he hurt his own effort. . . . I think someone should acknowledge that mistakes were made and that they hurt the effort and take responsibility for it.”

“We learn as children it’s easier to ask for forgiveness than it is for permission,” Crawford said. “I think the buck stops in the Oval Office.”

Bury the lede much, Bobby?

bonkers @ 14: yup, and very well said! hey, it’s ’we, the people’ again. booyah!

The same people that will control his blackberry will control those things too. Afterall, it would be too shocking for the country to learn what really happened. Obama is in the jaws of the beast right now. I hope he fights like hell. The more they tell him, the more dangerous it is for him.

So Woodward. Why now?

Woodward is Tweetie in a better suit.

LS @ 23: Woodward now must mean that things are shifting behind the scenes, ”big time.” That’s all I can figure.

Obama should keep his Blackberry … they are trying to brainwash him. He’s keeping some friends close though. And he’s a courageous person, so that helps.

If the floodgates were getting ready to open, say, like Woodward has already been contacted by new sources, he would want to get out in front of it by doing a story now, no? Pompous prick.

God I hope you’re correct, because Obama’s stance on many basic issues have us lefties gulping antacids! If he’s this Machiavellian it’ll be interesting how the GOP will be lead around by the nose and will put Rove and Cheneys machinations to shame.

Well if it’s wrong, we’ve got infrastructure in place and people engaged more so than I’ve ever seen in my lifetime, so I’d expect that we can fight back this time against the “centrists.” This is what drove me crazy during the 1990s, where Liberal complacency was preventing any significant push back against DLC policies “since there was a Dem in the White House.” Gets chills just thinking about that time again…

By the way, I saw a article today about Mike Huckabee ripping on Sayrah Failin, and then saw how Obama had dinner with a the wacko pundits last night. This is so fantastic! Divide and conquer, baby!

I think you have to ask yourself what is in it for bin Laden (if alive) and al Qaeda to prove he is alive.

Compelling water intoxication. It’s technically called hyponautrea and killed Jennifer Smart in Sacramento (and that was VOLUNTARILY Acquiesced to). Here again you have a case where a torture is used that not only is likely to have a high risk of killing the individual, but also is unlikely to obtain any useful information since the victim

a) will say just about anything to stop the suffering, and
b) becomes incoherent and confused, subject to suggestion, and irrational.

This is yet another form of water torture used by the Japanese and others to compel forced confessions.

That would be great. I guess we can’t lose our nerve with all of the innuendos flying around. He’s a smart cookie.

I’m concerned about some of his choices…

I refused to be slowly boiled like a frog…again.

Woodward probably told him, “Listen, I’m tired of your chickenshit games! I don’t want hints. I need to know what you know.”

Obama is now on ‘tenderhooks’ and it will be necessary for the bloggers to generate the political aspirations of various members of Congress to get an investigation up and running quickly. Otherwise, Obama will have to face the wrath of the Right and all without the Democrats ‘having his back’, since they too want this subject to float down the River of Neglect, and thusly, doing no damage to the Republicans in the years ahead.

Jaango

I read an interview (I forget where and whom :-[ ) by a Obama insider who stated Obama wants accountability by Bushco, but if his Whitehouse pushed it, he’d get nothing through Congress

Well then, that makes it official. This lame, bitch arse excuse CAN be used for everything.

The Kos Diary also has a poll on whether one believes OBL is alive, dead, doesn’t matter, or don’t know.

Which, when posted on the day he releases yet another in a long line of post 2002 tapes, serves merely a judge of the kookiness of Kos readers.

Your poll is as valid as one asking whether anyone has any proof that Obama’s birth certificate is real. You don’t and you don’t know anyone who does. Either you should infer something from this, based on your predisposition for being a gullible conspiracy theorist, or apply the same standard of evidence you’ve used for judging whether Bush was a cyborg.

Or generally just STFU with your truther BS.