Who’d Be Behind Bars Longer?
If Obama and his AG Eric Holder had their way, who would be imprisoned longer, George Bush or Osama bin Laden?
WASHINGTON — President Obama has ordered his national security team to investigate reports that U.S. allies were responsible for the deaths of as many as 2,000 Taliban prisoners of war during the opening days of the war in Afghanistan.
Obama told CNN in an interview that aired Sunday that he doesn’t know what how the U.S.-allied Northern Alliance behaved in November 2001, but he wants a full accounting before deciding how to move forward.
“I think that, you know, there are responsibilities that all nations have even in war,” Obama said during an interview at the end of a six-day trip to Russia, Italy and Ghana.
“And if it appears that our conduct in some way supported violations of the laws of war, then I think that, you know, we have to know about that.”
The president’s comments seem to reverse officials’ statements from Friday, when they said they had no grounds to investigate the 2001 deaths of Taliban prisoners of war who human rights groups allege were killed by U.S.-backed forces.
And
WASHINGTON — Attorney General Eric Holder is considering whether to appoint a criminal prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration’s interrogation practices, a controversial move that would run counter to President Barack Obama’s wishes to leave the issue in the past.
Holder plans to make a final decision within the next few weeks, a Justice Department official told The Associated Press on Saturday night. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on a pending matter.
Justice Department spokesman Matt Miller said Holder planned to “follow the facts and the law.”
“We have made no decisions on investigations or prosecutions, including whether to appoint a prosecutor to conduct further inquiry,” he said. “As the attorney general has made clear, it would be unfair to prosecute any official who acted in good faith based on legal guidance from the Justice Department.”
A move to appoint a prosecutor is certain to stir partisan bickering that could create a distraction to Obama’s efforts to push health care and energy reform. Obama has repeatedly expressed reluctance to having a probe, saying the nation should be “looking forward and not backwards” when it came to Bush-era abuses.
Newsweek magazine, which first reported the development on Saturday, said Holder was aware of the political implications of having a probe and preferred not to create unnecessary trouble for the White House. Still, the attorney general was troubled by what he learned in reports about the treatment of prisoners at the CIA’s “black sites.”
The probe would focus in part on whether CIA personnel tortured terrorism suspects after Sept. 11, 2001. Holder has said those who acted within the government’s legal guidance will not be prosecuted, but has left open the possibility of pursuing those who went beyond the guidance and broke the law.
It i nice to see Obama and Holder take some time off from trying to magically erase the Bill of Rights, but it is pretty disturbing that they are so focused on turning Americans into criminals rather then defend them. Now look, there is a good chance that Obama and Holder could end up putting people from the Bush administration in jail for longer then the people who tried to mass murder Americans.
It is a sad day for America when such little people become so powerful and can’t move beyond partisanship, let alone realize that our nation was at war.
Oh and I am also sick and tired of the fact that no one defines torture, they just claim it was done.
What was done? What specifically is torture?
If what was done did not fall outside the bounds of any law, then this is a political payback investigation and it will destroy the Obama administration. Mark my words, America will not tolerate accusing those who defend her to be dragged through the mud by some petty little men. It is getting bad America. We need to stand up before all is lost.
Can’t wait to see what the fall out is when a new republican administration is sworn into office!
Is there any statute of limitations that would preclude going back to the Carter Administration in order to deal with those that gave us the situation in Iran? How about the bombing of the Chinese Embassy during Clinton’s Admistration? Am sure that there will be some things done over the next few years that a new, fresh thinking Attorney General could request an investigation into the actions taken by the Obama Administration.
We need to recognize this for what it is: a distraction so the media won’t pay attention when the National Energy Tax & ObamaCare get rammed through congress.
The prosecutions won’t happen. Besides, I’d love seeing them prosecute Cheney or his staff. The first thing his lawyers would do is make a motion to have Obama turn over the memos that tell how effective waterboarding was on KSM & Abu Zubaydah. His staff lawyers would make the same motion.