Wash. Post has the Pelosi being briefed on waterboarding

[shraby]

article online now.
I haven't read it yet, but here it is.
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/08/AR2007120801664.html>

[Maven]

1. If true, Pelosi should step down.

Her tenure as Speaker has been a miserable failure and this revelation fully and completely delegitimizes her as an opposition leader.

EDIT: I've changed the subject line to reflect the vagueness of the assertions in the article.

[Maven]

2. P.S. you might want to change the title of the thread to something more descriptive

:)

[shraby]

10. Any suggestions? The title was the best I could

think of.

[Maven]

12. Sorry, I just meant change it to something more similar to your other thread

so people reading tomorrow will know what it's referring to

[shraby]

15. Thanks, did it to it. Did I get it right?

[Maven]

16. ...

:thumbsup:

[Lex]

3. Would you like to hear if she denies it first?

nt

[Maven]

5. Denies being there?

The report is pretty unequivocal about her presence at the show-and-tell session.

[Lex]

6. Denies the writer's characterization of her reaction.

nt

[Maven]

8. What did she do to stop it?

That's what I want to know. That's the reaction I'm interested in. Her inaction since that time speaks for itself IMHO.

[Lex]

11. We wouldn't know because it would be classified

Harman's was --

from the article:

Rep. Jane Harman, who replaced Pelosi as the committee's top Democrat in January 2oo3, disclosed Friday that she filed a classified letter to the CIA in February of that year as an official protest about the interrogation program. Harman said she had been prevented from publicly discussing the letter or the CIA's program because of strict rules of secrecy.

There is no reason not to allow Pelosi to say for herself what she did or didn't do and then make judgments about it.

[liberalnurse]

22. It wouldn't matter what

she wanted to do or not do at the time since she was only the Minority Whipp then...in a Trifecta Congress of republican control.

[goclark]

4. Oh my

:(

[msongs]

7. pelosi is not man enuff....or woman enuff for that matter...for her job nt

first she acts like she thinks bushco are honorable and amenable to compromise, which shows she does not learn very well from bushco's observable and identifiable behavior, secondly she does not act on subpoenas issued by her own committees.

Msongs

[madrchsod]

9. wow !

what a beautiful written piece of shit article. i`ve got to hand it to the wp for hiring these two. they must have taken uncle karl`s secret course in spinning a story to blame everyone but bush and the republican party.
there are so many things in this article that is so wrong but what the hell it`s better to blame the democrats than to really understand why this was written

[Lex]

13. . . . and people believe it just as it is spun.

nt

[LeftCoast]

26. Yep. It fits with the narrative they have in their head about the leaders of the Democratic Party

Any 'fact' that fits the "our Dem leaders are evil and ineffectual" narrative is instantly taken as gospel around here.

[shraby]

14. I noticed the article used a lot

of "official said" type of reporting. Pretty non-informative. If the "officials" have so much to say, maybe it would be a good idea to identify them so we have an idea of their credibility.

[Elidor]

27. Exactly

A bunch of unnamed sources pretend to know what she thought, and she is prohibited by law from discussing it. It reeks. Someone is selling us a frame.

[Tom Joad]

17. Yes, Pelosi is complicit in war crimes, and not only should step down,

but charges should be filed against her as an accessory.

[L. Coyote]

24. I'm calling BS on this one. So, judge, jury, sentenencer, you accept "said two officials "

as proof positive, without know who they are, who the work for, what their politics is, what their agenda is, if they are truthful, etc. etc. Just jump on the leader of the House Dems without asking if this is BS? Not me. I've been fed a steady diet of lies from the Rs since Nixon was President, and this stinks to the max.

Bush gets caught committing war crimes, and now this comes out. You do the math! Don't be naive>

[Tom Joad]

32. Don't be naive yourself.

to think that it is just Republicans who support war crimes, and the Dems innocent. God... you don't remember LBJ and his monstrous war in Vietnam, based on lies, damn lies?

who is handing bush another check to continue his war this week? wHoyer, Reid, Nancy, and the rest.

they could easily stop the checks. but they don't want to.

when the major 3 dem candidates (otherwise known as damn fools) for president can't even commit themselves, if they should enter the oval office... to ending the illegal occupation of Iraq in 4 years?

[Tom Joad]

34. she should get a fair trial. she should not be tortured in any way.

i think i am being enormously generous, give the gravity of the crime that she stands accused of.

[ShaneGR]

18. In faireness to Pelosi, this article is all over the place

To wit, lets look at this part, earlier in the article it says vaguely that two individuals asked for harsher measures, and the article does not mention the specifics of the briefing (were they talking about specific suspects or generally for all detainees?). I mean, if we had a 1st in command of AL Qaeda in custody back in 2002, how would a lawmaker respond? Keep in mind, this is 2002 just after 9/11,

Anyways, here's the part that caught my eye.

The lawmakers who held oversight roles during the period included Pelosi and Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) and Sens. Bob Graham (D-Fla.) and John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), as well as Rep. Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.) and Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan).

Individual lawmakers' recollections of the early briefings varied dramatically, but officials present during the meetings described the reaction as mostly quiet acquiescence, if not outright support. "Among those being briefed, there was a pretty full understanding of what the CIA was doing," said Goss, who chaired the House intelligence committee from 1997 to 2004 and then served as CIA director from 2004 to 2006. "And the reaction in the room was not just approval, but encouragement."
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Congressional officials say the groups' ability to challenge the practices was hampered by strict rules of secrecy that prohibited them from being able to take notes or consult legal experts or members of their own staffs. And while various officials have described the briefings as detailed and graphic, it is unclear precisely what members were told about waterboarding and how it is conducted. Several officials familiar with the briefings also recalled that the meetings were marked by an atmosphere of deep concern about the possibility of an imminent terrorist attack.

So who is to say that you have a room of 6 individuals, Pelosi, Harmon, Graham, Rockefeller, Goss, and Roberts and the TWO who pushed harder for waterboarding weren't Goss and Roberts??? I mean, Goss went on to be the Bushit's nomination to the CIA (he lasted a year) and Roberts the Republican from Kansas. The article doesn't mention any of that. Just that they were briefed.

[shraby]

20. Not only that, but if any of the ones with oversight

roles did want to object what were their options? Who could they ask or complain to without breaking their vow of secrecy? Seems for the most part the administration had them hog-tied to the max.
The last paragraph citing Sen. Feingold is pretty telling concerning the whole blinkin' article.

[salin]

33. Senator Graham was reportedly at the same briefing - and is cited

in the article as emphatically having no recall of any such briefing.

[Bumblebee]

19. Yes, she should have objected but how much, you think, she could've

learned in one hour —- which I am sure was just to give them a superficial knowledge, just enough to make them accomplices -- and so soon after 9-11, when any protest would have been deemed politically "immature," especially coming from a woman. I am not whitewashing it -- but the article promises much more than it delivers. Can that be a reason it's not even on their home page? It's an opportunistic hit job by the "official" (Karl Rove?) but I am not sure it really packs much of a punch.

[frazzled]

21. It seems like Porter Goss is one of the sources of this story, and two unnamed "officials"

We've heard this kind of story from the Bush administration before: "we told them everything about X."

I suggest everyone read between the lines in this story before condemning Pelosi (oh yeah, I forgot, she's the wicked witch of the west).

Consider:

(a) administration officials are the source of this story
(b) it is said: "on that day, no objections were raised." What about the next day?
(c) it is also said: "Instead, at least two lawmakers in the room asked the CIA to push harder, two U.S. officials said." Might those two lawmakers have been the Republicans in the room?
(d) The article states: "With one known exception, no formal objections were raised by the lawmakers briefed about the harsh methods during the two years in which waterboarding was employed, from 2002 to 2003." Were there any informal objections?
(e) "Congressional officials say the groups' ability to challenge the practices was hampered by strict rules of secrecy that prohibited them from being able to take notes or consult legal experts or members of their own staffs." Ah yes, the ultimate Catch 22: you can't say a word about this, and if anything goes wrong, we'll just say you never said a word about this.

This is more administration-pushed drivel to the WaPo. The point of fact is this: Nancy Pelosi did not authorize torture: the Resident did. Now all of a sudden, it's her fault that she should have spoken up against ... well, we don't really know what they told her anyway.

I'd like to hear from Bob Graham on this.

[shraby]

23. Isn't Bob Graham the one who consistently takes

copious notes about absolutely everything? His notes should be interesting right now to say the least.
And you're right, it was * who authorized this atrocity in the first place then put the oversight committee in an untenable position. Damned if they talk and damned if they don't.

[L. Coyote]

25. PROPAGANDA ALERT: "it is unclear precisely what members were told about waterboarding and how ..."

This is a non-story being turned into a Dem bash on DU.

Shameful how propaganda is so effective--who needs Rs when the DU crowd wants to bring down the leaders!

[tom_paine]

28. I am sure, if true, Pelosi wishes she could do it to those vagrant outisde her home.

You know, those bums who deserve to be swept up off the street, except their stupid, ratty anti-Bush t-shirts keep them in their false and lame 1st Amendment protection.

[WilliamPitt]

29. BULLSHIT ALERT: "Bipartisan group, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, did not object..."

What's wrong here...

Front page WaPo:

Lawmakers Briefed on Waterboarding in 2002: Bipartisan group, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, did not object to CIA's interrogation tactics during a virtual tour of overseas detention sites.

a) WaPo arguing "It's OK"

b) "...including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi..."...um...2002? Who was Speaker then? Seems like this headline is trying to conflate her current status with 2002-oriented decisions...how does a minority CA Rep. approve of 2002-era torture tactics? Why would the GOP back then even have bothered to ask her opinion or seek her approval? They wouldn't, and didn't.

Pssst...she wasn't Speaker in 2002. That was Hastert.

This is the WaPo trying to pretend that today is the same as 2002.

Don't let them.

[L. Coyote]

31. Bullshitted Alert too. Why are DUers so easily propagandized by Bushco?

Maybe they are drinking heavily on Saturday night??? :rofl:

[Tom Joad]

35. she was a leader in the House then, House Minority leader.

it would not be expected that if they were going to brief the House, they would invite members of both parties.

and she is, unfortunately, House Speaker now... as much as some of us would want a stronger anti-war voice in that position.

[EFerrari]

36. Ding, ding ding!

[L. Coyote]

30. Actually, the article says the opposite.

"Pelosi declined to comment directly on her reaction to the classified briefings. But a congressional source familiar with Pelosi's position on the matter said the California lawmaker did recall discussions about enhanced interrogation. The source said Pelosi recalls that techniques described by the CIA were still in the planning stage -- they had been designed and cleared with agency lawyers but not yet put in practice -- and acknowledged that Pelosi did not raise objections at the time."

HUGE NO-BRAINER! So, who do you believe? Unnamed leaks in the Bush administration, of a Dem leader in Congress?

Is the CIA trying to cover-up yet another crime? Not fully informing Congress of their war crimes?? Another NO-BRAINER that!

[B Calm]

37. So she basically agrees with this torture against our own soldiers

if they are captured..