VIDEOS of the Mukasey Hearing: CIA Tapes Investigation May Cover Interrogation Techniques

[L. Coyote]

First one up already! Still happening at this time in Senate Judiciary, questioning of Mukasey.
TPM is really on top of it. Give them some support and thanks!
No doubt more will follow. The hearing is very interesting, now turning back to waterboarding again.

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Mukasey: CIA Tapes Investigation May Cover Interrogation Techniques
By Paul Kiel - January 30, 2008, 11:05AM - http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/005173.php

In his first round of questioning this morning, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) asked a question that's been on everyone's mind: will the criminal investigation that's been launched into the destruction of the CIA's torture tapes also cover the techniques that were documented on those tapes?

VIDEO

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[L. Coyote]

1. VIDEO: Mukasey: "I Would Feel" That Waterboarding is Torture if Done to Me

Mukasey: "I Would Feel" That Waterboarding is Torture if Done to Me
By Paul Kiel - January 30, 2008, 11:40AM - http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/005176.php


Here's the most fruitful of the responses about waterboarding that the senators were able to elicit from Mukasey.

Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) had a long wind up before delivering his punch. After detailing how objectionable torture was, how it was clearly torture, as clearly as robbing a bank is stealing, he came out with: "Would waterboarding be torture if done to you?"

VIDEO

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[L. Coyote]

2. VIDEO: Mukasey Shocks Biden's Conscience

Political Epiphany: DC is The Corrupt Bastards Club vs. The Altar Boys

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Mukasey Shocks Biden's Conscience
By Paul Kiel - January 30, 2008, 12:12PM - http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/005177.php


Michael Mukasey finally got into the nitty gritty of how he thinks about torture, and he seemed to finally show his hand.

Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) said that he'd been getting the impression that Mukasey really thought about torture in relative terms, and wanted to know if that was so. Is it OK to waterboard someone if a nuclear weapon was hidden -- the Jack Bauer scenario -- but not OK to waterboard someone for more pedestrian information?

Mukasey responded that it was "not simply a relative issue," but there "is a statute where it is a relative issue," he added, citing the Detainee Treatment Act. That law engages the "shocks the conscience" standard, he explained, and you have to "balance the value of doing something against the cost of doing it."

VIDEO

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[burgundy floppy hat]

5. Mukasey is a mediocre mind...

" That law engages the "shocks the conscience" standard, he explained, and you have to "balance the value of doing something against the cost of doing it."

And who makes this determination, a man who is intellectually incapable of understanding torture, or it's greater implications to the individual, and the state? (Hello, NEOCONS!)

How do they know it "shocks the conscience?" Because an unqualified,
psychologically ill scientist told them so?

(I remember reading about the early CIA, it was said the only doctors who would agree to research torture were the fifth and sixth tier doctors, the great ones refused to comply. Which says a lot about where Mukasey gets his information -- known scientific quacks. What next? Black people are genetically inferior to whites?).

Mukasey doesn't, or wont, recognize torture as a politicized issue , he is supporting Dick Cheney's agenda.

His inadequate, flawed reasoning, legally invalid, is the product of mediocre minds, not worthy of the American legal code. (Think Yoo, and Addington.)

Men who don't understand torture lost a war, were unable to provide for, or plan, American national defense, cannot run a country, should not be discussing the validity of torture, they just are not world class intellects. It's a BUSH ADMINISTRATION policy, another FAILED policy, enough said.

9.11 happened because George Bush didn't act to stop it, the intelligence was there, gathered without torture.


Thank goodness for the Hague, at least their is a body of intellect left somewhere. And this is what Mukasey's argument plays to, I think, keeping Bush out of the Hague.

[burgundy floppy hat]

6. there, sorry

DITTO!

[L. Coyote]

7. "keeping Bush out of the Hague" plus, keeping a lid on his own role I suspect.

The So NY Court (Mukasey) was involved in what decisions? Padilla evidence admissability, ...??

[alfredo]

15. Welcome to DU

[L. Coyote]

22. Ditto that kick

[L. Coyote]

3. VIDEO: Mukasey Tongue-Tied on Administration Law Breaking

Mukasey Tongue-Tied on Administration Law Breaking
By Paul Kiel - January 30, 2008, 11:31AM - http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/005175.php


Here's an entertaining exchange. Michael Mukasey is not a man to live in the past. It's a much more difficult place.

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) started his questions by asking about the President's Article II powers under the Constitution. Do you think that the President can break any law he pleases because he's the President -- including, say, statutes banning torture?

"I can't contemplate any situation in which this president would assert Article II authority to do something that the law forbids," Mukasey shot back.

VIDEO

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[L. Coyote]

4. Today's Must Read

Today's Must Read
By Paul Kiel - January 30, 2008, 9:37AM - http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/005170.php

Last time around, Attorney General Michael Mukasey had more than a little trouble telling the Senate Judiciary Committee whether waterboarding is torture. "If it amounts to torture, then it is not Constitutional" just wasn't cutting it.

But this time, he's coming ready. He laid it all out in a letter to the panel last night. When he sits down for his hearing this morning, he'll say... I can't tell you if it's torture, because we're not doing it now anyway and there's no use talking about it if we're not even doing it -- which doesn't mean that we won't do it, but we really probably won't.

Or as he puts it, if I may quickly summarize his 3-page letter (http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/docs/mukasey-leahy/):

"(I) have concluded that the interrogation techniques currently authorized in the CIA program comply with the law.... I have been authorized to disclose publicly that waterboarding is not among those methods. Accordingly, waterboarding is not, and may not be, used in the current program.... It is precisely because the issue is so important, and the questions so difficult, that I, as Attorney General, should not provide answers absent a set of circumstances that call for those answers. Those circumstances do not present themselves today, and may never present themselves in the future."

The clear intended message here for the Democrats on the panel is that Mukasey would never approve waterboarding, but they're not going to get him to say why.

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[L. Coyote]

8. VIDEO: Mukasey on Waterboarding: "It is Unresolved"

You can add comments, so give up some "THANKS" at TPM:

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Mukasey on Waterboarding: "It is Unresolved"
By Paul Kiel - January 30, 2008, 1:08PM - http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/005178.php


Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) picked up where Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) left off. Does the attorney general really think that it depends on the circumstances when you can waterboard somebody?

Here's the VIDEO:

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[L. Coyote]

9. VIDEO: Mukasey Refuses to Support Outlawing of Waterboarding

Mukasey Refuses to Support Outlawing of Waterboarding
Paul Kiel - January 30, 2008, 3:08PM - http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/005179.php


Michael Mukasey is attorney general in large part due to Sen. Chuck Schumer's (D-NY) support. And in his questions today, Schumer started by commending a number of Mukasey's actions (restarting the OPR investigation into the warrantless wiretapping program, tapping a well-qualified prosecutor to investigate the CIA tapes' destruction), but then said that he was "disappointed" in Mukasey in other ways. And he tried his best to give Mukasey a hand and pull him out of the swamp.

His question was simple. You've said that waterboarding is "repugnant." So, if it is repugnant, don't you think that a ban of waterboarding is a good thing? Wouldn't you support that?

Mukasey didn't take Schumer's hand. He said he'd need to mull it over. Here's the VIDEO:

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[countryjake]

10. kick & thanks for posting them here

[L. Coyote]

11. Quite the collection of George "Waterboard" Bush Presidency moments for one day!

[Solly Mack]

12. You're a treasure!!!

K&R

[L. Coyote]

13. Gracias. Here's all of it in one spot

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/cats/michael_mukasey/

Just coincdence = today is the 75th anniversary of Hitler rising to power.

[L. Coyote]

14. VIDEO: Whitehouse to Mukasey: Why Not Investigate Torture?

Whitehouse to Mukasey: Why Not Investigate Torture?
By Paul Kiel - January 30, 2008, 5:16PM - http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/005180.php


As I noted earlier, Mukasey indicated early in the hearing that the criminal investigation of the CIA's destroyed torture tapes may well explore whether the interrogation techniques shown on those tapes were legal. But as Mukasey made clear, that may or may not happen.

So Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) wanted to know, is the Department of Justice investigating whether the sorts of techniques used by CIA agents were torture? And if not, why not?

Well, they aren't. And as for the why not, he and Mukasey went round and round on the question for two rounds of questioning. Here's Whitehouse's second try:

VIDEO

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[L. Coyote]

16. Democrats grill Mukasey = "Mukasey stopped short of saying Bush" tortures

Democrats grill Mukasey
By Manu Raju
Posted: 01/30/08 07:21 PM - http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/democrats-grill-mukasey-2008-01-30.html

Attorney General Michael Mukasey said Wednesday he believed the Justice Department had previously instituted a policy that would give President Bush the last word on waterboarding.

Mukasey acknowledged that the president is part of a three-step approval process on harsh interrogation techniques, speaking during a tense hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. He also outlined the process in a letter to the panel’s chairman, Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), released Tuesday night.

Mukasey stopped short of saying Bush actually gave the call on the controversial practice. But the disclosure drew the attention of Democrats and could be significant because the Bush administration had previously acknowledged that the simulated drowning technique was used on a handful of people soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. If the president gave his endorsement to waterboarding, he may have authorized a practice in violation of anti-torture laws, Democrats say.

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Comment by Jennifer Daskal, Sr. Counterterrorism Counsel, Human Rights Watch
google news commentMukasey Protecting the Administration on Waterboarding - 4 hours ago
http://news.google.com/news?btcid=fa5ac1000f0076b8

Attorney General Michael Mukasey's continued refusal to acknowledge that waterboarding is illegal - even if done by another nation to a captured American - indicates the lengths to which he is willing to go to protect past abusers from prosecution. Waterboarding is a form of mock drowning which has been prosecuted as torture for over 100 years. Mukasey claims that the answer depends on the circumstances. But under what circumstances would the United States ever accept as legal one of its citizens being strapped to a board and suffocated with water? He should take note of the statement of Republican Senators John McCain, John Warner, and Lindsay Graham that waterboarding has been outlawed by Congress and anyone who engages in the practice may be held criminally liable.

[L. Coyote]

17. Q. "...did the president approve that?” (torture) A. "I’m not authorized to discuss it.”

“My question is, did the president approve that?” Feinstein asked.

“I can’t speak to whether people were in fact waterboarded or whether the president approved it,” Mukasey said. “I can’t do it because I’m not authorized to discuss it.”

Mukasey said he was not authorized to talk about past practices, declining to say whether waterboarding was one of them or whether Bush had any involvement.

[L. Coyote]

18. Daniel Shore on NPR right now about this. Mukasey at the Judiciary.

Wiretapping, waterboarding, and the CIA tapes.

"I can see these backstage battles spinning on for the rest of the President's term."

I can see them on the front stage daily!

[L. Coyote]

19. Guardian Unlimited: US attorney general hints at Bush's permission for torture

US attorney general hints at Bush's permission for torture
Elana Schor in Washington
Wednesday January 30, 2008 8pm GMT / 3pm ET
Guardian Unlimited - http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2249424,00.html


Under questioning from a Democratic senator, US attorney general Michael Mukasey today suggested that George Bush might have personally authorised the waterboarding of suspected terrorists.

Mukasey immediately corrected himself to say that he was not permitted to discuss past events. But in describing the process by which the CIA could seek legal clearance to resume waterboarding, he appeared to tie the president to the controversial technique.

When Democratic senator Dianne Feinstein asked if the current path to authorising waterboarding - a request from the CIA director, followed by approval from the attorney general, followed by consultation with the president - had applied in the past, Mukasey said yes.

.... Article continues ....

[L. Coyote]

20. Morning bump. Enjoy the clips.

[L. Coyote]

21. ditto