"If, as Obama so casually admits-'we tortured some folks'-then we have to prosecute some folks too"

[kpete]

..............."If, as President Obama so casually admits, 'we tortured some folks,' then we have to prosecute some folks, too." We can all come up with good excuses for why we haven't prosecuted anyone. But, we're still obligated to do it. I'm glad that the New York Times will no longer equivocate and prevaricate when it comes to calling torture "torture," but their unwillingness to take a stand was nothing compared to our government being unwilling to take a stand. Looking back, it didn't even buy President Obama any good will. At best, it prevented a war with the Intelligence Community that no sensible president would welcome. But being afraid, however sensibly, is not a legal excuse for allowing violations of the law to go unpunished.

The "landscape" may have "shifted" under the feet of the New York Times, but it will surely shift under the current administration once posterity goes to work. Future generations will not give a single shit why it might have made some sense not to prosecute people in the middle of one of biggest financial collapses in our country's history, nor will they care about Obama's rhetoric about bringing the country together rather than tearing it apart. All they will want to know is why we allowed people to torture folks and get away with it.



more:
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2014/8/9/232026/0769
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/08/03/1318195/-The-law-President-Obama-did-not-faithfully-execute



In February 2010, Scott Horton pointed out that the while legal action against members of the Bush torture team would be an extremely difficult task, in this case the prosecutors would have one major piece of evidence in their favor:
http://harpers.org/blog/2010/02/does-dick-cheney-want-to-be-prosecuted/

Section 2340A of the federal criminal code makes it an offense to torture or to conspire to torture. Violators are subject to jail terms or to death in appropriate cases, as where death results from the application of torture techniques. Prosecutors have argued that a criminal investigation into torture undertaken with the direction of the Bush White House would raise complex legal issues, and proof would be difficult. But what about cases in which an instigator openly and notoriously brags about his role in torture?

To be sure, Bush and Cheney proudly owned up to their roles in creating the regime of detainee torture they described as "enhanced interrogation techniques:"

"Yeah, we waterboarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed," the former president said during an appearance at the Economic Club of Grand Rapids, Michigan, according to the Grand Rapids Press.
"I'd do it again to save lives," he added.

If that sounds familiar, it should. Back in February 2010, Dick Cheney bragged to ABC's Jonathan Karl, using almost the exact same terms:

I was a big supporter of waterboarding. I was a big supporter of the enhanced interrogation techniques ....

In that same ABC interview, Cheney explained why he was daring Attorney General Eric Holder to either charge him or, through inaction, essentially bless a torture program conducted by the United States of America:

The reason I've been outspoken is because there were some things being said, especially after we left office, about prosecuting CIA personnel that had carried out our counterterrorism policy or disbarring lawyers in the Justice Department who had -- had helped us put those policies together, and I was deeply offended by that, and I thought it was important that some senior person in the administration stand up and defend those people who'd done what we asked them to do.

(It is worth noting that former National Security Adviser and Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice came up with a defense worthy of Richard Nixon. As she explained to a group of her angry students at Stanford University, "The United States was told, we were told, nothing that violates our obligations under the Convention Against Torture, and so by definition, if it was authorized by the president, it did not violate our obligations under the Convention Against Torture.")

As a horrified Horton responded in amazement:

What prosecutor can look away when a perpetrator mocks the law itself and revels in his role in violating it? Such cases cry out for prosecution. Dick Cheney wants to be prosecuted. And prosecutors should give him what he wants.

MUCH MORE:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/08/03/1318195/-The-law-President-Obama-did-not-faithfully-execute

[Scuba]

1. Failure to presecute equals condoning the torture.

Some days I'm ashamed to be an American.

[grahamhgreen]

8. Amen

[daleanime]

2. K&R....

[sabrina 1]

3. Of course they should be prosecuted, and if that had happened in the beginning

when we threw them all out of office, starting with investigations which would have brought witnesses, victims of the torture to the public consciousness. Many Americans don't know we were that evil because it has all been kept so quiet.

Investigations would have changed that, the corporate media would have had no choice BUT to cover the prosecution of elected officials and their underlings for TORTURE.

Moving forward from war crimes, hasn't placated the war criminals in terms of this President, they now have the arrogance to BLAME HIM for their crimes. That should have been expected.

AND we should have allowed the other countries, Spain eg, to go ahead with their torture prosecutions of Bush's gang, instead we actually intervened and pressured them not to do it.

[woo me with science]

4. Failure to prosecute=the moral dumpster fire=complicity in war crimes.

[Marr]

5. Stop being sanctimonius. The torturers were patriots.

Look Forward©.

[johnnyreb]

6. When I look forward, I see more lawlessness.

[Overseas]

7. K&R. Yes please!

[KG]

9. let's stop pretending 'folks' aren't still being tortured.

[leftstreet]

10. DURec

[ColesCountyDem]

11. Excellent post! K&R.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

12. The problem being that too many Democrats signed off on the crimes or looked the other way.

There are plenty of worms in that can and some of them have (D) behind their names.

[neverforget]

13. If they're not prosecuted, it will happen again.

Guaranteed.

[Electric Monk]

14. k&r

[BrotherIvan]

15. Is that fucking picture real?

Did they think they were in an episode of Dallas? FFS!!!!!!

[Octafish]

17. The Supremos.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/supremos/supremos_02.html

[slipslidingaway]

16. knr n/t

[Uncle Joe]

18. I believe George W. Bush put the best argument out there for not indicting and prosecuting those

people who enabled, legalized and promoted torture...er maybe he didn't?

Thanks for the thread, kpete.

[JEB]

19. Failure to prosecute = abetting

[RobertEarl]

20. Aw, shucks

You are just making Obama look bad.

Where are the Obama defenders? Am I the first and only? Yeeeeha!!

********************

The PTB told Americans to go ____ themselves. We did it, didn't we?