Obama and the CIA investigation: when in doubt, go after Bush
John Hindraker of Powerline has read the lengthy CIA report on which claims of terrorist interrogator misconduct are based. He writes a devastating piece on how very minor the infractions appear to have been, and how most of them are mere allegations (some based on hearsay).
Read his article and understand just how low the Obama administration and its Attorney General Eric Holder have sunk in making much ado about virtually nothing. As the WSJ says, “We suspect millions of Americans will be shocked to learn that these unshocking details are all that the uproar over ‘torture’ is about.” The administration seems to have lost all sense of proportion in its attempt to make the previous administration look as bad as possible, as well as compromising our security along the way.
Here—as in so many other things—Obama attempts to play it both ways. To the Left, angry at him for not ramming the public option through before the American people had time to realize what was happening, he throws the tasty fish of more breast-beating about pretend torture and the possible prosecution of evil CIA interrogators (actually, it appears to be mostly a single CIA debriefer—not even an interrogator—who was most clearly at fault, but the MSM isn’t reporting that). For moderates, Obama mouths words that indicate it’s actually rogue Attorney General Holder who is pursuing this against the President’s will, and that Obama himself would just as soon let bygones be bygones.
Yeah, right.
But that’s the way the story is being reported in much of the MSM. Tom Raum of the AP is fairly typical—poor pitiful Obama “caught in the crosswinds” between his own desire to move on and the vengeance of the out-of-control Holder [emphasis mine, for sarcasm]:
After declaring he would rather look forward, President Barack Obama is delving instead into the past to deal with lingering assertions of CIA mistreatment of terror suspects during the Bush administration…
Obama’s approval of a new elite interrogation unit ”” to operate within the FBI but under supervision of an interagency group to be chaired by the White House national security adviser ”” allowed him to get out in front of the decision by Attorney General Eric Holder to appoint a government prosecutor and the administration’s release of a newly declassified report detailing harsh Bush-era interrogation practices…
White House officials said the disclosure of Obama’s decision on the new interrogation team on the same day as the release of the report and the prosecutor announcement was coincidental.
Even so, Obama’s role in creating the new unit may help keep the controversies alive despite his hopes of putting the Bush administration’s controversial interrogation policies behind him and moving on…
See how it’s shaping up?
It’s very easy to destroy a President’s authority when you send out the propaganda message that even his own subordinates don’t respect him enough to obey him. THat instead, Obama is having his strings pulled like a puppet.
That doesn’t do much good for Obama’s authority, the same as Bush’s situation.
Krauthammer properly nails this too:
Well, it is a hell of a coincidence, isn’t it? The administration is in a deep health-care debate, a national debate, and every hour that passes, support for [Obama’s] plans are diminishing and his own popularity is tanking.
All of a sudden, this issue explodes on a Monday.
Friday, the administration — at 5 o’clock, after hours — releases a $2 trillion error in estimates of deficits, and on a bright Monday, you get this re-litigation of the Bush administration all of a sudden exploding upon us.
Look, I’m not a conspiracy theorist, but I’m not a child. It’s not a coincidence.
And secondly, you get the president pretending he is against all this and that it is Holder, the attorney general, whose initiative all of this is about, as if Holder isn’t an employee and under the direction of the administration.
So, the president is the good cop who is magnanimous, who really wants to look ahead as the messianic visionary he is — and Holder is the bad guy.
Obama knows exactly what is happening and this serves his purposes wonderfully.
This may be a smokescreen to turn people’s attentions away from healthcare reform. It is, however, a stupid move. What they are saying is that policy decisions arrived at by DOJ lawyers and approved by the President were not only wrong, but criminal. Some of the tin foil hat crowd believe that but reasonable people are not going to accept such a ridiculous premise. It actually makes them look foolish, more foolish than they are. It also invites VP Cheney back onto the public stage. And we know he made Obama and company look very foolish in round one.
whats the bigger picture? They work in big pictures, not details. they also work to achieve ends that are not so clear, so whatever you see in front of you, thats just smoke and excuses. its ALWAYS that way, havent you seen the pattern?
endlessly discussing the misdirection is pretty much what your supposed to do, that way you dont see the ‘other’ issues. they would not risk the public discussion if there wasnt another reason that was worth more regardless of where the public discussion goes.
its a message saying that even if it puts us in trouble and isnt a wise thing to do, we are going to be all over you publicly and your career is over if you do anything we dont like (your safety and your families safety will be questionable). It says we are not just vindictive, we are stupid vindictive, so dont think that having a check on us will stop us.
Ultimately if the CIA was not their ‘friend’ already, it would eventually be one of the scarier ‘enemies’. If it is their ‘friend’, then this is just both sides against the middle for show.
Ultimately a few people with the natural skills they look for can do a whole lot more to be a problem than almost everyone else. The ones that can make things happen are the scariest not for how they look but for what they can do with almost nothing (its nothing like the movies). Many no longer work for such a place.
They are (relatively) safe because no one knows who they are. this game is not being played for us, its being played for them regardless of what we think about the issue.
we just wont see other things and will just chalk it up to stupidity, or something else. we wont generally realign our view to scan for other things that fit and take note. Oh, and we even more seldom imagine that we are not the important thing but the incidental thing to be handled.
(ever notice that most reincarnated people were famous some other time?)
This may be a smokescreen to turn people’s attentions away from healthcare reform. It is, however, a stupid move.
Yes, it is and this move was for me one of the last straws that broke the back of my willingness to consider Obama as a possible pragmatist.
Old Russia had a peasant people who looked at their Czar with some religious trust. Call it mass Stockholm Syndrome. The Czar could crush them without a thought, and the peasants had to have hope that the Czar was good. If only the Czar could be made aware of the terrible things his administration was doing, then he would fix things.
It seems that half of the U.S. has this peasant outlook. This all can’t be Obama’s fault, he is good. His ministers are only taking advantage of him, and when he finds out, all will be well.
Andrew M. Garland:
I have written about that phenomenon, under the somewhat related title “If only Stalin knew.”
Well, I will agree with what most have already said here – there is definitely (at least a little) some of the “wag the dog”. However I must also say that I have no problem whatsoever with things such as “mock executions” and (what I call) the “Body Double” ploy – bringing in the drill (if anyone remembers the movie). So what if they suffered a some mental anguish. They (the terrorists) certainly didn’t worry about the mental anguish the people in the twin towers or on the planes suffered.
I know those to the left would say, “We have to be better than that.” To them I say – we are, we always have been, and we always will be. – because it is the character of the American people. But it is also in our character to defend our families, property, and way of life.
But I am more and more worried that we will be that paraphrase of Elliot in “The Hollow Men”
This is how America ends
This is how America ends
This is how America ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.
Either Obama is in control of his cabinet or he is not. Frankly, I think he is. I think that the administration observed the way CIA tried to unseat Bush in ’03 & ’04, with the Plames and various Kerry-friendly leaks, and they said, “Not us.” Is this a way to treat Democrat-voting government careerists? I guess so.
Now the sensitive work of interrogations will be the province of the FBI, under the watchful eye of DOJ. Can CIA expect any help from their neighbors on that side of the Potomac? No, the Pentagon’s sitting this one out, recalling the beating they took along with the Whitehouse.
It’s great to know that high school sophomores are running the country. Will somebody please tell them that their internal squables are getting people killed?
If he’s trying to smokescreen his current woes, zero is going to lose this.
For one thing, not many Americans will buy what he’s selling, especially when they hear what it actually was.
For another, not many Americans are going to be distracted by what happened to some terrorists long ago and far away when big stuff is happening to them right here and right now.
It does give the next republican administration cover for going after the tax-cheating czars, though.
And AG Holder is to supposed to work for…who? If Obama really disagreed with this new persecution/witch hunt/smelling-out, he could put a stop to it with a single phone call: “Eric, leave it be. Got it? No? Well, in that case, I expect to have your resignation letter on my desk by opening of business tomorrow”. Cabinet officers serve at the pleasure of the president. This tells me that either Obama approves of what Holder is doing, or that Obama is so weak, even his own cabinet holds him in contempt. I’m betting it’s the former.
Go after the CIA for trivia and let the Panthers off the hook for election day intimidation. That is the kind of AG NObama wants.
I for one, am not afraid to have a national conversation about AG Holder, even though he might consider it racist to do so.
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Hostage to Fortune, hostages to Fortune.
The Messiah can use this issue to muddy the waters now, but if there’s subsequently another terrorist attack, he is going to own it, lock, stock, and barrel, and it will be either the de jure or de facto end of his Presidency.
Obama isn’t trying to distract the right, because the right has already figured him out. He’s trying to distract the press and, most importantly, the left.
Obama’s grand schemes for the stealth socialization of health care is at the ‘defending Suribachi’ phase of operations. To deflect from his impending failure he needs to distract the press and throw a bone to the Left.
the only way to break good rules is to push them to absurdity
Clearly Obama figures ObamCare is done, or he wouldn’t bring up this distraction now. Presumably he’s doing so to throw the rabid left some red meat.
Of course, having said that, he already pointlessly brought up one distraction – Gates’s arrest – before ObamaCare was getting the last rites, so maybe it’s just garden-variety stupidity on display again.
Remember when, shortly after his inauguration, Obama released the legal memos re: torture? I remember a Rassmussen poll that showed almost 60% of people polled considered it was bad for national security and wanted any contemplated prosecutions halted. Obama backpeddled after that.
Now he is back at it again? Is he really this stupid? If he wanted a distraction, why not bomb a small country somewhere? This is a total loser for him. And hiding behind his AG will never work.
And this comes on the heels of the totally lame “fake but true” CIA terrorist assassination squads that never existed but Congress was supposed to be briefed on them anyway. By the way, aren’t we supposed to be trying to kill terrorists? Are Democrats opposed to that?
Along with others, I have come to the conclusion that Obama is not ignorant, but stupid.
“I can teach ignorance, but there’s not a damn thing I can do with stupidity.”: J. Robert Oppenheimer, In Conversation.
This remark applies here. The man isn’t ignorant, he’s just plain stupid.
Told ya so…
As others have pointed out before, if, indeed, Obama has some sort of Achilles Heel that his total blackout of his paper trail–his birth certificate foremost among the documents–is intended to protect, I assume that by now almost any good national intelligence agency would have ferreted out that information, including the CIA.
Thus, it is not good to push the CIA too far.
Wolla.
I’m not generally a fan of leaks, but I could make an exception….
MikeLL Says:
“Now he is back at it again? Is he really this stupid? If he wanted a distraction, why not bomb a small country somewhere?”
Yeah, there is this guy in Libya that comes to mind…
Just more of what you would expect from an authentic Manchurian Candidate….
Let’s see, domestic agenda falling apart.
Health care’s in shambles.
Cap & Trade looks more and more like a non-starter.
Card check, not gonna happen.
Deficit worse than expected.
Citizens increasingly angry & disenchanted, on the left and right.
What to do?
Blame it all on Bush, his administration, their lawyers and the CIA!!
How original, how productive!!
How post-partisan and transcendent!
How predictable.
Watch what will happen. The special prosecutor will call people before a grand jury, threaten prosecution, make all kinds of moves designed to run up defense costs to bankrupt the CIA personnel, but the case will never go to trial. Why? Because the prosecutors could never get an American jury to convict.
Uh-oh! Look out for an attempt to have the trial at the International Criminal Court. Or in Berkeley.
Hurry, 2010. Hurry, 2012.
Gringo has it right. Make Holder the issue. Anyone who could let the New Black Panther Party off the hook for voter intimidation when they had already defaulted AND pick up legal persecution of the previous administration when he has no chance of succeeding is obviously unfit to be Attorney General of the United States. Equal justice under the law is giving way to political expediency and score-settling. Trying to criminalize previous administrations is the best way I can think of to bring about constitutional collapse. Holder’s politicized DOJ is becoming a threat to the Republic.
And does anyone else find the idea that the White House is going to exercise direct supervision over high value interrogations more than a little bit creepy?
Forcing out Holder would be a triple loss for Obama. Time for a Forward Strategy. ¡No pasaré¡n!
Yep, good old Holder. Didnt he have something to do with Clinton’s rendition policy? Was there no rough interrogations going on in those overseas off-sites? Or did they avoid interrogations by not apprehending any bad guys back then??
Joe buzz, Holder was one of the lawyers responsible for Clinton’s last minute pardon of Mark Rich.
To wit,
“In his final days with the Clinton administration, Holder was involved with Clinton’s last-minute pardon of fugitive and Democratic contributor Marc Rich. Between November 2000 and January 2001, Jack Quinn, Rich’s lawyer and former White House Counsel from 1995-96, had been contacting Holder, testing the waters for the political viability of a presidential pardon. After presenting his case to Holder in a November phone call and a last minute January 17 letter, Quinn arranged a phone call between the White House and Holder, asking the Deputy Attorney General to share his opinion on the Rich pardon.”
Forcing out Holder would be a triple loss for Obama. Time for a Forward Strategy. ¡No pasaré¡n!
Oblio: It would be great to force Holder out, certainly, but unless he’s caught in some scandal, I don’t see where the levers are to make that happen.
Part of the problem is that Obama is pressing on so many fronts at once and doing so many outrageous things at once that it’s hard to focus a counterattack. Most of that energy is going towards defeating Obamacare and it’s hard to disagree with that priority.
The drawback of Obama’s strategy for him is that quite a number of moderate and independent Americans, who were favorably disposed to Obama, may not even oppose his initiatives but are alarmed at the speed and the quantity of them.
Another ominous side of the Obama administration is Obama’s penchant for setting up czars — often quite radical like Holdren, the top science advisor. At this point it’s hard to say how many czars there are but it’s somewhere between two and four dozen, enough for a shadow government, I’d say.
The great thing about czars is that they do not have to be confirmed. Obama could slide in Bill Ayers as Education czar and there is nothing we could do but complain.
Meanwhile, over seven months into his term, Obama has only staffed 50% of the 383 jobs requiring Senate conformation.
An analysis by the White House Transition Project – a nonprofit organization tracking administrations – showed that 210 days into his administration, Obama had nominated candidates for 243 of the 385 jobs requiring Senate confirmation.
The Senate has confirmed 193 but still has a backlog of candidates needing to be examined.
CNN 08/25/09
Looks like the pegs are out of the gears if sumtin turns up the heat
They aren’t going after the CIA; they are going after Cheney.
…they are going after Cheney.
Yep. Cheney is the great white whale for these folks.
Is the operative word “white?” Is it all about the “whiteness of the whale?”
Thar she blows…
I was thinking whiteness more in the sense of Moby Dick, and Ahab’s fanatical, revenge-driven quest to kill the whale even at the cost of his own life, his ship and the lives of his crew.
It’s not a bad metaphor for what Obama and the Democrats are up to, given the stakes.
If the US suffers another 9-11 level attack — or worse, and it could be much worse — it will be a disaster for the country, and even more so for Obama and the Democrats.
It’s a very sound analogy, Huxley, and one I appreciate. To which I can only add – “Save the Whales” – a sentiment with which one would expect the Left to sympathize – although probably not in this case.