The Discerning Texan
-- Edmund Burke
Friday, December 07, 2007
UPDATED AND BUMPED Harman, Rockefeller, others were reportedly briefed on Destroyed CIA tapes TWO YEARS ago. PLUS: Why this is a GOOD thing.
WHAT DID THEY KNOW AND WHEN DID THEY KNOW IT: The Muckraker isn't digging the Jay and Jane Show:
But the bottom line here is that at least some Congressional leaders knew something about the tapes and something about their destruction, and didn't say anything about either. [Jane] Harman's silence is especially stunning: she co-chaired a joint Congressional inquiry into the 9/11 attacks in 2002 that didn't receive that very pertinent information.
And in a post that might have been titled "With Democrats Like These..." Marty Lederman writes:
Jay Rockefeller is constantly learning of legally dubious (at best) CIA intelligence activities, and then saying nothing about them publicly until they are leaked to the press, at which point he expresses outrage and incredulity -- but reveals nothing.
...Jane Harman also knew of the intention to destroy the tapes, and she at least "urged" the CIA in writing not to do it. (Where were her colleagues?) But when she found out the CIA had destroyed the tapes, where was Harman's press conference? Where were the congressional hearings?
This ongoing selective outrage by the Congressional overseers is ridiculous.
The sick part of this is that because the US Courts decided in the first place that the 20th 9/11 hijacker (Zacarias Moussaoui) had standing for trial in US Courts (denying, in effect, that Moussaoui was a Prisoner of War...)--the fact that Moussaoui requested these tapes at his trial and the CIA denied to the court that they existed may in fact mean that Moussaoui's conviction could be overturned on appeal.
Nice work by "the Company"--especially the leakers. Once again tarnishing its own country for political reasons. Maybe if you took a little bit more care about doing your jobs and paid a little less attention to trying to sabotage the Bush Administration, you might not now have made it possible for a 9/11 planner to go free. (But perhaps that was the whole idea in waiting for the Moussaoui trial to end first....).
UPDATE: Glenn Reynolds adds:
CAPT. ED SAYS don't dismiss the CIA tape-destruction scandal.
I don't know a lot about this, but it's possible further evidence that I was right to oppose Harriet Miers' nomination. Well, that's probably unfair -- she opposed destroying the tapes, according to ABC. On the other hand, she'd be a Supreme Court justice now, which would be ticklish. As I argued, the path from White House Counsel to Supreme Court is not one that should be too short.
Should we abolish the CIA? Well, it's probably too early to draw that conclusion.
UPDATE: And... finally, my very favorite commentary of all:
Fits are being pitched, and the hissing in the Mad City coffee shops is crescendoing nicely, about what you ask? Those dirty dogs at CIA destroyed what could have been the greatest videos ever.
Does anyone want to place bets on how long it would be from the time those tapes were in the hands of a Democratic staffer to their airing on CNN? Immediately, comes to mind.
There are two good reasons to destroy the tapes. Hayden put the first one front and center, our interrogators are shown on them. Keeping their identities secret is very important, and something Valerie Plame could have paid more heed to. Once the interrogations were completed and transcribed, there is no use to them other than the ghoulish watching of human suffering.
Which brings us to reason number two. They were almost certainly horrifying and awful and their viewing by many Americans would cause a reaction. It would likely move public opinion toward more restrictions on what methods may be employed. We have already put too many and the unpleasantness of the coercive techniques would be offensive to some who would otherwise approve of using all techniques short of torture.
I believe there are quite a few things being discussed in open forums, that belong back on the dark side. It is right and proper that our government does unpleasant, unsavory and sometimes awful things in defense of our freedom. This should happen out of sight of all, but we are a little too paranoid as a country for that. So those with agendas constantly leak classified information and weaken our abilities.
Given that the mere existence of these tapes created bad possibilities they did the prudent thing and destroyed them. They broke no laws and were not even required to have made the tapes, they were done as an internal safeguard. They were also reviewed to see if any breaches of interrogation policy occurred by the Inspector General, none were shown.
At that point they served no purpose other than as torture pron, and that is an ugly thought. Not that that would have stopped any number on the left from putting it out there.
