Comments on: Ex-Rice Aide Blasts Torture Program

By: uudeem

uudeem — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 00:27:24 +0000

While on the surface Zelikow's statements seem appropriately nuanced, subtle even, given the subject matter, eloquent. However, at base, it is a weasel. Mr. Zelikow is attempting a pre-emptive CYA maneuver for his boss Ms. Rice as well as himself. Mr. Zelikow appeared on the Rachel Maddow show a couple of days ago and put this argument out, claiming that over in the State Department there was considerable consternation regarding these actions. I believe that these arguments are being made so that he and possibly Ms. Rice wil attempt to absolve themselves from any tinge of responsibility by using this supposed opposition as a basis for absolution. Unfortunately,at the time the torture program got underway, Ms. Rice was functioning as National Security Advisor. The question then,is, in what capacity did ZeliKow serve when Condi was NSA? What advice did he offer at that time?

By: uudeem

uudeem — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 17:27:24 +0000

By: Topics about Stephen-smith » Ex-Rice Aide Blasts Torture Program

Topics about Stephen-smith » Ex-Rice Aide Blasts Torture Program — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 01:07:39 +0000

[...] The Dirty’s Fresh Dirt created an interesting post today on Ex-Rice Aide Blasts Torture ProgramHere’s a short outline…on display from the Office of Legal Counsel’s Steven Bradbury, and … Nor do I mean to imply that resignation is an easy thing [...]

By: gandhi

gandhi — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 23:01:52 +0000

Zelikow told the Annual Lecture, Houston Journal of International Law, on April 26, 2007, that “good intelligence can be gained by physically tormenting captives”.

He said improved interrogation methods have been developed through “a process of painful trial and error”! He said it was ” tempting for some local governments to let the Americans do the distasteful things that protect their people too.” He called for such governments to abandon the rule of “traditional” law. And he argued in favour of “the quite defensible policy of renditions”.

Now he's a hero of the resistance, doggedly pressuring the White House on torture???

By: Dennis

Dennis — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 17:44:54 +0000

Even an “attempt” for this nation to try its own war criminals would do more to bolster the image of the US around the world than anything else that can be done.

The question is does Congress have the political stomach and ethics for it?

By: Dick Hertz

Dick Hertz — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 17:28:14 +0000

Just another moral failure from the Right. Why get off the gravy train with biscuit wheels if its just a bunch of sand n——- getting beaten to death for no good reason? Why stop the VP from his fix of snuff porn to fwap to in the Naval Observatory? To the victor goes the spoils bizches! The Bush man has a Man Date.

By: Jake

Jake — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 16:34:50 +0000

They were enablers. Powell of course being first among them becuase he knew better and yet allowed his partisan loyalties to sway his judgment. The ooze of the unlawful war in Iraq – and it appears from the timing the torture was aimed at providing a link between 9/11 and Iraq in order to justify the war – will tarnish all who touched it. Including Tony Blair,

By: theod

theod — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 16:34:06 +0000

Resignation for ethical reasons doesn't seem to work for American political types. It effectively takes you out of the govt for life, since your former supporters have lost faith in you forever and your new-found friends on the opposing side don't fully trust you either. So unless they can be confident of maintaining ambitions in the private or academic sectors, people with a shred of conscience rarely seem to use it dramatically through resignation. See Sec of State Cyrus Vance, for example.

Zellikow has proved to very much like his govt connections. If he can prove his memo exists he will have played this game cleverly.

By: Jake

Jake — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 16:31:36 +0000

Zelikow performed a whitewash of our failed govenrment as director fo the 9/11 commission. Why should he have exhibited qualities of menschness as a Bush appartchik by resigning. The 9/11 Commission, like the Warren Commission, obscured the truth and thus provided the American people degred and unreliable information.

By: GTFOOH

GTFOOH — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 15:41:45 +0000

These Johnny-come-lately pillars of Justice like Phillip Zelikow and Richard Armatage are worse than people like Cheney. Because they could have stopped it!