The Washington Independent

Posts Tagged Torture

An Open Letter to Liz Cheney on Torture

By | 02.21.10 | 11:24 am

Dear Ms. Cheney,

I don’t know if you saw ‘Meet The Press’ this morning, but a general you may have heard of named David Petraeus — he’s the commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East and South Asia and is the most distinguished Army general since Colin Powell — More…

‘Do We Know If Boo-Boo Is Allergic to Certain Insects?’

By | 02.19.10 | 8:09 pm

The Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility released its report on professional misconduct over torture authorized by ex-Justice officials John Yoo, Steve Bradbury and Jay Bybee today, and the results aren’t so good for them. While they avoided a formal recommendation for disbarment, Justice Department ethics officials found that More…

Intel Chief ‘Deeply Regrets’ U.K.’s Torture Disclosure, But…

By | 02.10.10 | 6:27 pm

After a British court ruled that the U.K. government has to disclose sensitive information about how the United States tortured a British citizen named Binyam Mohamed whom the U.S. held as a terrorist for years, Dennis Blair, the director of national intelligence, released this statement:

The protection of confidential

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Key Figure in Bush’s Military Commissions Set for Obama Job

By | 02.09.10 | 6:00 am

A key behind-the-scenes architect of the Bush administration’s first version of the military commissions for terrorism suspects — which the Supreme Court found to unconstitutionally restrict the legal rights of detainees — will take a central Pentagon position dealing with detainee policy for the Obama administration.

William Lietzau, a Marine More…

So. Which GTMO Detainees Won’t Obama Charge?

By | 01.21.10 | 4:28 pm

ABC News reports that the task force President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder empaneled to decide the venue for charging each remaining Guantanamo Bay detainee — civilian courts or military commissions — has wrapped up its work. So who won’t get charged — but will still be detained? More…

Sessions to Mueller: Why Didn’t We Torture Abdulmutallab?

By | 01.20.10 | 2:49 pm

It’s quite a spectacle to watch members of Congress — all of whom have sworn an oath to support the U.S. Constitution — brag about their disdain for the right to due process, which is guaranteed by the Constitution’s Fifth Amendment (even for foreign nationals suspected of crimes in the More…

John Yoo Wins Battle of ‘The Daily Show’

By | 01.12.10 | 11:43 am

It’s a testament to Jon Stewart’s extraordinary abilities to speak sensibly in an age of insanity that we expect him to skewer knaves like John Yoo, the former Office of Legal Counsel torture advocate, who appeared on “The Daily Show” last night. Stewart has a great command of the facts More…

Surprise! John Yoo Believes in Broad Executive Powers

By | 01.04.10 | 7:42 pm

Former Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo has been spewing his grandiose views on presidential power ever since leaving the Bush administration. So although his latest book, “Crisis And Command,” is an unusually ambitious 446-page historical survey of executive power from George Washington to George W. Bush, his More…

Quotes From John Brennan That Liberals Won’t Like

By | 01.04.10 | 9:13 am

From Peter Baker’s New York Times Magazine overview of the Obama administration’s approach to terrorism:

Most of those [Bush holdovers], of course, were in the moderate camp inside the Bush administration, not the Cheney cadre, or like Brennan they present themselves as simply career professionals who followed orders or

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58 Percent of U.S. Voters Want to Waterboard Failed Christmas Bomber

By | 12.31.09 | 11:56 am

Don’t expect any charitable feelings around the holidays. According to a new Rasmussen national telephone survey, 58 percent of U.S. voters say they’d support using waterboarding and other aggressive interrogation techniques to extract information from the failed Northwest Airlines Flight 253 bomber.

Just 30 percent oppose using such More…