The torturer in chief and his slightly less corrupt than Gonzales attorney general.
The American Enterprise Institute hosted a torture fest yesterday, giving a large platform to at least two people who should be in prison for war crimes, to continue to forward the torture apologists narrative that waterboarding led to bin Laden. To give you an idea of the tenor of the procedure, John Yoo acted as moderator. On the panel were Bush Attorney General Michael Mukasey, former general counsel to the CIA John Rizzo (who worked with both Jay Bybee and Steven Bradbury to pre-authorize torture), torture cheerleader Marc Thiessen, Benjamin Wittes from Brookings (a constitutional scholar who
argues for the benefits of ignoring the constitution) and a lone voice of morality and sanity, Elisa Massimino from Human Rights First.
You can the whole thing here, if your stomach and blood pressure can handle it. If not, the key takeaway is Mukasey's attacks on Sen. John McCain and ongoing lies.
On Monday, as first reported by the Washington Post, excerpts from a letter from Panetta to McCain dated May 9 were released. In the letter, Panetta reiterates what he has said publicly—that bin Laden was found after 10 years of intensive intelligence from "multiple streams" and "painstaking collection and analysis."
In the letter, which was verified by a spokesperson at the CIA, Panetta says: "We first learned about the facilitator/courier's nom de guerre from a detainee not in CIA custody in 2002." He said that some detainees who had been subject to enhanced interrogation techniques attempted to provide false information about the courier....
Mukasey said that while it wasn't the first time a detainee had mentioned the name, it only became significant "when it came out of [KSM'S] mouth."
And he indicated he believes the controversy is more than just a war of words regarding the courier's nickname or his true name.
"I'm not accusing anybody of being misleading and I'm certainly not here to play word games," he said. "I know what I said to be true, and you can read into that [Panetta's] letter what you want to.
"I'm not interested in playing word games with anybody, least of all with a certified war hero who has a superb public record," Mukasey said of McCain. "But it's possible to be a war hero and have an excellent public record and be mistaken about some things, all at the same time."
McCain wasn't mistaken about anything, and is not misinterpreting the Panetta letter. Marcy Wheeler has a good post on just what we learned from the Panetta letter and what we already know, and that is that the courier was identified and located through long years of intensive intelligence gathering. Not from the illegal actions of a bunch of amoral monsters in the White House and CIA.