Veracity Radio

http://www.cheneywatch.org/documents/torture/cia_oig_report.pdf

Here is the long awaited report. Many new details have been released. We are reading the document and will elaborate the details here. And we will publish the news coverage related to this story. Stay tuned….

Documents By Chronology:
The attacks on September 11, 2001 were the catalyst for the “war on terror”– and for a legal revolution in assertions of broad powers for the Commander-in-Chief. In this chronological library of 34 documents, it is possible to chart the decision-making that led to interrogations of prisoners in U.S. custody that were “at a minimum, cruel and inhuman treatment and, at worst, torture,” in the words of the former general counsel of the United States Navy, Alberto Mora.
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Reports are flying that Eric Holder has read the soon, supposedly, to be released, supposedly, CIA torture report. Will Eric Holder be compelled to investigate the torture program?

At the same time we are reading that Dick Cheney instructed the CIA to withhold information to the Congress about a “program” that background talkers saying never fomented into action. The issue is, “how does the Vice President of the United States of America get this much power? How is he able to be outside the law? And why is he allowed to continue this if he has such contempt for the United States government he serves in?”
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Let your voice be heard.  Write:

Whitehouse: http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/

U.S. Senate: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

U.S. House of Representatives: https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml

U.S. Department of Justice:  http://www.usdoj.gov/ag/ 

American Civil Liberties Union:  http://www.aclu.org/

Get involved:   http://www.aclu.org/safefree/torture/index.html

Submit evidence of torture: http://www.aclu.org/accountability/action.html

 Petitions against torture:

 http://www.democrats.com/iraq-torture-petition 

Donate:

ACLU:  http://action.aclu.org/site/PageServer?pagename=FJ_donationhome

Info and activism: www.IndictBushNow.org

Today we learn that the Supreme Court of the United States will not hear the appeal filed by Valerie Plame and Joseph Wilson in their case against Dick Cheney, Scooter Libby, Richard Armitage, and others. The decision marks yet another example of the unaccountable government you live under in the United States. The illusion of “checks and balances” is gone. The President can do no wrong, this is the tacit approval of the SCOTUS decision.
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(Thanks to our friends’ site: NoQuarterUSA.net for heads up on this.  Thank you to Steve Clemons for allowing us reprint the full text with Col. Wilkerson’s and Steve Clemons’ express permission from The Washington Note.)

This is a guest post exclusive to The Washington Note by Col. Lawrence B. Wilkerson, who is former chief of staff of the Department of State during the term of Secretary of State Colin Powell. Lawrence Wilkerson is also Pamela Harriman Visiting Professor at the College of William & Mary.

Last night I was on Rachel Maddow’s show on MSNBC at the top of the hour. But before I came on, through the earpiece I listened to the five minutes that Rachel sketched as a lead-in. Most of it was videotape from the last few days of former Vice President Dick Cheney extolling the virtues of harsh interrogation, torture, and his leadership. I had heard some of it earlier of course but not all of it and not in such a tightly-packed package.
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Reuters is reporting that Spanish Judge Baltasar Garzon is going to continue with investigation of the Cheney/Bush Administration officials involved with torture at Guantanamo. Earlier in the day, the Spanish Attorney General moved to dismiss the charges.

This is on the heels of the Obama Administration’s grand failure to keep the promise of accountability and his legal obligations to investigate crimes. He’s placed political expediency above the law again. Eric Holder announced that the administration would not seek to charge CIA officers who engaged in the “enhanced torture techniques” so long as they were doing so in “good faith” to the legal opinions rendered by the OSC.

Can you imagine how defense lawyers can utilize this sort of formula now for their rape and murder cases? If they can just find various areas where “moving forward” is more valuable than “dwelling on the past” they’ll be able to get any of their defendants off. Further, they could always go for an equal protection claim that shows their client received a greater sentence than Officers who tortured and killed detainees.

Let us not forget we have accusations of deaths in custody including the accusation of murder committed at Bagram Air Base.

Did the United States ever really have integrity? Was it an illusion to begin with? Or is this just an aberration and an anomaly the US character?

Secret Torture Memos have been released by the Obama Administration. These memos show the administration did willfully violate U.S. law and international laws and treaties by seeking to give legal cover for interrogation techniques that clearly cross the line into illegal treatment of detainees.

Here are the memos by Jay Bybee and Steven G. Bradbury

Memo One

Memo Two

Memo Three

Memo Four

The repeated calling of detainees as “terrorists” does not finalize their legal path. They have not been adjudicated and thus are simply suspects. Torturing suspects is a violation of our fundamental standards of law.

Now the Obama Administration is telling the CIA that they will not be prosecuting the officers who were “just following orders”. Apparently Obama’s constitutional law background doesn’t understand this change in legal standards. From now on, anyone who is given an illegal order can simply hope to have a memo stating it was legal.

This muddying of the legal waters isn’t only a US problem. The Spanish chief prosecutor has said he would not recommend proceeding with prosecution of US officials. The nature of the investigation isn’t in the hands of the prosecutor but the judge and it will be a couple more days before we hear what he will recommend. Stay tuned…

Larry Wilkerson appeared on Rachel Maddow with up close insight to the Bush/Cheney administration: