As I noted earlier, Mukasey indicated early in the hearing that the criminal investigation of the CIA's destroyed torture tapes may well explore whether the interrogation techniques shown on those tapes were legal. But as Mukasey made clear, that may or may not happen.

So Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) wanted to know, is the Department of Justice investigating whether the sorts of techniques used by CIA agents were torture? And if not, why not?

Well, they aren't. And as for the why not, he and Mukasey went round and round on the question for two rounds of questioning. Here's Whitehouse's second try:

In this and the other exchange it became apparent that there were two justifications for Mukasey's stance.

The first you might call the real reason. It's one he succinctly described earlier when he said "I [am not] going to call into question what people do or have done, when it's not necessary to do so."

The second rested on a legal argument that was seemingly less self-justifying -- but he had real trouble getting it to stand up under Whitehouse's questioning.

The main issue, he argued, was whether the proper "authorizations" were given.

Well, isn't Mukasey's emphasis on "authorizations" really the Nuremberg defense? Whitehouse wanted to know. "I had authorization and therefore I'm immune from prosecution?"

Read more »

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) picked up where Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) left off. Does the attorney general really think that it depends on the circumstances when you can waterboard somebody?

Here's the video:

Durbin pressed the point that the Senate had, on a broad bipartisan basis, prohibited "such practices with the McCain amendment" (the 2005 Detainee Treatment Act).

But the Senate had also "voted down a bill that would prohibit waterboarding," Mukasey replied.

"You still think that the jury is out on whether the Senate believes that waterboarding is torture?" Durbin wanted to know.

"The question... is whether the Senate has spoken clearly enough in the legislation that it has passed...."

"Where is the lack of clarity in the McCain legislation?"

Read more »

Michael Mukasey finally got into the nitty gritty of how he thinks about torture, and he seemed to finally show his hand.

Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) said that he'd been getting the impression that Mukasey really thought about torture in relative terms, and wanted to know if that was so. Is it OK to waterboard someone if a nuclear weapon was hidden -- the Jack Bauer scenario -- but not OK to waterboard someone for more pedestrian information?

Mukasey responded that it was "not simply a relative issue," but there "is a statute where it is a relative issue," he added, citing the Detainee Treatment Act. That law engages the "shocks the conscience" standard, he explained, and you have to "balance the value of doing something against the cost of doing it."

What does "cost" mean, Biden wanted to know.

Mukasey said that was the wrong word. "I mean the heinousness of doing it, the cruelty of doing it, balanced against the value.... balanced against the information you might get." Information "that couldn't be used to save lives," he explained, would be of less value.

Marty Lederman blogs: "What this reveals is that DOJ and Mukasey have concluded that waterboarding is categorically not torture, and is not 'cruel treatment' under Common Article 3 (even though it is, by Mukasey's own lights, "cruel" -- go figure)."

Biden responded, "You're the first I've ever heard to say what you just said.... It shocks my conscience a little bit."

Update: Here's the transcript:

Read more »

Here's the most fruitful of the responses about waterboarding that the senators were able to elicit from Mukasey so far.

Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) had a long wind up before delivering his punch. After detailing how objectionable waterboarding was, how it was clearly torture, as clearly as robbing a bank is stealing, he came out with: "Would waterboarding be torture if done to you?"

"I would feel that it was," Mukasey replied. But then he devolved into his practiced take which he detailed in his letter last night. He can't just come out and say that waterboarding is clearly torture when done to anyone, he says, "because of the office that I have." It was a brief moment of clarity.

Update: Actually, Mukasey's responses to two other questions, detailed above, proved even more clear.

Update: Here's the transcript:

Read more »

Last time around, Attorney General Michael Mukasey had more than a little trouble telling the Senate Judiciary Committee whether waterboarding is torture. "If it amounts to torture, then it is not Constitutional" just wasn't cutting it.

But this time, he's coming ready. He laid it all out in a letter to the panel last night. When he sits down for his hearing this morning, he'll say... I can't tell you if it's torture, because we're not doing it now anyway and there's no use talking about it if we're not even doing it -- which doesn't mean that we won't do it, but we really probably won't.

Or as he puts it, if I may quickly summarize his 3-page letter:

"[I] have concluded that the interrogation techniques currently authorized in the CIA program comply with the law.... I have been authorized to disclose publicly that waterboarding is not among those methods. Accordingly, waterboarding is not, and may not be, used in the current program.... It is precisely because the issue is so important, and the questions so difficult, that I, as Attorney General, should not provide answers absent a set of circumstances that call for those answers. Those circumstances do not present themselves today, and may never present themselves in the future."

The clear intended message here for the Democrats on the panel is that Mukasey would never approve waterboarding, but they're not going to get him to say why. Somehow I don't think they'll be completely satisfied. Especially if he repeats this line from his letter:

"There are some circumstances where current law would appear clearly to prohibit the use of waterboarding. Other circumstances would present a far closer question."

So -- what's up? Marty Lederman, a former lawyer in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, speculates that what's really driving Mukasey's refusal to address the question is that "such a repudiation would undermine the legal basis for other of the 'enhanced' CIA interrogation techniques" -- techniques such as stress positions, inducing hypothermia, sleep deprivation and the like.

Remember also that Mukasey has expressed confidence in Steven Bradbury, the current head of the Office of Legal Counsel, who has reportedly approved all these techniques (and waterboarding). And in his statement today, Mukasey seems to be saying above that he's approved them too (minus waterboarding). He supports the current system and doesn't want to rock the boat. With the most controversial technique eliminated, all this unwanted scrutiny will hopefully recede.

We'll be providing live updates of Mukasey's hearing, which starts at 10 this morning.

It's no secret that after 9/11, the administration authorized the use of waterboarding, and that the technique was used on a number of detainees in 2002 and reportedly stopped in 2003. But the administration has never explicitly admitted that.

In fact, when Dick Cheney, seduced into loose talk by a friendly interviewer, confirmed that "a dunk in water is a no-brainer if it can save lives," the White House furiously backpedaled, and Tony Snow did his best to proclaim that "a dunk in water" had not been a reference to waterboarding, but just "a dunk in the water."

So John Negroponte is really letting the horse out of the barn here. In an interview with National Journal, the former director of national intelligence casually mentions the use of waterboarding:

Q: When we as a nation are still debating the morality and efficacy of "harsh" interrogation techniques that much of the world consider torture, and indefinite detainment that lies outside the rule of international law, can the United States really win the "war of ideas" that President Bush insists is crucial to this conflict?

Negroponte: I get concerned that we're too retrospective and tend to look in the rearview mirror too often at things that happened four or even six years ago. We've taken steps to address the issue of interrogations, for instance, and waterboarding has not been used in years. It wasn't used when I was director of national intelligence, nor even for a few years before that. We've also taken significant steps to improve Guantanamo. People will tell you now that it is a world-class detention facility. But if you want to highlight and accent the negative, you can resurface these issues constantly to keep them alive. I would rather focus on what we need to do going forward.

Somehow I think that his upbeat, glass-is-half-full message will get lost here.

And expect for White House spokeswoman Dana Perino to do her best to put the horse back in the barn tomorrow.

From 60 Minutes' fascinating interview with FBI agent George Piro, who led the American team to interrogate Saddam Hussein:

Piro says no coercive interrogation techniques, like sleep deprivation, heat, cold, loud noises, or water boarding were ever used. "It's against FBI policy, first. And wouldn't have really benefited us with someone like Saddam," Piro says.

Why not?

"I think Saddam clearly had demonstrated over his legacy that he would not respond to threats, to any type of fear-based approach," Piro explains.

"So how do you crack a guy like that?" Pelley asks.

"Time," Piro says.

Months of time, during which Piro manipulated Saddam, creating a relationship based on dependency, trust and emotion.

Oh, and by the way: "He considered [Osama bin Laden] to be a fanatic. And as such was very wary of him. He told me, 'You can't really trust fanatics,'" Piro says."

via Laura Rozen.

You hear a lot about the administration's torture regime, but not a lot about the process of how we got to where we are.

Say hello to TPM alum and drinking buddy Spencer Ackerman at his new muckraking home, The Washington Independent. In his first big piece, Spencer looks at how the CIA ended up implementing a system where "U.S. interrogators are still mostly in the dark—in the dark not only about al-Qaeda, but about how to effectively elicit vital national-security information from the detainees in its custody."

As a preview of Attorney General Michael Mukasey's appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee next Wednesday, all ten Democrats on the committee signed a letter to him today from Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) asking whether he can finally tell them whether he thinks waterboarding is torture or not.

During his confirmation hearing, Mukasey made his infamous "massive hedge" about whether the technique was torture. He promised to institute a review and has apparently followed through. "It has been over two months since then, ample time for you to study this issue and reach a conclusion," the Dems write.

They want answers to two different questions:

1. Is the use of waterboading as an interrogation technique illegal under U.S. law, including treaty obligations?

2. Based on your review of other coercive interrogation techniques and the legal analysis authorizing their use, what is your assessment of whether such techniques comply with the law?

The full letter is below.

Read more »

From the Sun-Sentinel:

In a significant departure from federal sentencing guidelines and prosecutors wishes, Jose Padilla, the man government officials once accused of plotting to detonate a radioactive "dirty" bomb on U.S. soil, will spend 17 years and 4 months in a maximum security prison for his role in a South Florida terror support cell, a Miami federal judge ruled Tuesday.

Padilla's recruiter Adham Hassoun was given 15 years and 8 months and co-defendant Kifah Jayyousi received 12 years, 8 months. The three men faced possible life sentences.

U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke announced her decisions after taking the long weekend to consider legal arguments and emotional testimony from friends and relatives of the men.

Referring to Padilla, the judge said: "He was held in hard conditions. The government argued that I could not take that into consideration…I disagree."

The more Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell talks, the worse it gets.

Consider: McConnell, whose nomination early last year was applauded by lawmakers from both parties, has twice provided false information to Congress -- and in both cases, they were statements that served to distort the surveillance debate. In the heat of the surveillance bill debate, McConnell claimed that three German terrorism suspects had been arrested due to intercepts made possible by the administration's Protect America Act; it turned out the intercepts were obtained under the old FISA bill. Only a couple weeks later, McConnell told Congress that rulings by the FISA Court had prevented the NSA from surveilling Iraqi insurgents who had kidnapped U.S. soldiers for 12 hours. That turned out to be, at best, a misleading explanation for the delay.

He's also said, over and over, that the public debate over surveillance law is endangering American lives.

But this one, to my mind, takes the cake. This week's New Yorker features an extended piece on McConnell by Lawrence Wright, based on a number of interviews over several months (not available online). It's a piece that I think even McConnell would agree is a fair portrayal. He comes across as a patriot obsessed with the security of the country. And yet, he also comes across as incredibly unreflective about the issue of torture.

According to McConnell, the issue isn't complicated. "We don't torture," he says, but then goes on to explain that tactics critics call torture have been enormously successful. It's gotten us "tons" of meaningful information and saved "tons" of lives. He confidently offers the example of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (Wright duly notes that the reliability of Mohammed's confessions have been "widely questioned"). And then there's this:

McConnell asserted that it was not difficult to evaluate the truthfulness of a confession, even a coerced one. "And as soon as they start to talk we can tell in minutes if they are lying," he said. "One, you know a lot. And you know when someone is giving you information that is not connecting up to what you know. You also know when to use a polygraph."

Never mind the debate over Abu Zubaydah. Apparently you can torture without any concern about false information.

But that's just a warm up for McConnell's take on waterboarding, which really has to be quoted in full to capture the full force of its thoughtlessness. For those who'd like a contrast with McConnell's views, see the descriptions of waterboarding here and here. From Wright's piece:

"You know what waterboarding is?" [McConnell] asked. "You lay somebody on this table, or put them in an inclined position, and put a washcloth over their face, and you just drip water right here" -- he pointed to his nostrils. "Try it! What happens is, water will go up your nose. And so you will get the sensation of potentially drowning. That's all waterboarding is."

I asked if he considered that torture.

McConnell refused to answer directly, but he said, "My own definition of torture is something that would cause excruciating pain."

Did waterboarding fit that description?

Referring to his teen-age days as a lifeguard, he said, "I know one thing. I'm a water-safety instructor, but I cannot swim without covering my nose. I don't know if it's some deviated septum or mucus membrane, but water just rushes in." For him, he said, "waterboarding would be excruciating. If I had water draining into my nose, oh God, I just can't imagine how painful! Whether it's torture by anybody else's definition, for me it would be torture."

I queried McConnell again, later, about his views on waterboarding, since this exchange seemed to suggest that he personally condemned it. He rejected that interpretation. "You can do waterboarding lots of different ways," he said. "I assume you can get to the point that a person is actually drowning." That would certainly be torture, he said. The definition didn't seem very different from John Yoo's. The reason that he couldn't be more specific, McConnell said, is that "if it ever is determined to be torture, there will be a huge penalty to be paid for anyone engaging in it."

The AP's headline gives the impression that McConnell condemned waterboarding. He didn't. He's saying that if you have a deviated septum, then waterboarding is torture -- because it just feels like you're drowning. If not (and the interrogator doesn't go overboard), then apparently it's a-ok. It seems to be an easy distinction for him. The subtlety might be lost on others.

Here's an approach I haven't seen before. From The Chicago Tribune:

In the latest legal contest over the treatment of detained terrorist suspects, attorneys for Jose Padilla filed a suit in a California federal district court this morning against John Yoo, the former deputy assistant Attorney General whose legal opinions formed the basis for Padilla's detention and the interrogation techniques used against him that the attorneys call torture....

The suit filed this morning in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in San Francisco, turns the spotlight of blame on Yoo, the author of a series of legal memoranda known collectively as the "Torture Memos." Drafted in 2002, when Yoo was a deputy assistant Attorney General in the Justice Department, they provided the legal justification for the interrogation techniques used on suspected Al Qaeda operatives that many, from former generals to presidential candidates, have since decried as torture.

"John Yoo is the first person in American history to provide the legal authorization for the instiution of torture in the U.S.," said Jonathan Freiman, an attorney representing Padilla in the suit. "He [Yoo] was an absolutely essential part of what will be viewed by history as a group of rogue officials acting under cover of law to undermine fundamental rights.it never would have happened without the legal green light. That made it possible."

Why did the CIA choose to videotape its interrogations of the first Al Qaeda detainees?

The short answer provided by The New York Times piece this weekend, based on "interviews with two dozen current and former officials," proves misleading. And there are a host of competing theories to sort through. But in the end, it´s really not so complicated.

The story's straightforward headline, "Tapes by C.I.A. Lived and Died to Save Image," is based on the idea that the videotaping was "prompted in part by worry about how [the agency´s interrogation methods] might be perceived — by Congress, by prosecutors, by the American public and by Muslims worldwide," as the Times puts it. According to this theory, the CIA was trying to cover its ass by showing that it was keeping to authorized techniques. That same fear was behind the drive to destroy the tapes.

But the bulk of the reporting of the piece tends towards a very different interpretation. There were plenty of reasons to want to videotape the interrogations, and one simple reason to want them destroyed. Buzzy Krongard (yep, that Buzzy) -- one of the very few CIA officials who spoke to the Times on the record -- puts it best:

Read more »

Just out from the AP:

A federal judge appeared reluctant Friday to investigate the destruction of CIA interrogation videotapes while the Justice Department is conducting its own inquiry.

U.S. District Judge Henry H. Kennedy is considering whether to delve into the matter and, if so, how deeply. The Bush administration is urging him to back off while it investigates.

"Why should the court not permit the Department of Justice to do just that?" Kennedy asked at a court hearing.

The hearing marked the first time that administration lawyers spoke in public and under oath about the matter since the CIA disclosed this month it destroyed the tapes of officers using tough interrogation methods while questioning two al-Qaida suspects.

A lot of people want to talk to John Kiriakou. After the leader of the team that interrogated senior al-Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah in 2002 -- one of the detainees whose interrogation was secretly recorded -- went public, a lot of confusion remained. Did Abu Zubaydah really break after 35 seconds of waterboarding, as Kiriakou said? Or, as the FBI's Dan Coleman and others have said, did Abu Zubaydah's interrogation yield the best information through non-coercive techniques? Very few people are sure of the answer. Many want to ask Kiriakou more questions.

Not least of whom: the Justice Department.

Jonathan Landay of McClatchy reports that the CIA has referred Kiriakou's case to the Justice Department. No, the department isn't investigating whether Kiriakou's role in Abu Zubaydah's interrogation was potentially illegal. That would be an admission that the torture apparatus established after 9/11 is illegal, and you know that Michael Mukasey and Mark Filip can't make up their minds about that. Rather, the FBI wants to know if Kiriakou criminally disclosed classified information by speaking to ABC News about the interrogation.

What's more, Kiriakou's former employer, the CIA -- which surely wasn't happy about seeing Kiriakou confirm on TV that his team waterboarded Abu Zubaydah and then call waterboarding torture -- won't confirm that it dimed him out.

A CIA spokesman declined to comment when asked if the agency had sought a criminal probe of Kiriakou. But the spokesman, George Little, added, "Separate and apart from any specific instance, when the agency has reason to believe there has been a possible violation of the law, such as the unauthorized disclosure of classified information, it has an obligation to refer the matter to the Department of Justice."

Quoth Kiriakou's attorney, Mark Zaid -- your go-to lawyer if you're a CIA official in legal jeopardy: "it wouldn't surprise me and I wouldn't find it unusual" if the CIA turned around and got Justice to open a criminal investigation into Kiriakou for the disclosure. None dare call it retaliation.

Read more »

From Roll Call (sub. req.):

Following hours of intense talks that ended in a standoff, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) decided late Wednesday to move several dozen nominees but still keep the Senate in business over the monthlong holiday break to block President Bush from making any controversial recess appointments while Senators are out of town....

But the two sides didn’t see completely eye to eye, as Bush pushed to include in the deal Steven Bradbury’s nomination to be assistant counsel to the attorney general. Bradbury is unpopular with Democrats for his controversial role in formulating the administration’s position on torture.

“I tried very hard to work with the president but he indicated he would still use the recess ... to appoint objectionable nominees,” Reid said on the Senate floor Wednesday night. “My only solution is to end this and call a pro forma session again.”

For a refresher on who Steve Bradbury is, and why the administration would want him in office so badly, see our earlier rundown here.

We all can get along. At least for the time being.

After the House intelligence committee threatened to issue subpoenas yesterday, the Justice Department backed down. Now the CIA will begin forking over documents relating to the destruction of the torture tapes, and the committee will hear from their second witness, the CIA's general counsel John Rizzo.

The DoJ seemed keen to paint Congress' reaction to their letter last Friday as an overreaction. Spokesman Brian Roehrkasse told the New York Times that "the department has 'no desire to block any Congressional investigation' and has not advised the C.I.A. against cooperating with the committee." And the AP relays that Department officials "denied they had changed their stance on the investigation."

And indeed, if you look at their letter to the committee from last Friday, where they "respectfully request" that the committee sit on their thumbs until the DoJ probes into the tapes' destruction wraps up, they have a point. They were just askin'. But somehow the graciousness and subtlety of the letter was lost on the House intelligence committee, who pronounced themselves "stunned" that the Department would move to block their investigation and said that, indeed, they'd been "notified that the Department of Justice has advised CIA not cooperate with our investigation."

Really, if the DoJ was just asking, it should have been pretty clear off the bat that the answer was "no." But apparently the threat of subpoenas was needed to drive the point home.

Now, while The Washington Post, straightforwardly calls this a reversal on the Department's part, the Times hedges, calling it a "partial resolution." Take, for instance, Roehrkasse (take him, please!):

“The wisdom, propriety and appropriateness of the decision to destroy these tapes are worthy and compelling subjects of an oversight investigation,” Mr. Roehrkasse said. But he said officials were still concerned that a Congressional inquiry could cause “disruption of our initial witness interviews, the delay and disruption of our document collection, and the tainting of any future criminal prosecutorial action because of Congressional grants of immunity to witnesses.”

Accordingly, things will get interesting when it comes to Jose Rodriguez, the CIA official who ordered the tapes' destruction. The committee wants to talk to him in January, along with Rizzo. But, with Rodriguez's lawyer crying about witchhunts and scapegoats, that's going to be hairy:

Officials said Mr. Rodriguez’s appearance before the committee might involve complex negotiations over legal immunity at a time when the Justice Department and the intelligence agency were reviewing whether the destruction of the tapes broke any laws.

So enjoy the inter-branch comity while it lasts.

Today, Mark Filip, the administration's nominee to be Michael Mukasey's deputy, had his confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. And much like his future boss did during his hearing, Filip (like Mukasey, a former federal judge) treaded lightly, seeming deferential while also proving elusive on certain key questions. Here's video:

When Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA ) asked whether waterboarding is torture, he punted, parroting Mukasey's answer exactly. Like Mukasey, Filip called the practice "repugnant." But stopped short, explaining that since Mukasey is conducting a review, he couldn't "get out in front of him on that question." He added: "if I am confirmed... I would view it like any other legal question and take a long hard look at it, and if I had a view other than his, I would tell him so."

Kennedy responded that after what Mukasey went through at his hearing, "We thought you'd be able to give a response."

When Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) pushed Filip on the Justice Department's recent stance that Congress had to sit on its thumbs until the Department finished its probe of the CIA's destruction of its torture tapes, he got pretty much the same result. To Specter, the issue is clear (see video below) that Congress has "pre-eminence over the Department of Justice on these investigations."

Specter asked if Filip agreed. He dodged: "I would hope, Senator, that I don't have to pick between the two." Some sort of agreement could be worked out with Congress, he said. When Specter tried again, all he got was "I would work very hard to find common ground."

The situation right now, to refresh your memory, is devoid of common ground. The Department has asked the CIA to refuse all Congressional requests until its probe wraps up.

But Specter said that he remains optimistic. He spoke with Mukasey the day before, he said, and hoped that conversation was just "the beginning" of more discussions.

Read more »

Abu Zubaydah was:

A) A high-ranking Al Qaeda operative who largely confounded U.S. interrogators with his literary and tactical genius until they submitted him to waterboarding and other forms of torture. After that, he provided key information that likely preempted future attacks.

B) A low-ranking and mentally ill Al Qaeda operative who provided valuable information under gentle questioning, but whose confessions made under torture were useless. Much of the threat information he provided was "crap."

A is the CIA's version (and the President's). B is the FBI's. And in today's Washington Post, Dan Eggen and Walter Pincus walk through the competing profiles. Zubaydah, remember, was one of the two detainees whose interrogations appeared on the destroyed CIA tapes.

It's clear off the bat that the version of events provided by John Kiriakou, the former CIA agent who launched something like a PR blitz last week, is not quite right. In his telling, Zubaydah held out until waterboarded; after only 35 seconds of that, he gave in and "from that day on, he answered every question."

By contrast, both CIA and FBI agents tell the Post that he provided valuable information before he was waterboarded. And there wasn't just one session: "Instead, [other former and current officials] said, harsh tactics used on him at a secret detention facility in Thailand went on for weeks or, depending on the account, even months."

And then you get to the real discrepancies.

A CIA agent says that Zubaydah was a "wily adversary" under questioning who seemed "very selective in what he protected and what he gave up."

Retired FBI agent Daniel Coleman, "who led an examination of documents after Abu Zubaida's capture in early 2002 and worked on the case," responded that Zubaydah was talking before he was waterboarded, but the CIA agents couldn't believe that he knew so little.

Coleman, in fact, emerges as an effective foil to Kiriakou (who, incidentally, participated in the capture of Zubaydah but wasn't present during the torture) in the piece. Coleman says that Zubaydah was a "safehouse keeper" for Al Qaeda who had suffered a serious head injury years earlier.

Zubaydah's mental instability was manifest in his diary, Coleman says, which was "written in three distinct personalities -- one younger, one older and one the same age as Abu Zubaida. The book was full of flowery and philosophical meanderings, and made little mention of terrorism or al-Qaeda."

Former CIA Director George Tenet, by contrast, writes in his book that Zubaydah used a "sophisticated literary device to express himself" in the diary.

And you get the impression that Tenet's reading is typical of the way the CIA agents tended to see Zubaydah:

Coleman said reports of Abu Zubaida's statements during his early, traditional interrogation were "consistent with who he was and what he would possibly know." He and other officials said that materials seized from Abu Zubaida's house and other locations, including names, telephone numbers and computer laptops, provided crucial information about al-Qaeda and its network.

But, Coleman and other law enforcement officials said, CIA officials concluded to the contrary that Abu Zubaida was a major player, and they saw any lack of information as evidence that he was resisting interrogation. Much of the threat information provided by Abu Zubaida, Coleman said, "was crap."

"There's an agency mind-set that there was always some sort of golden apple out there, but there just isn't, especially with guys like him," Coleman said.

Note: This tidbit reported by Newsweek last week seems worth noting here:

[The interrogation of Zubaydah] sparked an internal battle within the U.S. intelligence community after FBI agents angrily protested the aggressive methods that were used. In addition to waterboarding, Zubaydah was subjected to sleep deprivation and bombarded with blaring rock music by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. One agent was so offended he threatened to arrest the CIA interrogators, according to two former government officials directly familiar with the dispute.

Update: Here's Ron Suskind, the author of The One Percent Doctrine and who first reported what FBI agents were saying about Zubaydah, talking to Salon last year.

Add another name to the wall of fame. Newsweek reports that John Negroponte -- Mike McConnell's predecessor as director of national intelligence -- told then-CIA Director Porter Goss not to destroy the torture tapes. That instruction, apparently documented, is going to be crucial: advocates for Jose Rodriguez, the CIA official who destroyed the tapes in 2005, have said that they did not receive clear instructions from their superiors firmly telling them to preserve the recordings.

In the summer of 2005, then CIA director Porter Goss met with then national intelligence director John Negroponte to discuss a highly sensitive matter: what to do about the existence of videotapes documenting the use of controversial interrogation methods, apparently includ­ing waterboarding, on two key Al Qaeda suspects. The tapes were eventually de­stroyed, and congressional investigators are now trying to piece together an extensive paper trail documenting how and why it happened.

One crucial document they'll surely want to examine: a memo written after the meeting between Goss and Negroponte, which records that Negroponte strongly advised against destroying the tapes, according to two people close to the investigation, who asked for anonymity when discussing a sensitive matter. The memo is so far the only known documentation that a senior intel official warned that the tapes should not be destroyed. Spokespeople for the CIA and the intel czar's office declined to comment, citing ongoing investigations.

Tally it up. Advising against destruction were: Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) with Nancy Pelosi "concurring," Goss as both a congressman and CIA director, Harriet Miers, anonymous DOJ officials, and Negroponte. Those with an appetite for destruction were, of course, Rodriguez and, reportedly, lawyers within the CIA's operations directorate.

As Paul noted in the Must Read, the leaders of the House intelligence committee aren't exactly impressed by the Justice Department's attempt to halt their investigation of the destruction of the CIA's torture tapes. Reading the letter that Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Wainstein and CIA Inspector General John Helgerson sent to the committee, it's not hard to see why.

We've added the Wainstein-Helgerson letter to our document collection, and you can read it in its entirety here.

On Friday, Wainstein and Helgerson asked the House to shut down its probe. Their rationale? Avoiding needless duplication that would complicate the Justice/CIA IG "preliminary" inquiry into the tape destruction:

Based upon our review of the Committee's requests to date, we believe our inquiry will encompass the same documents and witnesses. Our ability to obtain the most reliable and complete information would likely be jeopardized if the CIA undertakes the steps necessary to respond to your requests in a comprehensive fashion at this time. This includes requests for interviews with [Inspector General's office employees], which the DOJ has determined to be problematic because they are potential witnesses in the matter under our inquiry.

What's missing from that explanation? Oh yeah -- an explanation of how the House inquiry would actually jeopardize the DOJ/CIA IG probe.

Just when you thought the GOP couldn't back torture any more. From the AP:

Senate Republicans blocked a bill Friday that would restrict the interrogation methods the CIA can use against terrorism suspects.

The legislation, part of a measure authorizing the government's intelligence activities for 2008, had been approved a day earlier by the House and sent to the Senate for what was supposed to be final action. The bill would require the CIA to adhere to the Army's field manual on interrogation, which bans waterboarding, mock executions and other harsh interrogation methods.

Senate opponents of that provision, however, discovered a potentially fatal parliamentary flaw: The ban on harsh questioning tactics had not been in the original versions of the intelligence bill passed by the House and Senate. Instead, it was a last-minute addition during negotiations between the two sides to write a compromise bill, a move that could violate Senate rules. The rule is intended to protect legislation from last-minute amendments that neither house of Congress has had time to fully consider.

The culprit? One-time torture opponent Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC). Graham: "I think quite frankly applying the Army field manual to the CIA would be ill-advised and would destroy a program that I think is lawful and helps the country." So torture is counterproductive for the military but valuable for the CIA?

Update: Yeah, yeah, I misspelled Lindsey Graham's name initially. Sorry, senator.

Let it be known: House Democrats oppose waterboarding -- the process of drowning a detainee that's so severe even those who think it "works" don't think we should do it -- and House Republicans support it. The House yesterday voted to restrict CIA interrogation methods to the Geneva Conventions-compliant provisions outlined in the Army's field manual on interrogation. The bill passed on a nearly party-line vote. President Bush, a self-described Christian, promises a veto.