Obama's Self Evaluation of the First 100 Days

In case you missed it, Obama went on prime time TV last night to tell the nation that he's doing a wonderful job, and to assure us that everything is coming up roses.  While I will not attempt to parse Obama's entire address last night, I do think a couple of points are worth making:

The media loves this guy. Dick Morris (former Clinton advisor) made the point after the address that during Clinton's first term (four years) the news media only allowed him two prime time addresses outside of the State of the Union addresses.  In three months, Obama has had three. I don't have the data to show how many Bush was allowed, but outside of his State of the Union addresses and outside of a couple of national emergencies (9/11 and the beginning of two wars) I doubt he had more than three in his whole eight years in ofice.

The questions asked were mostly softball questions.  Yes, this is a matter of opinion, but let's face it.  We are in the middle of a Depression, the likes of which hasn't been seen since the 1930's, and nobody asked him about the economy.  

The more important points made during his address were regarding "interrogation techniques."  

Before I address his answer, I want to make the following point:  What the Bush administration calls "interrogation techniques", the democrats are very carefully wording "torture."  "Bush used torture to...."  They want to paint Bush as Hitler.  They have wanted to do this since he came into office. They tried to tie the Bush legacy to the Iraq war for the last 4 years of his presidency. When it looked like we were actually going to win the Iraq war, the switch tactics and are now trying to tie torture to the Bush legacy.  This is about politics and elections, not about moral standards. If they can convince people that Bush was Hitler and he tortured people, they can use that in national elections for the next 30 years.

Back to Obama....

Obama made it clear that he would never use "enhanced interrogation techniques" even if it meant saving American lives. The interesting thing about that answer is that he considers his opinion that these techniques are wrong to be more important than national security and the lives of the American people. That's a huge amount of arrogance, as far as I'm concerned. 

There will be another attack on US soil by Islamoterrorists.  I'm convinced of that.  I'm also fairly certain, that they will attempt one within the next four years.  What if a loved one of yours lost his or her life, and that could have been prevented by withholding food from a known terrorist for 36 or 48 hours? Nothing that would have caused permanent harm.  Just a little temporary hunger.  How would you feel about Obama's insistence that he's right and the CIA and the Bush administration were wrong?

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Security Before Politics

Porter J. Goss writes the following for the Washington Post:

Since leaving my post as CIA director almost three years ago, I have remained largely silent on the public stage. I am speaking out now because I feel our government has crossed the red line between properly protecting our national security and trying to gain partisan political advantage. We can't have a secret intelligence service if we keep giving away all the secrets. Americans have to decide now.

A disturbing epidemic of amnesia seems to be plaguing my former colleagues on Capitol Hill. After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, members of the committees charged with overseeing our nation's intelligence services had no higher priority than stopping al-Qaeda. In the fall of 2002, while I was chairman of the House intelligence committee, senior members of Congress were briefed on the CIA's "High Value Terrorist Program," including the development of "enhanced interrogation techniques" and what those techniques were. This was not a one-time briefing but an ongoing subject with lots of back and forth between those members and the briefers.

Today, I am slack-jawed to read that members claim to have not understood that the techniques on which they were briefed were to actually be employed; or that specific techniques such as "waterboarding" were never mentioned. It must be hard for most Americans of common sense to imagine how a member of Congress can forget being told about the interrogations of Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed. In that case, though, perhaps it is not amnesia but political expedience.

Let me be clear. It is my recollection that:

-- The chairs and the ranking minority members of the House and Senate intelligence committees, known as the Gang of Four, were briefed that the CIA was holding and interrogating high-value terrorists.

-- We understood what the CIA was doing.

-- We gave the CIA our bipartisan support.

-- We gave the CIA funding to carry out its activities.

-- On a bipartisan basis, we asked if the CIA needed more support from Congress to carry out its mission against al-Qaeda.

I do not recall a single objection from my colleagues. They did not vote to stop authorizing CIA funding. And for those who now reveal filed "memorandums for the record" suggesting concern, real concern should have been expressed immediately -- to the committee chairs, the briefers, the House speaker or minority leader, the CIA director or the president's national security adviser -- and not quietly filed away in case the day came when the political winds shifted. And shifted they have.

Circuses are not new in Washington, and I can see preparations being made for tents from the Capitol straight down Pennsylvania Avenue. The CIA has been pulled into the center ring before. The result this time will be the same: a hollowed-out service of diminished capabilities. After Sept. 11, the general outcry was, "Why don't we have better overseas capabilities?" I fear that in the years to come this refrain will be heard again: once a threat -- or God forbid, another successful attack -- captures our attention and sends the pendulum swinging back. There is only one person who can shut down this dangerous show: President Obama.

Unfortunately, much of the damage to our capabilities has already been done. It is certainly not trust that is fostered when intelligence officers are told one day "I have your back" only to learn a day later that a knife is being held to it. After the events of this week, morale at the CIA has been shaken to its foundation.

We must not forget: Our intelligence allies overseas view our inability to maintain secrecy as a reason to question our worthiness as a partner. These allies have been vital in almost every capture of a terrorist.

The suggestion that we are safer now because information about interrogation techniques is in the public domain conjures up images of unicorns and fairy dust. We have given our enemy invaluable information about the rules by which we operate. The terrorists captured by the CIA perfected the act of beheading innocents using dull knives. Khalid Sheik Mohammed boasted of the tactic of placing explosives high enough in a building to ensure that innocents trapped above would die if they tried to escape through windows. There is simply no comparison between our professionalism and their brutality.

Our enemies do not subscribe to the rules of the Marquis of Queensbury. "Name, rank and serial number" does not apply to non-state actors but is, regrettably, the only question this administration wants us to ask. Instead of taking risks, our intelligence officers will soon resort to wordsmithing cables to headquarters while opportunities to neutralize brutal radicals are lost.

The days of fortress America are gone. We are the world's superpower. We can sit on our hands or we can become engaged to improve global human conditions. The bottom line is that we cannot succeed unless we have good intelligence. Trading security for partisan political popularity will ensure that our secrets are not secret and that our intelligence is destined to fail us.

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U.N. Official Blasts Obama's Decision not to Prosecute CIA Operatives

According to Manfred Nowak, an Austrian who serves as a U.N. torture investigator, Obama's decision not to prosecute CiA operatives who used questionable interrogation practices violates international law.

"They are party to the convention and the convention is very, very clear," Nowak said.  "The fact that you carried out an order doesn't relieve you of your responsibility."  

What Nowak omitted, however, makes things less clear.  The Geneva convention, to which he was referring, specifically prohibits torture of soldiers in an army.  It does not refer to terrorists.  The distinction is an important one, from a legal standpoint, regardless of which side of the "to torture or not to torture" issue you fall on.

This is another instance in which I must give Obama credit.  He made the correct decision here.  If you prosecute people in an administration for matters of policy, particularly when that policy is deemed legal by lawyers within the administration, it would be a huge mistake. Any future administration official or anyone in government working under that official would be at risk for retroactive punishment in any future administration that did not like that policy.

While I disagree with most of what Obama stands for, he has shown the ability to make the right call on occasion.  This is one of those times.

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Report Indicates CIA "Tortured" prisoners

The International Red Cross released a report today indicating that the CIA  allowed practices that amounted to "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment of al queda prisoners.

The secret report strongly implies that the United States violated international law prohibiting torture and mistreatment of prisoners.  ICRC officials were granted exclusive access to "high-value" detainees in Guantanamo Bay.  The prisoners gave detailed accounts of their "torture" which included sleep deprivation and being held naked while listening to constant music.

The CIA did not comment, but an official familiar with the report noted that the claims were not witnessed by Red Cross officials and were "unsubstantiated."  The claims came from terrorist, themselves.

The news article this comes from did not mention that no US prisoners were beheaded or permanently maimed while in US custody, as would happen had they been in the "custody" of our enemies in the war on terror.  Nor was their any mention of the fact that the US allows the ICRC access to our prisons and prisoners to investigate abuses, while many other nations do not.

I, for one, applaud the CIA and the previous administration for using whatever means necessary to keep us safe.  I doubt the current administration will be as successful in the war on terror, since they are allowing political considerations to hamper their ability to deal appropriately with terrorist groups and terrorist nations.  

Instead, the current administration wants to sit down for tea with those who want to kill us.

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