The only effort being made is to protect the TORTURERS.  Never, ever, to protect the victims.  The victims, past and future, are not at risk.  They have no rights.  They exist only to be squeezed for information and then their shattered husks discarded while simultaneously prevented by Administrative Order from speaking out about their suffering or seeking redress for their pain.

In other words, all of us are in the hopper now.

Their lawyers should have known that and they should have gotten assurances from the FISA courts.

...there never was any legitimate justification for authorizing torture. There is no sufficient remedy for committing such a loathsome crime that does not involve 'removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust, or Profit under the United States.'

Human dignity demands nothing less. Yet, here we are...with a nominee for the position of Attorney General, the chief law enforcement officer of the Federal Government, who is precluded from calling 'waterboarding' a form of torture because, to do so, 'would put a lot of people at risk for what has happened.'

Joan Walsh at Salon has posted this video from Current TV that demonstrates what we are talking about here.  

I will give you her caveat:

I saw this video earlier this year when I first visited Current TV, and I couldn't get it out of my head. I'm glad to have it here. It's disturbing, but it makes Mukasey's dodge that much more outrageous.

There is no way someone can watch this video and still advocate or hold even a neutral view on waterboarding.  This is the very face of torture.  And our government is doing this in our name.

"Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity"

unfortunately, congress has already amply demonstrated that the LEAST they can do is dramatically less than any of us are capable of accepting... it may be an extremely hard pill to swallow, but we had better start accepting the fact that our democratic congressional leadership, in company with a good many other congressional democrats, are working hand-in-glove with congressional republicans and the executive branch on our democracy's "death by a thousand cuts..." if they haven't acted already, in the face of overwhelming abuses, violations and outright crimes committed by this presidential administration, what possible grounds do we have for thinking that they will do so now...? we are better advised to use our time and energy figuring out alternative ways to get our country back and restore our constitution... contacting my senator, harry reid, and receiving in reply, yet again, boilerplate that says nothing, backed up by no action or change in position, has definitely become an empty exercise...

visit my blog - http://www.takeitpersonally.blogspot.com/

"I'm not going to talk about techniques. There is an enemy out there. I don't want them to understand, to be able to adjust one way or the other," Bush told reporters.

"My view is this: The American people have got to understand the program is important and the techniques used are within the law, and members of the House and Senate know what I'm talking about, they have been fully briefed," he said.

Bush said questions to Mukasey about the program were "unfair" because "he doesn't know whether we use that technique or not."

So, if a Senator asks Mukasey if it would be legal for Dick Cheney to take a shotgun and shoot someone in the face, it would be an unfair question because Mukasey doesn't know whether Dick Cheney has shot someone in the face.  Oh wait...

These companies were assured that their cooperation was not only legal but also necessary because of their unique technical capabilities. They were also told it was their patriotic duty to help protect the country after the devastating attacks on our homeland.

I would bet you anything that's not what their lawyers told them, at least not at first. Corporate lawyers, whose job it is to protect the profits of the stockholders and company executive and board members collective asses, are some of the most cautious, risk-adverse people you can imagine. That's their job, after all, to advise against any action, practice or public statement that will hurt the company's bottom line.

However, that doesn't mean they will advise a company to NOT DO what it's planning to do, or to stop engaging in a profitable but potentially illegal or damaging action or means of doing business, if that's what the company really wants to do.  What they will do is come up with the CYA policies -- the "legal" approach to not solve the problem but keep the resulting shitstorm from getting the executives' suits dirty or cutting into the profit margins. Risk management doesn't mean "don't do things that instigate lawsuits or breaks the law" -- it means "find a way to pass the risk on to someone else, or otherwise make us not legally responsible for it."  

So what probably happened is their lawyers said "this is technically illegal. This puts our company at a huge risk of liability if this is investigated by, say, Congress, or the FCC, or the Justice Dept. Yes, of COURSE we want to do our patriotic duty. But you can see the RISK here, if this doesn't work out. So you have to assure us that in doing so, our company will never be held liable for the results. And never means not ever, regardless of whether this little deal becomes public or whether any information you receive from us ever goes missing, or never proves at all useful."  

And of course, the telecoms received that promise. They also got some concessions (apparently) on those pesky FCC regs and so on.  More consolidations would be approved. And the telecoms donated thousands to the re-election coffers of their "friends" in both parties (hedging their bets in case of a change in management).

And here's the thing. IF by some miracle (and I'm beginning to fear a miracle is what we need here), the telecoms do NOT get away clean, if they ARE held accountable, or at the very least, all the sordid details of the deal are laid bare and public opinion is sufficiently negative that the laws are tightened and those companies suffer financially enough to make an impression -- then the chances of any company doing something like this again are much MUCH reduced. Because Corporate Lawyers are such cautious, risk-adverse creatures, and they learn from other corporate lawyers' mistakes.

If they are NOT held accountable.... it will be even harder to do so the next time, and the crime will be worse, and have even greater cost and impact.

Precedent has a lot of weight. This needs to sink down deep.  

Keith Olbermann speaks for me.

If the Democrats had a spine (I know--keep dreaming) they would have hearings and demonstrate for the American people what waterboarding is.  I will volunteer.  Or better yet.  Make a public casting call for any right-wing hack, like Rush, to volunteer to be waterboarded as part of a "fact-finding" investigation .  Have a demonstration on the house floor.

Mukaskey says he doesn't know the details of what is involved . . . . let's show him and then let him decide.  Call a historian to testify about how the Spanish inquisitors did it.  We can have the Japanese show us how they did it.   Subpoena the military records of the people the U.S. HUNG for these crimes.

But that would make Hillary and Obama and the rest of the Democrat invertebrates look too radical . . . . I guess.  So America will go on excusing torture and providing immunity to tortuers.  

Thanks for reminding us all of the abosolute fact that crimes were committed . . . and Congress will do nothing except use the Mukasey hearings as a way to lift a little bit of weight off their consciences.  They will express their misgivings . . . then go right  back to giving Bush what he wants . .  an AG that does not prosecute torture.