Bush Administration Officials Could be Charged for Formulating Torture Program

Obama says memos that were released reflect the U.S. having lost moral bearings. Hoping to not prejudge the matter, he will defer to the Attorney General.

(SALEM, Ore.) - While many Americans may be reluctant to believe it, there does appear to be a real possibility that members of the Bush Administration could face charges for creating the programs used to torture people in U.S. custody.

The word came during a press conference today, that followed President Barack Obama's meeting with longtime U.S. ally, King Abdullah of Jordan.

This new development stems from interrogation memos that were released last week. While Obama was clear then about not wanting to prosecute those who were instructed to carry out the actual torture, he stated clearly today that those who formulated the program, are not necessarily off the hook.

Obama says this has been a difficult chapter in our history, and he called last week's announcement about the immunity of CIA torture operatives one of the tougher decisions that he's had to make as President.

"For those who carried out some of these operations within the four corners of legal opinions or guidance that had been provided from the White House, I do not think it's appropriate for them to be prosecuted."

Obama continued, his statement "Having said that, the OLC memos that were released reflected, in my view, us losing our moral bearings. That's why I've discontinued those enhanced interrogation programs."

"With respect to those who formulated those legal decisions, I would say that that is going to be more of a decision for the Attorney General within the parameters of various laws, and I don't want to prejudge that. I think that there are a host of very complicated issues involved there."

Obama said if and when there needs to be a further accounting of what took place during this period, Congress will have to to examine ways that it can be done in a bipartisan fashion, outside of the typical hearing process that can sometimes break down and break it entirely along party lines.

Or he added, "to the extent that there are independent participants who are above reproach and have credibility, that would probably be a more sensible approach to take."

The President says what makes America special in his view, includes history and diversity.

"It's that we are willing to uphold our ideals even when they're hard. And sometimes we make mistakes because that's the nature of human enterprise. But when we do make mistakes, then we are willing to go back and correct those mistakes and keep our eye on those ideals and values that have been passed on generation to generation."

Obama is clear that he believes we should as a nation be moving forward, and not looking backwards, but the opening of this idea of prosecuting Bush officials is something that he believes must remain on the table as an idea.

"And so I'm not suggesting that that should be done, but I'm saying, if you've got a choice, I think it's very important for the American people to feel as if this is not being dealt with to provide one side or another political advantage but rather is being done in order to learn some lessons so that we move forward in an effective way."

The reflective look at U.S. torture policy is one of many things, the President says, on his plate right now.

As far as how this would sit with the American public, it is important to look back to the mid-1970's note how quickly people dropped their support of Richard M. Nixon after his Impeachment. Even some of his close allies couldn't put enough distance between themselves and the former President.

While the idea of going after Bush officials for torture will be distasteful to many, just the possibility that it could be looked at objectively, while holding upper officials to the law of the land, is something that will undoubtedly sit well with many Americans

Tim King is a former U.S. Marine with twenty years of experience on the west coast as a television news producer, photojournalist, reporter and assignment editor. In addition to his role as a war correspondent, this Los Angeles native serves as Salem-News.com's Executive News Editor.
Tim spent the winter of 2006/07 in Afghanistan with Oregon troops. Tim recently returned from Iraq where he covered the war there while embedded with an Oregon Guard aviation unit. Serving the community in very real terms, Salem-News.com is the nation's only truly independent high traffic news Website, affiliated with Google News and several other major search engines and news aggregators.
You can send Tim an email at this address: newsroom@salem-news.com

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Nam Vet April 22, 2009 1:41 pm (Pacific time)

Editor: I never stated that there were different interpretations of torture, but that the Geneva Convention rules were written for "uniformed" (as in clothing) combatants, not freelancers in civilian clothes, aka Jihadist's. There was nothing inaccurate about my below post. It is obvious that until the Obama Administration releases the memo's (which the intelligence community has requested) that coordinate the "harsh interrogations" with the information that saved American lives (which members of the intelligence community state was what happened) we will not see the complete picture. I feel confident that they will surface in a timely manner though, regardless if Obama tries to engage in a cover-up, which he has a demonstrated pattern of doing going back many years, not just to the past Stimulus Bill. They will not prosecute anyone, this is political theatre because Obama's numbers have been in steady decline and they want a distraction, that's what the radical left does, always has, always will, but it is not as effective, except for those who cannot think in a critical fashion. You must know that top congressmen and senators were constantly briefed and signed on to all tactics being used to protect the homeland? Regarding my military background, we went to Vietnam, (besides the set-up democrat LBJ designed in the 1964 Gulf of Tonkin), because of the Southeast Asian Treaty Organization which we are members, which is written similarily as our committment to NATO. I spent several tours there, and before going there I went to the Dominican Republic in 1965 and got my first firefight under my belt. I never witnessed any torture by us but can certainly attest to the torture tactics of the NVA and the VC. When those "memo's" are released or leaked (not by the NY Times or Wash. Post--not in their self-interest this time) there will be more objective debate on what really constitutes torture. This will happen! Just 3% of the voters need to switch their perspectives about Obama's mishandling of literally everything he has done. He is bad news, complete moron. He and his wife both flunked the bar exam. Ergo, neither of them practised law, just affirmative action con people controlled by the people who want Israel to control that part of the world. They will to, because the far left radicals are playing right into their hands. It has been my experience that those of us who have been in combat have a much better understanding of just what constitutes real torture v.s. responsible intelligence gathering. I can see that the Obama supporters are not happy with how things are playing out for him, but you should realize an important characteristic of a leader is to be a good judge of character. Look at the quality of Obama's appointments (actually the zionists made them). Look at the recent headline: "Canada: Napolitano blames Canadian border for entry of 9/11 terrorists The Examiner ^ | April 22, 2009 | Heather Hogue Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano suggested the Canadian's were responsible for allowing the 9/11 perpetrators to enter the United States. (Excerpt) Read more at www.examiner.com ..."

scott April 22, 2009 12:02 pm (Pacific time)

was Nam Vet's post any more partisan to your editorial eyes than Henry's?

Editor: Henry is a dedicated Salem-New.com writer who has been with us almost five years. If you don't understand how this works I can't help you. The comment section is not intended to give people a place to spread unsubstantianted information, simple as that.

Henry Ruark April 22, 2009 10:09 am (Pacific time)

To all: Nam Vet response reveals rapidly via tone, words chosen, even grammar, the precise form and content from many-such here and on other channels. See upcoming Op Ed for more detail on huge damages this is now doing to once-reliable mirror of public opinion, to guide legitimate pressures on public officials for policy and action. IF 'Nam-er is legitimate, let him so show, simple note to Editor as demanded. If NOT received, that's prima facie evidence of malign intent, per Editor insights. Any true patriot will so respond rapidly to make case for others thus put under same shadow --peripheral damage of abusive use here, little realized but becoming all too pervasive across Internet.

Nam Vet April 22, 2009 9:13 am (Pacific time)

I find that people often have different standards and interpretations of what torture is. For example thousands of our military and intelligence personnel have been waterboarded as part of their training. There has not been one case where any of these individuals suffered any physical damage nor lingering emotional/mental after-affects. For sure if you go kill terrorists, say in Afghanistan with missles/bombs at their residences when they are with their families, killing women and children, well I would call this far worse than water-boarding. After the 9/11 attack we also came under a spreading Anthrax attack, most Americans certainly would not have assumed that after 7 1/2 years later we would not be attacked again. Who knows what other enemy activity was going on at the time that the government needed to keep under wraps because they did not want to expose their counter-intelligence methods? My hope is that we find out if so-called harsh interogations were part of the reason we have not had subsequent attacks in the homeland since 9/11. I also would like to point out the Geneva Convention rules were written for uniformed combatants, not the terrorists. Maybe they should develop some special code for these people. I would like to observe that process.

Editor: OK Nam Vet, I am starting to see that you are another right wing agenda driver. I think most of what you said here is not even slightly true. I also seriously doubt that you are a Vietnam Veteran. At this point, if you want to post anything like this, you will need to send an email to the newsroom and demonstrate that you are who you are. Salem-News.com is here to educate people and we are seriously reeling in the BS in the comment section. There are not different interpretations of torture, that is meaningless. There are no credentials for people who leave comments and the last thing I am going to do is allow anyone to rewrite history. What betrays you? The very last thing you wrote. In Vietnam the same excuse was used for torture; that Americans were criminals for being in Vietnam and therefore not subject to any international rules of war. We are better than that.

Henry Ruark April 22, 2009 8:33 am (Pacific time)

Scott et al: The "terrorist" "war" is a wellknown propaganda ploy. It substitutes an open and very flexible designation for a very definable, specific, locatable and physical force. By so doing it allows the ploy-user to shape the true situation as needed for a range of [urposes, and to keep in full shadow who, what, where, and why "the enemy" may be. IF you do not know, cannot find out for sure, or have any political purposes to conceal and protect,it is very useful. Most to whom it is directed have no way to check or test, so it often is well accepted. Little doubt remains that the Bush neocon cabal so used the term, driven by necessity and incompetent intel after 9/11. We suffer from inability to define, isolate, and fully addresss the whole class of real enemies for our nation due to the manipulative use of this maneuver by that cabal.

Scott April 21, 2009 8:55 pm (Pacific time)

Tim, you said “In the heat of battle, if an enemy was actually under a gun, and had vital information, and it was the here and now... then excessive force would probably get some answers”. Your example of justified extraordinary measures is interesting. Are we at war with terrorists? If it’s not a war what is it? If we are, where is that terrorist war battlefield? Even if you don’t think we’re at war, terrorist leaders still tell their subordinates to bring the war to U.S. soil, and that we are at war. We're at war constantly with an enemy prefers not to engage our armed forces on a traditional "battlefield" which fits your example. Terrorists explicitly advocate murdering non-combatant U.S. Citizens. In our enemies eyes every U.S. Citizen is a fair target, all day every day everywhere. The “heat of battle” occurs on hostile foreign sands, and also in the interrogation room. It’s certainly arguable that the “heat of battle” was occurring the morning of 9/11, it’s just that folks didn’t realize it was happening as they were checking in boarding passes.

Henry Ruark April 21, 2009 7:06 pm (Pacific time)

To all: Most thinking Americans familiar with past situations to which Tim's elegant story refers will find his coverage and conclusion right on target for tested American values and beliefs. For others,try "mirror test" of facing self, responding to what your mother taught you re respecting life and liberty and the rights of others. You may find it improves tolerance for totality of the situation; and may even help for what we as a nation should surely want all others to believe we believe and try to live. For those sharp enough to read closely, President O's statement today comes as no great surprise. Given time and the slow workings of justice, built in to assure that it IS justice, let us see what is the final result. I.e.: Patience and again Patience !!

April 21, 2009 4:29 pm (Pacific time)

Barack Hussain Obama is lying like alway...

Editor: You have bothered us enough for the day April or whatever your name is, take a nice hike somewhere, will ya?

Trying to be an Independent thinker April 21, 2009 4:44 pm (Pacific time)

Tim, your article is slanted so steeply to the left I had to take a dozen runs at it before i could get through the whole thing. But this one thing would help me understand you better - please tell me what methods of torture, or what idea of torture, you are thinking of when you use the term "torture".

Tim King: Actually rather than left, I think 'humanitarian' would work. I appreciate that you are asking a fair question, and my answer is probably not something I can accurately state here. On the battlefield, pretty much anything goes. In the heat of battle, if an enemy was actually under a gun, and had vital information, and it was the here and now... then excessive force would probably get some answers. Anything that was totally legit probably wouldn't be anything we would ever hear of or know of in the first place. I dropped my membership with the American Legion when they had on their magazine cover one month, "Why not torture?" Are you old enough to remember the Vietnam War? Then President Nixon failed to pay $2.2 billion in war reparations for the single reason, that our forces were tortured. Americans were horrified to think of our pilots and soldiers and Marines in those situations. So he and Kissinger decided not to provide what they as men agreed to, and the Vietnamese kept the rest of our POW's, simple as that. The people you can thank beyond them are John Kery and John McCain. All of our remaining people were left to rot. The point is that Americans 30 years ago were so disgusted with the idea of torture, they couldn't get over it. Thirty years later and we become the people our enemies were?. If you write to me I can send you links to all of these things. tim@salem-news.com Have you ever seen The Deerhunter? As moral people, supposedly somewhat religious, I have no idea how anyone could in any way believe that actually torturing people is OK. Please remember that Iraq didn't even do anything to us. Droves of prisoners who were tortured had been misidentified as terrorists and since released. As I said it isn't an answer that can easily be provided here. My heart breaks honestly that any person would feel otherwise, but this is the nation that bombs away in the name of Christianity. I think God is very disappointed. I basically would authorize no procedure that I would want somebody doing to my kid, who served two tours in Iraq.

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