WSJ:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pressed the case for creation of a special “truth commission” to investigate the interrogation of terror suspects during the Bush administration. The California Democrat said several House committees already are examining the issue amid concerns that brutal tactics were used. But in a roundtable meeting Wednesday with reporters, she suggested “it might be further useful to have such a commission so that it removes all doubt that how we protect the American people is in a values-based way.”

Good on speaker Pelosi. Speaking for me only

ABC:

Sen. Patrick Leahy pledged today that if he cannot get the votes to create a bipartisan commission to investigate U.S. torture policy under former President George W. Bush -- and regardless of calls by President Obama that any inquiry be bipartisan -- he'll conduct his own partisan inquiry in the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Good on Leahy.

speaking for me only

Greg Sargent and Steve Benen do some incredible contortions to try and spin Obama Administration Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair's inaccurate and inexcusable rationalization for torture. Blair wrote a memo that states:

“High value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qa’ida organization that was attacking this country,” Adm. Dennis C. Blair, the intelligence director, wrote in a memo to his staff last Thursday.

. . . “I like to think I would not have approved those methods in the past,” he wrote, “but I do not fault those who made the decisions at that time, and I will absolutely defend those who carried out the interrogations within the orders they were given.”

(Emphasis supplied.) Blair becomes the first witness for the defense of those who enacted the torture policies, and Sargent and Benen can not wish that away. For Blair, the use of torture is just a "policy difference," proving John Hinderaker of Powerline right. The fact is Blair is unfit to serve. He should resign. More . . .

UPDATE - Blair sounds like a problem to me.

Sandy Levinson noted that President Obama said to the CIA yesterday that:

What makes the United States special and what makes you special is precisely the fact that we are willing to uphold our values and our ideals even when it’s hard, not just when it’s easy, even when we are afraid and under threat, not just when its expedient to do so....

However, President Obama's Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair said upon the release of the torture memos:

AP:

President Barack Obama . . . is leaving the door to open to possible prosecution of Bush administration officials who devised harsh terrorism-era interrogation tactics. . . . Obama did say . . . he could support a Hill investigation if it were conducted in a bipartisan way. [President Obama] also said that it is up to the attorney general whether to prosecute Bush administration lawyers who wrote the memos approving these tactics.

Rahmbo and Gibbs are contradicted by the President. Clearly a walkback. What will it mean? We'll find out. Video on the flip.

More . . .

Scott Shane and Peter Baker:

Pressure mounted on President Obama on Monday for more thorough investigation into harsh interrogations of terrorism suspects under the Bush administration . . . Mr. Obama said it was time to admit “mistakes” and “move forward.” But there were signs that he might not be able to avoid a protracted inquiry into the use of interrogation techniques that the president’s top aides and many critics say crossed the line into torture.

More . . .

Like me, Sully sees Cheney's request for more disclosure on torture as an opportunity for a Truth Commission:

[T]his seems to me to be a real opportunity to set up the Truth Commission many of us have been asking for. Release all the data on the torture - all of it - alongside the intelligence we got from it. . . . This will take time - and should be done carefully and exhaustively. But it is vital if the US is to remain within the legal and moral bounds of Western civilization.

I agree. See also Jason Zengerle, Spencer Ackerman, Jules Crittenden, and others. Speaking for me only

Laura Rozen:

Goss has given only one on-the-record interview on these CIA controversies since leaving the CIA director job. In the December 2007 interview, he said that Congressional leaders including Representatives Pelosi and Harman, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) and Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS), had been briefed on CIA waterboarding back in 2002. "Among those being briefed, there was a pretty full understanding of what the CIA was doing," Goss told the Washington Post. "And the reaction in the room was not just approval, but encouragement." Who was the lone person the article identified as objecting to the program? Jane Harman.

[MORE . . .]

Via Drudge (reporting on Fox News, so should be reliable):

CHENEY: One of the things that I find a little bit disturbing about this recent disclosure is they put out the legal memos, the memos that the CIA got from the Office of Legal Counsel, but they didn't put out the memos that showed the success of the effort. And there are reports that show specifically what we gained as a result of this activity. They have not been declassified. I formally asked that they be declassified now. . . I've now formally asked the CIA to take steps to declassify those memos so we can lay them out there and the American people have a chance to see what we obtained and what we learned and how good the intelligence was, as well as to see this debate over the legal opinions.

Fair enough. Let's get it ALL out there, not just the memos Cheney wants out there. Sounds like Cheney is in on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Let's do it.

Speaking for me only

From TPM, Representative Jane Harman's office responds to the CQ story:

Congresswoman Harman has never contacted the Justice Department about its prosecution of present or former AIPAC employees and the Department has never informed her that she was or is the subject of or involved in an investigation. If there is anything about this story that should arouse concern, it is that the Bush Administration may have been engaged in electronic surveillance of members of the congressional Intelligence Committees.

Assuming this is true, Harman has a strong point. I also find it incredibly ironic that some folks who have been quiet as church mouses on the Obama Administration's policies on Bush Administration abuses (or even before, see Senator Obama's cave in on FISA) have been on the attack against Harman.

For the record, my previous view of Rep. Harman on FISA, warrantless wiretapping and the value of primaries. See also this and this. Harman was converted on FISA long before this story broke, due to pressure from the Left flank and a primary challenge from Marcy Winograd. It did not come today. Speaking for me only

The explosive CQ story (this post provides a good basis for doubting the story as reported) regarding an alleged telephone conversation between Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) and a "suspected Israeli agent" turns on the identity of the "suspected Israeli agent" Harman was is alleged to have conspired with. Josh Marshall thinks it was Power Rangers mogul Haim Saban, an American citizen, staunch supporter of all things Israel, and a significant Democratic contributor. Marcy Wheeler thinks it was Naor Gilon, an Israeli citizen suspected of being a spy. Who the conversation was with is crucial under FISA: