On the other hand... Obama voted for FISA. He campaigned for Lieberman, and on and on.

But just imagine if this was the reaction to any other crime?

I said huh?

Most people on the site heartily applauded the sentiment, being very protective of Obama. But one wise person spoke up and said Obama is not a liberal but a centrist. Therefore he/she never expected a liberal oasis. And if people actually want Obama to move more leftward on issues like this one, they need to let their displeasure with his position be known. Objecting to his stance on an issue is not "disloyalty." Etc. It was a great response. But I'm pretty sure it sailed over the heads of the others who were engaging in some fierce Obamalove.

I think the left blogosphere overestimates its importance in general, which is demonstrated by Obama's actions on FISA, Rick Warren, prosecution of those who tore up our Constitution and our honor, the bank bailouts....And their fawning behavior demonstrates why that is: most aren't so much about principles as they are about winning, just like the DLC folks they savaged throughout the primaries--and before. Their attacks on "despicable pragmatists" like the Clintons were just like parakeets attacking their own images.

Personally, I have nothing against pragmatism--as long as certain core Constitutional principles and personal liberties are protected. When they aren't, it's time to speak out.

From President Ford's pardon of Richard Nixon in 1974 to Iran Contra and the presidential election fraud in 1980, drugs for arms, election fraud and other abuses, the Bush Administration's secret prisons and torture is just the latest manifestation of Republican dishonesty in a string of abuses that has encouraged and empowered repetitive lawbreaking.

President Obama says we should move forward and we shouldn't be vindictive, but that's really not the point.  We don't even know the extent of who was involved in the lawbreaking this time.  Holding officials accountable isn't vindictiveness, it's a way to ensure that this never happens again.  The little we already know requires prosecution under the rule of law.  When we excuse high level lawbreakers in the interests of "moving forward instead of dwelling on the past," we embolden them to commit more and more crimes that tear down our democracy.  At the very least, we must know the full truth to prevent it from recurring.

Our inability to prosecute unethical and illegal activities degrades our democracy and make a laughingstock of American justice and the rule of law.  We have a wildly popular Democratic president suggesting we do the same thing Ford and others did - let bygones be bygones.  But you cannot move forward without dealing with the past. In fact, there needs to be a serious reckoning before any sense of reconciliation can be achieved, especially since the characters corrupting our government are repeat offenders.  Cheney was a congressional intern in 1969 during Nixon's presidency.  He was on Donald Rumsfeld team when Rumsfeld from 1969-70.  He was White House Staff Assistant in 1971, and involved in other offices until 1975, when he suggested in a memo to Rumsfeld that Ford should use the Justice Department in legally questionable ways to exact retribution for an article published by The NY Times investigative reporter Seymour Hersh.  Sound familiar?  Would the Bush Administration have acted more responsibly if the Nixon Administration had been held to task for breaking the law?  Absolutely.  Would Cheney be have been our VP if more people knew about his devious and questionable activities.  I hope not.

The name of the game is getting away with it, and Republicans are experts.  These memos describe grotesque war crimes legalized by those who benefit from destroying our great nation.  The Bybee memo just released seems like a legal authorization and preemptive point-by-point legalistic excuse for why the laws against torture don't apply to what they wanted to do.  In fact, it reads like somebody (perhaps Cheney) told them to go figure out a legal defense for why what they intended to do wouldn't be, strictly speaking, torture.

So how do we fix this mess?  The Truth Commission should investigate and recommended policy changes, and a special prosecutor should be assigned to give the investigation some teeth.  We start with indictments, then move quickly to trials, convictions, and punishment.  Indict them, and some of them will turn tail and rat out the bosses rather than fall on their swords. Obama could grant clemency and commute their sentences providing they admit wrongdoing and testify against those in power who ordered them to do what they did.  I personally don't think Bush did much at all in terms of governing.  I think he was a puppet of oil interests and war profiteers.  I'd like to take down the real movers and shakers.  We need to get to the truth to destroy the power structure that has hamstrung our democracy for the past fifty years.

We're no better than Serbia -- or that is the lesson many will draw.  And it is hard to lecture Cuba, or China, or anyone else when we cannot uphold the rule of law on torture in our own country.

Today in Iraq the report is that Iraqi men perceived as gay are being tortured and killed by having flesh-binding glue put in their anuses, followed by laxatives.  

The most basic point, the key here, is to make sure that we have a general societal agreement that torture is wrong.  A finding that it doesn't work would be nice to. Once you start to prosecute, all kinds of forces are put into play....Lt. Calley was supported by many, many people while he was being tried....He was convicted, served a small amount of time on house arrest, and then was free....I believe his prosecution actually created more sympathy for him than for those he and Capt. Medina butchered.

We need to brand Cheney, Bybee and Yoo as the monsters that they are.  We need a public consensus on that point.  It would be nice to prosecute them but in reality that would tend to draw too much sympathy to people "who were just defending their country."  Those who oppose torture have the public with them--now.  Cheney and his ilk could become martyrs in the eyes of many.  And they could win at trial.  There is no sure thing here...

I think the best way is to start disbarment proceedings in California against Bybee where he sits on the Ninth Circuit, and against Yoo where he teaches (assuming both are members of the California Bar.)

Keep pressuring for a special prosecutor and it will happen.  Feinstien wants a Senate investigation.  While I wouldn't trust her on this issue put Sheldon whitehouse on the committee and it will bring to light the facts and demonstrate the need for a Special Prosecutor.

In order to avoid the naming of a prosecutor as a "cave in to the left," or "political retribution"  and creating an all consuming  sideshow that derails other Obama Administration initiatives, the case needs to be made slowly and surely before the jury, which is the American public.  The release of these memos is a good step... They should release whatever the Hell Cheney is talking about too, I doubt there's anything that will help out that paranoid creep.  

We could very well have an impeachmnet of Bybee and a real trial in the Senate which could bring to light more facts.

Obama/Rahm's notion of "move on move on nothing to see here, move along" is just not ok.

It's an expression of numbing and avoidance -- gee, come to think of it, isn't that one of the prime symptom categories of PTSD?

Why, yes it is!