The Magnificent Seven riding herd on Panetta

Ex-CIA directors urge Obama to drop abuse probe

AFP

WASHINGTON — Seven former CIA directors have called on US President Barack Obama to end a probe into claims the agency abused terror suspects, warning it will cause “serious damage” to intelligence operations.

The former intelligence chiefs, appointed by both Democrat and Republican presidents, in a letter to Obama called on him to end the Justice Department inquiry, warning it would make agents more reticent to act for fear of prosecution.

“This approach will seriously damage the willingness of many other intelligence officers to take risks to protect the country,” the group stated.

Warning of “endless criminal investigations,” the seven said allegations of detainee abuse had already been probed, with the supervision of federal prosecutors.

“Attorney General (Eric) Holder’s decision to re-open the criminal investigation creates an atmosphere of continuous jeopardy for those whose cases the Department of Justice had previously declined to prosecute,” the letter read.

The signatories warned that the investigation could jeopardize relations with other nations that had co-operated with investigations, on the proviso of secrecy.

Though not a signatory to the letter, current CIA Director Leon Panetta also opposed Holder’s investigation.

“I think the reason I felt the way I did is because I don’t believe there’s a basis there for any kind of additional action,” Panetta said.

“My concern is … that we don’t get trapped by the past. My feeling is ultimately, we’re going to be able to move on,” he told reporters this week after a speech in Michigan.

Is Leon Panetta up to the job?

I think not!

…………zzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

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CIA refuses to release torture probe documents

Middle East Online, Sep 3, 2009

Documents show ‘assistance provided by certain foreign governments’

US spy agency says further documents too sensitive to release amid public shock in America.

WASHINGTON – The CIA has refused to release further documents related to its controversial suspect rendition, detention and interrogation programs.

In a 33-page court statement made public on Tuesday, the Central Intelligence Agency said the documents contained sensitive information “that implicates intelligence activities, sources and methods, and information relating to the foreign relations and activities of the United States.”

Last month the Department of Justice revealed details of a report by a CIA inspector general that outlined methods used during interrogations of suspects during the presidency of George W. Bush, including threats of rape of family members of detainees and murdering their children.

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U.S. government withholds information about Bagram detainees

By Danielle Kurtzleben, Inter Press Service News

WASHINGTON, Aug 14 (IPS) – The U.S. government continues to withhold even the most basic information about prisoners in the Bagram detention facility in Afghanistan, according to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), a New York-based legal rights organisation.

An April 2009 ACLU Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for documents and information about the detainment of prisoners at Bagram has yielded dead ends with both the Department of Defence (DOD) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

The ACLU wants the Obama Administration to make these records public, including information about “the number of people currently detained at Bagram, their names, citizenship, place of capture and length of detention, as well as records pertaining to the process afforded those prisoners to challenge their detention and designation as ‘enemy combatants.’”

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Bush’s torture legacy haunts the US

By Mark LeVine, Al Jazeera, Aug 8, 2009

Some human rights groups want Obama to investigate top Bush administration officials [GETTY]

Somewhere in the borderlands between Afghanistan and Pakistan, Bowe Bergdahl, a US soldier, is being held captive by the Taliban.

The threat of execution hangs over him if the US does not agree to the still unspecified demands of his captors.

Bergdahl is the first US soldier captured in Afghanistan since the 2001 invasion and the circumstances of his capture, which occurred around July 1 outside a US military base in Helmand Province, remain unclear.

But in the wake of years of revelations of abuses by US personnel of Iraqis in Abu Ghraib, and of alleged Taliban or al-Qaeda detainees elsewhere, the spectre of US troops in enemy hands is disturbing because of the possibility that they could face copy-cat treatment.

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Gang of Sickos: Six US Senators Sell Out Constituents for $11 Million from Health Industry

TPM July 18, 2009

A bipartisan group of six “moderate” US senators, dubbed the “Gang of Six” by news agencies, issued a demand July 17 for a slowdown on Democratic health care reform. These senators – including three conservative Democrats, one conservative Independent who caucuses with Democrats, and two moderate Republicans – asked for a slowdown on health care reform not because their constituents wished it so: recent polls show that a clear majority of Americans want health care reform now including a public health care option such as that proposed by President Obama and progressives in Congress. No, these senators asked for a slowdown on health care reform because the for-profit health, insurance, and pharmaceutical industries have bid them to do so in the hope that reform can be stopped, and because these same industries have generously provided them with career campaign contributions totalling more than $11 million.

Read more about these sicko’s

Gang of Sickos (part 2)

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Obama to reverse Bu$hco’s emphasis on covert CIA actions

FBI planning a bigger role in terrorism fight

Bureau agents will gather evidence to ensure that criminal prosecutions of alleged terrorists are an option. The move is a reversal of the Bush administration’s emphasis on covert CIA actions.

Los Angeles Times

By Josh Meyer
May 28, 2009

Reporting from Washington — The FBI and Justice Department plan to significantly expand their role in global counter-terrorism operations, part of a U.S. policy shift that will replace a CIA-dominated system of clandestine detentions and interrogations with one built around transparent investigations and prosecutions.

Under the “global justice” initiative, which has been in the works for several months, FBI agents will have a central role in overseas counter-terrorism cases. They will expand their questioning of suspects and evidence-gathering to try to ensure that criminal prosecutions are an option, officials familiar with the effort said.

Though the initiative is a work in progress, some senior counter-terrorism officials and administration policy-makers envision it as key to the national security strategy President Obama laid out last week — one that presumes most accused terrorists have the right to contest the charges against them in a “legitimate” setting.

The approach effectively reverses a mainstay of the Bush administration’s war on terrorism, in which global counter-terrorism was treated primarily as an intelligence and military problem, not a law enforcement one. That policy led to the establishment of the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; harsh interrogations; and detentions without trials.

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Astroturf Roots & Dick Armey’s Tea Party

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Armey’s Axiom: Don’t Take Me Seriously

The corporate lobbyist behind freedomworks.org/ is non other than the architect for Bu$co’s Homeland Security program, Richard K. Armey. He is now Senior Policy Advisor Co-Chair, Homeland Security for DLA Piper.

This article appeared in Israel Venture Capital Journal in June 2003 and is produced by permission of the publisher. If you want much information from this publication, you’ll have to subscribe. The more thousands of shekles you pay the more info you get.

Former congressman Dick Armey served as chairman of the select committee on Homeland security and was the principle architect of the homeland Security Act of 2002.

Homeland Security Advanced Research Projects Agency,
HSARPA modeled after DARPA is shown by the Googleplex to be hsarpa.com.

Israel Venture Capital: Views on 911

The enduring Israeli-American relationship has been based on shared values and common interests. The tragedy of 911 joined our nations in another way that neither of us wanted-as democracies challenged by the menace of terrorism.

The enduring Israeli-American relationship has been based on shared values and common interests. The tragedy of 911 joined our nations in another way that neither of us wanted-as democracies challenged by the menace of terrorism.

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