First off we don’t know precisely when the water boardings were approved and monitored. It may be that they occurred subsequent to Goss coming on after McLaughlin was asked to resign along with Tenet.

Then Porter Goss comes in as Director and starts accusing the Agency of not being aggressive enough. One officer in the Operations Branch, Robert Grenier cited Goss telling him that his approach to terrorism was “not aggressive enough”. Goss also demanded the resignation the head of the Directorate of Operations Steven Kappes and fired his #2. It was Goss’s handpicked “Jack Bauer model” Jose Rodriguez that was the one that destroyed the tapes. We know that the CIA officials up to that point had held on to the videos and had sought out legal opinions regarding them.

Could it be that Goss ordered the water boardings after WH demands? That the CIA officers were ambivalent about them. And that they ordered the videotaping as part of the record of what occurred (and have other documents demonstrating their opposition?).

Thus the “old” CIA may be exposing how this illegal activity was occurring.

Just asking. I have no proof to believe any of the above, but I just thought that the Post should be informed of any possibilities that these rumors could indeed be true and check them out with its usual, true journalistic thoroughness. After all, who really knows about this Perry Bacon Jr.? He could secretly be a Muslim sympathizer or even a terrorist mole in disguise as a journalist.

We have to protect America from all foreigners and foreign ideas. Otherwise, we will become just like them — foreigners, not true Americans who immigrated here before 1976, the bi-centenial of the American Revolution (just to pick a date that leaves out a lot of Muslims and Mexicans).

God bless America, especially the real Americans (you know who you are, even if some of you are Jewish).

Bless our great country and curse those who think differently, no matter what their religious (or atheistic) denomination is.

Just remember that America is a land of horses and ponies and dogs and cats. We are not a land of camels. So if you like camels, please leave. Thank you.

It’s not so much that they believed this rumor (its clearly B.S. and disproven), but the fact this would sway the person’s view, as opposed to something substantial like his votes while in congress, or his speeches.

My suspicion is that the other individual who encouraged increased measures (one was Goss) was Roberts. Rockefeller and Pelosi, IF they were present through the whole briefing, and IF the techniques were fully described on the “virtual tour”, remained silent. This does not imply they approved, as any effective protest would not have been lodged to the individual administering the interrogations, but to their SUPERIORS. That’s what Harman did, she sent a letter protesting the use of these “enhanced techniques”.

So it may be that the techniques were not fully covered (and those who are commenting to the WashPo have special interests in distorting this). It may be that the procedures were described and Pelosi did lodge a protest, but not to the “interrogator”.

Finally it could be that it’s exactly what the “interrogator” and Porter Goss told the reporters from Wash Po….and that Senior Democrats had no issue with the waterboarding. But it’s strange that Goss never brought this up during the debates earlier this year about waterboarding…and it’s only come out now, when he is shown to be involved in a situation where he may have given orders to destroy evidence.

But now there is an additional piece of evidence that must be subpoenaed…the VCD of the virtual tour that demonstrated the techniques of interrogation…since this is quite relevant to what Pelosi actually was briefed upon. This would not, of course, show actual waterboarding in action, so it might be important to see what precisely was described on the “virtual tour”. And find out if anything was left out during the briefing.

here’s the jane mayer piece i’ve quoted before (from the new yorker):

And then there was, of course, the unsuccessful effort to arrange for the rendition of bin Laden from Sudan back to Saudi Arabia before the attacks on the US Embassies in East Africa. The Saudis refused, principally because they knew that bin Laden would become a lightning rod for dissent against their regime. They preferred “exile” over extradition.

If that is true…this is bad, bad, bad. But, it might not be. It sounds like there is a huge smear campaign goin’ on. Rover’s out there roamin’ around….

Me- and he’s trying to turn things so that the dems wanted to rush to war before the election in 2002. Thinking maybe someone will buy it. I watched Rove telling this BS to Charlie Rose, and he could hardly keep from laughing. He was just having a good ol time thinking everyone would buy it on accounta he said it.