Democrats' complicity in a war crime

In their forceful (and admittingly, successful) campaign to block any torture investigations, the Republicans have made their point: some of the leading Democrats were implicated in Bush's torture policies. They released outlines of CIA briefings of top Democrats on the intelligence committee, including the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, in which it becomes fairly clear that she--along with other Democrats (Rockefeller of W. Virginia and Harman of California)--was told that CIA would use waterboarding. The fact that the briefing took place in September, while Abu Zubaydah had been water boarded in August, shows that the Bush administration did not care one bit about following the law or informing the other branches of the government BEFORE committing this war crime. But the brief also shows that Pelosi said nothing--not a word!--about these techniques. Her explanation really insults the intelligence of the average American: "we were told that these techniques could be used and not that they were going to be used or that they had been used"!!! Even if this was the case--which I highly doubt--Pelosi should have raised objections to this and threatened to go public if this continued. Yes, this would be a great political risk, but what good is power if you do not utilize it for the common good.

And Pelosi, as well as most of the Democratic mainstream establishment, (with the fine exception of Russ Feingold of Wisconsin among others), went along with everything that Bush wanted them to go along with. Arguably, it is this complicity that allowed Bush to plunge our country into the abyss of war crimes, deep recession, and to tarnish our image abroad. Pelosi should come clean to the American people about her role, her knowledge, of torture techniques, or otherwise, resign!

Now it becomes clear to me why the Democratic establishment is using "let's be united" baby talk to obstruct the course of justice in holding those who tortured accountable. As one of my favorite constitutional scholars Jonathan Turley, a professor at George Washington University, has consistently and passionately argued, a criminal investigation of torture is not A CHOICE, but a CONSTITUTIONAL OBLIGATION of our government. The investigation should hold everyone involved accountable: whether they are Democrat, Republican, or Marsian for that matter. The future of our democracy and our rule of law is truly at stake in this case.

The Times report about the Pelosi role in all of this is even more worrying in the light of the leak from the Justice Department that Holder might not appoint a special prosecutor instead, referring the case of the lawyers who drafted the torture memos to the American Bar Association, for possible disbarrement. As Professor Turley has argued, the Bar Association has no authority to investigate fully their criminal enterprise, only to the extent to which it affected their professional conduct and the worst punishment it can mete out is to disbar them.

Yes, disbarment for a war crime, that is certainly the penalty that fits the crime! If this proves to be the outcome, then the international community, the Hague Tribunal, and the United States should apologize to Serbia for holding their former President in the prison for war crimes when they could have just disbarred him, instead of letting him die in prison.