“Don’t be discouraged that we have to acknowledge that potentially we’ve made some mistakes.
That’s how we learn. But the fact that we are willing to acknowledge them and then move forward, that is precisely why I am proud to be president of the United States and that’s why you should be proud to be members of the CIA.”
Today, during a visit to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, those were precisely the words that President Obama used to lift the spirits of CIA employees. I especially enjoyed his employment of the word ‘potentially’.
How many times do you suppose a mistake can be made before it’s recognized as such? In 2003, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who remains in US custody, was waterboarded 183 times. Abu Zubaydah? 83 times in August of 2002. Every journalist and politician that has volunteered to be waterboarded has unequivocally claimed it torture. And yet the ‘mistake’ was made on a single person 183 times.
183 times isn’t a mistake, it’s policy. One would imagine that 183 times is enough to affect those carrying out the procedure to question their superiors as to why they’re repeatedly doing it.
According to White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, the Obama Administration has not only decided not to prosecute those involved in the practice itself, but those responsible for the initial formation of policy. During an interview on ABC’s ‘This Week’ Emanuel said…
“It’s not a time to use our energy and our time in looking back and any sense of anger and retribution.”
I’m sure there were a few gentlemen at Nuremburg that would have agreed with Mr. Emanuel, not to mention those Japanese that the United States prosecuted for war crimes following the war for employing a method that US prosecutors at the time deemed torture…
…waterboarding.
