Joe Conason has finally corrected the glaring error about the USA/Gallup numbers in his last column. However, there is no explanation or apology, just a change in the piece itself. If you weren't looking for it you'd never know there had been an error and subsequent correction. In addition, the comments thread has also been closed. So readers will not have an opportunity to ask about the error or why it took so long to fix.

I find it very ironic that in a piece where Mr. Conason argued against accountability for Bush officials that he would, by his own actions, reveal that he also believes that he shouldn't be held accountable either.

I thought he handled this whole thing very badly. His actions showed a total disrespect to his readers. I hope Salon finds someone to replace him who isn't so resistant to being held accountable. I agree with you that everyone makes mistakes but when you have to be dragged kicking and screaming to fix them and then do it in a way that ignores the people who pointed out the mistake in the first place then your head is way too big to write in this kind of environment.

Hi Kitt, I don't know if Conason is required to be there to interact with all of us but in this case, where he made a glaring error and his readers pointed it out to him, he at least owed us some type of acknowledgment (explanation, apology, thank you for pointing it out, etc.). To come in at the end of the work day on Monday and not say anything to his readers after they caught the error and notified him of it on Friday was just plain rude. The next time he makes such a terrible error I hope people will just point it out in the comments and then leave it there for the world to see.

I think Salon.com's higher-ups should be made aware of this, since the time has expired to post letters in Conason's Pardon-the-torturers article.

- independentminded

When I checked earlier today and saw the comments closed on the Bush piece that Conason wrote I specifically checked the previous story about Phelps that Conason wrote to see if the comments were open on that article. I can't prove it but I could have sworn that the comments section for the previous article written by Conason was still open (it's now closed). I wish now that I had posted there as I was going to do because I think the comments in the Bush piece was deliberately closed to prevent us from making comments and now the Phelps comments are closed to cover for that. But like I said I can't prove it but it sure gives me a creepy feeling.

Bystander, many thanks for the link to The Guantánamo Testimonials Project.

The Washington Post has a piece today called:

Judges: Torture, Abuses Undermine Values in U.S., U.K.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/17/AR2009021700506.html?hpid=moreheadlines

Within the WaPo article there is actually a link to the report (I was surprised).

Eminent Jurists Panel on Terrorism, Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights

http://ejp.icj.org/hearing2.php3?id_article=167&lang=en

What the Post doesn't tell us, however, is that there is another report at the same site called:

ICJ Expert Legal Panel on Corporate Complicity in International Crimes

FINAL REPORT

http://icj.org/news.php3?id_article=4405&lang=en

The Expert Legal Panel on Corporate Complicity in International Crimes was set up in 2006 to explore when companies and their officials could be held legally responsible under criminal and/or civil law when they are involved with other actors in gross human rights abuses.

The report, comprising three volumes, addresses corporate complicity from the angles of criminal law, the law of civil responsibility and public policy.

Perhaps we need to send a copy of this report to the Obama administration so that they stop using the "state secrets" privilege to help the Bush administration cover up their crimes and the crimes of those corporations who were complicit in those crimes.

Glenn, why don't you submit a piece to the Post that responds to their op-ed?

Yeah, Glenn in the WaPo. Why not? Nothing ventured, nothing gained. I post comments there all the time telling them they need to have Greenwald as a columnist to increase their readership so why not an op-ed. I'd cc the new editor. Maybe the new guy will force old Fred to run it. lol

RetriedMilitaryPatriot just posted an excerpt from Time to highlight what Leahy said but I noticed at the bottom of that snippet was the following:

Perhaps surprisingly, a majority of Americans polled recently by Gallup expressed their support for some kind of investigation into Bush-era wrongdoing such as the politicization of the Justice Department or torture, though much of the backing was for an independent panel, not a criminal probe.

Looks like we have another "journalist" deliberately mistating the facts about the USA/Gallup poll just like Joe Conason did the other day. This is obviously not an accident, but a pattern of deceit.

Sorry for butchering your name Retired Military Patriot and thanks for posting that Time Magazine link.

Yeah, I know about the WaPo. I thought the ombudsman, Debbie the Howler was out. Is she still hanging around?

I sent an email to Bobby Ghosh at Time alerting him that his article incorrectly characterized the results of the recent USA/Gallup poll:

Leahy's Plan to Probe Bush-Era Wrongdoings

I wonder if Mr. Ghosh will take as long as Mr. Conason did in correcting his piece. What a coincidence that they both misrepresented the exact same part of the poll.