Ordering torture and abuse of prisoners is a war crime. These orders came from top officials in the sitting administration. This is already fully exposed. To simply "look forward" from this disgrace is to approve a precedent for future Presidential despotism. Prosecute those responsible or surrender any pretense to US "moral authority".

http://michaelfury.wordpress.com/2008/10/16/confess/

You forgot your Almanac. Here, let me help you out with a page from the Wikipedia on the subject of the Patriot Act. That way you won't have to go around exposing yourself as an idiot whenever you open your mouth:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PATRIOT_Act

BTW, for the record, the name BIDEN (Joe or otherwise) doesn't appear there even one time. What he DID claim-- on the offhand chance you might ever actually want to be RIGHT about something-- is that the Patriot Act is SIMILAR to an anti-terrorist bill he authored and introduced called the "Comprehensive Counter-Terrorism Act", which was after the Oklahoma City bombing, and was subsequently defeated. You are of course welcome to read the bill for yourself (assuming you CAN read) and decide how close it is to the Patriot Act:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d102:s.00266:

Sorry to bust your bubble, but Bush and his cronies thought up all that wire-tapping, torture, and economic ruin stuff on their own.

Saddam WAS a bad actor-- and frankly, had Bush simply said "Saddam is a bad actor, we're going over to finish the job"... I might have actually agreed with the plan. Maybe other folks would have too. But he didn't. He lied. And lied. And lied some more. His list of crimes is long. Perhaps not as bad as Saddam Hussein's-- but on the other hand nobody's pushing for him to jump down a SPIDER HOLE-- just to face trial for what he's done, get convicted (hopefully) and serve out a suitable sentence (preferably in Gitmo) for what he's done.

If you would like, you're welcome to get together with some of us and we'll tie you to a board and see how "amateurish" water-boarding really is. We'll give it a few go's just to make sure we're doing it right-- but hey, who knows, you might be right. Maybe its no big deal at all. We'll let you decide.

Afterwards if you're still up for it, we might have you try out some of those "Stressful Positions" they keep talking about. Maybe we can even manage to spring Private England for the afternoon and take some pictures of her laughing at your tiny dick. I'm sure she'd love having it for her scrapbook.

Why don't we get Obama to undo all the damages from the Bush admonistration AND bring them up for justice-- BOTH! (What a concept, do two things at once-- almost like its a REAL organization and capable of getting stuff DONE). I'm willing to bet the Obama administration will be able to walk AND chew gum-- at the SAME time!

Anybody who posts stupid crap like you and that Terkoff guy does must be too dumb to be a traitor. That's probably your saving grace.

(Look at me, I can attack both the content of the message AND the messenger! Hee Hee...)

Fuck you!

It's time to put some constitutional limits on Presidential power. The power of pardon should be limited by an exclusion against pardoning any member of the president's own administration and for any act ordered by (or conceived to be ordered by the president and/or his lieutenants and/or cabinet).

Executive privilege should be clearly and tightly defined and delimited.

The Vice Presidency should be clearly stated as a part of the Executive Branch and ordered to be transparent in all its dealings.

The papers of presidents and administrations should be defined as the property of the People of the United States and cannot be edited, limited, removed, redacted or otherwise changed or hidden by the administration.

Let's really make this a government of laws and not of men.

One can wish that President Bush issues such a pardon. Such a step would admit that illegal activity took place and would open the door to a full investigation - which should also include actions by the White House. Little is gained by prosecuting the guilty persons

these bastards will never be able to leave the US and will have to spend their lives and fortunes in court and in front of congressional committees defending themselves against civil actions, at least.

They'll all be stuck on a stick and left to rotate for a very, very, very long time.

Isn't Karl Rove already illegally ignoring subpoenas over his various dubious activities? Not sure why someone can't just go arrest the guy live on Fox News or something.

I think the whole point of the brazenness with which these guys flouted legality was to erode the accountability of the executive branch. If we let them get away with it, they win a dangerous victory even as they lose power. And, actually, I think O's well aware of this and he and his team will already be putting their formidable planning powers to work on an appropriate strategy (OK, so those are words I'm also well prepared to eat). The thing is, it's a game of chess not a straight felony trial. You don't just win by being right.

It's totally f***ed up though that one of the things standing in their way is that they're going to be busy. There should be DAs on the case and it shouldn't even be up to O and co to sort this out. The system definitely doesn't work.

The problem with trying to use the South African model is who is reconciling with whom? In South Africa, most of the victims were in power (or in a position where they COULD be in power) when the commission was formed. Therefore, the largely black government of South Africa had the power and the credibility to say it was willing to be reconciled with the previous white power structure because the black government was perceived to represent the victims.

I voted for Obama & I wish him well, but I do not accept that he represents -- symbolically or otherwise -- the mostly Muslim & mostly non-American victims of Bush's torture policy. Who is he or a commission appointed by him to "reconcile" with Bush & Cheney's torturers? Obama may not have liked Bush's torture policy & on some level, all Americans have been soiled by it, but most of us did not directly suffer from it.

If Obama thinks this is too distracting for himself and the Congress to handle, then send it to the Hague. At least the World Court is a better place for the primarily Muslim victims to get something like justice -- more than I fear they will ever get from any US court.