I agree with Greenwald that high-level officials, including Bush and Cheney, should defend their actions in court. But the way to get higher level players to court may be by prosecuting low-level torturers. In fact, the low road may be the strategically wisest way.

The events of the last few weeks are not easy to parse for meaning. It can be hard to discern what is real or not from the media.

But I see some hope when political/cultural elites are arguing and posturing and picking fights with each other. Torture trials will come about because of fissures within the elites that create a dynamic in which one party needs to prove that another party is wrong (Pelosi v. the Republicans for example). That dynamic in turn will support a venue to air splits within the CIA (military etc) between brass and lower level officers. It seems doubtful now that the elites can forever maintain their de-facto agreement to torture Muslims and to set aside political aspirations in the name of torture. Torture was chic, but now passe, and nobody much wants to own it.

The fact that Holder is releasing trial ballons itself shows that this administration senses that it is losing some sort of perception fight. The timing of these balloons coincides with Obama's foreign tour. I would suggest there is pressure arising both from the increasing fractures among American elites, but also from abroad. Obama is less-likely to have a legacy in the Middle East with his current pro-torture immunity policies--let's remember who gets tortured.

It is not necessarily the case that pro-torture policies make dealing with India and China, both doing relatively well in the global economy and critical to many Obama domestic proposals, any easier--despite (or because of) the large (India) or restive (China) Muslim populations in those countries. Obama's consistently anti-Muslim stand in the torture issues is probably starting to have blowback against his son-of-a-Muslim image, particularly after his stumbles with the Iran uprising. He could just as easily be dismissed as a kafir if he comes across as having a double standard.

Domestically, Obama has ample reasons to provide a distraction from his pro-wealthy-at-all-costs mishandling of the recession and healthcare.

Once torture trials benefit the elites, there will be trials, Holder just has to discover new reasons for those trials. THink of how Panetta now seeks to increase his own power by "discovering" for the Democrats the secret CIA program. There is a increasing dynamic for exposure of many of the elite classes' secrets of the past eight years, and is likely that exposures on one issue may lead to exposures on others.

Forget trial balloons. Let the popcorn kernels pop and sit back for the show.

"Put the guilty in jail and there is the potential that everything will be worse. My willingness to do the right thing is controlled by my level of fear of the unknown."

Careful who you criticize Adnoto - rrheard is a lawyer!

Hey Mr. Solicitor,

Is it possible that on the point of prosecuting the evil ones who tortured and ordered it and funded it, you and I finally agree on a point?

If POTUS & VPOTUS fund or cover up they are morally guilty, have not fulfilled their respective oaths (taken multiple times) to uphold the Constitution of the US and they should be impreached and imprisoned - correct?

Of course we know that will never happen becasue Pelosi would be POTUS if she could prove the CIA lied to her - what are the chances of that happening?

How would you like President Nancy Pelosi to run the economy, solve Social Security, prosecute BO's war on terror in Afganhistan, and reduce the mean global temperature by 3.6 degrees F BY 2021?

That scares me more than Palin!

Posting letters on the web is fun and educational, and one can hope that Obama, Holder, et al have aides scouring the web to gauge the response. But do something meaningful- contact the Obama administration directly and let the know what you think. Write your representatives and your Senators and demand investigations.

Here's a website to contact Obama:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/

Criminal Investigations. Now.

The Warren Commission Report

The 9/11 Commission Report

The Interrogation Commission Report

Well the one other solution is a mass lawyer/judges movement in this country effectively shutting down the legal system but that will never happen because lawyers have student loans and mortgages to pay. And the average Joe would love to watch lawyers as protestors getting clubbed in the head on the nightly news so I'm not so sure we'd have much "public" sympathy behind our movement. -- rrheard

Two things:

First, lawyers got us into this mess and/or have stood by and allowed their members to perpetrate it. Why hasn't Yoo been brought up for review (or whatever it is you all do in your club) and disbarred? Lawyers are the last people I would go to for help. That would be like giving the thieves in the financial industry our tax dollars to...er... wait...

And secondly, on a more serious note, we are in this thing together. We all have student loans and/or mortgages or other debts. That is not a valid excuse IMO. In fact, I think that would simply add to our power. We can't pay because we have to take time out to protest their bullshit? Well, tough shit, they don't get their money until they meet our demands.

If the rule of law is dead and we do indeed live under an oppressive two-tiered system of justice then all the lawyering in the world (within that system) isn't going to do much for us. Your law degree isn't worth very much at this point, is it?

..."If this is the approach Holder takes -- one that, yet again, shields high-level Bush officials while targeting low-level "rogue" agents -- one can make a strong argument that it is worse than doing nothing, that this will actually further subvert the rule of law rather than strengthen it."

It seems that this is in fact the sole idea of the rulers of the universe. Just look at the back slapping comraderie amongst them at the G8 and what you see is a world elite, not just a national US elite, beholden to no law and able to do pretty much what the hell they like and hang the consequences. Every other poor slob like the Ghanians and other Africans that Obabma is busily preaching to about the rule of law are told to apply the rule of law to their corrupt leaders and they naturally scoff because they know that it is a case of "do as we say not as we do".

This is why attacks on Americans are so easily justified by their victims and also why fewer and fewer of the average citizens of the world have no sympathy for the ruling elite of the world. Simpy put the bastards do not deserve it and if they truly got what they desreved the graves being filled by all the soldiers and fighters from all the blighted nations of the world would be filled by our so called leaders. They do not lead, they follow instructions from monopolistic oligrachs who own the planet and push capital around like it is some plaything in an oversized playground. Even the Saint barack Oabma, that newly minted hypocrite whose fundamental policy is to pursue Americna nterests, whihc is truly the crux of the problem.

Pity is that the majority of people of the world are the expendable pawns in their corrupt and evil game.

The hallmark of these people is their hypocrisy and blatant abuse of power, very simple really. Pursuing them and bringing them to justice will entail the same destruction and mayhem that brought all the other fascists of history to heal and it will take a focussed effort by those who they are currently killing in the name of the war on terror, namkely the poor and marginalised and disempowered. Those are the facts. The whole thing is turned on its head and until the dummy is sat back on its feet nil will change. To them, bloodhounds like the esteemable Mr Greenwald are just a passing nuisance, sorry to say and this internet thing is a great way for them to keep tabs on you all.