if at any point the administratin will figure aout that people don't trust them anymore, and that we base our distust purely on their actions.

Nah.

If Judge Mukasey satisfies senators' concerns by stating that waterboarding is torture and its use is unacceptable would the President withdraw his name from nomination?

This is undoubtedly my last posting to War Room, since I'm sure my head will be exploding any moment now. It's been fun, everyone -- but everything that could possibly be said, HAS been said, after Dana Perino's latest pronouncement about Judge Mukasey.

Does the meaning of the word Torture depend on what the meaning of the word Is is?

Let's see, first we need to grant immunity to the telecoms. Then we need to grant immunity to the Blackwater officials. Now we need to grant immunity (in a roundabout way)to Mukasey.

Does anyone need to be held accountable anymore? Oops. I don't think the administration would answer that either.

It figures.

All I can hear right now is W: "I'd gladly pay you Tuesday if you would buy me a hamburger today."

...about impeachment. Impeach first then ask questions later.

Oh wait a minute, thats the way impeachment is supposed to work. This is a confirmation hearing. It's like when someone interviews a candidate for a job, they can give them the interview after they hire the candidate.

Brilliant. Saves a lot of time in the hiring process.

...heads are exploding all across the land today!

In my wildest fantasies about jobs and moronic bosses, I would never have dreamed that someone could say whatever she wanted and NOT lose her position. However, in this case, Perino does just that and may be up for a promotion.

Ms. Perino, meet Col. Boylan. You deserve each other.

I'm getting really sick of Perino's (and the rest of the Bush Administration's) use of the word "hypothetical."

White House Press Briefing 10/30/07: Reporter: Does the President think he has the right to do it [attack or bomb Iran] without going through Congress?

• Perino: That is -- it's a hypothetical situation, Helen. I'm not going to answer it.

10/24/07: Reporter: Is that number -- if that number [the CBO estimate for the cost of Iraq and Afghanistan at $2.4 trillion] turned out to be somewhere close to accurate, do you think that would be a reasonable amount of money to be spending on the war --

• Perino: You're asking me another hypothetical question; if that were to be true. I'm not going to answer that.

9/12/07: Reporter: If [conditions on the ground don't continue to move in the right] is the President prepared to extend deployments beyond 15 months?

• Tony Snow: Number one, I'm not going to presage the President's speech, and number two, I'm not going to play the hypothetical.

9/11/07: Reporter: This is not a hypothetical question. Does the President feel that he has the right to attack any country without going first to Congress?

• Tony Snow: No.
• Reporter: He does not feel he has -- he can't attack Iran, for example, without first asking permission?
• Tony Snow: We are not getting into hypothetical questions about Iran.
• Reporter: It's not hypothetical. I'm asking you if he has the authority.
• Tony Snow: Excuse me, it absolutely is hypothetical.

6/5/07: Reporter, Dana, if the [Scooter Libby] appeals process is still going on, on January 20, 2009, will the President continue to not get involved?

• Perino: That's very speculative and hypothetical and I think let's just let that process start next week. (note the question asked just moments before “And if Scooter Libby says, ‘I'm not going to appeal’?” was not deemed too hypothetical to answer)

Apparently, “hypothetical” means, “That’s a question that’ll come back to bite me in the ass if I answer it so I’m not gonna. Nanny-nanny, boo-boo.”

-briefings from whitehouse.gov

Presuming the Bushists are actually not completely stupid, inept and evil, I would further bet a dollar that they are well aware that the stupid, inept and evil acts that have been the result of their policies have created more then a few internal memos of how to get through life without ending up in the Hague.

Given this preposterous presumption that they have some sentient self awareness, one must also presume that the person who they present as the top cop in the United States is not going to turn on them and, say, enforce the laws of the land against them.

If Ms. Perino agreed with the reporters that the inability to answer a simple question as to whether water-boarding is form of torture (which it most certainly is), then I would have to grudgingly grant that there is some integrity in the present administration.... a position, I am sure, I will never have to take.

Remember Richard Feynman bringing in some O-rings to the shuttle explosion hearing to solve once and for all that, yes, in ice water, they DO get brittle (while people had been bitching back & forth for hours)?

Look Dianne, Chris: Bring a pitcher of water and a towel to the confirmation hearing and ask Mukasey to lay on the table. Seriously! Quit whining about semantics - it's SO EASY TO DEMONSTRATE!

OK, OK, you gleeful Salon readers reading this - now consider what happens next; All Repubs THEN point out that this just proves their point. Senate committee questioning is effete -- we can't get a single answer out of ANYONE in the adminstration by using traditional techniques, so why should it work in Gitmo or anywhere else?

Bottom line: Democrat failed interrogation techniques in the Senate (and press) have PROVED that waterboarding is required!!

Bush and his bevy of heavy breathing sychophants are finally exposed for what they are: nothing but the little guy behind the curtain, full of flash and bombast but no real substance. My guess is that water-boarding is torture and criminal and that Bush and his little sychophants are afraid of criminal prosecution for torturing prisoners labled terrorists. Why is Bush hidding behind secret memos? Because he's committeed a criminal act by authorizing torture and, as a result, he might be prosecuted. It's just as simple as that.

The president wants to protext his legacy, not the country. We're better off knowing exactly what the secrets are so we can get on with the business of the country, regardless of what these memos do to Bush's legacy.