The Torture Loophole

By GottaLaff

Oh pleaseohpleaseohplease:

New documents on enhanced interrogation techniques suggest the Bush administration did not seek proper legal clearance to grill detainees. [...]

The apparent lack of clear legal authority for each of the subsequent interrogations could be an issue of interest to John Durham, the federal prosecutor appointed last week by Attorney General Eric Holder to investigate the CIA’s handling of the detainee grillings—a decision which drew fire from former Vice President Dick Cheney over the weekend. Holder has said publicly that his department would not prosecute those who followed the Bush administration’s legal guidance “in good faith.” But all bets may be off if the legal authority to interrogate detainees other than Zubaydah was murky or nonexistent, as the evidence made public thus far suggests. [...]

But now it turns out that in some interrogation sessions—even those involving waterboarding—the CIA and White House may have had no formal legal authorization. With the release of the new documents, it seems that later OLC opinions were drafted primarily to provide ex post facto legal justifications for torture that had already been implemented without authorization.

There is therefore a very real possibility that high-level Bush administration officials are implicated in unauthorized interrogations of detainees--including CIA officials who facilitated and oversaw the key post-Zubaydah interrogations in late 2002 and early 2003, and NSC principals, including Dick Cheney, who oversaw the expansion of EITs and provided the after-the-fact NSC sign-offs for the expansion in 2003 and again in 2005. Perhaps it is just this threat which leads Cheney to so vociferously defend the CIA tactics. If so, it calls into question the personal motives of that defense.

The new documents may leave the Attorney General Holder and his special prosecutor, John Durham, no choice but to expand their investigations beyond CIA rank-and-file officers to the top echelons of the CIA and even, perhaps, to the Bush White House.

John Sifton is a private investigator and attorney based in New York City. His firm, One World Research, carries out research for law firms and human rights groups, including in South Asia, the Middle East and North Africa. He has conducted extensive investigations into the CIA interrogation and detention program.

(You might also recognize him from his appearances on MSNBC)

I pretty much cut to the chase. There is much, much more here.

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All my previous posts on this subject matter can be found here; That link includes one specific to only Fayiz al-Kandari's story here. Here are audio and video interviews with Lt. Col. Wingard, one by David Shuster, one by Ana Marie Cox, and more. My guest commentary at BuzzFlash is here.

If you are inclined to help rectify these injustices: Twitterers, use the hashtag #FreeFayiz. We have organized a team to get these stories out. If you are interested in helping Fayiz out, e-mail me at The Political Carnival, address in sidebar to the right; or tweet me at @GottaLaff.

If you'd like to see other ways you can take action, go here and scroll down to the end of the article.

Then read Jane Mayer's book The Dark Side. You'll have a much greater understanding of why I post endlessly about this, and why I'm all over the CIA deception issues, too.

More of Fayiz's story here, at Answers.com.

Ex-FBI Agent: Still No Evidence That Cheney’s Torture Methods Work

By GottaLaff

Spencer Ackerman's piece includes a lot more information than I'm posting here, but the bolded red segment stood out to me:

If it’s first-hand accounts you want, then, here’s Mike Rolince. Rolince is a 31-year FBI veteran who retired from the bureau’s Washington, D.C., field office, where he worked on counterterrorism, in 2005. Both from experience in interrogations and from viewing the IG report, Rolince can’t believe that so-called “enhanced interrogation” techniques like waterboarding still have their defenders. “I’m just not a fan of them, and never have been a fan of them,” he told me. “I’ve never believed that it works, I don’t believe its been documented that it works, and I don’t believe we as a country should stoop to that, I don’t think we ought to be doing it. I just don’t think we need to do the untested, untrained and unreliable.”

Well, what then is tested, trained and reliable? “So many of these people are so uninformed when it comes to the capabilities of law enforcement and intelligence gathering,” he said, referring to torture advocates, some of whom — like Cheney — denigrate law enforcement approaches to counterterrorism. “What is it they think police officers and state troopers and [FBI] agents do successfully every day of the week? And have done for a hundred years? Investigations, interviews and interrogations.” The FBI’s track record of “confessions obtained [and] convictions obtained,” he said, speaks for itself.

Why doesn't Cheney support our law enforcement professionals?

Seriously, you know how I feel about this whole torture thing. I've written and written and written about it, and will continue to do that. This was a slightly different take, one I haven't read that often, if at all, and I had to share.

Meanwhile....

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All my previous posts on this subject matter can be found here; That link includes one specific to only Fayiz al-Kandari's story here. Here are audio and video interviews with Lt. Col. Wingard, one by David Shuster, one by Ana Marie Cox, and more. My guest commentary at BuzzFlash is here.

If you are inclined to help rectify these injustices: Twitterers, use the hashtag #FreeFayiz. We have organized a team to get these stories out. If you are interested in helping Fayiz out, e-mail me at The Political Carnival, address in sidebar to the right; or tweet me at @GottaLaff.

If you'd like to see other ways you can take action, go here and scroll down to the end of the article.

Then read Jane Mayer's book The Dark Side. You'll have a much greater understanding of why I post endlessly about this, and why I'm all over the CIA deception issues, too.

More of Fayiz's story here, at Answers.com.

VIDEO-- Gibbs: Why is anyone still listening to Dick Cheney?

By GottaLaff

Robert Gibbs had something to say about Cheney's remarks on the investigation of the BushCo Torture Machine, posted here. Zing:

Today, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs responded to these accusations, wondering whether it’s really useful to listen to anything Cheney has to say on foreign policy:

I’m not entirely sure that Dick Cheney’s predictions on foreign policy have borne a whole lot of fruit over the last eight years in a way that have been either positive or, to the best of my recollection, very correct.

Dickless Cheney emasculated again. Of course, that wrongly assumes he had anything there to render impotent to begin with.

The Latest Euphemism From The Torture Party

By GottaLaff

Words are what we use to communicate. Without them, we'd be silent, so it's important to choose them carefully. The Rushpublics are awfully good at selecting just the right ones to perpetuate their lies, whether subtly or more obviously.

Sully nails them on their latest twisted attempt to mislead on the subject of torture and BushCo's culpability:

Max Boot deploys a new one (they keep coming up with them):

It would be easy to conclude with a “high degree of confidence” that one of the most effective intelligence-gathering tactics in the war on terrorism — the aggressive interrogation of captured terrorists — has been eliminated and, along the way, the agency charged with being on the front lines of the war has been severely degraded in operational effectiveness. In other words, the Obama administration has taken some of the most effective changes implemented by the Bush administration and reversed them in what could be a Carter-style emasculation of American intelligence capabilities.

"Aggressive interrogation of captured terrorists" needs translation into plain English. It means "the torture of captives suspected of being terrorists."

Thank you. Thank. You.

Next:

"One of the most effective intelligence-gathering tactics in the war on terrorism" also needs translation, since there is no evidence, as Bush DHS official Frances Townsend and every neutral observer has noted, that the intelligence, if accurate, could not have been achieved by legal, American and ethical means.

I'm drowning in gratitude here, Sully. More? Bring it on:

We also know for a fact that the majority of all those who have been abused and tortured by the US under Bush and Cheney were innocent of any terror offenses. (At Abu Ghraib, one of the test-sites for Cheney's methods, up to 90 percent were completely innocent, according to the Bush administration).

Home run.

Now take a peek at what "aggressive interrogation" means. Hint: It means torture:

"Aggressive interrogation" means, in plain English, stripping suspects, hooding them, beating them, putting a collar around their neck and launching their bodies against a plywood wall up to thirty times, subjecting them to sleep deprivation in one case as long as 960 hours over 54 days, shackling them in stress positions used by the Vietnamese against John McCain, denying medical care in some cases, sexually traumatizing them, using Islam as a weapon against them, putting them in upright coffins, threatening to kill their children and spouses, threatening to drill their skulls with power-drills, freezing them in iced water or freezing air-conditioning until near-death, subjecting them to extreme heat, and sensory deprivation in isolation for months until they become mental and physical shells.

Don't believe him? Read The Dark Side by Jane Mayer, or this, from the L.A. Times. Or the series I've done on this subject (see below).

It means Abu Ghraib, the one place where we have been able to see what neoconservatism has come to stand for: the brutal torture and abuse of Arabs and Muslims. It means murdering over a hundred of such prisoners - merely because they are suspects and Arab Muslims. [...]

As for "Carter-style emasculation", let us also remember that the return to ethical, legal treatment of prisoners is just as easily described as "Reagan-style emasculation." It was Reagan who signed the UN Convention on Torture which these neocons have torn up and despise.

They want euphemisms? Here are some now: BushCo consisted of a collection of brazenly criminal sphincters who have done to this country what Phillip Garrido did to Jaycee Lee Dugard. Interesting how the authorities didn't insist that we don't look back/just look forward when it came to that series of crimes.

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All my previous posts on this subject matter can be found here; That link includes one specific to only Fayiz al-Kandari's story here. Here are audio and video interviews with Lt. Col. Wingard, one by David Shuster, one by Ana Marie Cox, and more. My guest commentary at BuzzFlash is here.

If you are inclined to help rectify these injustices: Twitterers, use the hashtag #FreeFayiz. We have organized a team to get these stories out. If you are interested in helping Fayiz out, e-mail me at The Political Carnival, address in sidebar to the right; or tweet me at @GottaLaff.

If you'd like to see other ways you can take action, go here and scroll down to the end of the article.

Then read Jane Mayer's book The Dark Side. You'll have a much greater understanding of why I post endlessly about this, and why I'm all over the CIA deception issues, too.

More of Fayiz's story here, at Answers.com.

Dickless in DC: Obama's torture investigation "offends the hell out of me"

By GottaLaff

This is the biggest endorsement of Barack Obama that I can think of, and it comes by way of Dickless Cheney:

"I was not a fan of his when he got elected, and my views have not changed any," Cheney said of Obama.

That should bring multitudes of voters our way. We owe him.

Oddly, my favorite quote has been removed from the AP piece. It was in regard to Dickless' claim that-- stop me if you've heard this one, it's a knee-slapper-- Obama is politicizing investigations, those unnecessary CIA ones. About BushCo's illegal torture of detainees? Yeah, those investigations.

Now maybe the quote was never in there to begin with, but that would be odd, because here is the The Daily Beast version that they attribute to the Associated Press:

“It’s clearly a political move,” the former vice president told Fox News Sunday when he was asked about the Obama administration’s investigation of CIA interrogations. “[It] offends the hell out of me. … I just think it's an outrageous political act...."

Here is the AP version:

"It's clearly a political move," Cheney said in an interview aired on "Fox News Sunday." "I mean, there's no other rationale for why they're doing this."

He added: "I just think it's an outrageous political act that will do great damage, long term, to our capacity to be able to have people take on difficult jobs, make difficult decisions, without having to worry about what the next administration is going to say."

The Case of the Missing "Offends the Hell Out of Me". Maybe Dickless is no longer offended? Offensive, yes; offended, no longer. Who knew he could be so forgiving?

Torture Watch: Cheney v. L.A. Times Readers

By GottaLaff

Compare...

"I just think it's an outrageous political act that will do great damage long term to our capacity to be able to have people take on difficult jobs, make difficult decisions, without having to worry about what the next administration is going to say."

-- Former Vice President Dick Cheney, in an interview on Fox News, on the Justice Department's decision to investigate possible CIA abuses of terror detainees.

... and contrast:

We're still a nation of laws

Re “We don’t need the pain of torture indictments,” Opinion, Aug. 26

My hat is off to Tim Rutten, who has brought brilliant new insight to the administration of justice.

With Rutten's approach, we can save literally billions of dollars. No more do we need "an absolutist, narrow reading of the law." From now on, there is no need to prosecute people who clearly and knowingly violated both the law and common decency, because "it would be a travesty" to go after them without also going after those above them.

Mafiosi and gang members nationwide can relax, secure in the knowledge that the pesky "absolutist" view no longer prevails. Unless we can manage to catch their bosses, they're safe as long as they say they were "pressured" into misbehaving.

Our prisons will be empty. The California deficit will be a thing of the past.

And all will be well, now that we have "resolved never to repeat such reprehensible conduct."

-----

I am astounded.

Rutten presents a long-winded explanation of how he has no doubt that criminal activity was perpetrated by some people in our government. But for some mind-boggling reason, he does not want these people held accountable because he wants to make nice with those who see nothing wrong with these actions.

My only conclusion can be that Rutten sees nothing wrong with this criminal activity either, or he would instead be trying to educate those who see nothing wrong.

His column is a smoke screen.

-----

Rutten is one of my favorite columnists. But his concern that "rancor will split this country if CIA interrogators or Bush administration officials start being dragged into criminal courts" overlooks the fact that our country is already split.

And that we are a nation of laws that holds lawbreakers accountable.

-----

I copied and pasted every letter. It's unanimous. Cheney is a Dick.

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All my previous posts on this subject matter can be found here; That link includes one specific to only Fayiz al-Kandari's story here. Here are audio and video interviews with Lt. Col. Wingard, one by David Shuster, one by Ana Marie Cox, and more. My guest commentary at BuzzFlash is here.

If you are inclined to help rectify these injustices: Twitterers, use the hashtag #FreeFayiz. We have organized a team to get these stories out. If you are interested in helping Fayiz out, e-mail me at The Political Carnival, address in sidebar to the right; or tweet me at @GottaLaff.

If you'd like to see other ways you can take action, go here and scroll down to the end of the article.

Then read Jane Mayer's book The Dark Side. You'll have a much greater understanding of why I post endlessly about this, and why I'm all over the CIA deception issues, too.

More of Fayiz's story here, at Answers.com.

Exposed: The WaPo’s One-Sided Account of Torture, Abuse

By GottaLaff

Is there a newspaper out there that we can trust any more?

I didn't think so:

The lead story in today’s Washington Post, headlined “How a Detainee Became An Asset,” provides a one-sided and distorted account of the torture and abuse of Khalid Sheikh Muhammad (KSM) and demonstrates the urgent need for a blue ribbon bipartisan commission to create a comprehensive and authoritative narrative of the eight years of misgovernment of the Bush administration. [...]

Today’s article argues that the techniques of torture and abuse turned KSM into the CIA’s “preeminent source” on al-Qaeda. Citing an intelligence assessment by the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center, which was presumably prepared for Vice President Cheney, the Post article argues that waterboarding was the key to breaking KSM’s spirit and eliciting valuable intelligence on the “inner workings of al-Qaeda and the group’s plans, ideology, and operatives.”

This view contradicts the findings of the authoritative 2004 report on detainees and interrogations of the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) as well as the personal views of the Inspector General (IG) himself.

The piece goes on to explain in detail why torture is wronger than wrong, and that the report did not conclude that torture elicited useful information that prevented any imminent attack.

And Dick Cheney, who has fanatically been waging his own personal jihad in defense of torture and abuse, told Fox News in an interview that will air tomorrow that CIA interrogators were justified in exceeding even the broad authorizations provided by the Justice Department, suggesting that the ends justify the means. Perhaps the Washington Post could give front-page coverage to the 18-page memorandum that the CIA gave to the DoJ’s Office of Legal Counsel in 2004, which provides extraordinary details of the interrogations in plain, but sordid and sadistic, language. [...]

In order to prevent the Washington Post and others from adding to the myths and misinformation of torture and abuse, it is time to appoint a blue ribbon commission to study all aspects of the CIA’s detentions and interrogations policies.

Melvin A. Goodman, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy and adjunct professor of government at Johns Hopkins University, is The Public Record’s National Security and Intelligence columnist. He spent 42 years with the CIA, the National War College, and the U.S. Army. His latest book is Failure of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA.

As far as I'm concerned, the debate about torture is over. However, there is so much CYA going on in so many places, this is one of the many times that winning is more important to BushCo and others than the worth of human lives... Fayiz al-Kandari's included (see below).

Oh, and then there are all those pesky little legal issues, too.

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All my previous posts on this subject matter can be found here; That link includes one specific to only Fayiz al-Kandari's story here. Here are audio and video interviews with Lt. Col. Wingard, one by David Shuster, one by Ana Marie Cox, and more. My guest commentary at BuzzFlash is here.

If you are inclined to help rectify these injustices: Twitterers, use the hashtag #FreeFayiz. We have organized a team to get these stories out. If you are interested in helping Fayiz out, e-mail me at The Political Carnival, address in sidebar to the right; or tweet me at @GottaLaff.

If you'd like to see other ways you can take action, go here and scroll down to the end of the article.

Then read Jane Mayer's book The Dark Side. You'll have a much greater understanding of why I post endlessly about this, and why I'm all over the CIA deception issues, too.

More of Fayiz's story here, at Answers.com.

DOJ May Skirt Court Order on Interrogation Documents, Go Generic

By GottaLaff

We've all seen what a few disclosures about torture can do. They were revelatory, were they not? More are due out soon, but oh, wait a minute, er... well...

The Obama administration may circumvent the spirit of a judge’s order to disclose hundreds of documents relating to the CIA’s Bush-era interrogation program, delivering instead generic descriptions of the documents and legal arguments for continued nondisclosure. [...]

On July 20, Judge Allen Hellerstein of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled that the government needed to complete a review of the documents for declassification in response to an ACLU Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by Monday, Aug. 31.

My original post on more CIA documents coming out Monday is here. Seems there's a glitch:

But after The Washington Independent reported on the forthcoming disclosure, an administration official who insisted on anonymity emailed to say the report was inaccurate. Asked if there would be any disclosures on Monday, the official responded, “Nope.”

Oh. Hm. Damn.

Hellerstein, however, ordered in July that the government had the option of submitting a so-called “Vaughn declaration,” a FOIA term detailing, as Hellerstein wrote, legal reasons “setting forth the justification for withholding the information.” [...] Hellerstein’s office, which declined to comment on the record, said the judge’s ruling from July 21 was still in effect and the Justice Department had yet to file any motions to extend the deadline for disclosure. [...]

The ACLU said late on Friday afternoon that it expected to receive a Vaughn declaration on Monday and not the documents themselves. “This past week, the Obama administration released documents that shed some much-needed light on theCIA’s rendition, detention and interrogation program,” said Jameel Jaffer, director of the ACLU’s national-security project. “Some of the most crucial documents, though, are still being withheld. The documents that the CIA is required to review for possible release by Monday would, if released, fill in some of the remaining gaps in the public record.”

Rachel Myers, a representative for the ACLU, said the organization expects to continue litigating to receive the still-withheld documents.

I'll just sit over here and wait, if nobody minds. I won't be in the way.

Even More CIA Documents to Be Disclosed Monday

By GottaLaff

Polish up them reading glasses folks:

The deluge continues. Word comes that in response to pending requests from the American Civil Liberties Union, another tranche of CIA documents about Bush-era interrogations and detentions could be released as early as Monday. [...]

[...] like about 129 documents from the closed CIA inspector general files, including interview reports, cables, emails and more. And then about 138 documents from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel that the CIA insisted on classifying.

The thread-pulling continues...

Death findings blacked out of CIA report

By GottaLaff

How many more little "incidents" do you think we'll discover now that the threads are being pulled?

Three detainee deaths and several detainee disappearances were blacked out in the CIA inspector general's report, an ex-official who read the full report says.

ABC reported the unnamed former senior intelligence official said the public version of the report did not contain the inspector general's findings on the three deaths, two of which reportedly occurred in Iraq and the third in Afghanistan.

Findings on a fourth death were included in the report, the U.S. television network said. A CIA contractor was convicted of assault in that case and is serving a prison term.

But remember: Never look back. That would unAmerican. Crimes committed in the past stay in the past. One must only investigate crimes in the future... wait. No. That's impossible. But that's not important now. What is important is....

...What happens in Abu Ghraib stays in Abu Ghraib.

VIDEO: Media snookered by Cheney on torture program

By GottaLaff

Let's take a look at how the media covers the now impotent Dick's claims of the Hey! Torture Works! Program as opposed to those found in the actual, you know, Inspector General's report:

Think Progress takes a look at the failure of the networks to report that the CIA torture docs don’t prove what Dick Cheney claimed they would. Those same networks gave Cheney’s initial claims countless hours of free airtime. But who’s counting?

Of course, it all depends on what the meaning of Dick is:

Here’s the Cheney statement that this story is based on:

“The documents released Monday clearly demonstrated that the individuals subjected to enhanced interrogation techniques provided the bulk of intelligence we gained about al Qaeda,” Cheney said in a written statement. “This intelligence saved lives and prevented terrorist attacks.”

Cheney is not claiming a causal relationship between torture and the intelligence gleaned from interrogations. Rather, he’s saying that the same individuals who were tortured also happened to yield the most important evidence about Al Qaeda. He’s not saying that the docs proved torture was responsible for producing that info.

There’s a reason Cheney worded his statement this carefully: The documents don’t prove torture worked, as he claimed. Don’t believe me? Go to paragraph 11 of this New York Times article, which says the same.

Now watch someone who usually gets it right, Tamron Hall, draw the same erroneous conclusion:



And we wonder why our message isn't getting across, whether it's about this or health care reform?

CIA Again Delays Release of Agency Watchdog's Torture Report

By GottaLaff

Last week they said it would be this week. This week they say it will be next week. Via Jason Leopold:

For the second time in a week, the Justice Department told a federal Judge the CIA needs more time to review an inspector general’s report on the Bush administration’s torture program before deciding whether any of the contents can be released.

In a letter Friday to U.S. District Court Judge Alvin Hellerstein, the Justice Department said the CIA expects to complete it’s review of the voluminous report by July 1 and at that time will alert the court whether the full report or some of the findings can be turned over the American Civil Liberties Union.

The ACLU filed a Freedom of Information Act request to gain access to CIA Inspector General John Helgerson report into the Bush administration’s torture program. [...]

But in a court filing last week, Lev Dassin, the acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, told Hellerstein the agency needed another week to “make a final determination as to what additional information, if any, may be disclosed from the report."

On Friday, Dassin said “the government now intends to complete it’s re-review [of the report] by July 1, 2009.”

Additionally, Dassin said the CIA also needs additional time to process the 35 classified Department of Defense documents dealing with specific torture methods used against so-called high-value detainees before deciding whether those documents or anything contained in the materials can be disclosed.

The CIA also expects to complete it’s review in that matter by July 1.

I'll be glued to my computer on July 1. No I won't, I'll be out of town. Well, I'll be glued to somebody else's computer then.

Heavily redacted portions of Helgerson’s report were released to the American Civil Liberties Union in May 2008 in response to a Freedom of Information Act request, but the ACLU appealed the Bush administration’s extensive deletions and the Obama administration agreed to respond to that appeal by Friday.

As with other recent battles over openness, the CIA is opposing any significant release of new information arguing that it would jeopardize sources and methods. President Barack Obama will have to decide whether to overrule CIA objections as he did in April when he released four Justice Department memos justifying torture.

However, more recently – in May and June – Obama has sided with U.S. officials wanting to keep evidence of detainee abuse away from the public.

One of the problems is, some of that information can be used to clear detainees like Fayiz al-Kandari, or at least clarify the so-called charges against them.

The ACLU’s appeal of the redactions from Helgerson’s report will test whether Obama’s retreat on openness includes concealing evidence of homicides.

In her 2008 book The Dark Side and in an earlier investigative report for The New Yorker, reporter Jane Mayer wrote that Helgerson was investigating at least three deaths of prisoners held by the CIA in Afghanistan and Iraq.

I posted on the deaths at Bagram here.

There were also questions whether Helgerson’s critical report prompted bureaucratic retaliation. In October 2007, former CIA Director Michael Hayden ordered an investigation into Helgerson's office, focusing on internal complaints that the inspector general was on "a crusade against those who have participated in controversial detention program."

If Obama more fully declassifies Helgerson’s report, the new information also might undercut Cheney’s claim that the harsh interrogation of "high-value" detainees produced valuable intelligence, thwarted pending terrorist plots against the United States and saved "hundreds of thousands of lives."

In addition to showing the inconclusive nature of the value of the intelligence gleaned through torture, the report will likely show that Helgerson warned top CIA officials that the interrogation techniques administered to detainees might violate some provisions of the international Convention Against Torture.

Again, let's hope the report is finally released, and let's double hope that it doesn't look like this:

If you'd like to scroll through every post I've written on this subject, most of them eye-openers, please go here. That link includes audio and video interviews with Lt. Col. Wingard, one by David Shuster, one by Ana Marie Cox, and more. My guest commentary at BuzzFlash is here.

If you use Twitter, the hashtag is #FreeFayiz. We have organized a team to get these stories out. If you are interested in helping Fayiz out, e-mail me at The Political Carnival, address in sidebar to the right; or tweet me at @GottaLaff.

Torture report due June 26

By GottaLaff

As Rachel Maddow calls it, the Big Kahuna:

The hotly-anticipated release of the CIA’s 2004 torture report that will raise questions about torture’s effectiveness and legality — which was set for today but postponed — has been pushed back only one week, a source familiar with the process tells me. That means the target day is now next Friday.

Let's hope it's released, and let's double hope that it doesn't look like this: