Ramallah, West Bank - Since the war in Gaza began two weeks ago, Rami Hamdan has oscillated between two emotions: sadness at the deaths of Palestinian civilians and anger, not only at Israel but also at its Palestinian foe, the militant Islamist group Hamas .
"Of course I am unhappy about the killings," said Hamdan, a 30-year-old building inspector in Ramallah , the de facto capital of the West Bank . "But Hamas is also responsible. They breached the truce.
What's the endgame for Israel and Hamas in Gaza?. Israeli troops moved deeper into Gaza City Sunday and pounded Rafah from the air. Hamas rejected plans for international peacekeepers in Gaza.
Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher, aka [base ']ÄúJoe the Plumber,[base ']Äù is currently in Israel covering the war for the conservative site PJTV.com. When asked what he has learned from his new experiences as a journalist, Wurzelbacher said that he believes the media shouldn’t be allowed to do “reporting” on wars:
I’ll be honest with you. I don’t think journalists should be anywhere allowed war. I mean, you guys report where our troops are at. You report what’s happening day to day. You make a big deal out of it. I think it’s asinine. You know, I liked back in World War I and World War II when you’d go to the theater and you’d see your troops on, you know, the screen and everyone would be real excited and happy for’em. Now everyone’s got an opinion and wants to downer–and down soldiers. You know, American soldiers or Israeli soldiers.
I think media should be abolished from, uh, you know, reporting. You know, war is hell. And if you’re gonna sit there and say, “Well look at this atrocity,” well you don’t know the whole story behind it half the time, so I think the media should have no business in it.
Obama Leaves Door Open To Investigating Bush, But Wants To "Look Forward" Responding to the most popular inquiry on the "Open for Questions" feature of his website, Barack Obama said on Sunday that he is "evaluating" whether or not to investigate potential crimes of the Bush administration, but that he was inclined to "look forward as opposed to looking backwards."
The answer was delivered during an interview to This Week With George Stephanopoulos. But the question itself has been weeks in the work.
The Obama transition team, as part of its efforts to open up the political process, had allowed web users to vote on questions for the incoming administration to field. To the top rose a query from Bob Fertik, president of Democrats.com and a former Clinton White House technology official, asking whether the incoming administration would appoint a special prosecutor to "independently investigate the greatest crimes of the Bush administration, including torture and warrantless wiretapping."
On Obama's website, a December statement from Vice President-elect Joe Biden on the topic was <a href="http://change.gov/newsroom/entry/open_for_questions_round_2_response/";>offered as a response (similar older statements were used to address several other national security-related questions, which the transition team has avoided discussing). But Stephanopoulos made the matter moot by posing the question directly to the president-elect.
"We're still evaluating how we're going to approach the whole issue of interrogations, detentions, and so forth," said Obama. "And obviously we're going to look at past practices. And I don't believe that anybody is above the law. On the other hand, I also have a belief that we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards. And part of my job is to make sure that for example at the CIA, you've got extraordinarily talented people who are working very hard to keep Americans safe. I don't want them to suddenly feel like they've got to spend all their time looking over their shoulders and lawyering up."
Pressed a bit -- was he ruling out prosecution? -- the president-elect suggested that decision would be that of his attorney general.
"I think my general view when it comes to my attorney general is that he's the people's lawyer. Eric Holder's been nominated," said Obama. "His job is to uphold the Constitution and look after the interests of the American people, not be swayed by my day-to-day politics. So ultimately, he's going to be making some calls. But my general belief is that when it comes to national security, what we have to focus on is getting things right in the future as opposed to looking at what we got wrong in the past."
I asked Fertik to share his thoughts on the president-elect's answer. This is what he had to say:
It's absurd to talk about "upholding the Constitution" and say "no one is above the law" if you refuse to look "back" at those who have subverted the Constitution and broken the law. And you can't have one set of rules for "national security" and a different set of rules for everything else.
So if there's any hope for prosecution in Obama's answer, it is that Attorney General Eric Holder will truly be "the people's lawyer" and fully represent us by prosecuting torturers, wiretappers, and other criminals who committed their crimes from secret undisclosed locations hidden within the Bush-Cheney administration.
One more thing that is worth noting. As <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/2009/01/11/obama-special-prosecutor-torture/";>pointed out by Think Progress, Dawn Johnsen, Obama's choice to lead the Office of Legal Counsel, has said that the next president should avoid "any temptation to simply move on." Here is the relevant quote:
We must avoid any temptation simply to move on. We must instead be honest with ourselves and the world as we condemn our nation's past transgressions and reject Bush's corruption of our American ideals. Our constitutional democracy cannot survive with a government shrouded in secrecy, nor can our nation's honor be restored without full disclosure.
Cheney On Not Catching Bin-Laden: "We've Got A Few Days Left" Pressed on some of the foreign policy missteps and shortcomings of the Bush administration, Dick Cheney, even with just days to go in his time in public office, pleaded for more time.
Asked by CNN's Wolf Blitzer why President Bush had been unable to "capture or kill [Osama] bin Laden or Ayman al-Zawahiri, the No. 2 al Qaeda leader," the vice president replied:
Well, we've got a few days left yet, Wolf.
He later expanded his answer, arguing that bin Laden's reclusion in the hills of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border had greatly limited his effectiveness as a terrorist leader.
"My guess is at this point he's operating in an area that's very difficult, very hard to get to, that he's not an effective leader at this stage," said Cheney. "He can't really engage his organization without coming out of whatever hole he's hiding in. And the key thing for us, even if we got bin Laden tomorrow, is to take down his organization. And that's what we've been actively doing."
The interview, one of many that the vice president has provided in the waning days in office, was largely a retrospective on the Bush years. And, in course, a number of contentious assessments of history were offered. Among them: Cheney insisted that the president did not base his decision to invade Iraq based on "any connection to 9/11" and argued that the CIA was responsible for the false notion that Iraq and al-Qaeda had an operational connection.
Here is the transcript as provided by CNN.
CHENEY: Well, the question on Saddam Hussein, I think, can be and should be considered separate and apart from 9/11. But if you're talking about whether or not there was any information connecting Iraq to 9/11, initially there was. The CIA produced the first report that came in, oh, a week after 9/11 that said, in fact, Muhammad Atta had been in Prague, Czechoslovakia, and met with a senior official of the Iraqi intelligence service at that time.
... BLITZER: So when you launched the war against Saddam Hussein, did you know then that Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11?
CHENEY: We did not base going after Saddam Hussein on any connection with 9/11. There was a history of a relationship with terror. He'd been a prime state sponsor of terror, as designated by the State Department.
In fact, the text of the original <a href="http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=107_cong_public_laws&docid=f:publ243.107";>2002 authorization for the war in Iraq included the text, "Whereas members of al Qaida, an organization bearing responsibility for attacks on the United States, its citizens, and interests, including the attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, are known to be in Iraq..."
In an interview with Brit Hume that aired today on Fox News Sunday, President Bush admitted that he personally authorized the torture of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. He said he personally asked “what tools” were available to use on him, and sought legal approval for waterboarding him:
BUSH: One such person who gave us information was Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. … And I’m in the Oval Office and I am told that we have captured Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the professionals believe he has information necessary to secure the country. So I ask what tools are available for us to find information from him and they gave me a list of tools, and I said are these tools deemed to be legal? And so we got legal opinions before any decision was made.
Watch it:
Bush staunchly defended the program, saying it saved American lives — despite interrogators’ claims to the contrary. He waved away the debate over torture by saying dismissively, “Look, I understand why people can get carried away on this issue.”
Last year, Bush admitted that he was “aware” that his national security team met to discuss KSM’s interrogation, and that he approved of the meeting. His admission today suggests Bush had a far more direct role in developing the specific torture program, which included waterboarding, a freezing cell, and long periods of standing and stress positions (all of which have long been considered torture).
E. Coli Biofuel Can Go Right in the Tank. Scientists have genetically engineered the E. coli bacteria to produce a carbon-rich alcohol molecule equivalent in energy to gasoline, Popular Mechanics reports. The "long-chain" alcohol does not occur in nature, but with six to eight atoms of carbon, it is far more efficient than ethanol, which has only two. "Long-chain alcohols can be directly used in automobiles or aircraft," the lead scientist said. [All Stories from Newser]
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You're Going to Hell, and There's Nothing You Can Do About It. Jesus needs salvation from the liberal, pansy ethos of mainstream evangelicals, and Mark Driscoll is determined to save him, Molly Worthen writes in the New York Times Magazine. The foul-mouthed Seattle pastor, who preaches in distressed jeans and unflinchingly discusses oral sex in the Bible, is a culture warrior resurrecting the fire-and-brimstone of Calvinism, a theology that makes Pat Robertson seem warm and fuzzy. [All Stories from Newser]
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