Such were the words of 'advice' given to military interrogators at GITMO from  Jonathon Fredman, chief counsel to the CIA's Counterterrorism Center.  

In an earlier diary I alluded to the possibility that, with so many stories on torture and tapes hitting at once, it would be easy for details to be lost.  

One example of a buried lede that seems determined to stay buried is found in the Washington Post story by Warrick and Eggen (assists White, Pincus and Tate) about the Congressional briefings on torture.  Sources for that story seem to have had a virtual laundry of goals, but in the efforts to frame the story in a way that makes sources comfortable that "their side" has been told, WaPo flits right past the aspect of the story that shows unequivocally that the Bush administration was breaking the law in its briefings.

There are so many stories floating around about video tapes found, and video tapes destroyed and who knew what and when about torture, that it is easy not only to confuse the stories, but for details to slip through the cracks.  

So lets break out some of the details separately.  Starting with September 13, 2007 and the "separate" CIA investigation that started this ball rolling.  

Cross posted as a grateful guest at folo

A boy admitted to starting one of more than a dozen wildfires that ravaged Southern California last week, state detectives said Tuesday night.

The child admitted to playing with matches Oct. 21 and accidentally starting the Buckweed Fire, Los Angeles County sheriffs said. Officials have released the boy to his parents.

Link to MSM  & MSNBC Story That Just Does Not Get It

For the REAL story - see below the line.

Spencer Ackerman at TPMmucraker has a story up about a letter sent today (pdf) from Waxman to Rice.  

That letter details incredible steps being taken by the State Department to protect Blackwater, misinform America and thoroughly disenfranchise Congress. Foremost is that Blackwater will be withholding documents from Waxman's committee at the request of Rice's State Department.

Read Spencer, read the letter and/or read below.  

It's a bit disturbing when Robert Bork channels Freddy Mercury and, not content with his Archibald Cox scalp, just has to see if he can make another one bite the dust. Couple that with the sight of "12 legal scholars" collectively donning their linguistic lycra and, concepts fluttering behind them like capes in a breeze, rushing off to do battle on behalf of obstruction and perjury, and the day is off to a bad start.  Now that the Bork 12: Vikram Amar, Randy Barnett, Robert Bork, Alan Dershowitz, Viet Dinh, Douglas Kmiec, Gary Lawson, Earl Maltz, Thomas Merrill, Robert Nagel, Richard Parker and Robert Putshaw, have joined forces, Libby can ditch that ineffective legal counsel he had and, like Richard Nixon, harness the power of the Bork.    

In connection with the Gonzales hearing yesterday,House Democrats released a transcript of an interview with a Sr. Counsel to Gonzales, Matthew Friedrich.  The Muckraker and McClatchey have been all over the portions of the report dealing with Sampson's use of Friedrich to try to put more pressure on USAs in certain states to bring voter fraud cases.  

But my attention was caught by a reference in the law.com coverage of the hearings.  

While the House Committee questioning of former Dep. Atty Gen. James Comey left a lot to be desired for depth and breadth, one reference that was elicited as interesting.  It was a response by Comey in connection with firings of USAs that took place when he was Deputy AG and one element of that response seems to have gone by virtually  unnoticed.

Did Comey testify that it takes a President to fire a US Attorney?  And if so, where the purged U.S. Attorneys fraudulently induced to resign?  Or did President Bush and his spokespersons engage in lies?  It's all a bit murky, but the events Comey described, coupled with recent news reports, certainly raise the question.

Former Dep. Atty General James Comey will be appearing tomorrow to testify before Congress.  He will be there to discuss the purge of the USAs, but his appearance will provoke memories of another Bush/Gonzales scandal, one where Dep AG Comey is reported to have figured prominently.  That scandal, which eventually resulted in the direct intervention of the President of the United States to shut down an ethics investigation, remains largely unexamined.  

With the issues relating to the USA purge on the table, it might seem that any questions relating to an ethics review, especially one in which the investigators had specifically said they would not be reviewing the legality of the program, might be a paltry affair.  But I can't help speculating and wondering, "what if?"

"What if" the story of the OPR investigation, as reported so far, leaves out or misinterprets some very significant facts?  "What if" the President directly intervened to shut down the OPR investigation because it was likely to reveal something that would cause most lawyers to lose their license?  What if"  one or two questions to Mr. Comey might raise the possibiity that Gonazles should be facing a judge instead of a Congressional committee?

Freshly sooted from a bombing in the Iraqi Parliament, Mike Pence (R-IN) surfaced from his fact finding trip with Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Lindsey Graham (R-NC) wearing a jovial smile. "Wow, that was just like the debates we used to have in the Indiana House of Representatives" he laughed. "If you can't handle plastic explosives or if you don't know how to make a bomb from fertilizer, your days in the Indiana House are numbered.

Bush has an interesting choice over the next few days.  The WH spin on the firing of the USAttys has been to put out two completely contradictory concepts and hope that no one notices.  This is a pretty safe bet with the MSM, but no so much with the lawyers sitting on Leahy's Judiciary committee.  Those lawyers are going to see very quickly that Bush will have to fish or cut bait.  The President must confess to a role in the removal of the lawyers, or the removals are prima facie illegal.

The National Security Archives has a examination of the Soviet experience in Afghansitan, based on declassified Soviet documents, that was published October 1, 2001.  The summary, Vol. II: Afghanistan: Lessons from the Last War is description of the Soviet experience and pitfalls in Afghansitan.

Let's nix that rumor that the "Lessons from the Last War" author, Svetlana Savranskaya, was the prophetess Cassandra in a prior life.  Or that in October of 2001, she was actually seeing something about to unfold, rather than describing an existing history.

What kinds of mistakes does her analysis highlight?

It's Halloween, things are scarey and Donald Rumsfeld is being kept up at night.  

Other than the thought of scarey Nancy Pelosi, what could be so troublesome that the man who called Iraq "messy" is having a hard time sleeping?  

That number is the toll free number of the Congressional Switchboard, which will connect you with the office of any member of Congress.[This is going to have a lot of typos and link glitches but I'll just have to come back to it and try to fix it later, but I'm not sure some of the message can wait]

This is a plea that you call or contact your members of Congress or leaders of your party or anyone or everyone in Congress and tell them that you do not want them to vote for EITHER the House Bill or the Senate "compromise" bill

Other contact info for the House of Representatives: http://www.house.gov/...
And Senate: http://www.senate.gov/...

I could write on and on, and write lots and lots, on the topic of the kidnap and torture engaged in by this administration.  But then I wouldn't get this up very quickly.  So I'm going to cut to the chase and tell you this, everyone needs to be on the phone sooner rather than later, telling your Senatorys and members of the House of Representatives you are against legislation that:

1. takes away habeas corpus rights of the innocent people who have been rounded up by the military or CIA and shippped off to be tortured and imprisoned for years with no protections and no way to secure their release; and

2.  allows for torture or violations of not only the Geneva Conventions, but the War Crimes Act, the torture conventions and allows the United States military, government, CIA or President to commit crimes against innocent people with no recourse.

IOW - you are against both the house and the senate "compromise" bills.

I've read one snide, or snipey or snitty or snotty piece after another about Judge Taylor's opinion, and I've become miffed.  If all states of mind (not just terror), came in color coded scales - I'd be teetering between red and orange.  In my color escalating miff, I've read the journalists quoting the pundits, the pundits quoting the professors, the professors quoting each other, and the President quoting himself.