“I feel angry that I had to go through this. That my family had to suffer through and what for?” Gonzales said in an interview with CNN.

The investigation by career prosecutor Nora Dannehy that began in September 2008 found the Justice Department’s actions in the firings of U.S. attorney David Iglesias of New Mexico during the Bush administration were inappropriately political, but not criminal. The investigative team also determined that the evidence did not warrant expanding the scope of the investigation beyond the removal of Iglesias.

Full Story: Former AG says he’s angry about criminal probe.

The existence of the federal investigation was first reported last month by the Los Angeles Times. In a nutshell, the Feds have been looking at an episode in which Norton’s Interior Department awarded three oil shale leases on federal land in Colorado — potentially worth hundreds of billions — to a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell. Two months later, Norton resigned, saying she had no job lined up. But later that year, she was hired by Shell as in-house counsel.

Federal employees are prohibited by law from discussing employment with a company while that company is involved in dealings with the government that could benefit it. They’re also prohibited from “violating the public trust” by, for instance, giving contracts to friends or associates. The Feds are said to be looking into whether Norton broke either of those laws.

Full Story: Gale Norton Subpoenaed By Grand Jury: Report | TPMMuckraker.

OPS: Make an example of her.
20 years in federal prison for selling out the public trust

New York — Seventeen human rights and civil rights organizations and 45 prominent lawyers and civic leaders have sent a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder last week urging him to appoint a special independent prosecutor to investigate and prosecute Bush officials and lawyers involved in setting illegal interrogation policies.

Holder had expanded the mandate of Justice Department lawyer John Durham to include a preliminary investigation but limited Durham’s focus to a handful of interrogators who exceeded the limits set by the “torture memos.”

The groups and individuals stressed that the special prosecutor should come from outside the Department of Justice and not limit the investigation to low-level operatives, but “should investigate and prosecute all those who ordered, approved, justified, abetted or carried out the torture and abuse.”

The letter cites “political pressure” which has “led to [Holder's] office taking too narrow an approach to the investigation.”

Full Story: National Lawyers Guild and Other Human Rights Groups Issue Open Letter to Eric Holder | BuzzFlash.org.

Rep. Wexler Announces Legislation for Select Committee

In a letter to voters, Congressman Robert Wexler (D-FL) has announced his introduction of House Resolution 383 to establish “a bi-partisan Select Committee tasked with making comprehensive recommendations on our national security policy – including those covering laws on torture, FISA law violations, wiretapping, civil liberties protections, among others. This committee would have all of the power of a standing committee, including subpoena power.” Co-sponsors are Barbara Lee (D-CA) and John Conyers (D-MI). Conyers is chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.

Wexler’s statement continued by stating that, “The committee will investigate many of the outrageous policies of the Bush Administration to unearth and expose what happened during the past eight years…. We must take a hard look at what went wrong in the last eight years. We must continue to peel back the veil of secrecy that the previous Administration used as cover to undermine our system of checks and balances, and establish a clear line between what is necessary for our security and what is unlawful government intrusion and a violation of our civil liberties.”

Wexler is not the only member of Congress to announce his attention to call out the Bush administration on its abuses. Senator Patrick Leahy wants to set up a “Truth Commission,” whose mission, as described in Time, would be “to investigate the politicization of prosecution in the Justice Department under former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales; the wiretapping of U.S. Citizens; the flawed intelligence used to justify the invasion of Iraq; and the use of torture at Guantanamo and so-called black sites abroad. Leahy’s commission is to be modeled after one that investigated the apartheid regime in South Africa .”

The trouble is that congressional investigating committees rarely amount to anything. An example was the 1976 House Select Committee on Assassinations, set up to investigate the killings of President John F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The committee met largely in secret, withheld much of its evidence from the public, and, while it said both assassinations likely involved conspiracies, stated no government agencies were parties to them. The latter point has been disputed by independent researchers both before and since.

via Investigate Bush Abuses: A Real Investigation or a Waste of Time?.

In a new poll out today, Gallup found that a slim majority of Americans — 51 percent — support “a government investigation into harsh interrogation techniques of terrorist suspects.” Forty-two percent said they were opposed to such investigations:

Greg Sargent notes that the poll also found that 55 percent believe in retrospect that the use of the interrogation techniques was justified. According to Sargent, this suggests “that the electorate doesn’t generally think a government probe would necessarily amount to retribution or revenge, as so many pundits keep saying, and merely view it as a necessary accounting of what actually happened.”

via Think Progress » Gallup: Majority support investigation of Bush administration’s interrogation tactics..

Colin Powell’s former chief of staff called on Friday for a special prosecutor to be appointed and “armed to the teeth” to investigate the authorization of torture by Bush administration officials. He also stated that the lawyers involved in drafting the “torture memos” should be disbarred, but he held out little hope that the political will exists for either course of action to take place.

In an email exchange with the Huffington Post, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson did not shy away from describing what he thought would be an apt punishment for the Bush officials involved in implementing controversial detainee interrogation programs:

“First, the lawyers,” he wrote. “I feel that [Alberto] Gonzales, [David] Addington, [John] Yoo, [Jay] Bybee, [Defense Department General Counsel William J.] Haynes and [Douglas] Feith should be, at a minimum, disbarred… That, in my view, is punishment enough for them…”

via Lawrence Wilkerson: Disbar The Bush Lawyers And Get A Special Prosecutor For The Rest.

THE BUZZFLASH EDITOR’S BLOG  – By Mark Karlin

If you’re a mafia kingpin and you authorize a “hit,” the feds will nail you for murder if they can prove the case.

As I have detailed in two recent BuzzFlash editor blog entries, the proof that Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld authorized, promoted and ordered actions that led to the murder and deaths of perhaps hundreds of detainees and merely “assumed bad guys” — not to mention rapes and other brutality — is overwhelming. The authors of legal memos, whose writers include Bush-appointed Federal Judge Jay Bybee, should certainly be disbarred.

But that doesn’t begin to address the underlying crimes that include the unnecesary and horrifying deaths of anyone that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld — and Condoleezza Rice — believed was in the way of their demonic “War on Terrorism” (which for Cheney and Rumsfeld — and others — was really a war for natural resources).

Details abound in the public record — as we have mentioned — of the homicidal acts that led to the deaths and disappearances of countless of individuals the Bush Gulag apparatus deemed “suspicious.” Some of the bodies have been accounted for; some of the alleged “enemies” just disappeared — as was the case in Chile and Argentina during the infamous reign of terror in those countries.

As I noted:

via Murder He Wrote: Why Aren’t Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld Being Prosecuted? | BuzzFlash.org.

THE BUZZFLASH EDITOR’S BLOG – by Mark Karlin

BuzzFlash fully supports trying Bush, Cheney, and their band of fellow sadists for war crimes, but while they are in the courtroom, let’s not forget Murder One. Apparently, many in the mainstream press and blogosphere already have.

The focus right now is on legal memos justifying the horrifying and numbing repetition of torture against “high profile” targets. We have a short memory in America — and most of what was in these memos — except for the diabolical excess of the waterboarding and the medieval torture by insects — was, as President Obama has said, pretty much already known.

Also known, but not discussed at this time, is that less upper echelon Al-Qaeda figures were murdered as a result of the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld torture jihad (euphemestically called in the mainstream corporate press “harsh” or “enhanced interrogation”).

Uh, remember those photos of bludgeoned prisoners in body bags that came out of Abu Ghraib? (And we still have only seen a small portion of the visual evidence.) Those people were murdered as a result of the green light on torture. Even the Pentagon has declared some of the Guantanamo dead were victims of homicide. Then there are many “renditioned” individuals who disappeared into torture prisons around the world and have never reappeared.

In 2008, Lawrence Wilkerson, former Chief of Staff to Colin Powell and a man who came over from the dark side to tell the truth, testified before Congress that a minimum of 25 people died in U.S. detention as a result of homicides — and that the figure was probably higher.

via The Legal Case Against Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Et Al., Is Murder One, Not Just War Crimes | BuzzFlash.org.

The War Crimes Act of 1996, a federal statute set forth at 18 U.S.C. § 2441, makes it a federal crime for any U.S. national, whether military or civilian, to violate the Geneva Convention by engaging in murder, torture, or inhuman treatment.

The statute applies not only to those who carry out the acts, but also to those who ORDER IT, know about it, or fail to take steps to stop it. The statute applies to everyone, no matter how high and mighty.

18 U.S.C. § 2441 has no statute of limitations, which means that a war crimes complaint can be filed at any time.

The penalty may be life imprisonment or — if a single prisoner dies due to torture — death. Given that there are numerous, documented cases of prisoners being tortured to death by U.S. soldiers in both Iraq and Afghanistan (see for example this report), that means that the death penalty would be appropriate for anyone found guilty of carrying out, ordering, or sanctioning such conduct.

via George Washington’s Blog: The War Crimes Act of 1996: Bush, Cheney and the Boys could be Indicted under US Law.

Special Comment:

U.S. future depends on torture accountability

Olbermann: We cannot let mistakes of the past haunt our future

By Keith Olbermann

As promised, a Special Comment now on the president’s revelation of the remainder of this nightmare of Bush Administration torture memos. This President has gone where few before him, dared. The dirty laundry — illegal, un-American, self-defeating, self-destroying — is out for all to see.

Mr. Obama deserves our praise and our thanks for that. And yet he has gone but half-way. And, in this case, in far too many respects, half the distance is worse than standing still. Today, Mr. President, in acknowledging these science-fiction-like documents, you said that:

“This is a time for reflection, not retribution. I respect the strong views and emotions that these issues evoke.”

“We have been through a dark and painful chapter in our history.

“But at a time of great challenges and disturbing disunity, nothing will be gained by spending our time and energy laying blame for the past.

Mr. President, you are wrong. What you describe would be not “spent energy” but catharsis.

Not “blame laid,” but responsibility ascribed. You continued:

Video & Full transcript  at link

via Future of U.S. depends on torture accountability – Countdown with Keith Olbermann- msnbc.com.

via YouTube – Scott Horton and Thom Hartmann talk about the Spanish court indictment of “The Bush 6.”.

Spanish prosecutors will seek criminal charges against Alberto Gonzales and five high-ranking Bush administration officials for sanctioning torture at Guantánamo.

Spanish prosecutors have decided to press forward with a criminal investigation targeting former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and five top associates over their role in the torture of five Spanish citizens held at Guantánamo, several reliable sources close to the investigation have told The Daily Beast. Their decision is expected to be announced on Tuesday before the Spanish central criminal court, the Audencia Nacional, in Madrid. But the decision is likely to raise concerns with the human-rights community on other points: They will seek to have the case referred to a different judge.

Both Washington and Madrid appear determined not to allow the pending criminal investigation to get in the way of improved relations.

The six defendants—in addition to Gonzales, Federal Appeals Court Judge and former Assistant Attorney General Jay Bybee, University of California law professor and former Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo, former Defense Department general counsel and current Chevron lawyer William J. Haynes II, Vice President Cheney’s former chief of staff David Addington, and former Undersecretary of Defense Douglas J. Feith—are accused of having given the green light to the torture and mistreatment of prisoners held in U.S. detention in “the war on terror.” The case arises in the context of a pending proceeding before the court involving terrorism charges against five Spaniards formerly held at Guantánamo. A group of human-rights lawyers originally filed a criminal complaint asking the court to look at the possibility of charges against the six American lawyers. Baltasar Garzón Real, the investigating judge, accepted the complaint and referred it to Spanish prosecutors for a view as to whether they would accept the case and press it forward. “The evidence provided was more than sufficient to justify a more comprehensive investigation,” one of the lawyers associated with the prosecution stated.

via The Bush Six to Be Indicted – The Daily Beast.

Bush Crimes

“If we prosecute those in America who only commit one murder, under what theory don’t we prosecute a president who is criminally responsible for over four thousand murders?”  Vincent Bugliosi

Michael Collins

Also posted at the e Pluribus Media Journal

(April 7, Wash. DC)  The legendary Los Angeles County prosecutor and top selling true crime author, Vincent Bugliosi, continues to make the case that he argued in detail in his New York Times best seller, The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder.  His crime, according to the esteemed former prosecutor:  deliberately deceiving the United States into an illegal war that resulted in the deaths of 4,200 U.S. soldiers and more than 1,000,000 Iraqi civilians.

He has the help of a citizens group called ABA Publishing headed by Arminda and Bob Alexander with Jude Morford.  The all volunteer group recently sent Bugliosi’s  cover letter and book to 2,200 local prosecutors across the country.

Bugliosi is offended by the prominence of proposed torture charges to the exclusion of what he argues is the much larger charge:  murder.  .

Prof. Jonathan Turley of the George Washington University School of Law was asked what charges were the most likely if there’s ever a serious investigation into Bush administration criminal activities.  Turley noted:

The two most obvious crimes in this administration are the torture program and the unlawful surveillance program. Despite the effort to pretend that there is some ambiguity or uncertainty on these crimes, the law is quite clear.

via MURDER TRUMPS TORTURE SAYS BUGLIOSI | discuss, debate, decide.

On Thursday, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers quietly released the final draft of an extensive report he first unveiled in January documenting the Bush administration’s “unreviewable war powers” and the possible crimes committed in implementing those policies.

In order to determine whether Bush officials broke laws, Conyers has recommended that Attorney General Eric Holder appoint a special prosecutor to launch a criminal inquiry to investigate, among other things, whether “enhanced interrogation techniques” used against alleged terrorist detainees violated international and federal laws against torture.

“The Attorney General should appoint a Special Counsel to determine whether there were criminal violations committed pursuant to Bush Administration policies that were undertaken under unreviewable war powers, including enhanced interrogation, extraordinary rendition, and warrantless domestic surveillance,” Conyers’s report says. “In this regard, the report firmly rejects the notion that we should move on from these matters.” An earlier draft of the report contained a similar recommendation, but the final version includes additional evidence that has surfaced since January to support Conyers’s reasoning s for a special prosecutor. The updated version “highlights significant source materials and Judiciary Committee accomplishments, and accounts for the final days of the Bush Administration.”

However, Conyers has not formally asked the Justice Department to appoint a special counsel as he had last year when he and 55 other House Democrats signed a letter sent to Attorney General Michael Mukasey seeking a special prosecutor to investigate the growing body of evidence that Bush administration officials had sanctioned torture, which had been documented by the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Not unexpectedly, Mukasey – a staunch defender of Bush’s theories about expansive presidential powers – ignored the letter. It’s unknown whether Conyers or any other Democrat intends to issue a similar letter to Holder.

via Conyers Wants Holder to Appoint a Special Counsel to Probe Bush Crimes.

Spanish official says arrest warrants ‘highly probable’

Six Bush-era officials responsible for crafting the legal justifications permitting the military prison at Guantanamo Bay are the subject of a potential Spanish criminal probe which could place the men under serious risk of arrest if they travel outside the United States.

“[Spanish newspaper] Público identifies the targets as University of California law professor John Yoo, former Department of Defense general counsel William J. Haynes II (now a lawyer working for Chevron), former vice presidential chief-of-staff David Addington, former attorney general and White House counsel Alberto Gonzales, former Assistant Attorney General Jay Bybee, now a judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and former Undersecretary of Defense Doug Feith,” noted Scott Horton at Harper’s.

He called them Bush’s “torture lawyers.”

On March 17, Lawrence B. Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, published an editorial in the Washington Note which accused Bush officials of knowingly holding innocent men in Guantanamo Bay for years.

“The case was sent to the prosecutor’s office for review by Baltasar Garzón, the crusading investigative judge who indicted the former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet,” reported the New York Times. “The official said that it was ‘highly probable’ that the case would go forward and could lead to arrest warrants.”

If the judge decides to open an investigation, it will be the first such legal action outside the United States, the private Cadena Sur radio said.

via The Raw Story | Pinochet judge weighs criminal probe of Bush ‘torture lawyers’.

By Naomi Wolf

Legal expert Michael Ratner calls the legal arguments made in the infamous Yoo memos, “Fuhrer’s law.”

In early March, more shocking details emerged about George W. Bush legal counsel John Yoo’s memos outlining the destruction of the republic.

The memos lay the legal groundwork for the president to send the military to wage war against U.S. citizens; take them from their homes to Navy brigs without trial and keep them forever; close down the First Amendment; and invade whatever country he chooses without regard to any treaty or objection by Congress.

It was as if Milton’s Satan had a law degree and was establishing within the borders of the United States the architecture of hell.

I thought this was — and is — certainly one of the biggest stories of our lifetime, making the petty burglary of Watergate — which scandalized the nation — seem like playground antics. It is newsworthy too with the groundswell of support for prosecutions of Bush/Cheney crimes and recent actions such as Canadian attorneys mobilizing to arrest Bush if he visits their country.

via Do the Secret Bush Memos Amount to Treason? Top Constitutional Scholar Says Yes | Rights and Liberties | AlterNet.

Torture has received the most attention among the many war crimes of the Bush administration. But those who support Bush’s pursuit of the “war on terror” have not been impressed by recriminations over torture. Worse than torture are the murders of at least 50 prisoners in Abu Ghraib, Afghanistan, and Guantánamo, but again the hard-hearted are unimpressed when those whom they perceive as terrorists receive illegal extrajudicial capital punishment.

The case for abusing children, however, is more difficult to support. The best kept secret of the Bush’s war crimes is that thousands of children have been imprisoned, tortured, and otherwise denied rights under the Geneva Conventions and related international agreements. Yet both Congress and the media have strangely failed to identify the very existence of child prisoners as a war crime. In the Islamic world, however, there is no such silence. Indeed, the prophet Mohammed was the first to counsel warriors not to harm innocent children.

From jailing children together with adults in prisons where they were raped to failing to notify their parents of their arrest, the U.S. committed numerous war crimes against children in Afghanistan and Iraq, a new book on President Bush states.

“American guards videotaped Iraqi male prisoners raping young boys but took no action to stop the offenses (and) children in Abu Ghraib were deliberately frightened by dogs,” writes political scientist Michael Haas in his new book, “George W. Bush, War Criminal?”(Praeger), a question he answers in the affirmative.

via Scoop: More Than 20 Types Of War Crimes Against Children.

CCR President Michael Ratner Talks about Prosecutions of Bush Officials on Democracy Now!

Lawmakers Debate Establishing “Truth Commission” on Bush Admin Torture, Rendition and Domestic Spying

On Capitol Hill, debate has begun over forming a truth commission to shed light on the Bush administration’s secret polices on detention, interrogation and domestic spying. A hearing on the issue was held Wednesday, two days after the Obama administration released a series of once-secret Bush administration Justice Department memos that authorized President Bush to deploy the military to carry out raids inside the United States. Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! speaks to human rights attorney Michael Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

Guest:

Michael Ratner, human right attorney and president of the Center for Constitutional Rights and author of the book The Trial of Donald Rumsfeld.

JUAN GONZALEZ: On Capitol Hill, debate has begun over forming a truth commission to shed light on the Bush administration’s secret polices on detention, interrogation and domestic spying. A hearing on the issue was held Wednesday, two days after the Obama administration released a series of once-secret Bush administration Justice Department memos that authorized President Bush to deploy the military to carry out raids inside the United States. The author of the memos, John Yoo, said Bush could disregard the First and Fourth Amendments of the Constitution.

via CCR President Michael Ratner Talks about Prosecutions of Bush Officials on Democracy Now! | Center for Constitutional Rights.

Judges and jurors, not politicians or unelected commission members, should determine whether Bush & Co. broke the law

It’s really quite simple. Truth and Reconciliation commissions, Congressional committees and blue ribbon commissions like the 9/11 Commission, are not deterrents to torture, illegal surveillance or lawyers on the Justice Department who attempted to justify the torture. They have a very limited function.

But they don’t punish anyone; don’t deter anyone, don’t even put pressure on the people who committed the acts and cannot really get at the truth to determine responsibility. They do not bring the full force of America’s 230 years of law down on the offenders. They don’t truly help rein in the powers of future presidents or defense secretaries who want to do the same or similar acts the next time they react to what they see as an extraordinary crisis. And different presidents, Democrats and Republicans from Woodrow Wilson and the prosecutions during the Red Scare, to Franklin D. Roosevelt and the internment of 110,000 Japanese, Lyndon Johnson, lying about the Gulf of Tonkin and to dramatically increase troop strength, nearly always find crisis and overreact.

via A Real Criminal Investigation of Bush/Cheney; No Truth Commission! | Rights and Liberties | AlterNet.

Press Release: Democracy For America

A USA Today/Gallup poll shows that nearly two-thirds of Americans want an investigation of potential wrongdoing by the Bush administration. But Republican Senators and some Democrats are preparing to stop the creation of a Congressional Truth Commission that will get the job started.

At a hearing held by Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont yesterday, Leahy called for Congressional action now. While Republican Sen. Arlen Specter from Pennsylvania called it a “fishing expedition.”

The Washington Post says Republicans are “confident of victory.” That’s because they haven’t heard from you.

via Scoop: Bush Investigation.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) yesterday issued an arrest warrant for Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur. Today, the AP reports that, based on the legal principles the ICC used to arrest al-Bashir, former President George W. Bush could be next on the list:

bushweb.jpgDavid Crane, an international law professor at Syracuse University, said the principle of law used to issue an arrest warrant for Omar al-Bashir could extend to former US President Bush over claims officials from his Administration may have engaged in torture by using coercive interrogation techniques on terror suspects.

via Think Progress » International Criminal Court’s case against Bashir could provide legal precedence for going after Bush..

By Daphne Eviatar 3/4/09 1:26 PM

The Senate Judiciary Committee’s “Getting to the Truth Through a Nonpartisan Commission of Inquiry” convened this morning to consider Sen. Patrick Leahy’s (D-Vt.) proposal for a sort of “truth and reconciliation” commission.

The hearing was full of all the predictable, lofty statements from illustrious supporters about why a commission would further the American people’s understanding of our nation’s past and true values, and also demonstrate to the world our commitment to truth and justice — most of which I agree with. But what was most surprising was that the Senate Republicans and their witnesses, in the process of ripping apart the idea, made the strongest case I’ve heard yet for why the Department of Justice should prosecute former senior officials of the Bush administration.

Sen. Arlen Specter, the ranking committee Republican, after noting his previous support for judicial review of the Bush administration’s terrorist surveillance program, referred to the recent disclosures of Office of Legal Counsel memos as potentially supporting the case for prosecutions.

via The Washington Independent » Republicans Make a Case for Prosecuting Bush Officials.

Indictments

Wars of Aggression

The Commission will inquire into the following charges:

Count 1: The Bush administration authorized a war of aggression against Iraq.

Count 2: The Bush administrations authorized conduct of the war that involved the commission of “war crimes.”

Count 3: The Bush administration authorized the occupation of Iraq involving, and continuing to involve, the commission of “war crimes”, “crimes against humanity” and other illegal acts.

full indictment

Torture and Indefinite Detention

The Commission will inquire into the following charges:

Torture:

Count 1: The Bush administration authorized the use of torture and abuse in violation of international humanitarian and human rights law and domestic constitutional and statutory law.

Rendition:

Count 2: The Bush administration authorized the transfer (“rendition”) of persons held in U.S. custody to foreign countries where torture is known to be practiced.

Illegal Detention:

….more

via Indictments | International Commission of Inquiry on Crimes Against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration.

142 Organizations Agree With Leading Senators and Congress Members

by David Swanson

Statement on Prosecution of Former High Officials

We urge Attorney General Eric Holder to appoint a non-partisan independent Special Counsel to immediately commence a prosecutorial investigation into the most serious alleged crimes of former President George W. Bush, former Vice President Richard B. Cheney, the attorneys formerly employed by the Department of Justice whose memos sought to justify torture, and other former top officials of the Bush Administration.

Our laws, and treaties that under Article VI of our Constitution are the supreme law of the land, require the prosecution of crimes that strong evidence suggests these individuals have committed. Both the former president and the former vice president have confessed to authorizing a torture procedure that is illegal under our law and treaty obligations. The former president has confessed to violating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

We see no need for these prosecutions to be extraordinarily lengthy or costly, and no need to wait for the recommendations of a panel or “truth” commission when substantial evidence of the crimes is already in the public domain. We believe the most effective investigation can be conducted by a prosecutor, and we believe such an investigation should begin immediately.

DRAFTED BY The Robert Jackson Steering Committee, SIGNED BY the Center for Constitutional Rights, the National Lawyers Guild, the Society of American Law Teachers, Human Rights USA, After Downing Street, American Freedom Campaign, and a total of 142 organizations listed at http://prosecutebushcheney.org

via Appoint a Special Prosecutor: The Crimes of Bush, Cheney, and Other Top Officials Must Be Prosecuted.

Legal Guidance Gave U.S. Military Broad Domestic Authority

WASHINGTON – The Justice Department today released nine national security legal opinions written by the Bush administration, and revealed that in the weeks before President George W. Bush left office, an administration attorney had disavowed all of them.

[Hours after Attorney General Eric Holder repudiated anti-terror methods enacted under former president George W. Bush, the Justice Department released nine internal memos and opinions it said gave legal grounding to the controversial policies. (AFP photo)]Hours after Attorney General Eric Holder repudiated anti-terror methods enacted under former president George W. Bush, the Justice Department released nine internal memos and opinions it said gave legal grounding to the controversial policies. (AFP photo)

The newly released memos deal with warrantless wire tapping, executive power and the seizure of terrorism suspects, all of which were issues on which the Bush administration received criticism from civil liberties advocates.

On Jan. 15, 2009, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Steven Bradbury wrote a “memorandum for the Files” stating that the opinions were no longer being relied upon and that they were “not consistent with the current views” of the Office of Legal Counsel.

via DOJ Memos Reveal Legal Thinking Behind Controversial Bush Terrorism Policy | CommonDreams.org.

OPS: well good for “off the table” Pelosi – it’s the right approach….too little too late.

Pelosi Disagrees With Immunity Proposal for ‘Truth Commission’ Witnesses

By Jason Leopold

In one week, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy says he will begin establishing a “commission of inquiry” to investigate the Bush administration’s use of torture and other abuses of power, but House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is objecting to his plan of granting immunity to some witnesses.

In an interview with Rachel Maddow on her MSNBC program Wednesday, Pelosi called Leahy’s investigative plan “a good idea,” but objected to immunity that could prevent prosecutors from holding Bush administration officials accountable for crimes in a court of law.

Pelosi, who refused to hold impeachment hearings when George W. Bush was President, signaled that she now prefers a proposal by House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, who wants a “blue-ribbon panel” to probe the Bush administration but seeks a special prosecutor, too.

via Pelosi Disagrees With Immunity Proposal for ‘Truth Commission’ Witnesses.

by Glynn Wilson Page

Evidence of Bush-Rove Crimes Hidden Away in Southern Town?

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — Hidden away in the basement of a bank building on Broad Street here, there is a bank of computer servers containing all the evidence Congress and the courts need to investigate and prosecute all the crimes of the Bush years. That includes the mysteriously missing e-mail messages sent by Karl Rove from his White House office through the Republican National Committee e-mail addresses from his special Blackberry reserved for political activities.

Ethics rules prohibit political campaigning from the White House, but since that was Rove’s sole job as political adviser to President Bush, what was an operative to do if he wanted to insist that a U.S. attorney be fired for not towing the Bush administration line by prosecuting Democrats? Rove, who has now defied a Congressional subpoena three times — a criminal act unprecedented in American history — is known to have used that Blackberry paid for by the RNC to keep on top of all kinds of nefarious activities, including the political prosecution of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman.

via OpEdNews » Evidence of Bush-Rove Crimes Hidden Away in Southern Town?.

The former president and his henchmen Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld could soon find themselves in the dock

From dismissal only a few months ago by leading Democrats in Washington as unthinkable, it now seems possible that senior officials in the Bush administration – maybe even at least one of the top two – will be the target of public war crime hearings and even criminal prosecutions, here in the United States.

Overseas is already dangerous terrain. George W Bush’s first defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, fled Paris a couple of years ago to avoid honouring a subpoena from French investigators, replicating a similarly hasty exit from the French jurisdiction by former secretary of state Henry Kissinger.

via Payback time looms for George Bush and his cronies | Opinion | The First Post.

ACCESSORY AFTER THE FACT

Whoever, knowing that an offense has been committed, receives, relieves, comforts or assists the offender in order to hinder or prevent his apprehension, trial or punishment, is an accessory after the fact; one who knowing a felony to have been committed by another, receives, relieves, comforts, or assists the felon in order to hinder the felon’s apprehension, trial, or punishment. U.S.C. 18

Not so fast.

Bush administration officials who broke the law should face criminal prosecution and shouldn’t get immunity in exchange for testimony under a proposed Truth and Reconciliation Commission being discussed in the Senate, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said in an interview broadcast late Wednesday.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy (D-VT) yesterday announced his committee will hold hearings on creating a panel to investigate alleged crimes committed by Bush administration officials, including torture of detainees and illegal wiretapping. Leahy has said the panel would avoid criminal charges except in cases of perjury.

via The Raw Story | Pelosi: Bush Administration lawbreakers should face prosecution, not immunity.

Leahy announces hearings on Bush investigations set for next Wednesday.

Speaking on the Senate floor this morning, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) reiterated his call to hold a truth commission to investigate Bush wrongdoings, and announced that the Senate Judiciary Committee would hold hearings on the matter next Wednesday. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) rose after Leahy to support the call for investigations into “this past carnival of folly, greed, lies, and wrongdoing.” “If we blind ourselves to this history, we deny ouselves its lessons,” he said, warning that such an investigation will not be comfortable or easy:

WHITEHOUSE: We are optimists, we Americans. We are proud of our country. Contrition comes hard to us. But the path back from the dark side may lead us down some unfamiliar valleys of remorse and repugnance before we can return to the light. We may have to face our fellow Americans saying to us, “No. Please. Tell us that we did not do that. Tell us that American did not do that.” And we will have to explain, somehow. This is no small thing. And not easy. This will not be comfortable, or proud. But somehow, it must be done.

Watch it:

via Think Progress » Leahy announces hearings on Bush investigations set for next Wednesday..