John Bellinger has been publicly suggesting the Obama Administration had exceeded the terms of the AUMF for some time. So it is unsurprising that he took the opportunity of a Republican House, the incoming Armed Services Chair’s explicit support for a new AUMF, and the Ghailani verdict to more fully develop his argument in an [...]

Shortly after news broke that CIA destroyed the torture tapes, the 9/11 Commission issued a letter complaining that they had not been told of–much less been allowed to review–the torture tapes. The commission’s mandate was sweeping and it explicitly included the intelligence agencies. But the recent revelations that the C.I.A. destroyed videotaped interrogations of Qaeda [...]

I just re-read Philippe Sands’ Torture Team and, given the news of disappearing emails and documents, this passage struck me anew: [Mike Dunlavey, who was in charge of Gitmo as they put together the torture plan for Mohammed al-Qahtani] would have liked to have gone back to the daily diaries and schedules that were kept [...]

A look at how Cheney scammed the system to implement torture.

A number of people are out today reporting that the 9/11 Report relies on the information from detainees who had been tortured. That is true. Though most of the information came after the worst torture stopped.

Philip Zelikow made clear in today’s hearing how Congressional briefing should work. But all the evidence suggests that’s not what happened.

It sounds like Sheldon Whitehouse is focusing primarily on the upcoming OPR report–and tomorrow’s hearing will pave the way for that report.

Yesterday, I showed how Steven Bradbury’s May 30 Memo was a failed response to Congress’ insistence that the Administration consider whether its torture program complied with the 8th Amendment. Well, that’s precisely what Philip Zelikow’s dissent was about.

I’ve been scouring the 9/11 Report to see whether interrogation reports derived from waterboarding provided useful intelligence. It looks like Zelikow will be addressing that issue himself, shortly.

Last night, as I was beginning my catalog of the interrogation reports used in the 9/11 Report, the former Executive Director of the 9/11 Commission was on Rachel Maddow, elaborating on his Foreign Policy article where he revealed how the Bush Administration destroyed his objections to the May 2005 Bradbury Memos.

Anonymous Liberal had a very good take on Zelikow’s story (which basically matches what bmaz said to me via email).