Marcy On MSNBC To Explain Secret Program Background

/in /by

ATTENTION all Wheelhouse and FDL members, Ms. Marcy Wheeler will be on MSNBC TeeVee with David Shuster during the 3:00-4:00 pm Eastern time hour. She is at the studio now and will be helping to explain details behind the much discussed "secret program". For more background, see these recent posts here and, to a lesser extent, here.

Watch along with us and comment away! I will graft in the video when it is available.

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    • Leen says:

      I have often thought Shuster was one of the more serious MSNBC host and really interested in digging into the issues. Finally Marcy gets on, Sure taken them awhile.

      Bmaz all
      amy goodman really digs into the deaths of the Taliban in Afghansitan
      http://www.democracynow.org/20….._into_2001

  4. WTFOver says:

    Cheney ‘ran secret black ops unit inside the CIA for eight years’

    http://news.scotsman.com/lates…..5452141.jp

    Allegations that former US vice-president Dick Cheney ran a secret “black ops” unit inside the CIA for eight years without informing Congress have increased pressure on the White House for a full investigation of alleged abuses of power by the Bush administration.

    The unit was so secret that even the former CIA director George Tenet did not control its activities, according to reports yesterday.

    • perris says:

      The unit was so secret that even the former CIA director George Tenet did not control its activities, according to reports yesterday.

      not secret to me, this “cia” is known as cheney’s “team b”, around since nixon left office, created by cheney and rumsfeld to undermine nixon’s treaty of detante, the use “team b” to create false information and unrest

      they are war monguers, sociopaths and that was and is team b

      • readerOfTeaLeaves says:

        The unit was so secret that even the former CIA director George Tenet did not control its activities, according to reports yesterday.

        I think that I may need smelling salts…

        What I find deeply disturbing is to view this whole idea of the ’secret Cheney group’ in the context of EW’s Ghorbanifar Timeline, along with what Gellman reports (in “Angler”) about the neocons linking with lobbyists and ‘non-profit’ employees (like Chalabi) all reporting directly to OVP. And OVP repeatedly hiding any links to it’s office in documents about things like the meetings in Rome between Larry Franklin, Ghorbanifar, and ‘Iranian defectors’** Something’s deeply, creepily screwy. I don’t know what it is, but it’s damn interesting that LittleDick (who was the Dept of State overseer of the Iran-Syria Group!) is going to vampily public right about now, and also painting this as a partisan issue.

        Partisan, my ass.
        But trust the Cheney’s to argue that it’s about ‘partisanship.’

        ** Clearly, I hold the view that the Iranians played Cheney the way a cat plays a mouse, and that the GOP can’t stand the idea that we might find out about it. “Defectors”?! I suppose it’s possible, but if it is, why would OVP insist that the CIA not be informed of the meetings?! That’s not ‘partisanship’, that’s creepy.

        • siri says:

          “** Clearly, I hold the view that the Iranians played Cheney the way a cat plays a mouse, and that the GOP can’t stand the idea that we might find out about it. “Defectors”?! I suppose it’s possible, but if it is, why would OVP insist that the CIA not be informed of the meetings?! That’s not ‘partisanship’, that’s creepy.”

          It’s also illegal as hell!

        • lysias says:

          The unit was so secret that even the former CIA director George Tenet did not control its activities, according to reports yesterday.

          And Yoo kept secret from Bybee and Ashcroft what he was doing in OLC.

  5. MadDog says:

    Though it might be too late, if EW has a moment, she might want to check out some more of the details on the canceled CIA program here:

    CIA planned al-Qaida assassinations in friendly countries, officials say

    Dick Cheney, the former vice president, ordered a highly classified CIA operation hidden from Congress because it pushed the limits of legality by planning to assassinate of al-Qaida operatives in friendly countries without the knowledge of their governments, according to former intelligence officials…

    …The official said he believes from conversations with serving members of the CIA that the area of real concern in Congress is that the planned operations may also have involved the covert surveillance of American citizens, a particularly sensitive subject in the US…

    …Peter Bergen, a senior security analyst at the New America Foundation, said that the secret operation must have gone further than that to have created such a backlash in Congress: “If it’s an assassination programme of al-Qaida leaders that is hardly surprising. Clinton had an assassination programme against bin Laden. There have been 27 drone missile strikes against al-Qaida alone this year.”

  6. MadDog says:

    And OT, but important too.

    The DOJ’s OIG has released a text-searchable version of the unclassfied Report on the President’s Surveillance Program (instead of the PDF image version).

    The text-searchable version is here (43 page PDF).

  7. LabDancer says:

    The emptywheel symbol deserves its own show — and another on the DFH* teevee network.

    [* DFH = Dailykos Firedoglake Huffingtonpost]

  12. Loo Hoo. says:

    She hasn’t come on yet??? I just got the notice! Should I have been tweeting or something?

  13. fatster says:

    While we’re waiting on EW, you might want to check this out. Greenwald is on fire!

    MONDAY JULY 13, 2009 06:14 EDT
    The events preceding Goldman Sachs’ new “blowout profits
    Glenn Greenwald

    “Other than those individuals whose life purpose is to serve as reverent apologists and servile defenders for the most powerful financial elites, is there anyone who would be willing to claim with a straight face that the last event is unrelated to all the ones that preceded it?  Add to that all the Serious consensus-talk about how the country can’t afford health care reform and how Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid must be cut because they’re too expensive, and the picture couldn’t be clearer.” 

    • Leen says:

      she said blowjob? yes!

      Our congress was far more focused on Clintos lies about blowjobs than the Bush administration intelligence snowjobs

      Go Marcy.

      Amy Goodman on!
      The interview of Risen and others having to do with Taliban atrocities…intense coverage
      http://www.democracynow.org/20….._into_2001

  20. MadDog says:

    Jiminy crickets, EW said “blowjob”! Way to go Marcy!

    Marcy is not apologizing for the “blowjob” comment, though Tamara Hall and David Shuster “are sure she would”.

    Blowjob!
    Blowjob!
    Blowjob!

  21. rosalind says:

    that’s what they’re freaking out about? i thought she dropped the f bomb and i missed it.

  22. bobash says:

    who was the incoherent dweeb they had Marcy parry? I’m going back to my standing policy, for the sake of my sanity–just say No to cable news.

  24. bmaz says:

    Ruh roh female co-host offended. Jeebus, does she realize what launched the network she is employed by. Fucking 24 hours a day discussion of Bill Clinton’s BLOWJOB, that is what.

    • readerOfTeaLeaves says:

      Well… how old was she when that happened?
      (As for me, I didn’t have time for teevee news back then, plus didn’t want to hear about it. I can’t believe I’m the only citizen who missed anything that wasn’t on the radio, and a lot of that I tuned out.)

  28. Tucker says:

    Marcy has nothing to apologize for, MSNBC. Then again, I bet she won’t be on again soon!
    Great job, Marcy.

  29. smartlady says:

    I hope this becomes huge! (hee hee) Blowjob!!!!!!! Look up who said it!!!! Yay! Go to her site!!! See her amazing work!!! Donate money!!!!!!

    Way to make a splash Marcy! You had that planned ahead I bet.

  30. readerOfTeaLeaves says:

    Well, gackkkkk!
    If that video clip is up at http://www.msnbc.msn.com I’m not seeing it show up yet in the “Politics: Latest Clips” que.

    Not everyone has a teevee.
    If anyone has the URL, please post.

      • readerOfTeaLeaves says:

        Okay, I’ll make myself a sitting duck for your skewering wit and withering take-downs, but I’m watching the new Dylan Rattigan show with interest. Take a look at this clip @07:30 in the clip, where Rattigan (?sp) makes a comment about ‘transparency’ being important in governing AND ALSO in markets.

        Chuck Todd then comes on and mouths Rahm’s talking points (’this intel story is a political distraction right now, the Pres can only get ‘beat up by it’, la, la, la…), and Rattigan @ 09:30 responds with something like, ‘well, [the Pres] can also get beat up by the data [meaning: by trying to ignore bad info, you also get ‘beat up’]’

        The fact that everyone on the show didn’t say, “Doh,” reveals much about the times in which we live. Eshoo was a guest.

        Okay, now back to waiting for Marcy’s spot…

  31. Petrocelli says:

    OMG … watershed moment and I missed it … will wait for video upload on msnbc.com

    Betcha Rachel & Keif are having a gut busting laugh right now …

  32. Leen says:

    hell Keith, and Rachels teams have been pulling from Marcy’s blog for quite awhile. Finally she is making it on

  34. puppethead says:

    I still think Cheney’s hit team is a red herring, it’s not the CIA program Panetta reportedly killed. Why would the Bush death cult keep killing of evildoers a big secret? It’s the one thing they’d be most proud of and brag about.

    This is all just a big misdirect to cover up something else, I’m sure of it.

  35. Mary says:

    Dang, I missed it.

    EW should not have used the term “blowjob.” She should have said, “highly classified enhanced intercourse technique, discussion of which will damage national security”

    If only Bill had thought to classify his penis.

      • Mary says:

        You know, as many favors as Obama has done for W, the least he could do is retroactively classify Bill’s penis for him.

    • LabDancer says:

      Secrecy Steve tells me classification is supposed to be reserved for things that were they known might endanger national security, and that classifying things just to keep them secret is to abuse the power of office. That could suggest President Clinton may well have given the matter full consideration, and decided to act appropriately within the purpose of presidential privilege in declining to wrap that rascal.

      Or it could suggest that for some reason he didn’t mind it being out there; but I’m pretty sure it’s the former.

    • freepatriot says:

      can we get a transcript for our dialup contingent ???

      I’m a cheap bastard, I had to choose between Marcy an high speed innertoobz

      guess which I chose

      maybe a guilt trip will get some action round here …

    • freepatriot says:

      so I’m thinkin Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert owe a few bucks to the kitty

      for, you know, providing content, an all

      My Muse is gonna be FAMOUS

      we need to start spreading that donation link

      an Marcy:

      THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU

      multiply that by infinity, and you’ll have a small sample of how grateful I am for this

      (snoopy dance)

      (smiles for miles)

  37. Mary says:

    One of the stories now is that the plan was to kill whoever Cheney thought was al-Qaeda in friendly countries, without letting domestic intel in on it. Like an Abu Omar dead in his apartment instead of rendered to Egypt.

    Who would be left in Saudi Arabia if that went operational?

      • Mary says:

        You know, there were all the internet conspiracy stories about the odd deaths in the Saudi royal family during the Zubaydah interrogations …

        The deaths and disappearances of Iranians linke to their nuke program …

        You know soon no one will be able to see the woodword anymore, but for all the things that are crawling out of it, real and phantom.

        The fallout from the spec of not making things public and in a CREDIBLE fashion is worse than the fallout from whatever the program really was.

        • readerOfTeaLeaves says:

          You know, there were all the internet conspiracy stories about the odd deaths in the Saudi royal family during the Zubaydah interrogations …

          The deaths and disappearances of Iranians linke to their nuke program …

          Huh???

          Actually, I’m clueless.
          I never cease to be astonished at what you seem to be aware of…

        • Mary says:

          “Aware of” isn’t the same as “knowledgeable about.” *g*

          In 2002, a member of the Saudi royal family who was very well known to horse racing circles died very unexpectedly of a heart attack.

          Not only did Saudi Prince Ahmed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz, who owned War Emblem, die of an unexpected heart attack at 43 -but his cousin,Sultan bin Faisal bin Turki bin Abdullah 41, died in a car accident on the way to the funeral.

          I won’t link to any of the spec sites bc of the bouncebacks, but there has been spec that during the times Zubaydah was saying pretty much anything to stop the torture, he tossed out some Saudi family names. There has also been spec unrelated to Zubaydah on ties to funding al-Qaeda and a determination, not necessarily by Bush, to strike back. OTOH, there is also speculation that Jesus would choose to reappear in the burn marks on a piece of toast, so take it fwiw. There’s equally been spec of Saudi family infighting being tied to the deaths (and others). Here’s a Safire piece from 2002 that talks about the factionalization within the family some.

          Still, the kind of “hanging” story we have now just fuels stuff like that.

          On Iran, here’s a Times online link to a story of one “mysterious” death, although it links back to Mossad instead of to CIA. Which, I guess if you were CIA and it was your program would make you happy There were some other deaths too and I won’t link to spec sites but you can find them with google pretty easily if you want.

          Something else that has happened recently, kind of under the radar, is that some of the Iranians we have been holding forever in Iraq, who claimed to be “diplomats” and who the Iraqis and Khurdish Iraqis claimed were “diplomats” but who we claimed were not have just been released back to Iran.

          So our response 6mos or so into the Obama administration and a month or so into the Iranian uprisings has been to … release these guys. Something I expected to hear Republicans raising holy hell about, but there hasn’t been much. I think technically we handed over their custody to Iraq – who then shipped them on to Iran.

          Anyway, lots of pieces on the table, but they aren’t all from the same puzzzle. And some might not even be turned right side up.

          Still – all the secrecy feeds the stories of the worst possiblities.

    • Citizen92 says:

      In Hersh’s early “slip” about the ring few months, he did say that neither the in-country CIA Chiefs of Station nor the Ambassador were informed of these units’ in-country covert activities.

      Now if DCI Tenet did not control the activities of the unit (distinctly different from not knowing about it entirely, kinda like having cancer, but not being able to control it), yet the unit was run ‘within the CIA’ then who at the CIA did know? Were these operatives contractors, on the CIA budget but outside of their operational control? And who came to Panetta to inform him about it, and why? Because the budget ran out?

      Maybe this unit was comprised of ‘consultants’ to the OVP?

      http://www.gpoaccess.gov/plumb…..endix5.pdf>

      APPENDIX NO. 5
      OFFICE OF THE VICE PRESIDENT
      The Vice Presidency is a unique office that is neither a part of the executive branch nor a part of the legislative branch, but is attached by the Constitution to the latter. The Vice Presidency performs functions in both the legislative branch (see article I, section 3 of the Constitution) and in the executive branch (see article II, and amendments XII and XXV, of the Constitution, and section 106 of title 3 of the United States Code).

      The annual legislative branch appropriations act (see, for example, Public Law 108–83) and the annual transportation-treasury appropriations act (see, for example, Public Law 108–199) provide funds for the Vice President to hire employees to assist him in carrying out his legislative and executive functions. Executive branch employees also may be assigned or detailed to the Vice President (see 3 U.S.C. 112) and the Vice President may employ consultants (see 3 U.S.C. 106(a)). The Office of the Vice President (OVP) consists of the aggregation of Vice Presidential employees whose salary is disbursed by the Secretary of the Senate from the Vice President’s legislative appropriation, Vice Presidential employees employed with the Vice President’s executive appropriation, employees assigned or detailed to the Vice President, and consultants engaged by the Vice President

      • TarheelDem says:

        I think you are on to something. Going outside the chain of command and authority in the CIA would be a Congressional no-no. Running an assassination squad out of the OVP using contractor chain of authority would be a staggering no-no. A stunning one, as some Congressmen put it.

      • maryo2 says:

        Good question – WHY didn’t Panetta learn about it for 6 months? In tracking the trail of deception for just the last six months, Panetta might be able to purge some Cheney embeds.

        • Citizen92 says:

          Since we’re back to normal government, it is summer afterall.

          2010 Appropriations bills are heading to the House floor. Some budget bureaucrat, somewhere in the CIA, may have been looking for program funding. Or some program manager, somewhere in the CIA, may have been forced to go to the DCI to explain his plight that the program no longer had any more money (presumably because no one at OVP was left to deliver the $$).

        • phred says:

          What do you bet the sob’s just wanted to get their greedy little hands on some stimulus money? ; )

      • radish says:

        A contractor-based (and/or organized crime based) targeted assassination unit would definitely connect some otherwise puzzling dots. Frex:

        * Freakouts by people (ranging from Panetta to Feinstein) who wouldn’t ordinarily give a rat’s ass about mere assassination of suspected terrorists

        * A program that had to be hastily shut down after eight years of “on and off” activity even though it was “not fully operational”

        * A program that did not require the approval or cooperation of the DCI (Tenet “not fully briefed”, Panetta only just finds out about it)

        * A program that different parties might describe in dramatically different ways, including:

        ** “former agency officials” talking about “a technically oriented intelligence-collection effort unrelated to terrorism suspects” and also

        ** “former intelligence officials familiar with the matter” talking about “an attempt to carry out a 2001 presidential authorization to capture or kill al Qaeda operatives” (in the same damn article no less!)

        * Sy Hersh’s description of a program that might or might not have been this one

        Why would a surveillance/assassination unit that wouldn’t normally raise any eyebrows in the Village result in both panicked shutdown and the kind of blind men and elephant spin we’re seeing in the papers? It might if it were composed wholly or partially of civilians outside any normal chain of command, answering directly to OVP. Especially if it was funded particularly, uh… creatively. With or without black money.

        • readerOfTeaLeaves says:

          outside any normal chain of command, answering directly to OVP. Especially if it was funded particularly, uh… creatively. With or without black money.

          Yup. And remember that Fox Fallon took early retirement, reportedly because he felt that things were happening that he couldn’t control — it’s my view that when you screw your own military commanders, you ought to end up with a long court date, to say the least of it.

          This whole thing doesn’t make any sense.

        • earlofhuntingdon says:

          Which gets back to the fact that Dick Cheney, as VP, had no personal authority to do more than go to the bathroom.

          The Vice Presidency is a constitutional nullity. Its holder has NO inherent powers (other than breaking tie votes in the Senate). Any and all actions he took or decisions he made are de facto actions of the President, through Dick Cheney as his agent. They are two inseparable sides of the same coin.

        • Neil says:

          as VP, had no personal authority to do more than go to the bathroom.

          Exactly, by fully delegating authority to Cheney and not staying fully informed, Bush failed to faithfully execute his oath of office. What is the remedy for a president who does not faithfully execute their oath of office?

  38. lysias says:

    “Team B” under Ford wasn’t part of the CIA, was it? My understanding is that it criticized the CIA’s analysis of Soviet military potential for being too conservative (when we now know the CIA if anything overrated Soviet military potential).

  39. Waccamaw says:

    Missed it on TV and dial-up = no vid clips.

    How did the term “blowjob” get brought into the conversation?

  40. Loo Hoo. says:

    fatster, here are Franken’s first remarks as a member of the judiciary committee. He went on to tell Mr. Sessions that he would be working in the tradition of Paul Wellstone. There must be some significance to that…

  42. Leen says:

    the blow job statement will take Marcy around the world..cutting to the values the priorities the focus of our congress.

    Shuster “it’s the kind of distraction that President Obama has been trying to avoid”

    Marcy and team pushing for accountability this is about the “rule of law”
    Morals International treaties and what has been done in “our names”

    Go Marcy

  43. siri says:

    i SINCERELY hope Marcy did NOT apologize for ANYTHING!
    It’s about time someone put the blowjob out there for what it was!

    • Waccamaw says:

      Now it’s wrong to say “blowjob” on msnbc but it’s perfectly OK for ol’ uncle pat to suggest it would be a good idea to drown someone? Shuster and hall just think that’s soooooooo funny! :-(((

      • Teddy Partridge says:

        Blowjob bad. Murder good.

        It really sums up their twisted sexual/political philosophy.

      • readerOfTeaLeaves says:

        I don’t think Shuster or Hall make the rules.
        They just have to work by ‘em.

        Still, Shuster is IMVHO **the** television expert on all things Plame-related. That was so convoluted it took talent to distill and explain to a busy, preoccupied public. I mean, how do you communicate the complexities of who’s-who in the Plame Investigation to a nation busy getting ready for dinner, or peeling carrots, or grabbing a bit on the way to baseball? Not an easy task.

  44. Mary says:

    ???????
    YOu’re trying to turn Eric Holder into Alberto Gonzales? Huh?

    They just toss the words at the wall to see what stick, don’t they?

  45. Teddy Partridge says:

    Funny how the media and the GOP is always so keen on “Clinton did it, too!” but when someone actually mentions what all the money was spent investigating, the pecksniffs are all shocked and appalled. I mean, c’mon Shuster, you know MSNBC was born on the back of that blowjob.

  46. Waccamaw says:

    Loo Hoo and esseff44 –

    Thanks! Kinda assumed that would be the case but just wanted verification.

  47. Leen says:

    They say that Marcy should apologize for saying “blowjob” yet our congress and the MSM subjected our nation..to two years (or was it five years as Marcy said sure seemed like it) of an investigation and impeachment of a President who lied under oath about blowjobs. And as a nation we have yet to witness our congress hold an administration accountable for serious serious crimes committed in our names

    WMD false intelligence…no one held accountable
    torture…no one held accountable
    Undermining of the DOJ no one held accountable

    Thousands of innocent people are dead DEAD due to the Bush administrations lies, undermining of International laws and Marcy is called out for saying “blowjob” Hope they bring her back on for being willing to tell the truth about when our congress and Justice system has not been willing to do their jobs

    Holder standing up to the Obama and others who want our nation to “move forward, turn the page, next chapter” We don’t want to be about “vengeance, revenge the blame game” hogwash.

    No way for this nation to truly move forward until those who committed very serious crimes testify under oath and are held accountable for those crimes. The whole world is watching

  48. JThomason says:

    Now that there are issues of genocide and murder on the table maybe the media wont be so squeamish about using the word “torture.”

  49. AZ Matt says:

    No apology for blowjob! It is what is was and what the Republicans still like to hit Dems with.

    • Leen says:

      blowjobs is what it takes to get the Republicans justice juices going.

      Lies about WMD’s, hundreds of thousands dead based on a “pack of lies”, thousands injured, torture, undermining Dept of Justice, outing of Valerie Plame, etc etc.

      Republicans and Obama repeat

      “Just move on folks, get over it, don’t be about revenge” Hundreds of thousands dead, people tortured, sodomized, raped for what? and they want our nation and the world to move on?

  53. bmaz says:

    MSNBC guest just talked about “investigating Bill Clinton for a blowjob.” Didn’t know you could say that on TV. Shuster grimaced, apologized
    about 1 hour ago from web
    HowardKurtz

    Maximum Twit Howie Kurtz is aghast!

    I dunno, if CNN can have a goatblower like Kurtz on every weekend, Marcy ought to be able to say “blowjob” on MSNBC.

  54. Leen says:

    The “blwojob” comment heard around the world. Will George Will and other Republicans heads explode?

    twitter Glenn Greenwald
    http://twitter.com/glenngreenwald
    Marcy Wheeler on MSNBC, destroying national moral fiber-& confirming Juan Williams’ fears- with the word “blowjob

  55. Styve says:

    Wayne Madsen drew a connection between George Tenet’s Woldwide Attack Matrix and Cheney’s Hit Squad…

    July 13-14, 2009 — Cheney’s “Assassination Squad” and Tenet’s “Worldwide Attack Matrix” — one and the same

    Re-published article from March 2002. George Tenet’s “Worldwide Attack Matrix” (WAM) is the basis for Dick Cheney’s hit squad that targeted those far beyond the mountains of Afghanistan. The “counter-terrorism” program was revealed in an article in The Washington Post, so it defies logic that Democrats in Congress are arguing that they were not informed. Representative Anna Eshoo (D-CA) said the program was “shocking” and Senator John McCain said that more details will be forthcoming on the covert operation. But the blame for the illegal murders carried out by the WAM primarily falls on the shoulders of Messrs. Cheney, Abrams, and Tenet.
    The CIA’s Death Squad Body Count Continues to Pile Up

    Wayne Madsen

    March 23, 2002

    President Bush tours Latin America as his newly-empowered CIA death squads rub out all those opposed to U.S. corporate interests and their local power-hungry surrogates. The latest victims:

    The Archbishop of Cali, Colombia Isaias Duarte was shot and killed in front of a church on March 17. He had previously claimed legislative candidates were receiving drug money. However, the only “recognized” candidates are those who support the Colombian oligarchy, supported by the right-wing paramilitaries (also involved in cocaine), the US-trained military, the CIA, and CIA front companies like Dyncorp, MPRI, and East, Inc. So Archbishop Duarte became a “target of opportunity” (or a “terrorist” to use the language of our mentally-impaired President Bush). The Colombian government, of course, blamed “leftist guerrillas” for Duarte’s death). The right-wing death squads in El Salvador tried the same line in 1980 when they, in fact, killed, with the support of the CIA and its local intelligence agency ANSESAL, Archbishop Oscar Romero. Those death squads were aided and abetted at the time by State Dept. operative Elliott Abrams, now the human rights coordinator for the National Security Council in the American unconstitutional regime of Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld.

    The same day that the Archbishop was assassinated, Jorge Rosal Zea, the head of operations for Guatemala’s Patriot Party in Suchitepequez Province was gunned down by several men waiting in a parked car. The assassination came a few days after Rosal Zea led a 3,000-person demonstration and called for the resignations of President Alfonso Portillo and Vice President Juan Francisco Reyes, both stooges of the CIA and its minions who now control U.S. Latin American policy in the State Department and National Security Council. Portillo, his personal secretary, and Reyes have been accused by opponents of opening secret bank accounts in Panama to embezzle millions of dollars in public funds. It is a familiar pattern for CIA surrogates who have done similar things in the past (Marcos in the Philippines, Noriega in Panama, and Somoza in Nicaragua).

    Mar 10, Sao Paulo, Brazil — Mikael “Mike” Nassar and his wife Marie Noel Nassarwere shot to death at a gas station after one their car’s tires was punctured. Nassar is a former Lebanese Phalangist leader and associate of Elie Hobeika, who was assassinated on January 24 in Lebanon. Hobeika and Nassar were prepated to testify against Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in a Belgian war crimes tribunal for his role in the 1982 massacres at the Palestinian refugee camps in Sabra and Chatilla in Beirut.

    Angola — Just like the CIA-Mossad team of convenience takes out a second threat to Sharon, another threat to the oil oligarchy of Angola removed a second threat to it. Antonio Dembo, the moderate successor to UNITA chief Jonas Savimbi, was reported to have been killed on March 7. Dembo was considered the best choice to lead UNITA into peace talks with the government. The CIA disinformation machine claimed Dembo died from complications of diabetes. And Patrice Lumumba died from lead poisoning!

  56. Leen says:

    Just hit “think Progress”
    orry this is off topic, but it is pretty funny. Although now that I think about it, a blow job and the Christian right, kind of go hand in hand…Anyway.

    In the midst of debating the merits of whether or not a special prosecutor should be appointed to investigate the CIA, FDL blogger, Marcy Wheeler, says “Blow Job” on MSNBC.

    Watch the whole segment here.

    http://progressnotcongress.org/?p=2152

    July 13th, 2009 at 4:39 pm

    I saw that when it happened ; anyone know if Marcy Wheeler is single ?

    She’s AWESOME ………………………..
    July 13th, 2009 at 4:42 pm

  57. JThomason says:

    When Bluto said “blowjob” in Animal House, he had to say it under his breath and cover it over with coughs. Let us not forget our heroes in freedom of expression so that now self-respecting Americans can say “blowjob” unapologetically on cable TeeVee.

  58. thegris says:

    Great job, Marcy! It’s so refreshing to see the Cheney apologists schooled with the facts, by a…. DFH blogger!

    I only wish Shuster had let you speak a bit more about the rule of law. That was the final nail.

  59. Mary says:

    Since Marcy mentioned Iran Contra, Vincent Canistraro is telling TPM that the program involved targeting Americans in something that went “beyond surveillance.”

    As for what the program did involve, Cannistraro suggested that it involved Americans as targets, and that it went beyond surveillance, but declined to elaborate. He added that, though Cheney may have directly ordered the CIA to keep Congress in the dark, the veep wasn’t acting alone. “The approval was from the president,” said Cannistraro.

    Why he would know or openly and for attribution tell the truth if he did, I have no idea. But that takes me back to things like CIA operations against Mayfield here on US soil.

    • LabDancer says:

      That fits my own conjecture – I’d be interested in yours. Targeting al Qaeda types, targeting Taliban even, disturbing as the mechanics of such a concept would have to be, those don’t seem likely to have gotten the undies of all these Congress critters in such a knot [well, maybe Rep Eschoo somewhat, but she’s one of my faves]. It has to have been the wider nature of the 007 authorization, that one can’t define in any way that makes sense beyond whoever Dick, or Dick and his little buddy with the big codpiece, decided.

      • phred says:

        What else would get Panetta to stop it immediately and send him scurrying up to the Hill? It wouldn’t have been killin’ fer’ners on the other side of the planet (which is pretty common actually). I suspect it is all about targeting American citizens (and possibly citizens of our allies). And I do not buy for one NY second that the program was never operational… In 8 years? With Cheney? Delay and caution were not their approach to anything.

        • Styve says:

          The “not fully operational” line was a complete red flag to me, as well. How the hell does Cheney manage the media like this, or why isn’t NSA working to at least inform the Obama Admin. of such treachery?!

    • john in sacramento says:

      Read this comment by FORAC @ # 5

      […]

      The agency conducted domestic surveillance of mosques in key areas (Chicago, Boston, New Jersey, California, Colorado, DC area) and then outsourced the assassinations to criminal gangs indigenous to the US. The purpose was two-fold: one, they could circumvent the ban on domestic use of the CIA, amd, because of the secrecy afforded to them, no one would be the wiser. (it was compartmentalized and probably stuffed into a SAP, google Special Access Program, it’s above TS).

      Two, by outsourcing the killings to bikers, Mexican gangs, etc they wash their hands of any knowledge or culpability. “What assassinations? The CIA does not carry out assassinations in the United States or anywhere else.”

      And they’d be telling the truth: THEY don’t. They pay or train other people to do it. The Taliban is a perfect example of them successfully training people to function as a lethal force, and then it bites the CIA in the ass and jeopardizes US foreign policy.

      […]

      And comment 11

      And comment 14

      • emptywheel says:

        Thanks for that. I was talking to a journalist about that who said, eh. I said, Look, I’m in Ann Arbor, we had our local muslim center busted up over this, on–from what I saw–really shaky basis. It pisses me off.

      • john in sacramento says:

        PS somewhat related

        When we first moved to Reno, we stayed in a motel until we could find an apartment. Of course many Reno residents by their nature are in transitory circumstances (we were). So anyway, there were people coming and going all the time, and for a short time there were a couple of recently discharged Marines who moved in upstairs. One time I was talking to one of them, and he was telling me about how he was sniper in Desert Storm and that before they came to Reno he did a favor for a couple friends of his in LA who happened to be ‘Bloods’ (the gang). And I wasn’t sure if it was true or if it was the beer talking, but, he said he went high up in an apartment building and ‘took out’ a ‘crew leader’ from the ‘Crips.’ He said something about how the guy went down, and nobody knew where the shot came from, and how easy it was. Again, I thought it was the beer talking

        This anecdote doesn’t prove any kind of support for the comments I linked to, or for the story in Mary’s link because I have no idea if it was true (and I wasn’t going to find out) but at the same time it’s also not out of the realm possibility that there could be relationships between certain segments of the government and not-so-legal segments of the population

        • Rayne says:

          Remember the white nationalists who wanted to do some damage at the DNC convention last year?

          This whole mess certainly changes the way one might look at these kinds of events.

      • ChuckinDenton says:

        Interesting thought re: outsourcing to gangs, etc. I wonder, though, if a control freak like Cheney would trust entities that tend to be renegade? If caught, wouldn’t they be more likely to spill the beans than trained Spec Ops folks?

  60. Styve says:

    The Politicsdaily guy was such a wimp, with his little “te hee” laugh! Oh yeah, and we’re supposed to think this guy knows jack about national security?!

    Good take-down, Marcy!

  61. LabDancer says:

    What Marcy did – “what that DFH said on my teevee” – folks, that is the stuff of legend. She may never be invited on to msm cable tv again, but this has the msm buzzing along with the Netroots, Andrew Sullivan will be compelled to name an award after her, and she will be recognized for the goddess status she has at the lake, deservedly so.

    • Leen says:

      I think it will be just the opposite. I was telling Chris Matthews at the Libby trial that he was missing the boat by not coming to Marcy’s blog, I told him again at the Democratic convention. These MSM’ers were hanging onto what they thought were reliable, verifiable sources..until they were totally fucking duped by the false pre war intelligence.

      As millions have swarmed to the internet after the “pack of lies” was stuffed down their throats..they may be starting to get it. They created the reason we swarmed.

      I’ll put some money on the next stop for Emptywheel will be Matthews, Olbermann’s or Rachel’s place.
      Matthews was just losing it about the Cheney torture program “who told the CIA to take orders from Cheney”

      Our favorite Marcy told the truth today I think some of the MSM folks actually want to hear it

  62. Styve says:

    More context to the above post, and I’ll leave it at that…

    J’ACCUSE: BUSH’S DEATH SQUADS

    By Wayne Madsen

    31 January 2002

    Today, The Washington Post ran the fifth segment in its series on what transpired within the Bush Cabinet in the aftermath of September 11. Of particular interest is what CIA Director George Tenet brought to the table at Camp David last September 15. According to the article by Bob Woodward and Dan Balz, when Tenet produced a Top Secret “Worldwide Attack Matrix” that specified targets in 80 countries around the world, he sought unprecedented authority to simply assassinate foreign terrorists directly or though allied intelligence services. The CIA even prepared a “Memorandum of Notification”which would allow the agency to have virtual carte blanche to conduct political assasinations abroad. This Memorandum trumped previous mechanisms by which the President would authorize intelligence actions (but not assassinations) through individual Presidential Findings. The fail safe mechanisms established under the administrations of Presidents Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush I, and Clinton were simply erased at the urging of Tenet. In light of these revelations, what was authorized by the President may have led to the assassinations of a number of human rights and ethnic leaders not connected in any way with Al Qaeda but did represent bothersome roadblocks to a number of U.S. military and corporate interests.

    It now seems likely, given the unprecedented “license to kill” President Bush granted to the CIA, there was U.S. complicity in the murders of the following individuals. Human rights commissions and war crime tribunals in Belgium and France should take a close look at these likely criminal misadventures:

    1. Theys Eluay. Today, the Indonesian army chief, General Endriartono Sutarto, confirmed in Jakarta that West Papuan independence leader Theys Eluay was assassinated by Indonesian Army units after he was kidnapped last November 11. The assassins were members of KOPASSUS, a special operations unit trained by U.S. Special Forces and CIA personnel and was involved in massacres in East Timor during the Indonesian occupation of that country. In 1969, West Papua was formally handed over to Indonesia by the United Nations after a referendum, now widely recognized as rigged, determined that the non-Indonesian population wanted to be Indonesian. Eluay was a thorn in the side of Freeport McMoran, a Louisiana-based mining company that has pillaged West Papua’s natural resources and has been accused by local activists of propping up local Indonesian army and KOPASSUS officers with bribes and favors. Henry Kissinger serves as a Director Emeritus on the board of directors of Freeport and former Louisiana Senator J. Bennett Johnston, recently identified as a lobbyist for Enron, serves as a full member of the board.

    2. Abdullah Syafii.On January 22, 2002, Indonesian army troops assassinated the military commander of the Free Aceh Movement, Abdullah Syafii. The Free Aceh Movement demands independence for Aceh, a region in northwest Sumatra, and is a member of the non-violent Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO), an international organization headquartered in the Netherlands. It has also been at loggerheads with ExxonMobil, which has extensive drilling and refining operations in the territory. Aceh’s Governor Abdullah Puteh, who is claimed by local activists to be on the payroll of ExxonMobil, had written a letter to Syafii inviting him to attend peace talks with the government. Syafii’s lieutenants claim that the letter contained a small microchip that permitted Indonesian KOPASSUS troops to track him down and ambush him. The operation has all the earmarks of the CIA, which can rely on National Security Agency (NSA) satellites to track such microchip transponders.

    3. Elie Hobeika.Elie Hobeika was the head of the Lebanese Forces militia, a right-wing Christian army that was allied with Israel during its 1982 occupation of Beirut. Although Hobeika was in charge of the Christian forces that massacred hundreds of Palestinian men, women, and children at the Sabra and Chatilla refugee camps that year, he had irrefutable evidence that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had authorized the mass murder in his role as Israeli Defense Minister. An official Israeli commission of inquiry found Sharon indirectly responsible for the massacres. Hobeika was going to testify against Sharon at an upcoming Belgian war crimes tribunal which has already indicted Sharon for the war crimes. It was that testimony that resulted in Hobeika being silenced by a Mossad car bomb that exploded near his SUV near Beirut. The bomb killed Hobeika and his bodyguards. The CIA, now closely allied with Mossad, is said to have given its approval for the action.

    4. Chief Bola Ige. On December 23, 2001, Chief Bola Ige, the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Nigeria, was assassinated in the bedroom of his home in Ibadan by unknown gunmen. Ige was a leader of the Yorubas, a largely Christian ethnic group that has championed the cause of southern Nigerian Christian tribes like the Igbo, Ogoni, and Yoruba that maintain grievances against exploitative Western oil companies that have spoiled their lands with pollution and pocketed most of the oil revenues for themselves and corrupt Nigerian politicians. […]

    In all likelihood all of these assassinations were likely known to the CIA and allowed to take place unhindered. The killings all directly benefitted the interests of the US military-industrial complex that President Eisenhower so poignantly warned us about some 40 years ago.

    ****

  63. Citizen92 says:

    Why did David Addington get to decide who got read in?

    Why didn’t Scooter Libby get that power? Libby was, after all, Cheney’s Cheney.

  64. bubbagoober says:

    Marcy! Go, girl, go!

    Sadly, by using the word blowjob, it just proves all your long sisyphean work is so pre-9/11.

    You should’ve threatened to shove a banana in his ass, then told him to go f*ck himself.

    The gopernuts thought it just fine for their sith master and abughraib…

  65. wavpeac says:

    I’d much rather have to explain what a blow job is to my children than have to explain why people blow each other’s heads off.

    I wish we would get our priorities straight.

  66. oldnslow says:

    Will say it again over; Marcy Wheeler, your my hero.

    (and you looked spectacular, so much less intimadating on tv than you are in person)

  67. Mary says:

    107 – Again, I have no idea, but the secrecy fosters that kind of theorizing for sure. We do know that there were at one point (I think we know, damned if I’m sure I can find a link or not) efforts to say that US citizens “suspected” of being affiliated with terrorist groups but not charged with anything were going to be barred from returning to the country and that went plop IIRC.

    Would CIA be invovled in anything so nefarious as possibly setting up a domestic operation to lure US citizen jihadi wannabe-s out of country to go to a fake training camp or a fictional meet up, and instead arrange for the US “recruits” to be rendered over to a foreign intel service and disapppeared? Get them to Africa and permanently lose them? Probably not – but given that no one is acounting for KSM’s children I’m thinking that it’s harder to justify not speculating wildly than to justify dismissing wild spec.

    103/104 – I have no real “oh, I bet this is it for sure” moments, but my very initial gut reaction was that the story involved a “next step” on the illegal surviellance of Americans front. If you are going to listen in, either without a court order OR POSSIBLY in violation of existing minimization requirements – why would you stop there? Other steps might include things like breaking and entering here without warrants, searching personal and business records (something about a psychiatrist’s office and patient records comes to mind from a prior era) – and IIRC the lawyer falsely linked to the Madrid bombings, I think bmaz or someone reminded me of his name, Brandon Mayfield, had some odd stories about his law offices being compromised. HIs filings also talked about searches of not only himself but his wife and even his children (e.g. opinion here ). So is there any reason to think that if there was a warrantless wiretap program there would have been a warrantless physical search program?

    That’s my spec.

    I guess legally you can carry it out the next step – if the DOJ lawyers were on board wtih extra-judicial massive felonious spying on Americans on American soil why wouldn’t they be ok with such an extra-judicial search program of Americans picked up in the first surveillance sweep and of Americans “affiliated” with them, etc.

    And if an extra-judicial warrantless physical search program is OK per DOJ, then why not an extra-judicial pre-judgment punishment program? Ok, this last part wasn’t my gut reaction to the revelations or spec, but as the other conjecture keeps coming out, you have to go that next step and say, well if A and B were OK, why would DOJ say C wasn’t ok as well? The “legal basis” of an all powerful CIC would be the same in any of them.

    • bmaz says:

      No, you are right, it is consistent with a lot of things. Remember the OLC bit about having the right to take over entire homes, businesses and apartment complexes. Whether this is the “secret program” or not, it is more than possible.

  68. Rayne says:

    Re: (102) — Technology at work:

    Aceh’s Governor Abdullah Puteh, who is claimed by local activists to be on the payroll of ExxonMobil, had written a letter to Syafii inviting him to attend peace talks with the government. Syafii’s lieutenants claim that the letter contained a small microchip that permitted Indonesian KOPASSUS troops to track him down and ambush him.

    Jeebus. And if Madsen’s right, this mess brought down an Archbishop, too???

    Even the righties can’t defend that.

  69. RubberBaron says:

    Been lurking from London, England for some time…

    This has gone around the world (or some of it) but not because of the word ‘blowjob’! Here in London, this is very tame language indeed. What’s shocking is that a. This ‘analysis’ was w-a-a-a-y too short and b. those MSNBC journalists were more concerned with a harmless word than the acts of torture themselves.

    Keep up the pressure over there guys and my prediction, if this opens up, is that it will blow apart the government here. And a good thing too, our so-called democracy in the UK is one of the most secretive in the Western world.

    • Rayne says:

      Glad you emerged from lurking, thank you for your feedback.

      Is there anything you see from your perspective in UK about this latest scandal to which you believe we need to pay more attention? Fresh eyes from a different angle are always good.

    • Leen says:

      an hour ago only a few blogs with Marcy wheeler said “blowjob” on MSNBC.

      Now a full page at Google. Of course you bring up a solid point. The MSM will be more concerned about Marcy’s choice of words about what our congress considers a priority to investigate and that is what Marcy was pointing out.

      More than willing to investigate lies told under oath having to do with “blowjobs” But the GOP not willing to hold those responsible for false pre-war intelligence, an unnecessary war based on the “pack of lies” torture etc

      I think folks around the world will get it. They all ready have.

  70. itwasntme says:

    This is not about killing specific al quaeda members as such, or other business as usual black ops. To a certain extent, that’s war for you, and everybody does it.

    This is about Cheney’s personal squad of assassins sent to off specific people, both at home and abroad. I’m not a conspiracy nut, but think Wellstone, Bhutto. We need to find out what the hell happened here.

    • freepatriot says:

      This is about Cheney’s personal squad of assassins MURDERERS sent to off MURDER specific people

      fixed it for you

      now we’re talking about simple US law

      we got laws that have specific penalties for Conspiricy To Commit MURDER

      a blowjob is a blowjob

      Murder is Murder

      one of them is not a crime under Title 18 of the US Code

  71. alabama says:

    [Mom, 38, and daughter, 8, are watching MSNBC]:

    D: Mom, what’s a blowjob?

    M [rather weary]: Um, gee honey….uh, oral sex…

    D: You mean fellatio? Mom, we all know what that is!

    • Rayne says:

      Too funny. My kids didn’t bat an eye.

      More worried about the creepy way it was handled after Marcy left the air by the “minder”.

      The word “blowjob” broke through my husband’s fog of business info (he’s been running around here trying to get ready for a business trip while taking conference calls). I actually got 30 seconds to explain the latest Cheney crap to him. Blowjobs can be a good thing at the right time, you know?

  72. Styve says:

    We are seeing front page coverage of the Bush/surveillance and Cheney/CIA stories out here in the Oregonian, which is novel, indeed! There were actually a couple of NYT columns over the weekend on the issues, by Scott Shane and James Risen.

  73. CompLitter says:

    It was great to see you on TV Marcy, & it’s obvious that you would have run circles around the TownHaller if you were given the time (you did anyway, but we all know it could have been much more substantive if given more time). The “blowjob” thing does bother me though, for the simple reason that I want to see you on TV as often as possible, and now you’ve given them an excuse not to put you on again. Look — the word doesn’t offend me at all & the FCC’s regulations are ridiculous given that most kids see much worse on the internets, but didn’t the SCOTUS just reconfirm the FCC’s draconian fining policy? We have to deal with the world as it is (as we try to change it), and I’m afraid they’ll use this as an excuse to keep your extremely important voice off the air. So that’s why I wish you hadn’t said it. But who knows, maybe it’ll bring you more publicity… I hope so.

    (sorry if this sounds like a “concern” statement — it is. But I am not a troll. I am, e.g., not “concerned” about investigations derailing Obama’s agenda, as Fox News now apparently, hilariously, is). I just want to see you on the air!

    • Leen says:

      I do believe they will have her back on she spoke the truth and some of them seem concerned with the truth…especially in regard to the illegal and unnecessary invasion of Iraq and the subsequent deaths of hundreds of thousands and they go seem genuinely concerned with the torture issue

    • dakine01 says:

      …the FCC’s regulations are ridiculous given that most kids see much worse on the internets, but didn’t the SCOTUS just reconfirm the FCC’s draconian fining policy?

      Not positive but I think the FCC can only fine over the air networks (such as Fox/CBS/ABC/NBC) and MSNBC is strictly cable.

      • CompLitter says:

        Thanks. I hope so. I’m already on to the links john in sac provided. I’m not former DOD official (far from it), but to me this sounds much more likely of a scenario. Cheney wouldn’t have hidden these al-Quaeda assassination squads from congress: this is something domestic, and FORAC’s guess seems much more plausible as something that would absolutely have to be hidden. And now that Marcy seems to take this seriously too (@ 136) I’m even more interested in this link…. the MSM’s assumption about what this program is (a hit squad on aQ targets abroad) is completely wrong at this point, I think.

    • freepatriot says:

      me thinks you be counter-intuitive

      watch the Daily show tonight, and we’ll see what happens

      I think we just changed the debate

      and I nominate Hillary Clinton to lead the investigation of the cheney murder conspiricy conspiracy

      cuz I LOVE ironic karma

      I can’t even spell conspiracy, is that a valid defense ???

      (wink)

  74. RubberBaron says:

    You might find this interesting: Torture Evidence

    As the opposition politician David Davis put it: “The Americans have made a clean breast of their complicity, whilst explicitly not prosecuting the junior officers who were acting under instruction. We have done the opposite. As it stands, we are awaiting a police investigation which will presumably end in the prosecution of frontline officers. At the same time the government is fighting tooth and nail to use state secrecy to cover up both crimes and political embarrassments, to protect those who are the real villains of the piece, those who approved the policies in the first place.”

    A lot of the torture took place in Pakistan, Egypt, the UAE and seemingly the CIA was often present. This is why I think blowing it apart in the US will help immeasurably over here.

  75. CTMET says:

    Marcy should be on TV more often. Before blowjobgate, I couldn’t help but notice the lipstick. Wooooo hoooo!!!! Foxy mama!!!!

    I hope the wingers pounce on this. More publicity for EW would be a good thing.

      • freepatriot says:

        oh fuck

        Marcy’s been using a playbook from a raider reject ???

        prepare to be sued by al davis

        • JThomason says:

          Both EW and LK will be fine. It was good to see some real outrage and emotion press through the media veneer of lets make nice and pretend. As you well know FP tyranny (and here I am talking about the will to power in the deprivation of life without due process of law) will grasp at whatever rationalization is readily available in masking its depravity.

          Policy, right. King George of old had his policies too.

        • JThomason says:

          Urban Meyer blitz, anti-blog media blitz, I think we are moving the line against Cheney, et al. and their depraved illegal policies and if it takes some rough spirited talk to instill a new attitude and a commitment I am all aboard. All the heavy lifting and sweat down here among the commenting class may be paying off. After all its only our country’s decency at stake. (BTW LK has UM’s number! No one said it was going to be easy.)

  76. chetnolian says:

    UK perspective? Time for me to delurk after my sojourn in BMAZ’s neck of the woods. Bit strong to set a rattler on me BMAZ!

    Actually, we are way behind on this. In a unitary state where the executive basically does what it darn well likes, then gets all its tame little MPs to vote it through Parliament, separation of powers issues don’t really resonate.

    I’m bound to say though that, taking all the issues together, it really does look as if Darth was staging an effective coup d’etat, with or without the Shrub’s knowledge. When we understand that we’ll get really scared.

    Currently we are far too busy obsessing here about our losses in Afghanistan, but no-one dares ay what we are doing there is what the USA (Bush or Obama it seems to make little difference) wants us to do.

    By the way don’t you dare apologise Marcy.

  77. ackack says:

    Wow! Who exactly is this idiot douchebag on with Marcy? He can’t seem to move past talking points.

    And, blow job? Good work using that to point out the blatant hypoocrisy of the right.

  78. phred says:

    Oh fer cryin’ out loud… We had to put up with endless excruciating reporting during the Clinton Impeachment Follies because the MSM could not get enough of spewing titilating innuendo, wink wink nudge nudge, all over cable (and the broadcast airwaves for that matter) as well as print editions and now these people have the gall to clutch their pearls because someone finally said blowjob?!?! I’m sure it is because of their shock at discovering that they could have had time to cover real news during that period had they simply learned to be more efficient with their verbiage. Just when I think these idiots can’t insult our intelligence any further, they find a way to do so. Kudos to you MSNBC for sheer unmitigated chutzpah.

  79. bubbagoober says:

    Leen,

    You’re a vet here, so I’m trusting that it’s true that you converse(d) with Mathews?

    If so, any suggestions on how we can ask/lobby/urge Rachel or Keith to invite her, given that maybe, just maybe, the expert can illuminate this on primetime?

    Thanks. (And Marcy, as a yearslong lurker — you are simply an inspiration. Thank you.)

  80. lysias says:

    There’s now confirmation that the “one particular detainee” that Col. Wilkerson was talking about being waterboarded in May-June 2002 was in fact Abu Zubaydah, as I interpreted Wilkerson’s language at the time he spoke it, back in May of this year.

    BBC News Worldwide reports:

    Fresh claims have emerged that a key al-Qaeda suspect was waterboarded before the Bush government lawyers issued written authorisation to do so.

    A former CIA agent has told the BBC that Abu Zubaydah was waterboarded by the CIA in May or June 2002.

    The date was provided by former CIA agent John Kiriakou. The practice was sanctioned in written memos by Bush administration lawyers in August 2002.

  81. Neil says:

    Peter Bergen, a senior security analyst at the New America Foundation, said that the secret operation must have gone further than that [assassination and capture of al-Qaida operatives] to have created such a backlash in Congress: “If it’s an assassination programme of al-Qaida leaders that is hardly surprising.”

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/worl…..ssinations

  82. KC Bill 13 says:

    Marcy,

    Watched your segment with Shuster.

    Do not apologize at all. If bl*wjob is not in the lexicon of language by now, they should just get over it. And the TownHall guy was an ass…

    Go Marcy

  83. Citizen92 says:

    Of course Congress was briefed on this program.

    Cheney, as VP is also President of the Senate.

    And Cheney has a Congressional office.

    Cheney knew about the program and was a Member of Congress, ergo, Congress was briefed.

    /snark