Gina Haspel, currently serving as Acting-Director of the CIA, will appear before the Senate tomorrow. She is nominated for the top job, and as David Ignatius sums up in the WashPost, she has been endorsed by many, if not most, of the previous directors.
She was involved in at least one of the torture bases during the Bush Administration and is reported to have destroyed evidence of those practices at the behest of another officer. I remind you of Abu Gharib (a torture center for the U.S. Army) and other examples of the U.S. government's decision to use torture as a mechanism of the war on terror. Attorney General John Yu cooked up a legal defense and Bush-Cheney and other elected officials approved it. As we know from the Nuremberg Trials and International Law, legalizing the illegal and reprehensible doesn't make it legal. So whatever Haspel has to say in her own defense is no defense.
David Ignatius acknowledges all of that, and yet creates an opening for the Senate to confirm her. His argument is that she is a knowledgeable Russia hand and has proven cooperative with the Mueller inquiry. He hints at but does not discuss another case that has been made by others: if she fails, Trump will nominate someone far more dangerous than she (Tom Cotton has been rumored, but there may be a long-line of deplorables waiting in the wings). Ignatius is always well-informed on foreign policy and the CIA, but if that's because he's an alum or covert officer, then one may suspect it's also that he fears even darker secrets in the hands of the Trump Administration. "Dirty Hands" as someone once wrote.
ProPublica has an extensive look at Haspel's career and involvement in the Thai dark site used to interrogate prisoners.
LobeLog has a naysayer on Haspel that doesn't depend on the torture question: "She’s not a swamp-drainer. She’s a swamp thing.--The author is alluding to her long years doing whatever it is the CIA does, and which it carefully keeps us from knowing about.
May 10 ROLLCALL has a summary of McCain's, Nay, on Haspel, and a rundown of how the votes are deciding and undeciding.
I tend to trust David Ignatius' take on things, at least more than that of many other analysts. I strongly dislike the idea that this woman covered up torture and destroyed evidence. But, it is also likely that a different candidate would be as bad or worse.
ReplyDeleteGen. Michael Hayden, former Director of the CIA (and of the NSA), and fervent #NeverTrump-er has a new book out called "The Assault on Intelligence". Hayden backs the current nominee apparently, just as Ignatius does. So she may be the least of the possible evils under this particular administration.
I plan to go to the remaining Barnes and Noble nearby (one just closed) and buy it, along with Madelaine Albright's new book on Fascism.
BTW, what happened to the post about supporting B&N? Amazon is going into the brick and mortar book business - the B&N that closed nearby will be replaced by a retail shop, but Amazon plans to open a store around the corner from the now closed B&N, and also a store in Georgetown, in DC. According to the news, Amazon has already opened 13 stores in 7 states. There are a couple of independent small bookstores in DC, but there are none left in the suburban area where I live. So, Amazon pretty much will monopolize book selling in cyber-space, but increasingly in the real world of brick and mortar stores also.
I have a like/hate relationship with Amazon. Living in a shopping desert as I do, I make a lot of use of my Prime membership. But I don't like what they are doing to their competition. We used to enforce anti-trust laws. Apparently that doesn't matter any more.
DeleteAnn: The B&N comment is with Jean's mother's cat below...got thrown in... 5/7 @ 10:17.
DeleteSo they could confirm someone competent, but ruthless and conscience-challenged; or they could decline her and pick someone like Cotton. Who is dumber than a box of rocks but thinks he is a genius. See Dunning Kruger effect. Is the Trump administration likely to pick anyone who isn't pretty okay with torture? I doubt it. But Haspel has already done it, or been in charge of others doing it. And others yet to be named have yet to demonstrate their willingness to oversee torture. However they may be totally incompetent at anything else the CIA is supposed to accomplish.
ReplyDeleteLeaving to one side for a minute the moral objections to torture, it sees to me to be a good way to get unreliable information. People can be worn down to where they will tell the interrogators whatever they think they want to hear. This can happen even with intensive questioning which doesn't quite qualify as torture. It happened with Noor Salman, the wife of the Pulse shooter. She was acquitted of aiding and abetting her husband. But she had previously confessed to knowing about the attack after an 11 hour interrogation session. She just wanted to make it stop.
Ignatius asks: "Is she so tainted by her involvement with the torture issue that it will undermine her leadership and shred America’s moral authority?"
ReplyDeleteAfter today's hissyfit, how is it possible to find any American moral authority to shred?
Yeah, she's better than Tom I Wish I Was in the Land of Cotton (KKK Is Not Forgotten). Mike "Heeeeere's Donny" Pence is better than the President of the United States. And a bullet is better than a noose, as long as we are in suicide mode.
Personally, I don't think Congress should cave to the "confirm this appointment or we'll pick someone worse" threat. If Haspel is unacceptable because of torture, then Congress should resolve to reject her and everyone worse than her on the subject of torture.
ReplyDeleteCongress also could work with the White House to surface candidates that are mutually acceptable.
Jim, Have you been paying attention to the federal judges (lifetime) Congress has been waving through?
ReplyDeleteThe Pro Publica story points out how hard it is for the average citizen to know exactly what the CIA is doing it how effective it is. Pretty sure that operatives and bureaucrats can make a case for how they've saved us all many times over. Is any of it true? And how would we ever know?
ReplyDeleteHave mixed feelings about Haspel. She seems to be a "company man." That means she might push biz as usual and lie her head off about it to protect the agency. Or she might effect real change.
Someone from outside the agency would get stonewalled and duped.
Trump wants her because she's tough and being a woman helps deflect those pesky sex stories.
In the end, she will be less a liability to the VIA and the nation than Trump.
"In the end, she will be less a liability to the VIA and the nation than Trump."
ReplyDeleteI think that observation wins the award for Lowest Bar Ever Set :-).
This business of reaping what we've sown sucks, doesn't it? I was pondering that while reading about our exit from the Iran deal, as per the prez's campaign promises. He keeps all the bad promises and breaks the good ones, like marriage vows. He's Satan.
Lowering the bar is going to be Trump's legacy. Not a surprise when someone is voted in by a lot of dumb ass people.
DeletePerhaps I should say that Haspel is less a liability than our leaving the Paris Accord, the Iran arms deal, the weakening of Obamacare, and all like that.
"This business of reaping what we've sown sucks, doesn't it?" Yes. It certainly does. Except the dumb ass people think it's great.
DeleteI've even heard, "Why don't people talk about the good things Trump has done?" They mention the low unemployment rate, the fact that we're not in a recession (yet?), North and South Korea are making peace. "The year's at the spring. And day's at the morn;...God's in His heaven— All's right with the world!" And Trump is responsible for all of it, to hear them.
Yup. I am seriously out of step with what is going on in their heads. Raber accuses me of wanting to be a Republican, which may be true--I certainly have a conservative and judgmental streak--but the problem is that they're just so mean, greedy, and short-sighted.
DeleteRead this if you want to know what waterboarding is like. And our pres. says waterboarding doesn't even qualify as torture. This statement from the Huffington article struck me: "At that point I’d have confessed to being the reincarnation of Jack the Ripper if it meant I could avoid another session on ― I shiver when I say it ― the infamous waterboard."
ReplyDeleteA Catholic or Christian who thinks torture is okay needs to spend some time meditating on the stations of the cross.
After reading more about Ms Haspel, I have changed my mind - now agree that she should NOT be confirmed.
ReplyDeleteI was inclined to give Haspel the benefit of the doubt (since all spookiness requires certain public doubts) until I watched John Rizzo, former CIA legal counsel (sic) defending her last night on the PBS Newshour. I know a lot of readers of this blog watch the Newshour. I just want to point out a couple of things. Rizzo said:
ReplyDelete"First of all, I was in a leadership position at CIA during those years. I was involved in the program from beginning to end....
"But I will say this for Ms. Haspel. She wasn’t in a leadership position at the agency, and certainly wasn’t in a leadership position, like I was, in the creation and approval and implementation of those techniques."
OK, so Rizzo has now admitted to being a promoter of torture. Nothing like having a torturer's endorsement.
But then later in the interview it got worse:
"For what it’s worth, I believe that there was a moral imperative after 9/11, both from the American people and from Congress, that the CIA wouldn’t, could not, must not allow a second major attack on the homeland to happen."
So-called moral imperatives from the people or from Congress are worth nothing, "for what it's worth." "The people" and (oh, dear Lord save us) "Congress" don't establish moral imperatives.
If the torturers -- who I don't want even shopping in the same supermarket I do -- are for her, I have to be against her.
Thanks Tom. So that creepy little guy on the Newshour was Rizzo! I missed both interviewee names. Both Peter and I caught that "imperative"! And both shouted at the TV; "What Imperative."
DeleteNYC and other places were plastered with "Not in Our Names!" I guess he was too far down in his weasel hole to see them. And that Nazi word: "homeland!"
From our long-lost correspondent, Irene Baldwin:
ReplyDeleteOn May 10, 2018, at 7:35 AM, Irene Baldwin wrote:
Hi Margaret, How have you been? I miss your Commonweal posts; I don't check that site so much anymore after they shut down blog comments. I still follow it on Facebook.
I have been trying to figure out what to think about Gina Haskels, the CIA Director nominee. (I can usually figure out what to think, even if what I think is misguided), but not in this one. I checked the Commonweal and America sites to see if there was any commentary on her nomination , but didn't see anything.
Maybe the answer on whether it is right or wrong to support her nomination is simple, (involved in torture= wrong, end of story). Or maybe not, if it was official government policy and torture-lite at a frightening time, and she regrets it in hindsight, and kind of hypocritical to deny her a government post for implementing that same government's policy in an official capacity. Or maybe that's all bullshit, and it's still torture and symbolically we need leaders who aren't tainted by stuff like that (But if so, should we take away George W Bush's pension?)
All I'm reading are op-eds saying no, she can't get the job, or yes, we need her strategic experience, but nothing really thinking through these issues. And not from a Catholic perspective.
Anyway, somebody should write about this, and I immediately thought of you.
I think around now - or soon- you would start posting about vacations in the UP. I hope you have a nice Summer.
Irene Baldwin
Hi Margaret, thanks for reconnecting me! (My nonprofit does free income tax preparation, so I'm pretty much lost to everybody from mid-January until May every year). I'll catch up on all of these posts tonight, but its so great your all still fighting the good fight. Irene
DeleteHurrah, Irene is back! :-)
DeleteJohn McCain has weighed in on this. He asked the Senate to reject Haspel. By rejecting Haspel, the US solidifies its rejection of torture. I don't expect the Senate to do the right thing as these days I don't expect much of the American public, either.
ReplyDelete