CIA Chief Michael Hayden Defends 'Lawful' Interrogation Practices

[Purveyor]

Source: Associated Press

WASHINGTON --CIA Director Michael Hayden defended his agency's interrogation practices Tuesday as political pressure mounted on President Bush's attorney general nominee to reject a technique that allegedly was part of the CIA's interrogation program.

"Our programs are as lawful as they are valuable," Hayden said in remarks prepared for delivery to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. "The best sources of information on terrorists and their plans are the terrorists themselves."

Hayden said "the irreplaceable nature of that intelligence is the sole reason we have rendition, detention and interrogation programs."

Several senior Senate Democrats had vowed to vote against the president's nominee for attorney general, Michael Mukasey, unless he stated unequivocally that the practice of "waterboarding" is torture. That would render the practice illegal. The U.S. military already forbids it.

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In a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats late Tuesday, Mukasey called waterboarding "repugnant" but said he didn't know if it is illegal because he hasn't been cleared to receive a classified briefing on it. If after further study he finds that it is, he would rescind any federal legal opinion that allows its use, he wrote.

Read more: http://www.bnd.com/326/story/166252.html

[Solly Mack]

1. "Our programs are as lawful as they are valuable..."

factoring in that torture does not yield anything of value...

[Up2Late]

7. "Our programs are as lawful as they are valuable..." in other words, not very!

He's a piece of work alright.

[Solly Mack]

8. Exactly...and I agree...he is a piece of work

[Toots]

10. It's easy to make something Lawful by just changing the wording of the Laws

As the Administration has done time and time again. If the Administration says it isn't illegal than by God it ain't illegal after all he is the "Decider" in a "Unitary Executive" Administration..When Bush* first came to office it was illegal to withhold Presidential Papers. There was an "Act of Congress" that was called the Presidential Papers Act and it requires the release of those papers. Bush* rewrote Congressional Law..

[C_U_L8R]

2. Prove it.

we don't believe you Hayden

[dickbearton]

3. Michael Hayden, like the Criminals Bush and Chaney, should be charged with treason...

Michael Hayden is a traitor and a war criminal.

[annabanana]

5. Seconded.. . . . . . . n/t

[bdamomma]

16. these guys all come from the same cloth.

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

4. Simply quote the specific law.

Give us the chapter, verse, paragraph and subparagraph. Show us the law book. Quote the law.

Prove it.

:shrug:

[Algorem]

6. Michael Twitchyface Hayden ? He seems a lot pervy to me.

[libodem]

9. I watched him on Charlie Rose

on PBS a few nights ago. He just needed a monocle and he'd look like some Nazi concentration camp commandant. A very scary, quirky, tic-ridden, weirdo, bush parrot, sock puppet, skin-crawly, pale, doughy, worm of an individual. He just looked like he could have you killed without a second thought. He's a no conscience psychopath if I ever saw or heard one. Did I say scary? The stuff nightmares are made of.

[rodeodance]

11. CIA chief backs rendition flights

Source: bbc




Last Updated: Wednesday, 31 October 2007, 07:51 GMT

CIA chief backs rendition flights


Gen Hayden said programmes such as extraordinary rendition produced what he said was irreplaceable intelligence.

Under the programme, terror suspects are transported to secret prisons in countries with less stringent interrogation rules.

Mr Hayden, speaking in Chicago, said the leads gained justified rendition.

"The irreplaceable nature of that intelligence is the sole reason why we have what I admit freely is a very controversial programme."
......


Read more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7070483.stm

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[DCKit]

12. Rendition to allow torture implicates US in that torture.

These asshats just don't get it.

Maybe they can explain it to them at the Hague.

[Xipe Totec]

13. Josef Mengele also argued that his research was valuable nt

[JCMach1]

14. Time for him to go...

[gratuitous]

15. If it's so legal, Mr. Hayden . . .

Why are you contracting out the questioning to folks who are more acquainted with alligator clips and power drills than the "good cop, bad cop" routine?

[libodem]

17. he's just creepy

that's all, twitchy and creepy. Twitches right after he lies.

[Supersedeas]

18. Rendition is used specifically to avoid U.S. laws -- some justification there