CIA Confirms Waterboarding

CIA Director Michael Hayden confirms that the agency waterboarded detainees Khalid Sheik Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim Nashiri. Former CIA officer John Kiriakou told the media he supervised in the waterboarding of Abu Zabaydah. Kiriakou told MSNBC host Dan Abrams the White House was aware that Zabaydah was tortured. The CIA destroyed tapes of the detainees of being waterboarded.

Abrams: So do you believe the White House ultimately knew that he was being waterboared?

Kiriakou: Absolutely.



President Bush repeatly denied that the administration was torturing suspects. When pressed about waterboarding, Bush would say he didn't want the enemy to know about interrogation techniques. That is a disingenuous way of the President not giving a yes or no answer. Astronauts on the International Space Station are likely aware that the United States waterboards.

This is the same President whom Lewis "Scooter" Libby and Scott McClellan publicly stated was involved in the leaking and cover up of Valerie Plame's CIA covert status. Bush has no respect for classified information. He is hiding behind secrecy to protect himself from criminal prosecution.

Does anyone really believe Bush has the same difficulty understanding the meaning of waterboarding that Bill Clinton had with the word "is?" Politicians use the stupidity excuse when they are in legal trouble. I doubt Bush will be prosecuted for torture.

After all the deception, Hayden is pleading with Congress not to make a law forbidding waterboarding. The Director uses fearmongering to get his message across.

"One should not expect them to play outside the box because we've entered a new period of threat or danger to the nation, OK? So there's no wink and nod here," he said. "If you create the box, we will play inside the box without exception."

Terrorists aren't the only groups guilty of playing outside the box. The White House still hasn't come clean about secret prisons and the kidnapping of Maher Arar. The Canadian citizen was taken to Syria by the CIA. The Syrian government tortured him. Maher was finally released by Syria and cleared by the Canadian government. Maher was abducted because he had a similar name to a person on the CIA's terrorist watchlist. The Bush administration refuses to comment on the Maher case. The reason is because it is (you guessed it) classified.