President Obama’s national intelligence director harsh techniques worked

NYT: Harsh techniques worked, intel chief says - White House- msnbc.com

President Obama’s national intelligence director told colleagues in a private memo last week that the harsh interrogation techniques banned by the White House did produce significant information that helped the nation in its struggle with terrorists.

“High value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qa’ida organization that was attacking this country,” Adm. Dennis C. Blair, the intelligence director, wrote in a memo to his staff last Thursday.

Staged, fake prisoner photos by the anti war protesters. No terrorist was made to kneel in front of the United States Navy Memorial in Washington D.C. See the shoppers in the back ground?

In March of 2008, the Democrats passed a bill banning harsh interrogation which included water boarding. President Bush vetoed legislation that would ban the CIA from using harsh interrogation methods such as water-boarding to break suspected terrorists because it would end practices that have prevented attacks.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Congress would work to override Bush's veto next week. "In the final analysis, our ability to lead the world will depend not only on our military might, but on our moral authority," said Pelosi, D-Calif.

The Washington Post reports that Pelosi, who was then a senior member of the House Intelligence Committee, was informed by CIA officials at a secret briefing in September 2002, that waterboarding and other forms of torture were being used on suspected al-Queda operatives. That's bad. Even worse is the revelation that Pelosi was apparently supportive of the initiative.

Now two years after this was published in the Washington Post, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said congressional leaders were never briefed about the use of an enhanced interrogation practice. "Flat out, they never briefed us that this was happening," she said. Now Nancy, waiting two years to deny this? This might be on film.

Democrat Biden said his bill would end “the administration’s semantic games on what constitutes torture. . . . There is no place for the administration’s bad faith interpretation — of water-boarding and other forms of torture — to gain a toehold.” He also warned that “continuing to equivocate about torture” would weaken the coalitions needed to fight terrorism, fuel terrorist recruitment and place Americans in jeopardy.

In June of 2007 Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, sent supporters and reporters a memorandum on titled “America Is Not Safer Since 9/11,” which cited research from the State Department and other groups that described terrorism as an accelerating threat.

Now what does president Obama believes? As the President has made clear, and as both CIA Director Panetta and I have stated, we will not use those techniques in the future. My question, how are you going to keep us safe, now that your only playing defence?

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Mark Levin talks to a soldier on waterboarding