BREAKING: U.S. Justice Department To Appoint A Special Prosecutor To Investigate The CIA

Holder to Appoint Prosecutor to Investigate CIA Terror Interrogations -- Washington Post

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. has decided to appoint a prosecutor to examine nearly a dozen cases in which CIA interrogators and contractors may have violated anti-torture laws and other statutes when they allegedly threatened terrorism suspects, according to two sources familiar with the move.

Holder is poised to name John Durham, a career Justice Department prosecutor from Connecticut, to lead the inquiry, according to the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the process is not complete.

Read more ....

My Comment: I predicted that this was going to happen a few weeks ago, and the consequences from appointing such a special prosecutor are the same .... a poisoning of the political process when it comes to intelligence.

There is nothing to be gained from mandating such a witch hunt .... but there is a lot to be lost if things go wrong. I am not going to repeat what I said a few weeks, but my comments and commentary are still relevant today. The link is here.

On a side note ..... there is going to be lot of discussion and commentary on this topic for today and tonight. I am going to summarize and update all news and opinions for a posting tomorrow morning at 8:00 AM EST.

White House To Appoint Special Prosecutor To Probe For "CIA Abuse" In The Bush Administration

Criminal Investigation Into CIA Treatment Of Detainees Expected -- L.A. Times

Reporting from Washington -- U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. is poised to appoint a criminal prosecutor to investigate alleged CIA abuses committed during the interrogation of terrorism suspects, current and former U.S. government officials said.

A senior Justice Department official said that Holder envisioned an inquiry that would be narrow in scope, focusing on "whether people went beyond the techniques that were authorized" in Bush administration memos that liberally interpreted anti-torture laws.

Read more ....

Update: CIA interrogations: Attorney general Eric Holder appears poised to open investigation of harsh tactics -- Chicago Tribune

My Comment: When talk of a special prosecutor first hit the news headlines this spring, I mentioned that it was a given that a special prosecutor was going to be appointed, and that its focus will be to target everyone in the former administration even though the prosecutor's public mandate will be to only investigate the CIA.

A special prosecutor is a special prosecutor .... and even though Attorney General Holder states that "it would be narrow in focus" .... no one believed him then .... and no one will certainly believe him now.

The consequence of such an appointment will be twofold. (1) It will completely poison the political process, and will set the precedent of one political party using the legal system to investigate the foreign intelligence policies of another. I can only imagine the legal bills that will now accumulate for every official that worked in the previous Bush administration and who will now be called up by this prosecutor. The bitterness that will come out of this will last for generations.

(2) The damage to the CIA itself. The CIA's actions and behavior were authorized and overseen by not only by the former Administration, but by Congress itself. To now have the same Congress and its members sign onto an investigation of policies that they themselves approved of .... the double standard at play here is too much to bear.

The net impact on the CIA is now obvious .... who will want to work for an organization that you know will be investigated in the future on actions and/or operations that are approved today. No one is going to take a risk .... and no one is going to follow through on any hard decision knowing that there will be consequences in the future even though the politicians today say that it is OK.