The Sanchez Report

Is Hoyer Throwing Pelosi Under the Bus?

Don't look now, but it looks like House Majority Leader, Rep. Steny Hoyer-D, is keeping some distance from Nancy Pelosi and WaterBoardGate. He has yet to come out and offer a strong defense of Speaker Pelosi and instead has maintained that any Truth Commission established should investigate Speaker Pelosi as well.

From Hot Air :

Granted, he wasn’t at the briefing in 2002 so he can’t say which side is right, but it speaks volumes that he’s unwilling to offer even a pro forma “I’ve never known Nancy to be untruthful” in her defense. Combine this with him telling reporters a few days ago that any torture truth commission should investigate Pelosi too and it’s pretty clear that even her own number two’s not betting on her version of events. And why would he? She’s a terrible liar. No sense in letting the sinking ship take him down too.

What Did She Know And When Did She Know It?... The Evidence Is Mounting

The evidence continues to mount that Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi (D), was lying when she claimed that she was never told about waterboarding. This time, the evidence comes from someone on the Democratic side of the aisle. According to a Washington Post article, a top aide to Pelosi attended a classified CIA briefing in which waterboarding was discussed in 2003. I just can't imagine that this aide would have kept quiet and not discussed the contents of the briefing with Pelosi. On top of that, GOP Congressman Pete Hoekstra was present at those meetings and has requested that detailed notes of the briefings be released to the public. I'm not so sure this is what the White House had in mind when they decided to selectively release some of the CIA interrogation memos.

From the Hot Air blog:

Nancy Pelosi’s attempt to evade responsibility for her role in approving the use of waterboarding and other enhanced interrogation techniques took another hit today in the Washington Post — and this time the fire comes from her side of the aisle.  Pete Hoekstra upped the ante as well, demanding the release of precise minutes of Congressional briefings, and Leon Panetta has promised to make them available, at least to Capitol Hill.

Pelosi’s attempt to weasel onto Harman’s objection fails when one looks at the briefing notes.  Both Pelosi and Sheehy attended a briefing on September 4, 2002, five months before Harman attended her first briefing.  That 9/02 briefing specifically covered EITs and their use on Abu Zubaydah.  Harman raised her objection in 2003, not in 2002, as she had yet to attend one of the EIT briefings.

Pelosi Briefed On Interrogation Tactics In September 2002

The evidence is starting to pile up and it looks like Speaker Pelosi has some explaining to do.  According to a report released by the Director of National Intelligence, Nancy Pelosi was given a detailed brief about the enhanced interrogation techniques used on Abu Zubaydah in September 2002. The meeting was described as a “Briefing on Enhanced Interrogation Techniques (EITs) including use of EITs on Abu Zubaydah, background on authorities, and a description of particular EITs that had been employed.” This contradicts her claims that she wasn't told that EIT's were actually being used on enemy combatants.
From ABC NEWS The Point:

The report, submitted to the Senate Intelligence Committee and other Capitol Hill officials Wednesday, appears to contradict Pelosi’s statement last month that she was never told about the use of waterboarding or other special interrogation tactics. Instead, she has said, she was told only that the Bush administration had legal opinions that would have supported the use of such techniques.

The report details a Sept. 4, 2002 meeting between intelligence officials and Pelosi, then-House intelligence committee chairman Porter Goss, and two aides. At the time, Pelosi was the top Democrat on the House intelligence committee.

The meeting is described as a “Briefing on EITs including use of EITs on Abu Zubaydah, background on authorities, and a description of particular EITs that had been employed.”

EITs stand for “enhanced interrogation techniques,” a classification of special interrogation tactics that includes waterboarding.

Former CIA Director Porter Goss Calls Out The Democrats

The former Director of the CIA, Porter Goss , seems to be getting ready for a fight. He has provided a compelling case as to why the Democrats in Congress should win the Hypocrisy Award for shameless politics. I'd bet my house the radical left and the White House failed to use a little game theory in trying to predict how this interrogation drama would unfold. In a sick twisted way, perhaps a show trial on Capitol Hill would be a good thing if only to demonstrate to the American people the hand that Nancy Pelosi and her colleagues had in approving strong interrogation techniques after 9/11.

From the Washington Post

Today, I am slack-jawed to read that members claim to have not understood that the techniques on which they were briefed were to actually be employed; or that specific techniques such as “waterboarding” were never mentioned. It must be hard for most Americans of common sense to imagine how a member of Congress can forget being told about the interrogations of Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed. In that case, though, perhaps it is not amnesia but political expedience.

Let me be clear. It is my recollection that:

– The chairs and the ranking minority members of the House and Senate intelligence committees, known as the Gang of Four, were briefed that the CIA was holding and interrogating high-value terrorists.

– We understood what the CIA was doing.

– We gave the CIA our bipartisan support.

– We gave the CIA funding to carry out its activities.

– On a bipartisan basis, we asked if the CIA needed more support from Congress to carry out its mission against al-Qaeda.

I do not recall a single objection from my colleagues.

Majority Of Americans Believe Release Of CIA Memos Threatens National Security

The latest Rasmussen Reports poll indicates that 58% of Americans believe the Obama administration's release of CIA memos endangers the national security of the United States. Perhaps this explains the recent reversal by President Obama on pursuing a Truth Commission.

Fifty-eight percent (58%) believe the Obama administration’s recent release of CIA memos about the harsh interrogation methods used on terrorism suspects endangers the national security of the United States. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 28% believe the release of the memos helps America’s image abroad.

Sizable majorities of Republicans and unaffiliated voters say the release of the CIA memos about the interrogations hurts national security. Democrats are evenly divided on whether the release hurt national security or helped the image of the United States abroad.