Hotline After Dark -- A Picture's Worth A Thousand Criticisms
"World News" and "Evening News" both led with Pres. Obama's reversal on detainee photos. "Nightly News" led with the hearings on the Buffalo plane crash.
Obama announced 5/13 that he will not release hundreds of photos potentially showing U.S. military members abusing prisoners.
ABC's Stephanopoulos, on what changed: "The White House argues that first of all, the president did realize he could make new legal arguments. The second is, these commanders came in hard on the president. ... They said, you are harming our troops. The president was convinced by this argument."
More Stephanopoulos: "But what I think you see here is that there has been a tension between the president's desire for a clean break from the past and his continuing responsibilities as commander in chief. He's siding increasingly with his responsibilities as commander in chief" ("World News," 5/13).
CBS' Plante: "Candidate Obama pushed for full disclosure. President Obama has decided that there are times when transparency is a tough call" ("Evening News," 5/13).
GW prof. Jonathan Turley: "What President Obama is saying today is diametrically against the federal law. And if he succeeds, instead of having a transparent government, he would create this opaque government. ... It's an incredibly dark moment for civil libertarians. It's just more evidence that this administration is becoming the greatest bait and switch in history. Then, you know, he's morphing into his predecessor" ("Rachel Maddow Show," MSNBC, 5/13).
CNN's Henry: "You know something really strange is happening here at the White House when Republicans like Mitch McConnell are praising the president and liberal groups like the American Civil Liberties Union is ripping him apart" ("Situation Room," 5/13).
More after the jump, including interrogation hearings.
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FNC's Hannity: "I, Sean Hannity, agree with President Obama. He did the right thing" ("Hannity," 5/13).
Rep. Joe Sestak (D-PA): "I have a bit of a hard time with this decision, but I would accept it for a temporary pause in the release for one primary reason. He's been dealt a very weak hand on Pakistan. ... I remember how the Danish newspapers published those photographs that were insulting to the Islamic faith. I would accept that at this precarious time for national security, not for the protection of our troops -- because our troops were already in endangered by the notices that we did torture -- but rather not to inflame a very precarious situation."
More Sestak: "But just like I believe there needs to be an exit strategy measuring success and failures and benchmarks for Afghanistan, there should be an exit strategy for the release of these eventually, because only then can we hold up a mirror to ourselves and once again say, that's not who we are. We are better than that" ("Ed Show," MSNBC, 5/13).
New York Times' Zeleny: "They really know that, once these photos were released -- at least that was their fear -- that this would spread and would, of course, be broadcast in media there and it would simply give another reason to oppose and to stand against what American troops are trying to do there" ("NewsHour," PBS, 5/13).
Conservative radio talk show host Monica Crowley: "On its face, it looks like a good move. It looks like he's protecting American soldiers. But if we are to believe what he said today, that he's concerned about the inflammatory effect that these photos would have in the Muslim world and on American citizens around the world, then why didn't he make this argument weeks ago? Why didn't he nip this thing in the bud from the beginning?"
More Crowley: "I think his Hamlet-like indecision of how to handle this has actually made this decision worse. ... What you have going on in the Muslim world today is an endless conversation about what is in those photos that must be so bad that even the liberal American president didn't want to release them. ... Now you have the imaginations running wild across the world as to what is in those photographs" ("O'Reilly Factor," FNC, 5/13).
CNN's Borger: "The president changed his mind. And he's allowed to do that. I don't think, politically, anybody would hold this against him, because he made the decision not to hand over propaganda to our enemies. ... But the question I want to know is if there were questions from the generals, why didn't the secretary of Defense, Mr. Gates, talk to the president about that sooner so it didn't look like they were flip-flopping here?" ("Situation Room," 5/13).
WATERBOARDING NOT UNDER THE BRIDGE
Meanwhile, attendees were asked to weigh in on what was accomplished by the interrogation hearings.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI): "We accomplished three things today. We showed that the factual predicates in the OLC memos about what had happened were false. We showed that administration lawyers who got a look at the OLC opinions were horrified and tried to push back, and instead of engaging in a debate to see if they were right or wrong, they were just squelched and shut down. And we showed that by the standards against which attorneys should be judged for malfeasance, experts agree that the OLC opinions don't cut the mustard and that they qualify for sanction. So, there were three very good pieces of the case put in today."
Whitehouse, on the next step: "The Office of Professional Responsibility report coming out on the Office of Legal Counsel. When that happens, I strongly suspect that my chairman, Patrick Leahy of Vermont, who is spectacularly good and interested in this subject, will hold hearings at the chairman level, which is where they belong for an issue of that magnitude. And then after that hearing takes place, I'll ask for a second hearing to look at other elements of this and continue going forward. So, this is the beginning of an ongoing process" ("Countdown," MSNBC, 5/13).
Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD): "Today's hearing was very constructive. We had a former FBI agent who testified very clearly that using these enhanced methods that is torture would not get reliable information. ... We also had testimony today that there was clear information made available that this was not legal and the Bush administration chose to ignore it" ("Ed Show," MSNBC, 5/13).
Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC), on whether he agrees with ex-FBI interrogator Ali Soufan that waterboarding isn't necessary: "Yes, I generally believe that. I believe that if you use waterboarding, whatever information you receive -- and some of it may be good -- you will wind up regretting have been done that. And look at where we're at as a nation. It did come back to bite us. But the question for the country is, that when you look back, did people who pursue that line of thinking, were they criminals?"
More Graham: "Clearly not. The people who were trying to come up with interrogation policy were afraid another attack was coming. And there are some CIA agents who said these kind of techniques did work. But, overall, they were a net negative. So I, like the president, want to look forward. ... I think there's a way to defend the nation without waterboarding people. But those who made that decision right after 9/11, in my opinion, are not criminals and we need to move forward" ("Situation Room," CNN, 5/13).
Newsweek's Wolffe, on Graham: "The goal here is a pretty clear attempt to discredit this whole process by saying that it's a partisan political food fight. ... The problem here is that these issues are too serious -- and Republicans need to understand that they should get on the right side of this. The right side of this is not about the punishment. ... What this is about is fact-finding. And that's why an independent commission is actually the right venue for this kind of questioning."
More Wolffe: "Senator Graham is a former prosecutor, he should know that he shouldn't ask a question unless he knows the answer. I suspect the question was designed to undermine the credibility of the witness. It was a political stunt in and of itself" ("Countdown," MSNBC, 5/13).
