“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing” - Edmund Burke

Yesterday everyone was up in arms over the destruction of interrogation tapes which may have depicted torture of US detainees. But turns out, some were a little less shocked than others since they’d been briefed on those same practices.

In September 2002, four members of Congress met in secret for a first look at a unique CIA program designed to wring vital information from reticent terrorism suspects in U.S. custody. For more than an hour, the bipartisan group, which included current House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), was given a virtual tour of the CIA’s overseas detention sites and the harsh techniques interrogators had devised to try to make their prisoners talk.

Among the techniques described, said two officials present, was waterboarding, a practice that years later would be condemned as torture by Democrats and some Republicans on Capitol Hill. But on that day, no objections were raised. Instead, at least two lawmakers in the room asked the CIA to push harder, two U.S. officials said.

This revelation is rightly causing outrage among many, despite protestations from the Democrats involved who claim their hands were tied due to secrecy clauses that prevented them from revealing what they had learned about the CIA program. While that excuse can only go so far, and indeed may not even be a valid one given the mechanisms available to Congress, the revelation is certainly likely to temper calls for investigation into CIA practices. And perhaps that was the reason this news was leaked in the first place.

In any event, we know one thing is for certain: The Democrats are now just as complicit as the Bushies.

(X-posted at The Xsociate Files)