A Show of Feith?

From THINK PROGRESS SECURITY:

Conservative Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin asserted in a blog post that Texas governor and Republican presidential hopeful Rick Perry did not write a Friday pro-Israel op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal and Israel’s Jerusalem Post. The op-ed, in which Perry cherry-picked a quote from a historian to link Texas and Israel, criticized President Obama’s pro-Israel record. “Perry almost certainly didn’t write it,” said Rubin. “We know that because his own foreign policy views are rudimentary. […] A ghostwritten piece so far above his current abilities highlights the concern.” Rubin acknowledged that “most pols have these things written for them,” but said that “until he personally could articulate his thoughts in detail, [advisers] should forgo the pretense of sophistication.” Among Perry’s top reported foreign policy contacts are former Bush officials Donald Rumsfeld and Douglas Feith. So who wrote Perry’s Op-Ed?

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Where Thinking Goes to Tank

From THE HUFFINGTON POST:

The George W. Bush Institute — the “action- oriented think tank” that is part of Bush’s Presidential Center — will co-produce a public television show hosted by its executive director, Ambassador James Glassman, in a rare convergence of public broadcasting and a partisan research organization.

“Ideas in Action” will premiere in February and will be co-produced by Andrew Walworth, who produces PBS’s “Think Tank.”

Because we all know how Chimpy always surrounds himself with geniuses.

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(I think I know where Douglas Feith, Dana Perino, Alberto Gonzales, and Chimpy got their ice cream)

Creepier by the Dozen

From The New York Times:

WASHINGTON — A coalition of left-wing advocacy groups filed legal ethics complaints on Monday against 12 former Bush administration lawyers, including three United States attorneys general, whom the groups accuse of helping to justify torture.

The coalition, called Velvet Revolution, asked the bar associations in four states and the District of Columbia to disbar the lawyers, saying their actions violated the rules of professional responsibility by approving interrogation methods, including waterboarding, that constituted illegal torture.

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Los Presos Españoles

From ABC News:

In what may turn out to be a landmark case, a Spanish court has started a criminal investigation into allegations that six former officials in the Bush administration violated international law by creating the legal justification for torture in Guantanamo Bay.

The officials named in the 98-page complaint include former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who once famously described the Geneva Conventions as “quaint” and “obsolete.”

Others include John Yoo, a former Justice Department lawyer who wrote the so-called “torture memo” that justified waterboarding and other extreme interrogation methods for terror suspects.

Also named are: former Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith; former General Counsel for the Department of Defense William Haynes II; Jay S. Bybee, formerly of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel; and David S. Addington, former chief of staff and legal advisor to former Vice President Dick Cheney.

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(And yes, kids, I am just as upset as you are to find out that William Haynes II is the secret identity of Mr. Bean! 😯 )

Cruel and the Gang

Kids, are you confused about all the Chimpy White House scandals? Too many to keep track of? Well, the good folks at Slate have made life a little bit easier for you. They have a wonderful post with an awesome graphic that sorts out the Crimes and Misdemeanors of Chimpy & Company.

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Your Appointment Has Been Cancelled!

From the Washington Post:

Speaking of Iraq, the Georgetown Hoya newspaper last week quoted a student saying she was “displeased that university officials have not asked” former Pentagon undersecretary Douglas Feith”to return to teach next year.”

Asked about Feith’s status, Robert Gallucci, dean of Georgetown’s foreign service school, told us that when Feith was hired — something that caused an uproar among the faculty — it was understood he “was on a two-year appointment.”

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In a League of Their Own

From The Guardian:

America’s most senior general was “hoodwinked” by top Bush administration officials determined to push through aggressive interrogation techniques of terror suspects held at Guantánamo Bay, leading to the US military abandoning its age-old ban on the cruel and inhumane treatment of prisoners, the Guardian reveals today.

General Richard Myers, chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff from 2001 to 2005, wrongly believed that inmates at Guantánamo and other prisons were protected by the Geneva conventions and from abuse tantamount to torture.

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Feith-based Initiative

(CBS) The name Douglas Feith may not mean much to most Americans, but to students of the Iraq War and historians already studying it, he is one of the main architects.

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