The news that senior Bush administration officials not only approved the use of torture but actually micromanaged the application of it should be the last straw for dithering Democrats in the House of Representatives.

We have known for years that the president and the vice president approved war crimes, including torture, on the basis of legal opinions provided by Justice Department functionaries authorizing the president to break any law in the name of national security. Now we know that Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and other top officials sat in the White House situation room dictated specific combinations of outlawed interrogation techniques—including waterboarding and physical beatings—for specific prisoners.

One of the great tragedies of the Bush administration is the lassitude, often appearing to shade into cowardice, displayed by those in opposition to it. The Democratic leadership in Congress refuses to consider impeachment as an option for dealing with a transparently criminal president and vice president, and very few major voices on the liberal end of the spectrum have chided them for it. Liberal blogging powerhouse Atrios today called Rice and company “monsters” and “war criminals” who should all be in jail for their actions; what, then, does that make House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Judiciary Committee chairman John Conyers and others who have the option of at least attempting to evict the monsters from the national house but have failed to act?

Maybe the personal involvement, the image of Condoleezza Rice sitting in the White House situation room discussing with Colin Powell and Dick Cheney how often Abu Zubaydah should be subjected to drowning, perhaps while watching the videos of their handiwork on the big screen TV—those infamous now-destroyed CIA videos—will be enough to motivate Conyers to finally begin hearings on whether or not the administration have committed impeachable offenses.

Pelosi Pelosi can be written off as a lost cause: as we’ve noted in the past, she is herself complicit in the administration’s crimes, albeit as a bystander, because she knew for years that their agenda included torture and she did nothing to stop it. If Conyers, though, is finally moved to act, Pelosi can do little to stop him without overtly incriminating herself.

Journalist Laura Rozen, who writes often on intelligence issues, suspects that the ABC News story regarding the personal involvement of Rice and others can be sourced to CIA officials angry at being exclusively tarred as torturers. She notes further that her own reporting and the ABC story suggest that there is a paper trail indicating which administration officials signed off on what torture aimed at which suspects—exactly the sort of documentation that from Nuremberg on has spelled doom for meticulous war criminals the world over.

It’s there: someone has to go get it. The person in the best position to do so is John Conyers. I urge anyone who has even the slightest interest in bringing our monsters to justice, or at least preventing them from ending their terms in office unscathed, to contact Conyers and politely urge him to investigate these new revelations. You can reach him by email or telephone at:
john.conyers@mail.house.gov
(202) 225-5126 (voice)
(202) 225-0072 (FAX)

Following is the email I sent to Conyers tonight. Feel free to borrow it.

The Honorable John Conyers
2426 Rayburn Building
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Rep. Conyers:

You’re no doubt aware of the ABC News report alleging that current and former senior Bush administration officials were actively involved in dictating specific acts of torture from the White House to be used against various terrorism suspects. As you know, torture is a violation of domestic and international law. I strongly urge you to convene hearings and demand the appearance of those officials named in the ABC report—Condoleezza Rice, George Tenet, Porter Goss, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell and John Ashcroft—for the purpose of determining whether they committed war crimes and, in the case of Mr. Cheney and his immediate supervisor, whether their actions constitute impeachable offenses warranting removal from office. The image presented by top US officials authorizing and managing the torture of US prisoners from the White House is both nauseating and immensely harmful to the interests of our country, and only a prompt and thorough investigation can begin to mitigate the damage. I know that you take your oath of office seriously; if there is ever to be a moment when the Constitution requires your defense, it has arrived.

Sincerely,
Weldon Berger

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