Spin Dry

That title is a quote from W. Here's the context, courtesy ofDaily Kos:

We've known for years now that George W. Bush received a presidential daily briefing on Aug. 6, 2001, in which he was warned: "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." We've known for almost as long that Bush went fishing afterward.

What we didn't know is what happened in between the briefing and the fishing, and now Suskind is here to tell us. Bush listened to the briefing, Suskind says, then told the CIA briefer: "All right. You've covered your ass, now."

I bring this quote up because it came to mind immediately in the wake of W's little speech today -- which apparently wasn't really important enough for any of the networks to break into soap operas in order to show.

President Bush on Wednesday for the first time acknowledged the use of secret CIA prisons outside U.S. borders to hold top suspects captured in the war on terrorism.

In a speech at the White House, Bush said captured terror suspects have been the best intelligence source in efforts to stop new attacks and listed attacks blocked because of this intelligence.

The CIA program has "saved innocent lives," the president said. [emphasis added]

Uh-huh, yeah, right... First off, seeing as most of these suspects have been held in our ultra-top super secret prisons for years, there really isn't much they could provide in the way of relevent information -- but there'd certainly be incentive, after a couple of years of being held incognito from the world, to start making shit up.

Let's make a comparison. This information is about as new and fresh as an American soldier captured in Baghdad in March, 2003 telling his captors in August 2006, "We're going to bomb Fallujah." Uh, yeah... we kind of already dealt with that one.

Incidentally, nowhere in the article do we get the money shot -- Bush's list of attacks allegedly stopped because of the American Gulag. Things that make you go "Hm."

The real reason for all this grandstanding now, of course, is that BushCo. got caught raping the Constitution, and the Supreme Court called them on it. From the same article:

In a 5-3 decision in June, the Supreme Court ruled that existing law barred military commissions. The decision effectively means officials will have to come up with new procedures to prosecute at least 10 "enemy combatants" awaiting trial or release them from military custody.

That "existing law" would be the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, folks. Those "new" procedures should be open jury trials, with witnesses and evidence and all the usual procedures.

Some (although fewer every day) people would call that "coddling terrorists." I call it "protecting what this country stands for." After all, if every one of the (we don't even know how many) detainees have committed some crime and are dangerous, the Administration should have no problem proving it in an open court, right?

Right?

(Crickets).

Otherwise, they're just blowing smoke up our asses as usual, and trying to come up with post facto justifications for their own criminal behavior. America is not about military tribunals, secret courts and indefinite detention without charges being brought. To behave in such a manner is itself a terrorist act.

Yes, I said it, and don't forget it in November. The real terrorists we should fear are the ones in charge.