Yet more SAP

Digby has some good comments on Hersh's article. What I think is devastating about this article is not the revelation of the existence of the SAP. Like Digby, I always assumed that some kind of "black" operation like this would occur after 9/11. It is only the criminally naive who think that we never get our hands dirty.

What is different here, though, was that a highly specialized intelligence tool was converted to a use it was not meant for. The SAP was meant only for "high-value targets" in Afghanistan. Rumsfeld and Cambone perverted it to deal with the growing problem of the insurgency in Iraq and then compounded their mistake by including amateurs in the operation.

Hersh has several sources within intelligences circles for this article. The reason why is obvious: the spooks are pissed at Rumsfeld (and Bush by extension) for exposing what they do to the light of day:

[...] Cambone and his superiors, the consultant said, �created the conditions that allowed transgressions to take place. And now we�re going to end up with another Church Commission��the 1975 Senate committee on intelligence, headed by Senator Frank Church, of Idaho, which investigated C.I.A. abuses during the previous two decades. [...]

More SAP in the NY Times

Here's a follow on in the New York Times that includes some reaction to Hersh's story.

What a bunch of SAPs

Seymour Hersh is out with yet another devastating article on the prisoner abuse scandal.

Quick summary: that the scandal at Abu Ghraib was not the abuses themselves, because these kind of interrogation techniques were known of and approved for use against "high value targets" in the war on terror. The scandal was that the program was allowed to grow beyond its original mandate, leading inevitably to the kind of meltdown we are witnessing.

Longer summary...

1. Shortly after 9/11, Donald Rumsfeld became outraged at the legalistic hand-binding that prevented special forces in the field from acting quickly on intelligence information about "high value targets" (Mullah Omar, bin Laden, etc.)
2. In response, he established a "Special Access Program" (SAP) of around 100-200 operatives whose mandate was to quickly gather high value information and act on it on a moments notice.
3. SAP's have been a feature in the Defense Department since the Cold War and have been rated as highly effective in achieving their goals, but they are generally NOT talked about because their methods of operations would probably not pass muster in the public eye (both foreign and domestic). In other words, they are "black" operations, not meant to be seen in the light of day, designed to convert raw information into something that can be used publicly (go "white") when it is solid enough.
4. While some SAP techniques might be questionable, they have usually been very strictly controlled and used only the most trained individuals and included oversight designed to keep them from expanding beyond the narrow focus they were created for.
5. After the fall of Saddam, Rumsfeld didn't give much heed to the growing insurgency problem in Iraq (he called them Baathist dead-enders). That started to change with the bombings of the Jordanian and United Nations embassies in August 2003.
6. By the Fall of 2003 it was clear to even Rumsfeld that things were falling apart in Iraq. It was around this time that the SAP set up after 9/11 was shifted towards dealing with the Iraqi insurgency. This was the first mistake because it violated the notion that SAP's should only be used for their limited purpose and not bent towards other goals.
7. General Miller, the commander of the prison camp in Gitmo, was brought in at this time by Stephen Cambone, who was essentially the civilian head of the SAP, to help "Gitmoize" the Iraqi prison system.
8. It was Cambone who made the next mistake by deciding to bring the military intelligence personal at Abu Ghraib and other facilities into the SAP, violating yet another precept of these programs that they should remain small.
9. Once that door was open it began to creep open even further as civlian contractors and raw military police, the latter having no training in these matters, were included in the "softening up" operations.
10. As the net of the SAP grew it no longer focused just on "high value targets" and it secrecy and effectiveness became compromised by the inclusion of ill-trained individuals. It was almost inevitable that something would break and it did on January 13th when one young MP reported what was going on to the Army's Criminal Investigations Division and handed over a CD full of pictures.
11. The report of this quickly went up the line to Rumsfeld. From that point on the most important goal of his and others reactions to the problem was NOT to stop the abuses but instead keep a lid on reports about them in order to protect the SAP.

In other words, it wasn't the abuses themselves that bothered the DOD leadership. It was the fear that a "black" program might become "white". Hersh's article finally makes that fear a reality. Yet it is Rumsfeld and Cambone and the others who should be blamed for this because it was they who approved the expansion of the SAP to the point where such exposure was almost inevitable.

Perhaps their greatest fear now is that it will be them who is blamed for fucking it up so badly.

Kerry 8, Bush 3

Smackdown, Week 11

Do I really need to explain again?

Dean Machine

On a related note to the previous discussion of Dean's "peculiar" political endorsements...

I think it is important to understand that Dean is a long-term strategist. He isn't thinking just about this years election but about what is going to happen in 2020. He seems to understand, at a gut-level, something that many in the Democratic establishment just never got: that the Republicans achieved power through a long-term strategy of taking over the country piece by piece and that defeating them will require a similar movement in response.

Also, there is a fundamental disconnect between the way politics is presented in this country by the media and the way it actually operators. The media focuses our attention on The Candidate to the point where the casual viewer comes to think that all that you need to do is get to know The Candidate and you will understand what they are going to do once they get in office.

But, we don't elect people in this country. We elect machines. We elect the organizations that back The Candidate because it is those organizations that will supply the mid-level administrators who will actually run the country.

Perhaps one of the reasons why Dean ultimately failed in his bid for the nomination is that he had no machine to back him up. He was just one guy standing on a podium asking questions in a loud voice. But when it came down to it, many people just didn't know what they would be getting if they put their support behind a Dean administration because they didn't know who would be in that administration.

Democracy For America may be Dean's attempt to build the machine that he was lacking in 2000. In 10-20 years that machine could provide him, or someone else if he chooses not to run again, with the organization he will need to convince people that he isn't just a hothead.

I, for one, hope he pulls it off.

Dean defies "conventional wisdom" again

DHinMi brings an interesting perspective to the Dean Dozen in this post over at the DailyKos:

On this list, there are only two candidates who have a high probability of seizing seats currently held by "the right-wing conservatives who dominate our government," but even one of those seats is in a legislative body (California Assembly) under the control of a solid Democratic majority.  And even if every candidate on this list wins their race, they will not constitute a a critical mass of Dean support in any state or legislative body where they could band together or on which he could  build for the future. All he will have done is help elect a handful of people scattered mostly in part-time legislatures.  

I can see how Dean's list seems to run contrary to conventional political thinking. But maybe that's the point.

Dean himself defied conventional political thinking and came damn close to actually winning the nomination. Did he do so because he was such a superior candidate? Possibly. But I think the greatest part of Dean's success was timing. All the internet activism, meetups and bring-out-the-bats wouldn't have made any difference if the party establishment hadn't been fundamentally weak to begin with. And it was weak in large part because it had become so focused on "conventional political thinking".

Dean's list is as much symbolic as it is strategic (possibly even more so). I think he is attempting to infuse energy in the party at all levels, not just at the small narrow band of wedge races that the national party has devoted so much of its attention to in recent years.

Of course there are good arguments to be made for focusing limited resources only in those areas where you are most likely to have the most immediate impact. This is especially true in the 50-50 nation we live in today where a change in a few seats can change the whole course of the country.

But there are also arguments to be made that to narrow a focus can leave the rest of the party feeling like their voices don't matter. This is a policy that encourages apathy in the Democratic party and it is that apathy that provided the opening for the Republicans to move in and take over.

Remember that 20 years ago Texas was a solidly Democratic state.

Update:

There's an excellent response to DHinMi's post here

I think it is important to remember that "winning" is not simply a matter of winning elective office. You "win" in politics when you change the political direction of the country. Howard Dean didn't "win" the nomination, but even many of his detractors would concede that he changed the direction of the race in a good way.

So, even if many of the Dean Dozen don't win their races, they can still have an impact on the overall process by using the bigger soapbox Dean is giving them to influence the political dialog.

Winning is more then just getting more votes than the other guy (the 2000 election should have taught us that).

Ch-Ch-Changes

If a Republican says that the world is flat then best the press would say in response is that some Democrats disagree. Thus illustrating, by exaggeration, the extremes the press will go to to avoid saying that said Republican is smoking crack. This is the establishment media rule, so ably documented by people like Bob Somerby, that we have had to live with for years.

Which is why it is so refreshing to see things like this from the Washington Post (courtesy Kicking Ass):

The Bush campaign has repeatedly accused the senator of "politicizing" Iraq. Bush-Cheney chairman Marc Racicot told reporters Wednesday that Kerry is relentlessly "playing politics" and exploiting tragedy for political gain.

Racicot, for instance, told reporters that Kerry suggested that 150,000 or so U.S. troops are "somehow universally responsible" for the misdeeds of a small number of American soldiers and contractors. Racicot made several variations of this charge. But Kerry never said this, or anything like it. [Emphasis added.]

In 2000 the Post wouldn't have batted an eye at comments like that. They let Republicans get away with equally bad distortions of Al Gore.

Maybe a few of them are starting to wake up?

Or maybe the recent advent of fighting liberals has started to goad them into achieving real balance?

Mmmm.... could be.

Start at the beginning

Howard Dean has announced his list of the "Dean Dozen", "twelve diverse candidates that represent the spirit of grassroots democracy" that Dean and his organization will work to get elected this year.

What struck me most about this list is that only three of the twelve are national level candidates (two congressional seats and one Senator). Typically, national groups like DfA, when they sponsor candidates, put a lot of attention on people vying for a position in Washington. Dean, by focusing his considerable political muscle on nine state level races, is demonstrating that he he is just as interested in rebuilding the Democratic party from the lowest levels of elective office.

Good thing to. The Republican revolution started in much the same way by focusing on city council and school board races and working their way up. Too many progressives have an "all or nothing" approach to politics. They go right for the big prize (ala Nader and the Presidency) instead of building a groundswell that will carry Democrats into all levels of government. After all, the main thing the President does is set an agenda. It is the ground-level functionaries who will actually have to flesh it out and implement it. That is where the real work gets done.

20 years from now you can examine any list of the most prominent and up-n-coming Democrats and I bet you will find a considerable number of them cut their teeth on the Dean campaign.

From little seeds great forests grow.

Nail...Hammer...Hit

Josh Marshal:

[Bush] doesn't even need the yes-men who "extract" the "facts" from the news articles. He's his own built-in yes-man.

Playing

I'm trying out a couple of variations on the blog look. Let me know what you think.

The Great Awakening

Read today's Tom Friedman column and then read Kevin Drum's follow on to it.

Democrats who supported action against Iraq can be roughly broken down into the following categories:

1. Those who were gung-ho for war from the beginning and didn't really care about Bush's motivations (Zell Miller, Joe Lieberman).
2. Those who thought war was the best option and believed that Bush wouldn't put partisanship above defending the nation and would use the expertise of the American military and our intelligence services to their best ability (Tom Friedman).
3. Those who were ready for war and believed that Bush wouldn't put partisanship above defending the nation but had serious doubts about whether he was up to the job (Josh Marshal, Kevin Drum, Matthew Yglesias)
4. Those who supported some of the ideas behind the war but believed that Bush couldn't be trusted to either do it right or not to use it for partisan advantage (Me)

Bush lost me long before the war because I knew that anyone who was willing to sacrifice the democratic principles this country was founded on in order to achieve the Presidency wouldn't think twice about using war for partisan purposes. And I never trusted in his abilities from day one.

Bush lost Marshal, Drum and Yglesias just prior to the war as they grew disturbed at his handling of the pre-war diplomacy and they began to wonder whether these guys knew how to handle it for the long-term.

Bush lost Friedman first because of the incompetence and then because the Bushies reaction to the failures brought about by that incompetence shattered his illusions about their motivations.

Frankly I don't know what would turn Lieberman or Miller at this point.

The group represented by Friedman has had the toughest road to slog through because they really did have their heart in the right place, they just misplaced their trust because they wanted to believe that no one could be as bad as Bush is.

Situational Ethics and the Geneva Convention

How convenient:

U.S. administration lawyers are advising the Pentagon not to publicly release any more photographs of Iraqi prisoners being abused by U.S. soldiers, Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said at the outset of a hastily arranged visit to Iraq aimed at containing the abuse scandal.

"As far as I'm concerned, I'd be happy to release them all to the public and to get it behind us," Rumsfeld told reporters travelling with him from Washington. "But at the present time I don't know anyone in the legal shop in any element of the government that is recommending that."

The government lawyers argue that releasing such materials would violate a Geneva Convention stricture against presenting images of prisoners that could be construed as degrading, Rumsfeld said en route to the Iraqi capital on a trip that was not announced in advance due to security concerns.

Ah, so now he is concerned about violating the Geneva convention.

Blindness and Mr. Friedman

Tom Friedman: It is time to ask this question: Do we have any chance of succeeding at regime change in Iraq without regime change here at home?

"Hey, Friedman, why are you bringing politics into this all of a sudden? You're the guy who always said that producing a decent outcome in Iraq was of such overriding importance to the country that it had to be kept above politics."

Yes, that's true. I still believe that. My mistake was thinking that the Bush team believed it, too. I thought the administration would have to do the right things in Iraq � from prewar planning and putting in enough troops to dismissing the secretary of defense for incompetence � because surely this was the most important thing for the president and the country. But I was wrong. There is something even more important to the Bush crowd than getting Iraq right, and that's getting re-elected and staying loyal to the conservative base to do so. It has always been more important for the Bush folks to defeat liberals at home than Baathists abroad. That's why they spent more time studying U.S. polls than Iraqi history. That is why, I'll bet, Karl Rove has had more sway over this war than Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Bill Burns. Mr. Burns knew only what would play in the Middle East. Mr. Rove knew what would play in the Middle West.

I admit, I'm a little slow. Because I tried to think about something as deadly serious as Iraq, and the post- 9/11 world, in a nonpartisan fashion � as Joe Biden, John McCain and Dick Lugar did � I assumed the Bush officials were doing the same. I was wrong. They were always so slow to change course because confronting their mistakes didn't just involve confronting reality, but their own politics.

Idiot! Dumpkopf! Asshole!

Frankly, the price we have paid in blood and prestige is to high for me to be happy when cretin's like Friedman finally realize what the rest of us have been trying to warn him about for years.

(Please keep one thing in mind before anyone suggests that I oppose George W. Bush because I am a Democrat: I only switched registration from Independent to Democratic this past year. I do not oppose George W. Bush because I am a Democrat. I am a Democrat because I oppose George W. Bush.)

Arrogance and Mr. Rumsfeld

I was watching a bit of Rumsfeld's Q&A session with the troops in Iraq (good moral booster for the troops btw) and I was struck once again by one of the defining characteristics of the Bush administration: they know how to make people feel good despite their incompetence. Rumsfeld and company know how to make the soldiers and the Americans tuning in to this event feel like they are in good hands despite the fact that they f*ck it up repeatedly.

In other words, the only thing these guys are competent at is public relations.

I've often heard liberals criticized by conservatives for being more concerned about people's feelings than in actually making their lives better (the old Rush line is that liberals want to keep the downtrodden downtrodden so that they can continue to appeal to their sense of victimization). Yet it is Bush and his people who are masters at pulling people's heart strings while glossing over the fact that they never actually accomplish anything positive (unlike Rush, I won't get into questions of motives).

Message: they care.

This is one of the most arrogant administrations this country has ever seen. But arrogance doesn't bother me so long as it is backed up by competence. When it is it is justified. When it isn't it is hubris.

Rush bothered and bewildered

Amazing. It looks like Media Matters has Rush on the defensive over his belittling of the Abu Ghraib scandal. I don't think he's used to it:

LIMBAUGH: Now, let's look at this -- this prison business.  When the first two or three pictures came out, and you know which ones they are -- the pyramid picture, which is what looks like a Skull and Bones initiation, the pyramid, the guys in the hoods, and we've got the female prison guard with a cigarette dangling from the mouth.  And we had this -- the guy in all -- in all black, hooded, and so forth, wires attached to various extremities.  And there was -- there was one other picture. 

And I said, "Well, you know, what's the big deal here?  This just looks like an average Skull and Bones initiation."  That quote, made the first day the pictures were published, is all that I am quoted as saying.  Well, maybe one other little quote.  I forget what it is.  But in this instance, not one journalist -- and that's what they are -- not one journalist has picked up the phone or sent me an e-mail, and said, "What do you mean by this.  Do you really think this?" 

Not one journalist has dared ask me for the context of the remark.  Not one person -- not one -- no Conservative journalist has either.  If there are Conservatives upset with me, I want to tell -- no one has gotten hold of me.  And I'm assuming that they're not listening to the program, because otherwise they would know the context of all this.  You can't -- I mean, I've spent 10 to 12 hours on this subject and said a whole lot on it, but that one comment seems to serve the purpose of those who have an agenda. 

...

CALLER: Just have a quick comment.  I just think it's a little hypocritical that you said that the media is taking some of your comments out of context when really your sound bites that you issue every day seem to be doing the same thing.  If you listen to the entire speeches, you can kind of get what some of the Democrats are talking about.  The way you --

LIMBAUGH: You know, Rob, I -- I -- I hate to interrupt here.  I'm only doing so because of time, but we got your -- your basic point.  Here's the difference.  In the first place, I don't take them out of context.  They are purposely taking me out of context.  I'm not complaining about it, though.  This is the one -- I want everybody to understand, I'm honored that this is -- don't get -- don't get upset about it.

"I'm not complaining about it, though."

Yeah, right.

Ouch

Iraq Jima

Tragedy

An American contractor named Nick Berg was beheaded and the video of the execution posted on an Islamic militant web site (AP).

Nick Berg's death is a tragedy. It is a tragedy that could have been avoided were it not for the pig-headed nature of our leadership. It is a tragedy that will become doubly so when the administration apologists use it as a reason to escalate the conflict in Iraq.

"An eye for an eye and soon the whole world is blind." -- Ghandi

Should Kerry care what we have to say?

There is much commentary out there about the latest Gallup poll showing Bush with his lowest approval rating yet (46%), yet still holding par with Kerry in the race for the presidency. Kerry has yet to turn Bush's troubles to his advantage. This is most likely because we are still in the "defining the candidate" phase of the campaign. Both teams are spending huge amounts of money to put out their preferred narrative about the other side. For Bush the strategy has become clear: he has nothing positive to run on, so the only hope he has of retaining his position is to make Kerry look even worse. And, to a limited extent, it is working.

You know, I could give all sorts of advice on what Kerry should do right now, but I think right now the Democratic campaign is suffering from an abundance of "good ideas". The multitude of political consultants (both amateur and professional) trying to grab Kerry's ear right now could itself become a threat to his campaign. Gore suffered somewhat in 2000 for listening to the advice of to many and appearing to skip back and forth between campaign strategies.

Kerry needs to pick a single campaign strategy and, barring disaster, stick with it (he probably already has). He should welcome advice with a friendly smile, but he should stick to his game plan with little visible modification. And the rest of us should not become so enamored of our political insight that we start going chicken little every time Kerry does something that appears to go against it.

Consider this...

Regarding this whole canard about how we shouldn't change horses in mid-war: Exactly how many generals did Lincoln go through before he found Grant?

(non-exhaustive list: Winfield Scott, Irvin McDowell, George McClellan, John Pope, Ambrose Burnside, Don Carlos Buell, William Rosecrans, Henry Halleck, Joseph Hooker, George Meade, etc.)

New Times

Blogger has come out with some new features (the most interesting to me being the comment feature), but in order to use them I have had to adopt a new template for my blog (the old one had become to hacked to translate correctly). This gave me an opportunity to update my blogroll, which had become badly out-of-date.

Hopefully everything goes well from here on out.

 

Update:  Well, that didn't work very well. The blogger comments are pretty screwed up. So I've switched over to using Haloscan.