Ron Paul Wants More Information on Torture - David Gregory Wants Less

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David Gregory jumps into the Nancy Pelosi/CIA story this morning on Morning Joe. As usual Gregory leaves out facts that don't support his view that there should be no accountability for torture and distorts facts to make them fit into his view.

Gregory: She either wasn't fully apprised personally of what was happening or she decided not to push back so that's the reality of the public record that we have so far. Now maybe if we go down this road maybe we will learn more, maybe we'll get a fuller accounting of what was contained in that briefing but what you've got right now are other people who were there..Republicans who were there saying look it was clear as day what they were asking for and what they were already doing.

According to the CIA log the only Republican that attended the briefing that Nancy Pelosi was in was Porter Goss. Yet in the above quote Gregory states that there were Republican(s) in the briefing that Nancy Pelosi received. Who are these other Republicans or is Gregory just trying to give the viewers the false impression that there are multiple people who attended her briefing who disagree with what she said the CIA told her? And why didn't Gregory bother to mention that Bob Graham also disputes what the CIA briefed him on? Or why didn't Gregory bother to mention that even Republican, Porter Goss, in his Washington Post op-ed didn't back up the claim that the CIA briefed them that waterboarding was already being done, as this excellent analysis by Emptywheel makes clear.

Porter Goss says Pelosi should have known "the techniques on which they were briefed were to actually be employed." But he doesn't say she should have known "the techniques on which they were briefed had already been employed." Which is a critical part of her complaint--that CIA did not tell Congress that waterboarding and other techniques "were used" ... that "they were using that." This briefing is always described as occurring in "fall 2002." Even interpreting "fall" broadly to include all of September, that means the briefing took place after they had already waterboarded Abu Zubaydah 83 times in a month.

So whether or not Pelosi is arguing "waterboarding" was mentioned or not, even Goss appears to confirm one of Pelosi's main points. The CIA did not reveal this was already taking place. Even Goss' understanding, they revealed only that waterboarding "was to be employee' -- in the future.

While I think David Gregory makes numerous misrepresentations in this video clip (like he always does) his point about the Obama White House not wanting investigations into torture appears to be on point although I'm sure even here he exaggerates because he's an advocate for this same view.

Gregory: In 2002 there were no Democrats who were willing to stand up to the White House. Even Republicans - some Republicans I've spoken to who are sympathetic to the criticism about the treatment of these detainees say we know everything we need to know about what happened. There's nothing more that we actually need to discover...lets just move on.

While I don't agree with the Obama administration doing everything in their power to shut down an investigation into torture I can at least understand the political motivation behind it, misguided though it may be. What I find incredible and what I simply don't understand is how so many supposed "journalists" like David Gregory are also going out of their way to bury this issue. Our Press is supposed to be interested in ferreting out the truth but there are far too many "journalists" in our establishment media who obviously don't want the entire truth to come out. They actually get agitated even thinking about the possibility that a full investigation will be conducted. Just look at how Gregory reacts  when he is asked a simple question about what are the chances that there will be a full investigation into what happened. His reaction is not a dispassionate reaction it's the reaction of an advocate of a particular position.  We saw an even more forceful example of this reaction when Gregory interviewed King Abdullah  and Abdullah did not give Gregory the answers that supported Gregory's position.

Carlos: Hey David even though the Obama White House would rather this not be the conversation what in your mind would be one or several tipping points that would move this towards a full investigation where we spend a summer like we did back in the late 80s talking about the Oliver North hearings. What might lead to that scenario in your mind?

Gregory: How about nothing. How about if the White House has ....Look if the White House has the kind of political capital that it appears to have they're going to make it clear that they do not want this to be the discussion. They've got a lot of other things they want to talk about...

This is not the dispassionate answer of an objective reporter. This is an answer of an advocate who is hiding behind the White House in order to cloak the fact that he is actually advancing his own point of view.

Another interesting segment on the Morning Joe show this morning was when Republican Ron Paul was asked about Pelosi and the CIA issue.  This was part of his response:

...but it's also beneficial in trying to find out what's going on...but just think we wouldn't have this discussion if we had just followed the law. Our law prohibits torture as well as international law. But the fact that this discussion is here and who said what is good. I have no idea who is telling the truth but I know it's very good for the country to get to the bottom of it.

You're right, maybe this will not lead to getting to the bottom of it because the administration is not all that interested in prosecuting the people who broke the law.

After he said this - surprise, surprise...Joe Scarborough changed the subject. While we had 6:11 minutes of David Gregory talking about this issue and 7:43 minutes of Kit Bond talking about this issue...We only had 1:30 minutes of Ron Paul's view on this topic. Of course Ron Paul was the only one of the three to actually talk about prosecuting people for lawbreaking and that doesn't agree with our establishment media narrative on torture so it's no surprise that they changed the subject. I guess we should all be grateful that at least they kept this part of the Paul interview in the video they posted online. When Doris Kerns Goodwin went off the reservation, like Ron Paul did today, they just eliminated her words from the online video.

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