Do you expect any of the wingnuts and warbloggers who denied that the CIA was running secret prisons in Eastern Europe to express any embarrassment now that the President has acknowledged the truth?
Me neither.
Of course, that’s just good clean fun. Making all our supporters in Europe look stupid isn’t. But of course all other considerations must give way to national-security imperative of preventing the GOP from getting clobbered in November.
Update Link added in response to comments. Yes, the primary winger response was that Dana Priest and her sources were traitors who ought to be put in prison for revealing state secrets. But the secondary line, especially after the EU Parliament investigation failed to find the smoking gun, was that the prisons didn’t exist and the story was part of a mole-hunting operation aimed at disloyal (to Bush, that is) elements within the CIA. Little Green Footballs, Captain’s Quarters, RedState, and Right Wing Nut House all made the same claim, and Glenn Reynolds helped spread the wildly implausible story without committing himself to it.
I saw a great link headline for this the other day:
Oh, you mean THOSE secret CIA prisons…
“[the] national-security imperative of preventing the GOP from getting clobbered in November”
In fact, I’m sure that this is how they think of it. Since the Dems will ruin the nation, therefore anything done to prevent them from taking power is justifiable.
Besides, too much money is at stake. By my estimate, at least $500 billion dollars per year.
“Do you expect any of the wingnuts and warbloggers who denied that the CIA was running secret prisons in Eastern Europe”
Link please!
Also, can you please specify the passage in Bush’s speech where he acknowledges that we had secret prisons *in Eastern Europe*?
I see an acknowledgement of prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan. I don’t see any other locations specified. Perhaps you can point it out to me.
Not to be smart, but I agree with A. S. I remember plenty of wingnuts saying he *should* have secret prisons, not so many denying that he did.
A.S.:
Link added.
And no, Bush didn’t actually specify “Eastern Europe.” But he did, finally confirm the existence of the secret prisons, thus vindicating Dana Priest’s story. And that story specifies Eastern Europe; Priest withheld the names of the specific countries at the request of the government, but it seems that they were Poland and Rumania.
A.S.:
Link added.
And no, Bush didn’t actually specify “Eastern Europe.” But he did, finally, confirm the existence of the secret prisons, thus vindicating Dana Priest’s story. And that story specifies Eastern Europe; Priest withheld the names of the specific countries at the request of the government, but it seems that they were Poland and Rumania.
The obvious response from Bushapologists about confirmation of secret US gulags will be:
a) So what?
b) You do what it takes to win.
c) So you’re pro-terrorist?
d) The terrorists have them too. I don’t hear you complaining about that.
e) War is war. Get used to it.
f) Even they save just one American life, they are worth it.
g) Everyone already knew it. Why do you keep dragging up old news? Getting desperate come November?
Here’s my “claim” that the prisons didn’t exist.
It’s a shame you have the sense of humor of a marmoset. I was, in fact, half in jest making a highly speculative claim that was identified as such:
“It is very, very tempting to connect those two dots. They are begging to be connected. One dot is going so far as to do a belly dance to entice the other. Alas, we have absolutely no evidence at this point so it is pure speculation to say that the entire “secret CIA prison” story was a plant and part of an internal agency leak investigation.”
Some claim, eh?
My follow up posts walk all the way back from that position and say that the preponderance of the evidence points to the existence of the prisons.
I also praise Dana Priest as one of the finest national security journalists around – which she is.
You’re going to have to do a better job distorting what I write if you want to keep up with the drooling lefties who have you beat hands down.
Thanks for the update, Mark. Yeah, Moran’s inital speculation was crazy (as was the rest of the right blogosphere for linking to it). But as he notes above, he basically retreated from it already. (E.g., http://rightwingnuthouse.com/archives/2006/04/22/cia-vs-the-white-house-walking-back-slowly/) And while there no doubt in my mind that we had secret prisons in Eastern Europe, just as Dana Priest wrote, I don’t think that Bush’s statement confirmed that. It confirmed the existence of secret prisons; in eastern Europe, not so much.
It was the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly, not the European Parliament (I make this correction out of loyalty to my old employer).
Folks who actually follow the link to Captain’s Quarters will see that the Captain cited the moran piece and was similary circumspect.
LGF said flatly “Well, they [the prisons] apparently don’t exist. EU official: No evidence of illegal CIA action. (Hat tip: efuseakay.)”
So, to paraphrase: Do you expect Mark Kleiman, who named names among “wingnuts and warblogers” as denying that the CIA was running secret prisons in Eastern Europe to express any embarrassment now that actual links have revealed the truth?
Me neither.
As to Bush’s stating that the prisons were in Eastern Europe – I guess we will keep waiting on that, too.
meanwhile, the Times had this on Sept 8:
Yet, European Union spokesmen insisted that there was still no proof of reports that there were secret camps on European soil, and officials in countries suspected of being hosts of such camps issued new denials. The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, said in Copenhagen that “all the information that I have is that no country in the E.U., or candidate country, as far as I know, has had secret prisons.”
Quite a post – other than Bush never confirming Eastern European prisons and “wingnuts” generally not denying them, its all good. No correction to be expected!
“Quite a post – other than Bush never confirming Eastern European prisons”
Quite a post — the important thing is that Bush has confirmed secret prisons. But for some pedants, the only cover left to them is to scream — he didn’t say they were in East Europe.