LowlyPion said:
Look at the evidence.
The chronology was that the FBI had interrogated Abu Zabaida. With non-coercive techniques they had confirmed the code name of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and they had identified and arrested Vincent Padilla in May of 2002.
Apparently not satisfied that Abu Zabaidah had given them all the information, because after all he had failed to link Saddam to 9/11, they were primed to step up their "techniques", as we can see by the issuance of the Bybee Memo on August 1, 2002. Sometime in August the FBI observed the sleep deprivation, loud rock music, and nakedness and cold exposure and withdrew from any further interrogation, suggesting that whatever information would be gained in this manner would be tainted through such coercion. That such interrogation treatment exceeded their ability to further participate.
The briefing of the Select Members, and the only one at which Pelosi was listed as present at by the CIA briefing memo, occurs on Sept 4, 2002. It's not clear at all, exactly what was conveyed at that time, because by then Abu Zabaidah had apparently been relocated to CIA dark sites in Pakistan, Thailand and points not disclosed.
What we can see from the CIA briefing memo is that there was disclosure of EITs being used. But there are 10 EITs referenced and approved in the Bybee Memo, some of which (sleep deprivation, cold, etc.) are on Bybee's list of "legal" means, and are the reasons already the FBI withdrew in August. So EITs were in use, but that does not contradict Pelosi's account that she was not informed that the 10th and last on the list technique of water-boarding had actually been used.
I'd say her account aligns pretty substantially. To suggest that she was lying based on the dissembling statements of Porter Goss who would imply that Pelosi had been at more than one briefing, then appears to be without foundation. Given Porter Goss's relationship with the Republicans and the CIA, you know how much I weigh his attempt to trash by implication Pelosi's statements.
LP...you accuse me of splitting hairs? 
Again, this is the eyewitness account...and she IS the most powerful member of the House and 2 heartbeats away from serving as our President (and might possibly remain in this position for DECADES)...she needs to be held to a much higher standard.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...042403339.html
"Security Before Politics
By Porter J. Goss
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Since leaving my post as CIA director almost three years ago, I have remained largely silent on the public stage. I am speaking out now because I feel our government has crossed the red line between properly protecting our national security and trying to gain partisan political advantage. We can't have a secret intelligence service if we keep giving away all the secrets. Americans have to decide now.
A disturbing epidemic of amnesia seems to be plaguing my former colleagues on Capitol Hill. After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, members of the committees charged with overseeing our nation's intelligence services had no higher priority than stopping al-Qaeda. In the fall of 2002, while I was chairman of the House intelligence committee, senior members of Congress were briefed on the CIA's "High Value Terrorist Program," including the development of "enhanced interrogation techniques" and what those techniques were. This was not a one-time briefing but an ongoing subject with lots of back and forth between those members and the briefers.
Today, I am slack-jawed to read that members claim to have not understood that the techniques on which they were briefed were to actually be employed; or that specific techniques such as "waterboarding" were never mentioned. It must be hard for most Americans of common sense to imagine how a member of Congress can forget being told about the interrogations of Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed. In that case, though, perhaps it is not amnesia but political expedience.
Let me be clear. It is my recollection that:
-- The chairs and the ranking minority members of the House and Senate intelligence committees, known as the Gang of Four, were briefed that the CIA was holding and interrogating high-value terrorists.
-- We understood what the CIA was doing.
-- We gave the CIA our bipartisan support.
-- We gave the CIA funding to carry out its activities.
-- On a bipartisan basis, we asked if the CIA needed more support from Congress to carry out its mission against al-Qaeda.
I do not recall a single objection from my colleagues. They did not vote to stop authorizing CIA funding. And for those who now reveal filed "memorandums for the record" suggesting concern, real concern should have been expressed immediately -- to the committee chairs, the briefers, the House speaker or minority leader, the CIA director or the president's national security adviser -- and not quietly filed away in case the day came when the political winds shifted. And shifted they have.
Circuses are not new in Washington, and I can see preparations being made for tents from the Capitol straight down Pennsylvania Avenue. The CIA has been pulled into the center ring before. The result this time will be the same: a hollowed-out service of diminished capabilities. After Sept. 11, the general outcry was, "Why don't we have better overseas capabilities?" I fear that in the years to come this refrain will be heard again: once a threat -- or God forbid, another successful attack -- captures our attention and sends the pendulum swinging back. There is only one person who can shut down this dangerous show: President Obama.
Unfortunately, much of the damage to our capabilities has already been done. It is certainly not trust that is fostered when intelligence officers are told one day "I have your back" only to learn a day later that a knife is being held to it. After the events of this week, morale at the CIA has been shaken to its foundation.
We must not forget: Our intelligence allies overseas view our inability to maintain secrecy as a reason to question our worthiness as a partner. These allies have been vital in almost every capture of a terrorist.
The suggestion that we are safer now because information about interrogation techniques is in the public domain conjures up images of unicorns and fairy dust. We have given our enemy invaluable information about the rules by which we operate. The terrorists captured by the CIA perfected the act of beheading innocents using dull knives. Khalid Sheik Mohammed boasted of the tactic of placing explosives high enough in a building to ensure that innocents trapped above would die if they tried to escape through windows. There is simply no comparison between our professionalism and their brutality.
Our enemies do not subscribe to the rules of the Marquis of Queensbury. "Name, rank and serial number" does not apply to non-state actors but is, regrettably, the only question this administration wants us to ask. Instead of taking risks, our intelligence officers will soon resort to wordsmithing cables to headquarters while opportunities to neutralize brutal radicals are lost.
The days of fortress America are gone. We are the world's superpower. We can sit on our hands or we can become engaged to improve global human conditions. The bottom line is that we cannot succeed unless we have good intelligence. Trading security for partisan political popularity will ensure that our secrets are not secret and that our intelligence is destined to fail us.
The writer, a Republican, was director of the CIA from September 2004 to May 2006 and was chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence from 1997 to 2004. "