1 Boring Old Man

^{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.}

^{The Bush administration did not inform Congress that it had waterboarded detainees in classified briefings, after the agency had already done so, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) charged Thursday. Pelosi told reporters that the administration officials only told her and those in a classified briefing in the fall of 2002 that they believed they had the legal authority to do so, based on Office of Legal Counsel memos which have recently been released by the Obama administration.}

^{"In that or any other briefing…we were not, and I repeat, were not told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation techniques were used," said Pelosi. "What they did tell us is that they had some legislative counsel…opinions that they could be used, but not that they would."}

^{Pelosi said that the officials promised to inform Congress if they ever did waterboard a detainee, but never did so. Her assertion contradicts a recently released Senate committee report that cited CIA records to claim that senior members of Congress in both parties were briefed on the waterboarding, which had already been done to detainee Abu Zubaydah. Pelosi, in the strongest terms should could conjure, said the report was untrue and that she never approved, tacitly or otherwise, the waterboarding of detainees.}

^{"Further to the point was that if and when they would be used, they would brief Congress at that time," said Pelosi. "I know that there’s some different interpretations coming out of that meeting. My colleague, the chairman of the [intelligence] committee, has said, well if they say that it’s legal you have to know they’re going to use it. Well, his experience is that he was a member of the CIA and later went on to head the CIA. Maybe his experience is that they’ll tell you one thing but may mean something else." Pelosi is referring to then-GOP Rep. Porter Goss. "My experience was they did not tell us they were using that, flat out. And any, any contention to the contrary is simply not true," she said.}

There are two obvious reasons for Oversight, checks and balances. One is to have a watchdog around to see that the Executive Branch doesn’t get out of hand. We’ve all talked about that a lot. The Bush Administration didn’t want anyone looking at what they were doing because what they were doing wasn’t kosher. But there’s another reason for Oversight. The people on these Oversight Committees are smart people who might have some really good ideas to add to the mix – sort of like consultants. In a tangle like we had in the years in question after 9/11, it seems like we could have used all the ideas we could get.