by: Lara Jakes Jordan, The Associated Press

Washington - Barack Obama's incoming administration is unlikely to bring criminal charges against government officials who authorized or engaged in harsh interrogations of suspected terrorists during the George W. Bush presidency. Obama, who has criticized the use of torture, is being urged by some constitutional scholars and human rights groups to investigate possible war crimes by the Bush administration.

Two Obama advisers said there's little - if any - chance that the incoming president's Justice Department will go after anyone involved in authorizing or carrying out interrogations that provoked worldwide outrage.

The advisers spoke on condition of anonymity because the plans are still tentative. A spokesman for Obama's transition team did not respond to requests for comment Monday.

Additionally, the question of whether to prosecute may never become an issue if Bush issues pre-emptive pardons to protect those involved.

Obama has committed to reviewing interrogations on al-Qaida and other terror suspects. After he takes office in January, Obama is expected to create a panel modeled after the 9/11 Commission to study interrogations, including those using waterboarding and other tactics that critics call torture. The panel's findings would be used to ensure that future interrogations are undisputedly legal.

"I have said repeatedly that America doesn't torture, and I'm going to make sure that we don't torture," Obama said Sunday on CBS' "60 Minutes." "Those are part and parcel of an effort to regain America's moral stature in the world."

Obama's most ardent supporters are split on whether he should prosecute Bush officials.

Asked this weekend during a Vermont Public Radio interview if Bush administration officials would face war crimes, Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy flatly said, "In the United States, no."

"These things are not going to happen," said Leahy, D-Vt.

Robert Litt, a former top Clinton administration Justice Department prosecutor, said Obama should focus on moving forward with anti-torture policy instead of looking back.

"Both for policy and political reasons, it would not be beneficial to spend a lot of time hauling people up before Congress or before grand juries and going over what went on," Litt said at a Brookings Institution discussion about Obama's legal policy. "To as great of an extent we can say, the last eight years are over, now we can move forward - that would be beneficial both to the country and the president, politically."

But Michael Ratner, a professor at Columbia Law School and president of the Center for Constitutional Rights, said prosecuting Bush officials is necessary to set future anti-torture policy.

"The only way to prevent this from happening again is to make sure that those who were responsible for the torture program pay the price for it," Ratner said. "I don't see how we regain our moral stature by allowing those who were intimately involved in the torture programs to simply walk off the stage and lead lives where they are not held accountable."

In the years after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, the White House authorized U.S. interrogators to use harsh tactics on captured al-Qaida and Taliban suspects. Bush officials relied on a 2002 Justice Department legal memo to assert that its interrogations did not amount to torture - and therefore did not violate U.S. or international laws. That memo has since been rescinded.

At least three top al-Qaida operatives - including 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed - were waterboarded in 2002 and 2003 because of intelligence officials' belief that more attacks were imminent. Waterboarding creates the sensation of drowning, and has been traced back hundreds of years and is condemned by nations worldwide.

Bush could take the issue of criminal charges off the table with one stroke of his pardons pen.

Whether Bush will protect his top aides and interrogators with a pre-emptive pardon - before they are ever charged - has become a hot topic of discussion in legal and political circles in the administration's waning days. White House deputy press secretary Tony Fratto declined to comment on the issue.

Under the Constitution, the president's power to issue pardons is absolute and cannot be overruled.

Pre-emptive pardons would be highly controversial, but former White House counsel Arthur B. Culvahouse Jr. said it would protect those who were following orders or otherwise trying to protect the nation.

"I know of no one who acted in reckless disregard of U.S. law or international law," said Culvahouse, who served under President Ronald Reagan. "It's just not good for the intelligence community and the defense community to have people in the field, under exigent circumstances, being told these are the rules, to be exposed months and years after the fact to criminal prosecution."

The Federalist Papers discourage presidents from pardoning themselves. It took former President Gerald Ford to clear former President Richard Nixon of wrongdoing in the 1972 Watergate break-in.

Clinton ended up doing nothing much for education and health care. However, Bush's horrible "no child left behing" that does not nothing but leave children behind, worsened education domestically. Bush certainly did not improve healthcare. Although the Clinton's tried, the Repilcans wouldn't let it pass. Clinton did improve the economy, although I agree everyone from the last several presidential administrations, starting at least with Reagan, and including Clinton, is complicit in creating the situation we had now. However Bush drove us into a mind-boggling deficit, "growing" government in a ways that are hyprocritical for even Republicans. And yes, both parties in Congress are part of the mess.

Therefore, while I am not amongst the fans of Clinton, who did some things well, some things not well, and in many cases did nothing, you know that I think Bush drove us backwards in every area imaginable.

I agree the country wants to go forward. It seems that Obama's thinking is that he's looking for "experts" and trying to find unifying figures for people those who are "centrists" -- clearly you and I are on opposite sides of "center." (The fact that I don't really buy into that contiuum is a different issue.)

Anyway, I certainly prefer more progressive people, more liberal people. However, he is going for experience and center. Maybe he thinks he can direct and delegate these "center" people, these Clinton people, in the direction of hope and change. That is yet to be seen.

I will say that if he gets us to where we were after Clinton, that will be a huge improvement from where we are, even thouogh that is far "to the right" from where I believe we need to be. I agree that would not be change from where we were eight years ago.

Although my thinking is very different than yours, at this point I am hopeful AND skeptical.

It will also be interesting to see if Obama is able to improve international relations, stop the war, improve the economy, turn us more green, and make advances domestically. If he can, I will applaud him, even if he doesn't get us all the way. If he is successful, it will be interesting to see if people of your views will appreciate these things, or if you really do want the world that the Bush left us with.

I don't know anything at all about No Child Left Behind, I payed very little attention to it. I do know that Talk radio conservatives have railed against it as a Teddy Kennedy bill. My overall position is that we should eliminate the Department of Education in it's entirety. What does it do? Just divvy up the money between the states. I would also get rid of HUD, and Veterans Affairs. The essence of their responsibilities could be assimilated into other agencies.

And I am only slightly right of center. Basically.

The one word/term in all of politics that has always irritated me is "progressive". "Liberal" doesn't bother me because I don't have a problem with the opposite of it. But what is the opposite of "progressive"?

The one thing Obama has on his side is the good will of virtually the entire media. They are even selling Obama videos on the major networks now. With a honeymoon that will last longer than most, doesn't it unnerve you that he is isn't showing any signs of being "progressive"? He just announced his Attorney General, the guy who helped Clinton with those last day pardons of people like Marc Rich(international arms trader).
He is probably telling the true believers in his camp "wait till the second term"
At least with Clinton, people knew they were electing a liar.

Last Edited on 18-Nov-2008 4:16 PM

My impression, based on the positions you expressed over the years, is that you are very far right of center. I would say "the center" are moderates in the two parties. The views you express are fiscally consverative and socially VERY VERY conservative. Your ongoing support of Bush, in comparison with the country's approval ratings, suggest you like the neo-cons more than most. But think what you will.

I would can accept I am seen to be at the far left (though I have issues with dichotomies as being unproductive.) However, I don't how that works when you compare me with someone like ME. He is hardcore Marxist, which I guess some would see as very left, but I see as conservative in a different way -- too closely bound to a rigid and old fashioned ideology.

While I think Marxism is important to understand and a really important tool, I don't think it is exclusively useful in all situations, and sometimes to simplistic. I have found other tools that may draw on Marxism, but are more dynamic, more hybrid, more useful. He would disagree, I'm sure. But this is an example where the continuum doesn't work.

I'm not very, very, conservative. I watch Will and Grace.

I wasn't very happy with the second Bush term. My support for him is more of a reaction to the irrational hatred people seem to have for him. I blame it on the media.

Marxism is socialism by sword. They may not have actual swords at these protests that you cheerfully advocate, but I think any type of mass gathering of like minded resisters to democracy is an act of violence. There are striking similarities between the mania of the Obama supporters and other groups in history, such as the Hitler youth. They just seem so brainwashed. He could literally advocate ANYTHING, and he would have unconditional support from so many young people. It's scary.

"There are striking similarities between the mania of the Obama supporters and other groups in history, such as the Hitler youth. They just seem so brainwashed. He could literally advocate ANYTHING, and he would have unconditional support from so many young people. It's scary."

Gotta walk ya through. As futile as I know it is.

Beyond the fact that Hitler youth were state-mandated to join and were forced into compliance, beyond the fact that Obama supporters are so only of their free will, beyond the fact that the Hitler youth were being trained in genocide, beyond the fact that Obama supporters largely believe in peace and civil liberties and are non-racist, and beyond the likelihood that you probably got this nonsense from that right-wing extremist nut job Paul Broun, or maybe FOX news, is that, oh, there are no similarities whatsoever!

They seem brainwashed to you, because you are so determined to cling to ... your fears? ... or anger?...or can only see through the lens of the abortion issue?... so much that you can not recognize happiness and relief.

See, lots of Americans are glad that so many of their countrymen and women have actually stood up to the past eight years. So many of us have been so outraged and disgusted for so long and now we have a window of hope. After the Bush years, we understandably underestimated our country. And now we are less ashamed. We think we might be able to walk with our heads up again, and look the rest of the world in the eye. In a friendly way. I know this hard for you to understand, but this is not brainwashing. This is a moment of celebration.

I guess if you don't hate bigotry and warmongering, and lying to the UN, and the lying to citizens, and lying to the military, and torture, and listening in on phone calls, and arresting people without reading them their rights, and killing kids in other countries, if you don't hate secret courts, then you are not going to understand why people are happy.

If you want to talk Hitler, talk, oh, yeah: bigotry and warmongering, and killing kids, and lying to the UN, and the lying to citizens, and lying to the military, and torture, and listening in on phone calls, and arresting people without reading them their rights. Bush didn't have concentration camps just ... Oh yeah... GITMO and Abu Ghraib!!!

And Obama is not going to advocate just “ANYTHING.” For example, he’s not going to advocate… let’s see.. Oh yeah: bigotry and warmongering, and killing kids, and lying to the UN, and the lying to citizens, and lying to the military, and torture, and listening in on phone calls, and arresting people without reading them their rights, and secret courts…

Sorry jojo. You’re confused!

On a more serious note (as if the above isn't actually VERY serious), I think and hope young people are involved and hopeful, and NOT unquestioning.

We always have to be questioning. And in the classroom I will continue to encourage questioning of power. A time of celebration does not mean that there won’t be questioning.