Former federal prosecutor Andy McCarthy has the definitive commentary on Eric Holder’s announcement that the Department of Justice may appoint a special prosecutor to seek criminal convictions of any CIA interrogators who might have gone beyond the guidelines established by the Bush administration in questioning captured terrorists. Read it all. Please.
‘We’re going to follow the evidence wherever it takes us, follow the law wherever that takes us.” So decreed Attorney General Eric Holder in April when asked whether government officials would face prosecution over coercive interrogation tactics used against terrorist detainees. After all, he elaborated, “no one is above the law.”
Tell that to the voters in Philadelphia who were threatened by nightstick-wielding Obama supporters from the New Black Panther Party. The Panthers got a pass even after they contemptuously ignored court process and even after the government already had prevailed in the case because of their default. For the Obama/Holder Justice Department, other considerations outweighed following the evidence wherever it led. The Panthers who turned out to be above the law include Jerry Jackson, a credentialed Democratic-party poll-watcher who brays on MySpace about “Killing Crakkkas.” Thanks to Holder’s decision, Jackson is right back in business, having obtained new poll-watcher credentials just days after DOJ dismissed the case.
The CIA interrogators are having a rougher time with prosecutors than did the Black Panthers. They are retaining counsel and preparing for a lengthy investigation that likely will prove personally and professionally ruinous. The Los Angeles Times reported over the weekend that Holder is close to naming a prosecutor to probe whether the agency and its officers committed criminal misconduct.
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