The Senator and the CIA

Dianne Feinstein is profoundly pissed.  As chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, she has loyally defended the interests and reputations of the CIA and NSA for years.  No more.

The Committee's investigation into the abuses of the Bush-Cheney years has produced a report that probably would never have been made public.  On the off chance that it might have been made public, CIA operatives hacked into the computers used by Senate staffers and removed some documents the CIA stupidly provided in the first place — most notably, an in-house report on rendition and torture asserting that nothing useful ever came out of such practices.

Now that Feinstein has gone public, however, there is a slight chance that the Senate report — or at least an executive summary — may be released.  Personally, I'd rather see the CIA's in-house report, but you take what you can get these days.  (Well, maybe somebody will send it to Wikileaks.)

Edward Snowden is a hero.  Chelsea (nee Bradley) Manning is a hero.  Certainly, some CIA staff and Bush-Cheney personnel (including, perhaps, Bush and Cheney) belong in jail.  Just don't expect too much of "Professor of Constitutional Law" Barack Obama.