Obama hedges on putting Bush and his torture regime behind bars

Philly's own Will Bunch got a hold of Barack Obama yesterday and asked: "whether an Obama administration would seek to prosecute officials of a former Bush administration on the revelations that they green-lighted torture, or for other potential crimes that took place in the White House." And, Obama, the infuriatingly cautious politician that he is, hedged and, again, disappoints:

What I would want to do is to have my Justice Department and my Attorney General immediately review the information that's already there and to find out are there inquiries that need to be pursued. I can't prejudge that because we don't have access to all the material right now. I think that you are right, if crimes have been committed, they should be investigated. You're also right that I would not want my first term consumed by what was perceived on the part of Republicans as a partisan witch hunt because I think we've got too many problems we've got to solve.

So this is an area where I would want to exercise judgment -- I would want to find out directly from my Attorney General -- having pursued, having looked at what's out there right now -- are there possibilities of genuine crimes as opposed to really bad policies. And I think it's important-- one of the things we've got to figure out in our political culture generally is distinguishing between really dumb policies and policies that rise to the level of criminal activity. You know, I often get questions about impeachment at town hall meetings and I've said that is not something I think would be fruitful to pursue because I think that impeachment is something that should be reserved for exceptional circumstances. Now, if I found out that there were high officials who knowingly, consciously broke existing laws, engaged in coverups of those crimes with knowledge forefront, then I think a basic principle of our Constitution is nobody above the law -- and I think that's roughly how I would look at it.

First off, who gives a fuck about how an investigation would be "perceived on the part of Republicans"? And, while I'm glad Obama signaled his openness to an "immediate" inquiry by his attorney general, we know enough right now that there "were high officials who knowingly, consciously broke existing laws, engaged in coverups of those crimes with knowledge forefront." We don't need an investigation, just read the fucking news.

While this doesn't change my support for Obama, just as his wishy-washy impeachment stance didn't earlier, I want more. I don't want hedges. If the last eight years under Bush and Cheney don't count as "exceptional circumstances," I don't know what does. I understand politics is being played here, but I don't want politics, or caution, I want justice. I want people in jail.

Booman and Froomkin have more.