Obama-era Guantanamo Bay: ‘Bush with a smile’

Adam Serwer, fresh from a trip to Guantanamo Bay to see a proceeding in an Obama-era military commission, draws some conclusions about the administration’s national security approach:

The detention camps have become more bearable for the detainees, with 85

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Gates sharply limits ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’

In a major victory for opponents of the military’s ban on open homosexual service, Defense Secretary Robert Gates significantly revised how the Pentagon will implement the so-called “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” law, effectively making it difficult to remove a soldier, sailor, airman or marine who does not out himself or herself as gay.

Anti-torture advocates worry Holder won’t go high enough up the chain

Like many in the intelligence community, Tyler Drumheller, a retired chief of CIA operations in Europe, is waiting to see if his former colleagues will be left holding the bag for the Bush administration.

As early as Monday, Attorney General Eric Holder is expected to announce the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate acts of torture performed by the CIA as part of the Bush administration’s so-called “enhanced interrogation” program.

Exiting Army Sec praises troops: Eight years of war and an all-volunteer Army

The Senate Armed Services Committee voted yesterday to send the nomination of Rep. John McHugh (R-N.Y.) to become the next Army secretary to the full Senate, making his confirmation imminent. (Alas, he still hasn’t clarified his Don’t Ask,…

Gary Hart says new Church Committee would settle dispute between CIA and Congress on intelligence

WASHINGTON — To investigate the merits of a new Church committee to take a comprehensive look at intelligence activities, I asked someone who was part of the first one in the 1970s: retired U.S. Sen. Gary Hart of Colorado.…

Battle brewing between Obama and civil liberties groups on detentions

It was a blind quote hitting the civil-libertarian solar plexus. Bad enough that, as ProPublica’s Dafna Linzner and The Washington Post’s Peter Finn reported late on Friday afternoon, the Obama administration was readying an executive order that would establish a system of preventive detention in terrorism cases. President Obama himself had indicated in a May speech at the National Archives that he wanted to seek legislation toward the same idea.

But now an administration official had told reporters that those same opponents of preventive detention had given the president cover to pursue it: “Civil liberties groups have encouraged the administration, that if a prolonged detention system were to be sought, to do it through executive order.”

EXCLUSIVE: Iranian Dissident Akbar Ganji on the Iranian uprising and Obama

I’ve just conducted a phone interview with Akbar Ganji, one of the leading Iranian dissidents and most prominent voices in the international community for a more liberal Iran.

He knows its brutality in a deeply personal way: the regime imprisoned Ganji for five years after he wrote a series of articles exposing its human rights abuses. Although the Bush administration sought to fund Ganji’s efforts in the hope of encouraging his fellow dissidents, Ganji took a high-profile stance against American support, arguing that even the suggestion of U.S. backing would set back the cause of human rights in Iran.

Obama strategy deepens U.S. committment to Afghanistan, Pakistan

The Obama administration recast the seven-year-long war in Afghanistan on Friday with a deepened commitment to both Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan.

Military experts to Obama: Don’t get rolled by top brass

During his July trip to Iraq, Sen. Barack Obama met with a man who represents both an opportunity and an obstacle to his presidency: Army Gen. David H. Petraeus. Petraeus, a hero to many Americans for his management of the war in Iraq, argued in a private briefing that military commanders should be given wide latitude in handing the future course of the war — though Obama was running for president on a platform calling for a withdrawal of combat troops in 16 months.

Rumors: Congress to investigate Bush in Obama Era?

Here’s something interesting from my favorite new Washington gossip blog, Unattributable:

According to one Democratic senator, the Senate Judiciary Committee has been discussing the possibility of holding major hearings to examine the activities of the Bush Administration.

The form and scope of such hearings have yet to be determined, but this senator, and member of the Senate Judicial Committee, is pressing for something along the lines of Church-Pike–a bicameral endeavor that would address the full range of executive misdeeds.