Reply #14: Sure, why not? This is what we'd discover

[wyldwolf]

Scott Horton, who testified as an expert witness for the European Parliament on the matter of Bush-era extraordinary rendition and is a New York attorney known for his work in international law, especially human rights law and the law of armed conflict, had this to say:

There are two fundamental distinctions between the programs (Clinton-era and Bush-era.) The (Bush) extraordinary renditions program involved the operation of long-term detention facilities either by the CIA or by a cooperating host government together with the CIA, in which prisoners were held outside of the criminal justice system and otherwise unaccountable under law for extended periods of time. A central feature of this program was rendition to torture, namely that the prisoner was turned over to cooperating foreign governments with the full understanding that those governments would apply techniques that even the Bush Administration considers to be torture. This practice is a felony under current U.S. law, but was made a centerpiece of Bush counterterrorism policy.

The (Clinton) earlier renditions program regularly involved snatching and removing targets for purposes of bringing them to justice by delivering them to a criminal justice system. It did not involve the operation of long-term detention facilities and it did not involve torture. There are legal and policy issues with the renditions program, but they are not in the same league as those surrounding extraordinary rendition.

http://harpers.org/archive/2009/02/hbc-90004326

Dennis Kucinich recognized this when he introduced H.Res. 1258 on the House Floor, which were proposed articled of impeachment for GW Bush.

H.Res. 1258; Article XIX. Rendition; paragraph 5 (Congressional Daily Record Page H5202) states:

The administration has claimed that prior administrations have practiced extraordinary rendition, but, while this is technically true, earlier renditions were used only to capture people with outstanding arrest warrants or convictions who were outside in order to deliver them to stand trial or serve their sentences in the U.S.

Wasting even more tax money on another pointless Clinton investigation would serve one useful purpose - it would lay to rest another Right wing (and now, unfortunately, left wing) myth about Bill Clinton.

Sure, the Clinton-era policy was still a violation of International Law, but no one in the US would ever convict him for it.

According to Clinton administration official Richard Clarke:

extraordinary renditions', were operations to apprehend terrorists abroad, usually without the knowledge of and almost always without public acknowledgment of the host government…. The first time I proposed a snatch, in 1993, the White House Counsel, Lloyd Cutler, demanded a meeting with the President to explain how it violated international law. Clinton had seemed to be siding with Cutler until Al Gore belatedly joined the meeting, having just flown overnight from South Africa. Clinton recapped the arguments on both sides for Gore: "Lloyd says this. Dick says that. Gore laughed and said, 'That's a no-brainer. Of course it's a violation of international law, that's why it's a covert action. The guy is a terrorist. Go grab his ass.'

After all, if asked, how many people would have been against snatching Osama Bin Laden in the 90s?