Bush Goes On Offense
President Bush went on the offensive today demanding that Congress act to clarify the proper means of interrogation and rules of evidence used in the war on terror. He said that the ball is in their court.
He is urging the Senate to pass a bill more like a House-passed one that would allow his administration to continue holding and trying terror suspects before military tribunals.
Bush said he would work with Congress to resolve the disputed language, but stood firm on his demands.
"If not for this program, our intelligence community believes al Qaida and its allies would have succeeded in launching another attack against the American homeland," he said.
"Unfortunately the recent Supreme Court decision put the future of this program in question. … We need this legislation to save it."
The high court earlier this year struck down Bush's current arrangement for trying detainees held at the U.S. Naval Base Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Bush said that it was vital to change the law to protect intelligence professionals who are called on to question detainees to obtain vital information. "They don't want to be tried as war criminals. … They expect our government to give them clarity about what is right and what is wrong."
He called it an important debate that "defines whether or not we can protect ourselves. Congress has got a decision to make."
He's right, of course. Congress has got to act to break the impasse that the Supreme Court created with the Hamdan decision.
UPDATE: Curt at Flopping Aces likes the reports he is hearing about the press conference.
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protein wisdom — September 15, 2006 @ 11:37 pm
By Beachhutman, September 15, 2006 @ 4:53 pm
I heard some of the Bush response over here. He was incoherent, and certainly did not present a case for his proposals. Even allowing for his difficulty expressing himself, that sounded like a case against his proposal, not for it.