In his major economic speech today, President-elect Obama blamed the current recession on the "era of profound irresponsibility" from Wall Street to Washington DC.

We arrived at this point due to an era of profound irresponsibility that stretched from corporate boardrooms to the halls of power in Washington, DC.

Obama is absolutely right, but his critique also needs to be applied beyond the economy to our national security apparatus as well.

In American history, there was nothing more "profoundly irresponsible" than Bush's "War on Terror," including the invasion of Iraq and the creation of a secret American gulag for torture, extending from Bagram Air Force base in Afghanistan to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

It is therefore infuriating to read Joe Klein in Time:

There is, I'm told, absolutely no interest on the part of the incoming Obama Administration to pursue indictments against its predecessors. "We're focused on the future," said one of the President-elect's legal advisers.

Of course the alleged "legal adviser" is anonymous, so we have no idea if Klein is just pulling this quote out of his ass. But anyone who calls him or herself a "legal adviser" to the President-elect should read what Obama said about the "era of profound irresponsibility" and make sure they do their part to end that era by prosecuting those responsible for torture.

Update 1: Glennzilla gives Joe Klein the (non-physical) headsmacking he deserves:

Time's Joe Klein, who, back in 2002 -- when Bush was overwhelmingly popular and powerful -- viciously mocked those who were objecting to the treatment of Guantanamo detainees and vehemently denied that the U.S. was torturing anyone, has now -- with a disgraced and powerless George Bush on his way out the door -- changed his mind completely and decided that the Bush administration's torture of detainees was its "most despicable act."  That's the modern American journalist for you:  reverence for politically powerful officials and criticism only for those perceived as powerless.

In any event, Klein reports:

There is, I'm told, absolutely no interest on the part of the incoming Obama Administration to pursue indictments against its predecessors. "We're focused on the future," said one of the President-elect's legal advisers. Fidell and others say it is possible, though highly unlikely, that Bush et al. could be arrested overseas — one imagines the Vice President pinched midstream on a fly-fishing trip to Norway — just as Augusto Pinochet, the Chilean dictator, was indicted in Spain and arrested in London for his crimes.

Whether Bush officials will be investigated and prosecuted is a decision that, at least in theory, will be made by the DOJ and Eric Holder.  But there are obviously close Obama advisers offering the same excuses, based on the same warped mentality, as Mort Kondrake. "We're focused on the future."  So does that mean that the Obama administration won't prosecute any criminals for crimes they committed "in the past" -- or is it only high-level political criminals who will receive this "focused-on-the-future" amnesty?

Exactly.