Jason Leopold of The Public Record is doing an outstanding job covering the Special Prosecutor question, and today breaks very upsetting news that Obama will quietly give amnesty to Bush and his torturers by refusing to prosecute them:

Several high-ranking members of Obama’s transition team told me this week that the president-elect will not authorize the Justice Department to initiate a criminal investigation into the Bush administration’s interrogation practices nor will the agency scrutinize any individual officials for approving such policies.

I can't vouch for Leopold's anonymous sources (or Joe Klein's). But if his report is accurate, it would obviously explain why Obama wouldn't answer my Special Prosecutor question at Change.gov. It would also explain the appointment of torture supporter John Brennan as White House director of counterterrorism. 

But how can Obama reconcile amnesty for torturers with his promise to end torture, which he repeated on Friday during his announcement of Dennis Blair and Leon Panetta?

Granting amnesty for torture will not end it. Instead it will allow blood-stained torturers to continue to work inside our government, and give them every incentive to torture in the future, knowing they can always get another amnesty.

Apparently Obama thinks he can turn a blind eye to Bush's criminal past and focus exclusively on the future, according to Leopold. That approach would be consistent with Joe Biden's recycled non-answer to my question. But even the "future focus" is seriously in doubt:

Instead, these aides, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Obama will review and possibly reverse some of Bush’s executive orders and withdraw some legal opinions that gave the president broad powers in the global war on terror. Additionally, the advisers on Obama’s transition team said the president-elect would support and encourage Congress to take its own steps to probe the White House’s controversial policy decisions, particularly decisions related to brutal interrogations.

Notice the total doublespeak in Obama's plan - he might "possibly reverse some" executive orders. That makes it just as likely he won't reverse them, especially when the CIA's torturers start threatening him. How exactly is this massive hedging "change we can believe in?"

As for Congressional review of the White House's torture policies, we already had that. The Senate Armed Services Committee just released its comprehensive report on torture by the Pentagon. SASC laid blame for torture directly at the feet of Donald Rumsfeld and George Bush and promised to send its findings to Obama's Attorney General for prosecution, since Congress has no prosecutorial power. Will Obama's AG simply ignore this definitive Congressional indictment? If so, what is the purpose of any further Congressional reviews - except to treat concerned citizens like chumps?

Granted, the question of torture by the CIA - as opposed to the Pentagon - has not yet been fully investigated. But the new Senate Intelligence Commitee chair, Dianne Feinstein, doesn't want to investigate torture. And the most important evidence of that torture - the video tapes - were illegally destroyed by the CIA.

So how could Congress investigate, even if they wanted to? Sure they could call the torturers as witnesses, but why would they confess to war crimes? Democrats in Congress have already proved they don't have the will to force hostile Bush officials to tell the truth, let alone show up. If they did, a parade of administration officials would be in jail, led by Alberto Gonzales (for perjury) and Karl Rove, Harriet Miers, and Josh Bolten (for contempt).

The only way to get the truth about torture by the CIA is to appoint a Special Prosecutor like Patrick Fitzgerald who refuses to accept lies. Every torture opponent outside the Obama Administration understands this, and we will not settle for anything less.

Obama must choose between democracy and torture. As much as Obama loves to compromise, this is one fundamental issue where compromise is impossible.