Crossposted at Daily Kos
Dear Mr. President:
We have served as Directors of Central Intelligence or Directors of the CIA for Presidents reaching back over 35 years. We respectfully urge you to exercise your authority to reverse Attorney General Holder’s August 24 decision to re-open the criminal investigation of CIA interrogations that took place following the attacks of September 11.
~snip~
Attorney General Holder’s decision to re-open the criminal investigation creates an atmosphere of continuous jeopardy for those whose cases the Department of Justice had previously declined to prosecute. Moreover, there is no reason to expect that the re-opened criminal investigation will remain narrowly focused.
bold and italic added by diarist
The last line is especially important in my opinion, as it proves Special Prosecutor John Durham and Attorney General Eric Holder may be taking this investigation all the way to the top, as they are required to do under the Constitution and International Law.
Thankfully, long gone are the days when the CIA could lie with impunity and the DoJ was not independant, but a political tool of the Executive branch. I guess the CIA misses the good ole days of Bush/Cheney.
Good thing those days are not coming back any time soon.
The letter was signed by former CIA directors Michael Hayden and Porter Goss, who worked for President George W. Bush; John Deutch and James Woolsey, who served during the Clinton administration; George Tenet, who worked for both President George W. Bush and President Clinton; William Webster, who served under President George H.W. Bush; and James Schlesinger, who headed the agency during the Nixon administration.
The only names of living CIA heads who have not signed are Ex President George H.W. Bush and current Secretary of Defense Robert Gates.
I’d say that it’s safe to say that when Clinton and George W. Bush appointees oppose this investigation it can’t be considered a witch hunt. I’d also say that it is safe to say that when the head of the CIA under Nixon opposes something, you are doing the right thing.
The full letter to the President plus analysis below the fold.
Dick’s daughter Liz might be interested in running for office. “It’s something I very well may do,” says Liz “Mini Me” Cheney. 
Sen. Feinstein and the Senate Intelligence Committee are presently conducting a 
Sen. Feinstein’s ongoing, secret torture probe is ostensibly only a 1-year “review” or “study.” In reality, these proceedings are a functional equivalent of proposed public Congressional inquiries. The Feinstein probe covers the same substantive issues that would be investigated by Congressional probes that are still languishing in the debate stage. The Feinstein probe will review classified CIA documents and “interview” witnesses so that it can formulate US torture policy. CIA witnesses will be key to both the Feinstein probe and any Congressional hearings. Given the number of pressing issues and crises facing the US, will Congress be motivated to conduct a public investigation after Feinstein’s probe is completed? If not, then the Feinstein probe will be the only torture investigation. Moreover, the Feinstein probe will formulate US torture policy in secret without public knowledge or participation and a report from this probe may never be released to the public. In short, some in DC have may have decided to implement the move-forward policy whether you like it or not. 
Torture used against criminal suspects in the US is not new, but two cases illustrate that we can appoint a special prosecutor now to investigate the Bush gang and then move on, or we can ignore the rule of law to let it fester over decades before justice in any form is served. 
1. He saw a female prisoner wearing a shirt with the number 650 at Bagram prison. 
Bush has instituted a torture regime that is comprised of ostensibly innocent sounding techniques that in reality can be as deadly, harmful and injurious as torture by horrendous physical acts. Some of the techniques have been sourced back to Chinese torture used for the purpose of extracting false confessions from captured US soldiers, and thus are not designed to obtain valid intelligence to protect our security. The coercive psychological torture technique, which is a package of multiple methods, was renounced by the US as torture years ago. However, it was used against prisoner 063, and then again renounced as torture by a senior Pentagon official recently. Another torture technique of sleep deprivation was also renounced by the US as torture in 2001, yet is apparently still used by the US. It’s no longer just left progressives: More and more people around the world and in our government are stating the obvious – Bush and Cheney et al must be prosecuted for war crimes.