From TruthDig
By Joe Conason

Predictably as always, the Republicans in Congress and in the conservative media are berating Attorney General Eric Holder for deciding to investigate the CIA’s use of abusive interrogation methods on terror suspects.

They warn that probing this sensitive history will compromise intelligence operations and endanger the nation. They insist that these techniques have, in the words of former Vice President Dick Cheney, saved thousands and perhaps hundreds of thousands of lives. They suggest that the attorney general should simply ignore the evidence of illegal conduct and “investigate the terrorists instead,” as if the Justice Department cannot do both.

But as those politicians and pundits ought to understand by now, the American system of justice was always meant to do both—that is, to apprehend and prosecute criminals, and to ensure that those who apprehend them do not violate the law in doing so. That system routinely investigates law enforcement officials who use excessive force because we recognize that the credibility and authority of the law depends on universal accountability.

Voices on the right have often protested prosecutions of police officers and sheriffs because, they claim, such accountability will lead to higher crime. Yet in fact, the declining crime rates of the past three decades have coincided with stronger efforts to ensure that the police observe the rights of suspects and avoid the use of undue violence.

By the same principle, any nation that professes to live under constitutional governance must be able to ensure that its intelligence professionals observe relevant laws, including the international treaties that ban torture and abuse of prisoners. There is nothing in the U.S. Constitution, even the president’s wartime authority, that permits the chief executive and his minions to assume dictatorial power. So the attorney general must investigate abuses committed in their name.

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