“Torture and the OLC,” and Other New Hearing Volumes
By authorizing extreme interrogation methods and defining them as legally permissible, the Bush Administration’s Office of Legal Counsel enabled “our country’s descent into torture,” said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) last year at a contentious hearing of a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee that he chaired. The hearing presented contrasting views on a range of related issues, including whether or not the Bush Administration’s “enhanced interrogation” program constituted torture under international law. The 695 page record of the hearing was published late last month, with voluminous attachments and submissions for the record. See “What Went Wrong: Torture and the Office of Legal Counsel in the Bush Administration,” May 13, 2009.
Other noteworthy new congressional hearing volumes include the following (both pdf).
“The Proposed U.S.-UAE Agreement on Civilian Nuclear Cooperation,” Senate Foreign Relations Committee, October 7, 2009 (published March 2010).
“The Impact of U.S. Export Controls on National Security, Science and Technological Leadership,” House Foreign Affairs Committee, January 15, 2010 (published March 2010).
The FY2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) paints a picture of a Congress that is working to both protect and accelerate nuclear modernization programs while simultaneously lacking trust in the Pentagon and the Department of Energy to execute them.
For Impact Fellow John Whitmer, working in public service was natural. “I’ve always been around people who make a living by caring.”
While advanced Chinese language proficiency and cultural familiarity remain irreplaceable skills, they are neither necessary nor sufficient for successful open-source analysis on China’s nuclear forces.
To maximize clean energy deployment, we must address the project development and political barriers that have held us back from smart policymaking and implementation that can withstand political change. Here’s how.