Obama's bedtime: Worrying about safety

by Mark Silva

President Barack Obama, intent on "looking forward, and not backwards" at the CIA interrogation tactics that he has banned, added a note of caution today to any congressional interest in digging deeper into the past: Make it an independent, not partisan, investigation.

"I do worry about this getting so politicized that we cannot function effectively... if and when there needs to be a further scrutiny of what happened during this period,'' Obama said today.

Yet, while the president has maintained that CIA operatives should not be prosecuted for any interrogations that they carried out with the legal backing of the Bush Justice Department, he is not ruling out action against higher-level Justice authorities who permitted the tactics in the first place.

"For those who carried out some of these operations within the four corners of legal opinions or guidance that had been provided from the White house, I do not think it's appropriate for them to be prosecuted,'' Obama said today. "With respect to those who formulated those legal decisions, I would say that that is going to be more of a decision for the attorney general, within the parameters of various laws, and I don't want to prejudge that. I think that there are a host of very complicated issues involved there.

"As a general view, I think that we should be looking forward, and not backwards,'' Obama said. "I do worry about this getting so politicized that we cannot function effectively and it hampers our ability to carry out critical national security operations.''

With some in Congress, particularly Senate Intelligence Chairman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), calling for further congressional scrutiny of the Bush administration's now-banned interrogation tactics, the president suggested that any review should rise above the typical congressional hearings that tend to "break down along party lines'' and have some independent oversight.

"I'm not suggesting that that should be done,'' Obama said today, after a meeting at the White House with King Abdullah II of Jordan, "but if you've got a choice, it is very important for the American people to feel that this is being done not to provide one side or the other some political advantage... but to move forward.

"What makes America special, in my view, is not just our wealth and dynamism of our economy and our extraordinary history and diversity,'' Obama said. "It's that we are willing to uphold our ideals even when they're hard... And sometimes we make mistakes, because that's the nature of human enterprise, but when we do make those mistakes we are able to go back and correct them.''

Obama also sought to counter criticism that his policies banning torture and other acts are making the nation less safe.

"It's not a matter of being naïve about how dangerous this world is,'' Obama said. "I go to bed every night worrying about keeping the American people safe... I've got a lot of other things on my plate. I've got a big banking crisis... There are all kinds of things during the day that occupy me, but the thing I consider my most (serious) obligation is keeping the American people safe.''

As for the CIA looking forward -- Obama says his trip to headquarters in Langley this week was intended to deliver a message: "I have their back.'