When Barack Obama assumed the office of president in January 2009 the nation had just endured the turbulent 8 year administration of George W. Bush. Obama's approach was an attempt to inspire unity and consensus rather than to sink his teeth into the controversial issues of his predecessor's regime. Despite those efforts, the supporters of that regime have consistently attacked him as their sworn enemy. Of the various issues that Obama attempted to paper over, one of the most troubling is the systematic torture program operated by the CIA. His approach was to order an end to such practices in his administration but to grant an amnesty from prosecution for past practices. That did not make the issue go away. The Senate Intelligence Committee has been conducting an investigation of the torture program which the CIA has done its best to block. The conflict has now erupted into open warfare between committee chair Dianne Feinstein and CIA director John Brennan. Obama doesn't want to get involved.
Obama: White House won't wade into CIA torture report dispute at this point
Barack Obama sought to distance the White House from the fierce dispute between top senators and the Central Intelligence Agency on Wednesday, claiming it would be inappropriate for his administration to become involved the clash over an investigation into the use of torture in post-9/11 interrogations.
In the president’s first remarks about the dispute since Dianne Feinstein, the chairwoman of the Senate intelligence accused the CIA of a cover-up and intimidation directed at her staff, Obama said it was not a matter for the White House to “wade into at this point”.
Obama’s remarks are likely to anger Democratic senators on the committee, who have been publicly calling on the president to get involved in the controversy, which has been characterised by bad feeling on both sides.
This would appear to be an attempt to hold onto the same approach that he used when he first took office. This smacks of the oft heard meme that not only is Obama not responsible for the policies and actions of the previous administration, but that it is also unreasonable to expect him to take responsibility for the policies and actions of his own administration. He has generally not been particularly devoted to Harry Truman's maxim, "The buck stops here.".
There are certainly very important ethical and constitutional issues involved in this matter. However, let's look at the situation in terms of nuts and bolts politics. Obama has no Republican friends. The Republicans have devoted their efforts to cutting the ground out from under him in matters great and small. I can't think of a single Republican member of congress who has ever stuck his or her neck out to support him. His friends and supporters are the Democratic members. I can't think of one of those Democrats who has been more loyal to him than Feinstein. She is no member of the radical left wing of the party and has generally been a friend and supporter of the intelligence establishment. She is being strongly supported by other Democratic senators in her demand that the president exorcise some control over the CIA director who is directly accountable to him.
It seems to me that Obama's effort to avoid taking responsibility for the problem is not only irresponsible, but politically very unrealistic.