Democracy Now! Monday, August 24, 2009

Today's Headlines

• Report Details New Evidence of CIA Torture
• Justice Dept. Advises Reopening Prisoner Abuse Cases
• New Interrogation Unit to Question Foreign Prisoners
• Report: Blackwater Involved in CIA Renditions
• US Begins Disclosing Prisoner Identities to Red Cross
• Generals: More US Troops Needed in Afghanistan
• Census: Contractors Outnumber Troops in Afghanistan
• Honduran Supreme Court Rejects Zelaya Return
• Native American Activist Peltier Denied Parole
• Ex-Soldier Convicted in My Lai Massacre Issues Public Apology
• Dems Could Pass Health Legislation by Simple Majority
• Study: Insurance Premiums to Rise 94% by 2020
• State Dept. Approves Tar Sands Oil Pipeline
• Dozens Mark 20th Anniversary of Slaying of Yusuf Hawkins

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  Newsweek: Inspector General Report Reveals CIA Conducted Mock Executions

  The Justice Department is scheduled today to disclose a long-suppressed 2004 report by the CIA’s inspector general detailing prisoner abuse. Among the findings are that CIA interrogators staged mock executions on prisoners. The report also describes how one detainee was threatened with a handgun and an electric power drill during the course of CIA interrogation. Newsweek magazine first reported details from the report on its website on Friday night. We speak with Michael Isikoff, investigative correspondent for Newsweek. [includes rush transcript]

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  Youssef Megahed Freed After Immigration Judge Throws Out Government's Deportation Case

  A Florida immigration judge on Friday dismissed the government’s deportation case against Youssef Megahed and released him from the detention center in South Florida where he had spent the last four months. Youssef was arrested by federal immigration agents outside a Wal-Mart in Tampa this April, just three days after a jury acquitted him on federal explosives charges. We speak to Youssef in his first extended broadcast interview since his release and with his attorney, Charles Kuck. [includes rush transcript]

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  Imprisoned Native American Activist Leonard Peltier Again Denied Parole

  The imprisoned Native American activist Leonard Peltier has been denied parole again. The US Parole Commission told the sixty-four-year-old Peltier on Friday that his release would “depreciate the seriousness of [his] offenses” and “promote disrespect for the law.” It was Peltier’s first full parole hearing in fifteen years, and he will not be eligible for parole again until July 2024, at the age of seventy-nine. We speak with Eric Seitz, Leonard Peltier’s attorney. [includes rush transcript]

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  Calley Apologizes for 1968 My Lai Massacre

  Over forty-one years after the My Lai Massacre, when US troops killed more than 500 men, women and children in Vietnam, the former Army lieutenant who was convicted for his role in the killings has publicly apologized. William Calley was the only US soldier held legally responsible for the slayings. He was convicted on twenty-two counts of murder, and his sentence was later commuted by President Reagan. Last week, William Calley publicly apologized for the first time, saying, “There is not a day that goes by that I do not feel remorse for what happened that day in My Lai." He added that he had been following orders. [includes rush transcript]