Committee chairman Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) is seen speaking to reporters after a closed briefing of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence in Washington, D.C. (Brendan Smialowski / AFP / Getty Images / November 15, 2012)

Americans have known for years both the broad outlines and some of the disgusting details of the George W. Bush administration’s policy of subjecting suspected terrorists to torture, humiliation and imprisonment at “black sites” in foreign countries. But they have been denied a comprehensive accounting of how the United States decided after the 9/11 attacks to travel to what then-Vice President Dick Cheney called “the dark side.”

That would change if the Senate Intelligence Committee released to the public a 6,000-page report on the CIA‘s detention and interrogation policies that it approved last week. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the committee chair, says the report includes “details of each detainee in CIA custody, the conditions under which they were detained, how they were interrogated, the intelligence they actually provided and the accuracy — or inaccuracy — of CIA descriptions about the program to the White House, Department of Justice, Congress and others.” The report also includes 20 findings and conclusions.

Release of the document could fill in blanks left by news reports, lawsuits and various official documents. It also could shed light on whether waterboarding and other “enhanced interrogation techniques” played a role in tracking down Osama bin Laden — a debate rekindled by the movie “Zero Dark Thirty.” Feinstein herself has rejected a claim that the operation that discovered Bin Laden’s whereabouts was carried out “based on information gained through the harsh treatment of CIA detainees.” Of course, even if torture did prove useful, that doesn’t make it legal or moral.

Unfortunately, the report will remain classified while the committee solicits comments — and presumably suggested redactions — from the Obama administration. Feinstein and her colleagues must press the administration, including the CIA, to review the document expeditiously and exercise restraint in editing it. Then the committee must vote to release it.

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Michael Isikoff and Daniel Klaidman have scooped the press with a Newsweek article claiming to know the verdict of the Department of Justice Office of Professional Responsibility report on the investigations into misconduct and unprofessional behavior by the Bush administration attorneys involved drafting the memos allowing the use of coercive interrogation techniques on prisoners. These techniques were largely derived from reverse-engineering torture inoculation procedures from the military’s Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape, or SERE programs.

According to Isikoff and Klaidman, the original verdict of the report was changed after the report was reviewed by the attorneys accused, and then reassessed by long-time DoJ honcho, David Margolis. The Newsweek article explains (emphasis added):

Valtin’s diary

Previously, the report concluded that two key authors—Jay Bybee, now a federal appellate court judge, and John Yoo, now a law professor—violated their professional obligations as lawyers when they crafted a crucial 2002 memo approving the use of harsh tactics, say two Justice sources who asked for anonymity discussing an internal matter. But the reviewer, career veteran David Margolis, downgraded that assessment to say they showed “poor judgment,” say the sources….The shift is significant: the original finding would have triggered a referral to state bar associations for potential disciplinary action—which, in Bybee’s case, could have led to an impeachment inquiry.

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