The Worst President Ever will give a televised farewell speech on Thursday.

"It's not something where he's trying to refight old battles. It's a very thoughtful, forward-looking speech in which the president will share the lessons he learned in office and his views on the future," Perino said.

The only real question is whether Bush will announce his blanket pre-emptive pardons on TV before a national audience, or whether he will do it secretly 1 minute before President Obama takes his oath.

If he does it on TV, he'll be able to give it a positive spin - even though it will be his Final Fuck You to the Americana people and the Constitution. The downside is that Olbermann and Maddow will rip him to shreds right up to the inaugural.

Haas: How Bush Murdered and Tortured Children
http://www.pubrecord.org/torture/610-children-as-unlamented-victims-of-bushs-war-on-terror.html

Ratner: We Need Prosecution, not a Truth Commission
http://michaelratner.com/blog/?p=39

John Cusack: Holder Must Appoint a Special Prosecutor
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-cusack/two-questions_b_156845.html

Fertik: Obama and Holder Should Not Judge Bush's Crimes
http://www.democrats.com/obama-and-holder-should-not-judge-bush-crimes

By David Swanson

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers has introduced a bill, H.R. 104, that would create a commission to spend a year and a half looking at the various crimes of Bush and Cheney. While this might allow congressional Democrats to run election campaigns against Bush and Cheney yet again, even though those two will have been out of office for two years, it's not clear that it would do much else that would be positive.

The NY Times published its first serious article about Obama's attitude towards prosecuting Bush's most egregious crimes.

Obama Signals His Reluctance to Look Into Bush Policies
By DAVID JOHNSTON and CHARLIE SAVAGE

WASHINGTON — President-elect Barack Obama signaled in an interview broadcast Sunday that he was unlikely to authorize a broad inquiry into Bush administration programs like domestic eavesdropping or the treatment of terrorism suspects.

But Mr. Obama also said prosecutions would proceed if the Justice Department found evidence that laws had been broken.

At Bush's press conference, Sheryl Gay Stolberg of the NY Times specifically asked Bush whether he would issue pre-emptive pardons for the criminals in his Administration. And just like Cheney did on Friday, Bush dodged the question:

Q Mr. President, in recent days, there's been a fair amount of discussion in legal circles about whether or not you might give preemptive pardons, pardons in advance, to officials of your administration who engaged in anything from harsh interrogation tactics to perhaps dismissing U.S. attorneys. I'd like to know, have you given any consideration to this? And are you planning on it?

THE PRESIDENT: I won't be discussing pardons here at this press conference. Would you like to ask another question?

On Thursday, January 15, at 9:30 a.m., the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold its confirmation hearing for Attorney General nominee Eric Holder. If the Senators are willing to work together and to listen to those of us who elected them, the questioning might go something like this:

Mr. Holder, is the water torture, often now referred to as "waterboarding", torture? Are beatings torture? Are electric shocks torture? Is hanging someone by their wrists torture? What about the combined and repetitive use of sleep deprivation, subjection to temperature extremes and stress positions, threatening with dogs, and sexual humiliation -- is that torture?

What about employing any of the techniques we've discussed until the result is death: up until the point where it becomes murder is such activity torture? Is it cruel? Is it inhuman? Is it degrading?

Fertik: Stephanopoulos Asks Obama About Special Prosecutor
http://www.democrats.com/stephanopoulos-asks-obama-about-special-prosecutor

Leopold: Obama's DOJ Won't Pursue Bush Officials Over Torture
http://www.pubrecord.org/torture/607-despite-evidence-of-war-crimes-obamas-doj-wont-pursue-bush-officials.html

Melber: Holder Must Answer Torture Questions before Senate Confirmation
http://tinyurl.com/8gefha

dday: Jon Kyl Insists Holder Must Support Torture
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/new-attorney-general-rules-by-dday.html

On 1/7/09, Bush repeated his torture defense in a lengthy TV interview with FOX's Brit Hume. As always, Bush insisted (a) it wasn't torture because lawyers approved it and (b) the information tortured out of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed saved American lives:

when people study the history of this particular episode they'll find out we gained good information from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in order to protect our country.

But how exactly are we supposed to "study the history"? Hume pressed Bush for more details:

Join us on January 20th. We have a permit for an Arrest Bush demonstration on the sidewalk in front of the FBI Building. Bush and Obama will pass by at around 11 a.m. on their way from the White House to the Capitol. Obama will pass back by as president at around 3 p.m. Wear your Arrest Bush & Cheney Sweatshirt, other warm clothes, and comfortable shoes. Be patient and arrive very early. Bring all your friends and family and an Arrest Bush sign as your ticket to get into our parade viewing area (everyone with an Arrest Bush sign welcome until it fills up). Updates here: http://www.arrestbush2009.com.

Stephanopoulos asked Obama about major budget cuts:

'At the end of the day, are you really talking about over the course of your campaign some kind of grand bargain? That you have tax reform, healthcare reform, entitlement reform including Social Security and Medicare, where everybody in the country is going to have to sacrifice something, accept change for the greater good?'

Obama replied:

"'[W]hat you described is exactly what we're going to have to do. What we have to do is to take a look at our structural deficit, how are we paying for government? What are we getting for it? And how do we make the system more efficient?'"

Jason Leopold of The Public Record is doing an outstanding job covering the Special Prosecutor question, and today breaks very upsetting news that Obama will quietly give amnesty to Bush and his torturers by refusing to prosecute them:

Several high-ranking members of Obama’s transition team told me this week that the president-elect will not authorize the Justice Department to initiate a criminal investigation into the Bush administration’s interrogation practices nor will the agency scrutinize any individual officials for approving such policies.

I can't vouch for Leopold's anonymous sources (or Joe Klein's). But if his report is accurate, it would obviously explain why Obama wouldn't answer my Special Prosecutor question at Change.gov. It would also explain the appointment of torture supporter John Brennan as White House director of counterterrorism. 

Your winning votes for a Special Prosecutor mattered - to Keith Olbermann, if not Barack Obama. Keith read Joe Biden's non-answer to John Dean, who warned foreign prosecutors would investigate U.S. torture if the Obama administration does not. Dean also dismissed Rep. Conyers' proposed commission as worthless.

Crooks and Liars points to this Bloomberg News story:

Italian Pensions Sapped by Private Funds Bush Backed
By Andrew Davis and Alessandra Migliaccio

Jan. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Italy did for retirement financing what President George W. Bush couldn’t do in the U.S.: It privatized part of its social security system. The timing couldn’t have been worse.

The global market meltdown has created losses for those who agreed to shift their contributions from a government severance payment plan to private funds meant to yield higher returns. Anger is rising both at the state, which promoted the change, and money managers such as UniCredit SpA and Arca Previdenza, which stood to profit.