Vice President Biden calls Bush Policies a “Recruiting Tool” for Al Qaeda

Yesterday Vice President Joe Biden spoke forcefully and eloquently about the harmful impact that Bush Administration interrogation and detention policies have had on U.S. national security as he visited the CIA to swear in Leon Panetta as its director. Vice President Biden praised President Obama for signing executive orders to close Guantanamo and CIA secret prisons and end torture, which “reverse the policies that in my view and the view of many in this agency caused America to fall short of its founding principles and which gave Al Qaeda a powerful recruiting tool.” It is refreshing to have a Vice President who can see and acknowledge the grave strategic consequences of the Bush Administration’s most egregious national security policies.