RUTHFULLY YOURS

Attorney General Jeff Sessions faces a decision that will be controversial no matter what he does: Fire former Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe, or overrule the recommendation of the FBI’s own internal investigators.

The recommendation to fire Mr. McCabe isn’t coming from Donald Trump or Russian bots. It comes from the FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility. News reports say it is based on a finding from the Justice Department’s Inspector General that Mr. McCabe authorized the disclosure of sensitive information to a Wall Street Journal reporter about the investigation into the Clinton Foundation—and then lied about it to IG investigators.

The IG report remains secret, but it’s hard to believe the FBI would recommend such punishment if it did not believe Mr. McCabe’s actions were a serious breach of duty. The bureau’s recommendation is in marked contrast to the endorsement from his old boss, former FBI Director James Comey, who tweeted in January that Mr. McCabe “stood tall” as “small people were trying to tear down an institution we all depend on.” Did St. Jim know about his comrade’s alleged deception?

Mr. McCabe is connected to controversial FBI investigations into both presidential candidates in 2016, and in January he said he would formally retire on March 18 when he would have enough seniority to qualify for his pension. Firing him early could cost him that lifetime payout.

The American people still don’t know what went on at the FBI during those 2016 investigations. Several FBI and Justice officials will soon testify to the House Intelligence Committee. Perhaps Mr. McCabe’s firing would persuade them that there are consequences for untruthfulness. Time and again we have been assured of the FBI’s high standards. Imagine how Mr. McCabe would treat an American citizen who lied to the FBI.

President Donald Trump’s pick for CIA director is about to experience a good Borking.

No one doubts her professionalism. President Barack Obama’s CIA director, Leon Panetta, told CNN she’s “a good officer,” “who really knows the CIA inside out.” She has the endorsement of Obama’s director of national intelligence, James Clapper, and of Mike Morell, who served as acting director of the CIA twice under Obama.

Haspel’s career at the agency since the 1980s, including extensive work undercover in the field, is getting blotted out by her reported involvement in the CIA’s black-site interrogation program, which has become a warrant to say anything about her.

Her critics assert she should be in jail, instead of running free at the CIA, and The New York Times editorial page wrote about her nomination under the headline, “Having a Torturer Lead the C.I.A.”

Not to be outdone in demagogic attacks on anyone associated with our national security apparatus, Sen. Rand Paul calls Haspel “the head cheerleader for waterboarding,” and claims she mocked a detainee for his drooling. The only problem is that this anecdote comes from a book by a contractor who worked with the CIA, James Mitchell, and it describes a man, not a woman, making the comment.

Their factual accuracy aside, the attacks on Haspel are ahistorical in that they ignore the context of the CIA program and unfair insofar as they portray her as a remorselessly cruel prime mover behind it.

The interrogation program began when Al Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah was captured in March 2002, in the shadow of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Not until December 2001 had the rubble at Ground Zero been reduced to street level. In March, workers began searching for human remains in an area of the towers they hadn’t been able to reach yet. The last column wasn’t removed until the end of May. In 2002, we believed another attack was imminent and preventing it had an urgency fueled by raw memories of an event that was literally yesterday’s news.

In light of this pervasive feeling, it’s unsurprising that a broad political consensus supported doing what was necessary to get information from captured Al Qaeda leaders. The CIA repeatedly briefed select congressional leaders, especially the top Republicans and Democrats on the Intelligence committees. By all accounts, the program met with the assent of lawmakers. Later, when waterboarding become politically radioactive, Nancy Pelosi tried to say she didn’t know about it, even though a CIA memo said the interrogation techniques had been described to her in September 2002.

The briefings go to how the interrogation program wasn’t a rogue operation. It was approved at the highest level of the U.S. government and the CIA sought, and got, explicit legal approval from the Department of Justice. The enhanced interrogations of Zubaydah didn’t begin until Attorney General John Ashcroft verbally approved the methods. When he initially didn’t sign off on waterboarding, the CIA team waited until he did a few days later.

Haspel is connected in the press to the Zubaydah interrogations, although the CIA hasn’t confirmed her participation in the oversight of any particular detainee and insists much of the reporting about her work in this period is erroneous. Again, the Mitchell book suggests a man, not a woman, was in charge at the time. A New York Times report places her at the site in Thailand in question beginning in 2003, when Zubaydah was subjected to waterboarding in 2002.

WASHINGTON (AP) — How did George Nader — Lebanese-American businessman, globe-trotting “fixer,” convicted child molester — get caught up in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation?

The answer, it seems, can be found in the shadows, where Nader has long operated.

His long history included intrepid back-channel mediation between Israel and Arab countries — and a 15-year-old pedophilia conviction in Europe that has not been previously reported. But Mueller, in his investigation of President Donald Trump, his campaign and possible wrongdoing connected to Russia, is focused on Nader’s role in two high-level get-togethers after the presidential election, according to three people familiar with the case.

Nader was caught in Mueller’s web a few days before the anniversary of Trump’s inauguration. He was transiting through Dulles International Airport outside Washington, on his way to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, when his plans changed — abruptly and involuntarily.

Mueller’s investigators stopped him, people familiar with the case said. His electronics were seized and he was then allowed to go see his lawyer. Nader later agreed to cooperate with Mueller’s investigation, said the people with knowledge of the case as it pertains to Nader. They weren’t authorized to speak publicly on the case and demanded anonymity.

Nader is little known to the public, a man who has led a shadowy existence as a go-between across numerous Middle East capitals and who gave testimony to Mueller’s Washington grand jury earlier this month.

Nader joined a meeting at New York’s Trump Tower in December 2016 that brought together presidential son-in-law Jared Kushner, chief strategist Steve Bannon — fired by Trump last August — and Mohammed bin Zayed, crown prince of Abu Dhabi and de facto leader of the United Arab Emirates.