President Obama is receiving both praise and criticism for promising not to prosecute CIA interrogators who followed the Justice Department’s perverse legal advice. But Obama’s decision may be less consequential than it seems. Congress already has anticipated the possibility of prosecution and has erected a significant barrier to it.

In the 2005 Detainee Treatment Act Congress provided as follows (it's worth wading through the legalese):

"In any civil action or criminal prosecution against an officer, employee, member of the Armed Forces, or other agent of the United States Government who is a United States person, arising out of the officer, employee, member of the Armed Forces, or other agent's engaging in specific operational practices, that involve detention and interrogation of aliens who the President or his designees have determined are believed to be engaged in or associated with international terrorist activity that poses a serious, continuing threat to the United States, its interests, or its allies, and that were officially authorized and determined to be lawful at the time that they were conducted, it shall be a defense that such officer, employee, member of the Armed Forces, or other agent did not know that the practices were unlawful and a person of ordinary sense and understanding would not know the practices were unlawful. Good faith reliance on advice of counsel should be an important factor, among others, to consider in assessing whether a person of ordinary sense and understanding would have known the practices to be unlawful. "

But wait -- there’s more! The DTA also says that the government "may provide or employ counsel, and pay counsel fees, court costs, bail, and other expenses" for interrogators."

In 2006 Congress passed the Military Commissions Act, which preserved legal protection for interrogators -- indeed, strengthened it by requiring, instead of just permitting, legal aid for interrogators. The Supreme Court found fault with the act for other reasons, but it didn’t object to protection for interrogators.

Granted, interrogators haven’t received total immunity. But Congress has erected a high hurdle for prosecutors to clear even if they do a better job than the Justice Department team in the Ted Stevens case. Obama’s "look forward, not backwards" mantra also reflects Congress’ attitude – and probably a jury’s as well.

In Thursday's Letters, readers vent their agitation over the Republican response, led in part by former presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, to President Barack Obama's stimulus package.

Anita C. Singer, of Laguna Woods, marvels that last week's Inaugural already seems a distant event:

Sen. John McCain is still behaving as if the campaign never ended, leading the GOP charge against President Obama. Republican leaders now pontificate about bipartisanship, but their public statements foster the old Washington gridlock and the old ways of doing the public's business.

Even more disingenuous is when they rant about the Democrats' recovery plan, claiming it will increase the deficit. What short memories they have. Under Republican control of the White House and the Congress for much of the last eight years, didn't the deficit increase off the charts?

It makes me wonder, who won the 2008 election, and wasn't it supposed to signal change?

Readers also reacted strongly to this story about the disappearance of facilities for equestrians in California.  Notes Joan Klengler, of Glendale:

Times and property uses have changed over the decades, and not necessarily for the better.

Those of us fortunate enough to live with our horses, adjacent to Griffith Park, are lucky enough to have access to miles of trails that are not likely to be replaced by housing developments and condo complexes, strip malls and parking lots. But even here, protecting the park from development has been an ongoing fight.

We believe strongly that preserving this way of life is worth the effort. Every day we lose a little more of the most precious things from our past. It is time to demand accountability from elected representatives and to fight to save what's left of our neighborhoods, parks and wild places -- not just for horse people but for everyone who enjoys having a place to go to that hasn't been paved over.

More on the nation's foreclosure epidemic, too.

*Jan. 27 photo of John McCain by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images.

If you trusted Joe the Plumber as a "plumber," political pundit or pitchman for the digital television conversion, maybe you'll give him a shot as a journalist.

Samuel J. Wurzelbacher, the man whose 15 minutes of fame seem inexhaustible, is heading to Israel to cover the ongoing conflict in Gaza. He told an Ohio television station he'll spend 10 days as a war correspondent for a conservative website, Pajamas TV.

Though I'm not impressed with the website, I'm willing to wait until his dispatches return before I suggest a new field of employment. If the man is willing to go to Israel and try to penetrate the conflict zones in Gaza, he's more than free. And if he wants to send videos and blog about it, I welcome it. But Joe the Journalist, whose celebrity was created by Sen. John McCain during the presidential campaign, should be judged by the quality of his work.

Journalists aren't accredited or licensed like plumbers. (Sound familiar, Joe?) Whether you're Joe or a random blogger writing from your bedroom, anyone can call himself a journalist. But it's up to the public to believe it. Newspapers, like this one, have an established and distinguished record of telling people's stories, providing valuable public information and holding those in power accountable. And people know that. (Many people disagree -- and they have that right.)

Read more about Joe the Plumb, er, Journalist after the jump.

In a desperate attempt to offload some Los Angeles Times-branded apparel, the Opinion Manufacturing Division held a contest last week challenging readers to name the five most popular topics among letter writers during the last half of 2008. Yes, I know, "the last half of 2008" doesn't sound quite as meaningful as the year in full, but we didn't start tallying up the submissions until mid-year.

Anyway, no one entered, so no one will be able to claim the lovely Los Angeles Times sweatshirt we had squirreled away. Hmmm. Perhaps it's time for a new contest: suggest a contest! "Predict the size of the stimulus package," say, or "Guess how many stimulus dollars are directed to Illinois," or "Pick the day when the California Supreme Court throws out Proposition 8".... The possibilities are endless.

Anyway, to close the loop on the whole Letters Top Five contest initiative, here are the answers to the puzzle no one tried to solve:

Of the 16,493 publishable letters received by the letters maven in the last half of 2008, 49% were in one of the Top Five topics:

• Prop. 8, 2,311 letters;
• Sarah Palin, 1,862 letters;
• The economy (including the Wall Street bailout), 1,632 letters;
• Barack Obama, 1,367 letters; and
• John McCain, 944 letters

Not surprisingly, politics were the dominant theme. Still, it's telling that Palin would generate more letters than the men at the top of the two tickets. What this bodes for her future is anybody's guess, but it does suggest another possible contest: Guess the date that Palin forms an exploratory committee for her presidential campaign.

How the Top Five is tabulated: Each week, your letters maven receives thousands of e-mails, dozens of letters through the good old U.S. postal service, and even a few faxes here and there.

After she cuts out spam, obscene mail, letters addressed to more than one recipient, letters that seem to be the fruit of letter-writing campaigns and letters with attachments (which gum up our computer systems,) she is usually left with several hundred eligible items, represented in the Letters Top Five tally. From these, she selects the somewhere around 100 that get published in the newspaper. Faxes and snail mail are not counted in the chart.

Too late for Michael  Crichton, scientists reported this week that they have recovered a good deal of the woolly mammoth's DNA from tufts of hair. Before you could say "Jurassic Park,"  journalists were speculating about the possibility of reviving the species by tinkering with the ova of elephants to replicate the mammoth's DNA sequence.

John McCain didn't like the federal government paying for research involving bear DNA, but even he might warm to the idea of bringing back the mammoth for a mere $10 million in federal funds. Stampeding mammoths probably wouldn't be as terrifying as a flock of velociraptors. And the Treasury could recover its investment by nationalizing Ripley's Believe It Or Not.

Still, is this trip really necessary? It isn't just that scientists have better things to do. A successful quasi-cloning of a mammoth would tempt scientists to try the same thing with other extinct species, including Neanderthals, those hunky hominids whose possible interbreeding with humans has figured in prurient speculation for years.

On its blog, New Scientist magazine notes: "With a  rough draft of the Neanderthal genome due around Christmas season, some reports speculate on the prospect for a Neanderthal-human hybrid or the more ethically palatable chimpanzee-human mashup." New Scientist provides this quote from genomicist George Church:  "The big issue would be whether enough people felt that a chimp-Neanderthal hybrid would be acceptable, and that would be broadly discussed before anyone started to work on it."

Enough people? All it would take is a few mad (or mischievous) scientists and a rich patron, a la "Jurassic Park." Then, when the resulting Neanderchimp reached marriageable age, all the speculation about human-Neanderthal mating could be put to the test, perhaps on the Maury Povich show. Creationists could picket outside the studio, joined by PETA and the SPCA.

On second thought, maybe the mammoth should be allowed to rest in peace. With global warming, the hirsute beast would probably go extinct all over again.

Today's editorial page is an extravaganza of topicality, hitting on three top-of-the-news issues: The proposed federal bailout for U.S. automakers, the taxing problems facing California lawmakers as the state budget melts down, and the ongoing protests by gay-rights activists following last week's passage of Proposition 8.

On the bailout, The Times urges Congress to look before it leaps into a $50-billion aid package for the Big Three automakers. These companies aren't failing for the reasons they like to claim -- high health care and pension obligations, unfavorable exchange rates and government fuel-economy standards -- but because they aren't building competitive vehicles. A bailout alone won't change that, nor would it replace the Big Three's failed managers or change their troublesome union contracts.

On the state budget, The Times urges Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to reinstate the car tax that he rashly slashed after bumping former Gov. Gray Davis out of office. Though it's a regressive tax, it's not nearly as bad as the 1.5% sales tax Schwarzenegger is proposing. And it's tax-deductible! (From your federal taxes, that is.) Finally, The Times points out the many mistakes made by opponents of Proposition 8; while it's nice to see them marching in the streets now, where were they before the election? Where were the gay leaders before Nov. 4? Opponents ran a disorganized campaign, failed to target the African Americans who proved crucial to the measure's success, and waited until the last minute to get serious about fundraising.

Wresting equal rights from a society reluctant to grant them isn't easy. It can take years of nonviolent resistance, passionate speeches and even in-your-face radicalism. If people who voted yes on Proposition 8 say they didn't see it as a civil-rights matter, that's because until now there has been nothing resembling a civil rights crusade by the gay community.

Over on the op-ed page, columnist Jonah Goldberg ponders George W. Bush's legacy for the  conservative movement. Bush's brand of conservatism has always been troubling to many on the right, even if they rallied to his side in the face of "shrill partisan attacks from Democrats who seem more interested in tearing down the commander in chief than winning a war." As the movement looks to reinvent itself, the question is whether it will choose "a debugged compassionate conservatism 2.0 or a Reaganesque revival of conservative problem solving?"

New York Judge Joseph Fahey, meanwhile, takes time out on Veterans Day to ponder the U.S. government's shameful treatment of Vietnam vets and their families whose lives have been torn apart by exposure to Agent Orange. With the courts failing to adequately compensate these victims, the government needs to fashion another remedy, such as a compensation fund. And author Norah Vincent, a libertarian conservative, regrets her decision not to cast a vote in last week's historic election. Turned off by John McCain's "doctrinaire sensiblity" and his choice of running mate, and disturbed by Barack Obama's tax proposals, he ended up supporting neither. But now she's a little caught up in Obamania:

But after watching the video of Obama's acceptance speech (I went to bed early Nov. 4), I have, to my great surprise, found myself moved to tears by the president-elect, by his poise and graciousness, not to mention what seems to be his almost Hegelian historical significance. I now wonder if I missed out on the moment. Am I going to feel a little caught out one day when I have to say that I did not vote for him? Or will I feel vindicated by what will surely be the many and great disappointments of the Obama administration?

* Illustration by Anthony Russo / For the Times

Who can possibly stop talking election yet? Not the Times' Opinion Manufacturing Division. Both the editorial board and Wayne State University professor John Corvino predict that, as society gains a deeper understanding of and appreciation for gay rights, there's a good chance voters will repeal the newly passed Proposition 8 in coming years. The board calls on the African American community, which voted heavily in favor of the gay-marriage ban, to remember the shared struggle of civil rights and how once society viewed interracial marriage as ungodly -- a few decades before the child of an interracial couple would be elected president.

The editorial board also applauds both presidential candidates' speeches on election night. After a long absence, the board says, the John McCain who reaches across the aisle to make things work, and who puts service to his country, showed himself. And Barack Obama reminded Americans of something they also haven't heard in a long time -- that success depends on people giving to their country as well as taking from it.

On the other side of the fold, Patt Morrison wonders whether party labels of outlived their usefulness:

How meaningful and relevant are candidates' political parties anymore? When a New England Republican can be more progressive than a Texas Democrat, when millions regard themselves as independents and occupy the takeout-menu middle on political issues, why do we need to belong to parties? Why red, why blue, why even purple, when there's the big deluxe Crayola box to choose from?

In a burst of free advice for Obama, former Secretary of State Warren Christopher offers trandition guidance to the president-elect and Rosa Brooks has ideas for how he can mend the country's global relations.

AP Photo/Paul Sakuma

The first tally is in, and it's Barack Obama by a landslide: 59% to John McCain's 41%. No, we're not talking newspaper endorsements (that foreordained result would have been even more lopsided) or absentee ballots cast by PLO sympathizers. (Here's a link to the tape!) (Psych!!!) Ahh, juvenile humor. And how appropriate, given that the votes in question were cast Monday by elementary-school students all across the country. Utah-based Studies Weekly, which publishes newspapers and magazines for children, was the main sponsor, and its website was the venue where the vast majority of student voters registered their support for Obama or McCain. (There were no third parties on the ballot -- sorry, that's reserved for kids who've taken algebra.) Children's Way of Castro Valley, Calif., which operates the Woogi World website for kids, also participated.

Unfortunately, with the results also comes our first controversy over electronic voting machines: it appears that more than 80% of the votes cast at the Studies Weekly site weren't counted.

Last month's post about the hyperbolic assertion that Barack Obama is a socialist drew some thoughtful comments about the gray area between pure free-market capitalism (which no country practices) and a centrally planned collectivist economy (which has some lingering adherents). If there's a slippery slope toward central planning, though, we're already on it. The Bush administration is using tax dollars to steer the housing, credit and insurance markets, all in the name of averting bigger problems in the economy.

I'm not arguing against the Bear Stearns bailout, the takeover of American International Group, or the $700-billion rescue of the financial industry. Nor am I criticizing the FDIC's efforts to reduce foreclosures by reworking some troubled mortgages, even though it could prevent housing prices from falling as far as they otherwise might go. Each move made sense at the time, given the growing problems in the credit markets that threatened to send the entire economy into seizure. Yet the government now finds itself in a market-shaping position that's the antithesis of Adam Smith's vision for how capital should get allocated.

Wow. Conservative panic has shifted into overdrive. Over at RedState.com, which is usually a well-written blog with sound arguments for Republican principles and philosophies, Managing Editor Erick Erickson is throwing all that high-toned stuff out the window. Instead, RedState is encouraging its right-wing denizens to get out there tomorrow and vote for McCain but tell pollsters they voted for Barack Obama. This, Erickson seems to believe, will cause all sorts of chaos.

As you know, the media relies on exit polling to formulate their news coverage of Election Day. Likewise, the campaigns make estimations as the day wears on via exit polls. Lastly, in preparing for the next election's polling, some pollsters will use exit polling to help them. We know how well that's gone this year.

I have a hearty suggestion for all of us: seek out exit pollsters. Find them. Be willing to engage in the exit polling. And lie.

Erickson -- whose personal blog, by the way, says he is graduate of Mercer University (an institution "affirming religious and moral values that arise from the Judeo-Christian understanding of the world") and a deacon at Vineville Presbyterian Church in Georgia -- doesn't say how this widespread dissembling, even were it to happen, would help the Republican ticket. In fact, couldn't it hurt the McCain/Palin cause?

If early exit polls show Obama with a big lead, wouldn't that information work to demoralize McCain supporters? Wouldn't tidings of an Obama landslide -- even an erroneous one -- actually discourage conservatives from voting? States like Nevada and New Mexico are in play, and their polls close well into the evening (Eastern Standard Time), so wouldn't telling the truth and boosting the numbers for McCain actually be a better strategy (not to mention more in keeping with a Judeo-Christian understanding of the world)?

But maybe RedState is more interested in making the mainstream media look foolish than keeping Barack Obama out of the White House. Well heck, if that's the case, maybe Erickson is making sense. He might as well aim for a goal that's achievable.

Photo: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg News