I think that whole question requires a fairly thorough review of where we've been.

The firewall between the White House and the Department of Justice.

I have been a persistent and animated critic of what has happened to the Department of Justice under Attorney General Ashcroft, Attorney General Gonzales, and Attorney General Mukasey.

I have a special regard for the Department of Justice. I know it to be an essential bulwark of our democracy and our freedom.

Executive privilege was used as a stonewall, and frankly they didn't care whether the theories were true or not.

It's not that small. I mean, when I went over to the old Executive Office building to read the super-classified opinions...

I think we need to have a coherent and consistent approach, I think an approach that involves accommodation as much as we can.

I think it's important that there be some credibility about this review that marks this as something different.

This was an effort to, for want of a better word, corrupt the office so that it would do what it was told rather than provide legal advice that was dispassionate and honest.

We'll be keeping the record open formally for a week for written questions.

I've described it as Dick Cheney's 'Little Shop of Legal Horrors.'

I thought in the last administration that we had to introduce the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration to the head of the Department of Health and Human Services and remind them that they worked for the same President and wondered…

everything was so classified that they took my notes away, and I was only allowed to read my own notes over in the secure confines of the Intelligence Committee.

I have many disagreements with Attorney General Mukasey, but to his credit, he put that firewall back up.

It has operational and political value because of the sovereignty problem.

Obviously, that's not my understanding of what rule of law means, nor of what Executive Orders amount to.

The valuation of these assets is going to be absolutely critical.

The number ran up close to 800 that were contained in that facility. About more than two-thirds of those detained have already been released by the previous administration.