I am SO glad that I give regularly to the ACLU!

ACLU! Doing the work Congress fails to do.

Am still trying to force my way through the read of the Yoo memorandum in its entirety. Painful does not begin to describe it.

Now you know how I feel when I read TheoCon theological treatises and sermons. But sometimes you just gotta do what you’ve just gotta do.

Thanks for taking one for the team.

Thirty years ago, this was the sort of behavior we attributed to the Soviet Union, and the reason that we had to fight for democracy. It appears that we didn’t win the cold war, we just co-opted their behavior.

Remember, too, in these our darkest hours as a nation, that lawyers are bringing this into the sunshine. Thank you, Christy, and everyone else who is leading on this sad, sad issue.

And it was lawyers marching in Pakistan.

Salut to the worthy lawyers among us.

Christy,

Thanks for the wonderful Casals. Let’s hope it gives a little peace on this day of revolting thoughts.

Scott’s prior work–Deconstructing is missing an S
[delete this after reading/correcting]

I’ll bring my question up from downstairs:

What (specifically) has Yoo done that could potentially be grounds for disbarment or other form of discipline?

Fern - left you a reply downstairs.

One of Glenn’s best lines, IMHO, is this: “While Yoo’s specific Torture Memos were ultimately rescinded by subsequent DOJ officials — primarily Jack Goldsmith — the underlying theories of omnipotent executive power remain largely in place.”

Turning on the lights to illuminate the BushCo SOP is a good start, but there’s lots more work to be done.

Thanks Peterr.

This is because he was in the employment of the federal gov’t at the time he wrote the opinion? Or is it enough that he did this in his capacity as a lawyer?

Thanks. Refresh your browser and it should be fixed.

Impeach Yoo too!

Oh Yes: The DOJ…I’m corrupt, fell down, and I can’t get up…

“…And of course, the torture lawyers fully appreciated from the outset that torture was a criminal act.”

Now THAT(!) says it all: “the torture lawyers.”

I can appreciate the effort to discredit Yoo and his ilk on legal grounds, but the hideous moral and ethical implications of what has happened to our government under their watch must be paired with the legal arguments somehow.

On Saturday afternoon, the Book Salon will be talking about Against the Tide: How a Compliant Congress Empowered a Reckless President. The author is former Senator Lincoln Chafee (R-RI).

I wonder what he might have to say about the willingness of the GOP-controlled Congress to go along with the “torture consiglieri” . . .

And Glenn Greenwald’s visit on Sat April 18th to talk about his new book is going to be even more powerful than I thought when Jane posted about it the other day.

As a DOJ officer, he was giving other federal workers (DOJ, DOD, CIA, etc.) legal cover for engaging in illegal activities. It’s misuse of authority, to further illegal conduct by others in authority.

Seems worth remembering that Yoo was writing in Ashcroft’s Department of Justice regardless of how independently Yoo acted within the department.

Just how do people like Yoo or Henry Kissinger for that matter get university teaching jobs. Do Universities like to brag that we have a war criminal who worked in the White House teaching here!
Just how do you spin that as a plus to encourage students to enroll in the college?

Good morning! Hard reading this morning, Christy. I should stick with the funnies.

My morning ritual after tea is to read various newspapers. I hit WaPo and there was the Yoo piece. I still feel ill. Next came the NYT. From the moment Yoo came on the scene I was concerned. He has a sinister criminal side to him that slants his perspective by his delight in torture and causing pain to others. Ugly soul.

There are such criminal minds as Yoo but a more interesting question is who hired him and why? You have to go out of your way to install someone like Yoo into your inner circle of legal advice. He didn’t put himself in that position.

Was Yoo hired without any approval from Congress? Was he appointed by AG with approval by the administration?

Here is an interesting piece from Wikipedia:

Yoo also contends that the President, and not the Congress or courts, has sole authority to interpret international treaties such as the Geneva Convention “because treaty interpretation is a key feature of the conduct of foreign affairs”.[5] His positions on executive power, termed by left-leaning bloggers as the Yoo Doctrine, also known as Unitary executive theory, are controversial since it is suggested the theory holds that the President’s war powers place him above any law.

John Yoo is just another hack lawyer making up the rule of law as he goes along so why would anyone listen to him? This is like listening to the drugged out debarred lawyer pushing a cart sleeping under the freeway and taking his word as the final word on the Constitution.

John Yoo is a war criminal along with the other members of the torture team of lawyers. UC Berkeley should never have hired him in the first place and should fire him immediately.

Hero Citizen Christie,
How are you with a shirt that says ‘What part of the Youngstown Case Don’t Yoo Understand?”

On the back it can read, “Presidential power is not unlimited, even in time of war.”

I can call a tee shirt place today if you want one. I also have a CD of music from Denmark that is used to treat post-traumatic stress, if you need it to help you sleep after reading the opinion.

Thanks again for all you do.

Thanks - got it and it makes sense.

So now I’m wondering - is this a matter for investigation and discipline by a regulatory body (law society or whatever) or a matter for investigation and prosecution?

Good point. This document was certainly not an individual/independent effort.

The only way this story goes anywhere is if the Democrats in Congress coordinate a strong response and threaten legal action. If they don’t, the story will die within a few days.

We need our Party leadership to take a strong lead on this.

A couple of oldies but goodies from LHP came to mind, as I’ve been reading the comments and posts here this morning:

Our Lady of the Law: “I lost count of how many times he [Mario Cuomo] used the word Monarch in his speech—but it was a lot. Cuomo said, ‘There is a time to be silent and a time to speak. This is the time for lawyers to speak.’”

This post was followed about two weeks later with another, where other lawyer-readers had taken LHP’s post to heart: Will American Lawyers Take to the Streets in Support of the Rule of Law in the US?

Disbar and Fire John Yoo: There needs to be a flood of letters to the American Bar Association as well as to the UC Chancelor.

Expose the entire torture team and campaign to disbar all of them.

Torture Legal Team: Addington, Bybee, Gonzales, Haynes, and Yoo

What Balkin Said:

If the Supreme Court adopted John Yoo’s theory of Presidential dictatorship, it might send us spiraling down toward the end of our two centuries’ old constitutional experiment with democracy, a possibility that the framers imagined but tried to forestall through the creation of doctrines like the separation of powers and checks and balances. Or it might not. The next Administration might come along, take very different positions, and appoint new Justices who distinguished the bad decision away. But, in any case, it would not simply be a question of us waiting passively for the Court to decide our fates. There are things we might and should do to promote the restoration of proper constitutional government. The fact that the Constitution is in all of our hands, and not simply the hands of the Justices, is the reason why we have a living Constitution.

Yeah! fall guy, a low level fall guy but Ashcroft approved or else Yoo would have been made to redo the report until Ashcroft, Bush and Darth all approved of it.
But by the White House approving well lets look at the likely chain of command Yoo wrote it, Ashcroft approved, Harriet Miers the White House lawyer certainly looked at it to make sure that her client the President and we presume the Vice President were covered for any acts of torture.
But the White House obviously told Harriet that we the President and Vice need legal cover for stuff we are already doing or will do.
I bet the White House asked for clarification of what torture was as an excuse to redefine torture in such a way as to clear Bush.
We have had a legal understanding of what is torture for years. We have put people on trial for this. Just because you lead a country or you acted on the orders of the leader of a country has never been held as an excuse to torture.
So Bush just redefined torture to not be torture anymore Freakin Magical Thinking, bad logic lazy thinkers!

How hell does a person possessing the demonstrated legal incompetence of John Yoo get a tenured position at a top law school? I know law schools don’t have the same kind of screens as top academic departments, but I have always assumed they have recruitment and tenure committees to screen out the dodos. It boggles the mind.

As to his oath of office when he joined DOJ, as Emily Lepita used to say, ‘nevermind.’

I can’t force myself to read through that tripe either. Just the snippets were enough to make me toss half of my breakfast.

i’m printing out sand’s article in vanity fair (that scott horton discusses in christy’s link) for a later read. just want to point out that horton says sand’s has a book on this coming out later this month on the same topic, “The Torture Team“

i’m pre-ordering it today. if you’ve read any of sand’s previous book, “Lawless World,” you know why (highly recommended).

and here are some comments on “The Torture Team” from amazon:

“Gripping, furious and very serious indeed”. — John le Carré

“Sands has written a page-turning investigation into one of the darkest mysteries in American history: how a country that has led the world on human rights came to embrace a policy of barbaric abuse. One by one, he corners the suspects and sifts the clues, shedding new light at each step along the way.” — Jane Mayer, staff writer, The New Yorker Magazine

I agree with the above posts that Yoo is a fall guy. But certainly an enthusiastic one.

Yoo also contends that the President, and not the Congress or courts, has sole authority to interpret international treaties such as the Geneva Convention “because treaty interpretation is a key feature of the conduct of foreign affairs”.

Uh why then when NAFTA conflicts with American law the Government including the President always says his hands are tied by international treaties? Unless the issue is politically unpopular.
I’m not disagreeing with you I’m just trying to say Yoo’s excuse is bunk because Bush’s power to interpret international treaties is convenient.

I just downloaded the memo from Glenn’s site. Thanks for the warning, Christy, but I’m gonna read it from start to finish. Can’t be any worse than the revelations of Nuremberg and Tokyo.

Hopefully some good person at Justice will leak the other documents. John Yoo needs to spend a lot of time at Leavenworth.

the conduct of the torture lawyers is a criminal act not shielded by any notions of government immunity.

At least tell me the statute of limitations will make prosecution possible in a future administration. On the flip side… …if we investigate this now can Bush pardon their sins away?

No problem. Please add to my comment. There is so much the Bush/Cheney legal team has done that we could have each as a topic in itself.

I figure the more exposed the stronger the case against the administration. This is the team he selected. It wasn’t forced on him. He didn’t go through the Yellow Pages looking for lawyers on his team.

You can’t wake up one morning and just know who the unethical lawyers are. You would have to deliberately seek them out or be familiar with them from previous nefarious dealings. Criminals hire lawyers with criminal minds.

People have died. There is no statute of limitations on murder.

I’ll be flabbergasted if there’s even a shred of accountability for any of the top players, into which category I’d include Yoo. (Unless Berkeley donors take up the cause.)

So Bush just redefined torture to not be torture anymore Freakin Magical Thinking, bad logic lazy thinkers!

Actually this kind of “legal” justification reminds me more of the kind of twisted thinking used by the “religious” torturers of the Inquisition

Ah, now that may be an angle to pursue.

That would be Emily Litella…(sorry!)

Unfortunately, while Yoo’s acts are international war crimes, prosecutable in other countries should he travel, they can’t be prosecuted as such in the U.S. even though they were crimes at the time of commission.

The Military Commissions Act of 2006 created new definitions of Torture to be applied when interpreting Geneva, and it amended the War Crimes Act. It thereby changed our interpretation of Geneva and CATCIDT. In particular, the changes to the War Crimes Act granted retroactive immunity back to November 26, 1997.

It would appear that such changes in our ratification of those two treaties are not permitted by the treaties without notice, and in the case of CATCIDT, they cannot be made to protect someone after the fact. But a country that can allow torture without so much as a whisper about impeachment or prosecution, can probably become a renegade to international humanitarian law without so much as a sigh.

Unless someone wants to challenge the MCA?

OK I agree but I still think its Magical Thinking. Also are you suggesting that people who employ torture come up with similar justifications despite the difference between time, culture, religion etc?
If so that might indicate a universal awareness that torture is wrong. This might indicate that some values are universal which would under other circumstances make the Bushies sooo Happy.

What Christy said. Here’s an echo from one of the world’s leading civil rights lawyers, Philippe Sands (emph. mine):

The Yoo-Bybee Memo was not simply some theoretical document, an academic exercise in blue-sky hypothesizing, but rather played a crucial role in giving those at the top the confidence to put pressure on those at the bottom. And the practices employed at Guantánamo led to abuses at Abu Ghraib.

The fingerprints of the most senior lawyers in the administration were all over the design and implementation of the abusive interrogation policies. Addington, Bybee, Gonzales, Haynes, and Yoo became, in effect, a torture team of lawyers, freeing the administration from the constraints of all international rules prohibiting abuse.

Philippe Sands, from Vanity Fair article, excerpted by Scott Horton.

http://www.vanityfair.com/poli.....ntPage=all
http://www.harpers.org/archive.....c-90002779

That is not a team of lawyers, so quit the lawyer bashing. That’s a team of men who’ve given up the law in service to Mammon. Bash them.

That’s a team of men who’ve given up abandoned the law….

mind the framing…. this was not a passive, this was an active decision, choice, freely made….

Let us never forget I. Lewis Libby when pondering this list of malfeasants.

Moral absolutism is the belief that there are absolute standards against which moral questions can be judged, and that certain actions are right or wrong, devoid of the context of the act. “Absolutism” is often philosophically contrasted with moral relativism, which is a belief that moral truths are relative to social, cultural, historical or personal references, and to situational ethics, which holds that the morality of an act depends on the context of the act.

Morals are inherent in the laws of the universe, the nature of humanity, the will or character of God or gods, or some other fundamental source. Moral absolutists regard actions as inherently moral or immoral. Moral absolutists might, for example, judge slavery, war, dictatorship, the death penalty, or childhood abuse to be absolutely and inarguably immoral regardless of the beliefs and goals of a culture that engages in these practices.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_absolutism

In what world is torture not absolutely wrong? Funny the GOP always nails us for being Relativists and weak morally. But do we ever preach against something, insist that others follow our rules, and then do the opposite?

…because thus far we have reached a level that should never, ever have occurred by law or by basic standards of human decency.

should never, ever
..clicks heels together three times…

Repeat after me.

“There’s no place like home.”
“There’s no place like home.”
“There’s no place like home.”

Umm, I’m sorry but isn’t it a bit late in the day for this level of naive
indignation, regardless of it being couched in a sense of outraged
professionalism.

I realize your professional sensibilities have been violated Christy,
but “should never, ever”, WTF !!!

I knew an old person, who used to bemoan the fact that professionalism
was the bane of the modern world, all sorts of indifference, incompetence
and injustice can be hidden beneath the veneer of civil professionalism.

Witness the smarmy smug propaganda narrative so routinely bandied about
as journalism, or political comity. Its bullshit, propaganda and crime, and
needs to be called just that.

Crying about the barn door after the horses have gotten out and trampled
local children is just more insular theatrical hand-wringing, surely you can
do better than “should never, ever” finger wagging

I acknowledge, that as a parent there is an urgent desire for cooler
heads to prevail, and that desire for a safe and civilized solution,
coupled with all the civil responsibilities of being a political blog,
are obligations to maintain a civil standard, but these guys are killers,
brutal, homicidal, and fanatically pursuing ecstatic murderous visions
of globalism, or American Empire.

I think we’re past the point of scolding.

There is all this talk of ‘Serious People’, and their ‘fitness’ for office,
their ’seriousness’, based on the criteria of their willingness to support
violence, or the heinous war crimes currently part of the panoply of
American foreign policy.

This euphemism cuts both ways, legal action, police action needs to be
taken, faxing politicians, and getting a bit of news coverage for citizen
activism is not enough. A lot of effort has been poured into an already
visibly co-opted political process.

Serious I think is being used to denote, ‘willing to act’, beyond the civil
bounds of ‘enlightened’ professionalism. ‘Serious’ should also be
understood as willing to take action that does not involve, phones, faxes,
keyboards or placards.

I’m not talking about vigilante justice, I’m talking about getting
some actual lawyer and police action in motion, and backing it up with
every bit of grassroots activism needed to validate that ‘action’.

How about using some of that legal eagle group-think to start some sort
of collective legal action, possibly as a means to jump start some kind
of engine of justice here, where these criminals have their power base.

Mod me dis-respectful, legally ignorant, a wingnut, or a troll. Matronly
rebukes seem insufficient to address the outrage, not of this memo, but
of the whole range of crimes that this memo attests to.

Mod the first word of my comment @46 should read Moral and not oral can you please fix it.

it’s a matter for impeachemnt of the entire administration imo .. criminal trials and professional sanctions can come about on down the pike ..

it shames me that our nation has been dragged into the gutter by these .. well ..by these guttersnipes .. i can’t think of a more appropriate term to describe them .. and i include in that category the complicit and butt-licking republican majorities under whose watch tese artrocities ..and that what they are .. we allowed to occur ..

Perhaps I am stating the obvious here but the Yoo memo came out on March 14, 2003, 5 days before the beginning of the Iraq invasion. This wasn’t a coincidence but part of a plan to process, interrogate, and torture prospective detainees from that invasion.

Thanks Mod:)

It will be interesting to see how UC handles this in the near future. John Yoo is a law professor at the Boalt Hall School of Law at the Univerity of California, Berkeley.

Berkeley is an enclave of political activism and strongly anti-war. The community and student body are not likely to sit idley by and do nothing. I’ll be groups are gathering as we blog.

Perhaps I am stating the obvious here but the Yoo memo came out on March 14, 2003, 5 days before the beginning of the Iraq invasion. This wasn’t a coincidence but part of a plan to process, interrogate, and torture prospective detainees from that invasion.

Agreed.

Thanks for this reminder. Well stated and timely.

as you said earlier christy, this is “might makes right”. that is all it is, this is yoo taking pen to paper and saying;

“I say it, and it becomes law”

I hate the term “breath taking”, it is far too gentle, this is more then devastating, there are no words that express the brazen depravity.

Browsed through the Vanity Fair article, seems like anyone traveling with Bush may be taking his liberty in his hands.

They planned this, they had intent, it was premeditated, it was not a bunch of solders who got carried away at Abu Graid they REALLY WERE FOLLOWING ORDERS! .
Not that that would make them less guilty, but it does mean the TOP guys Bush, Darth, Rummy etc knew that this would happen and they protected themselves legally from it but did nothing to stop it?
Why because they ordered it. I always had a hard time believing that the solders came up with sick games like they did at Abu Graid.
Sure beating a few prisoners I could understand but the stuff in the photos suggests a real Pervert.

I have to start a new thread because teh following is so important I don’t want it missed by those skimming;

you approved torture, the administration not only sanctioned torture, they ordered it.

there is now no choice, pelosi must bring charges of impeachment or remove herself from office

or she must be impeached

this is torture, plain, clear, there is no two ways about it and there is no choice anymore from pelosi, she cannot possibly have “impeachment off the table” and still remain the speaker of the house

the time has now come

I never thought that I would use my Philosophy Degree in the real World:)

Yeah!

In what world is torture not absolutely wrong? Funny the GOP always nails us for being Relativists and weak morally.

This is an excellent point. Conservatives are for smaller government, except when they are for bigger government. They are for fiscal responsibility except when they send the national debt above $9 trillion. They are for government staying out of people’s private lives, except when it comes to abortion and sex. They are against nation building and for staying out of foreign conflicts, except when oil is involved. They are very law and order, except when it comes to illegal spying, ditching habeas corpus, or going after Democratic officeholders. And as you point out they are for moral absolutes, except when they’re not (torture).

“Time Has Come Today” - The Chambers Brothers

Time has come today
Young hearts can go their way
Can’t put it off another day
I don’t care what others say
They say we don’t listen anyway
Time has come today
(Hey)

Oh
The rules have changed today (Hey)
I have no place to stay (Hey)
I’m thinking about the subway (Hey)
My love has flown away (Hey)
My tears have come and gone (Hey)
Oh my Lord, I have to roam (Hey)
I have no home (Hey)
I have no home (Hey)

Now the time has come (Time)
There’s no place to run (Time)
I might get burned up by the sun (Time)
But I had my fun (Time)
I’ve been loved and put aside (Time)
I’ve been crushed by the tumbling tide (Time)
And my soul has been psychedelicized (Time)

(Time)
Now the time has come (Time)
There are things to realize (Time)
Time has come today (Time)
Time has come today (Time)

Time [x11]

Oh
Now the time has come (Time)
There’s no place to run (Time)
I might get burned up by the sun (Time)
But I had my fun (Time)
I’ve been loved and put aside (Time)
I’ve been crushed by tumbling tide (Time)
And my soul has been psychedelicized (Time)

(Time)
Now the time has come (Time)
There are things to realize (Time)
Time has come today (Time)
Time has come today (Time)

Time [x4]
Yeah

there are no words that express the brazen depravity.

Perris,
For me the true outrage is that it was done in my name. I am one of We The People. This memo is nothing more than the sanction of murder. Coldblooded, premeditated, with malace. Murder.

My horror is based in large part on my 35 year old recolection of my Military training. We were instructed; we do not abuse prisoners. EVER.

Just because Yoo said it was OK doesn’t mean that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Addington, Ashcroft, and the thousand other creeps in Bushco aren’t guilty of war crimes.

This case needs to be referred to the World Court in the Hague. Period.

Perfect you should send that in to Hilary and Obama. That speech pretty much describes why I’m not a Conservative. Now we just need a speech that Defines why we are Liberals!… or Lefties

Note that the picture in the Horton article of a prisoner on the floor has what appears to be a broken or severely traumatized left leg, the lower half of which is misshapen, miscolored, bloated and hastily patched. Blood elsewhere on the floor is obvious.

The man is naked. He is in custody, under the absolute physical control of the armed forces of the United States. He is not a threat to them there or us here. He might be a threat, somewhere, sometime. He certainly will be if he survived his treatment and vows revenge on his tormentors. He might also have been a baker on his way to work, or a brother en route to getting drugs for his younger sister. Odds are, the dozens of US personnel “attending” him didn’t a clue, even if any of them spoke Arabic.

This is brutality as an expression power. It is not to obtain information or prevent harm. After a short interval it doesn’t even intimidate the “enemy”, certainly not one whose religion gives it examples of soldiers dying for the cause (as do the legions of Christian martyrs). It is a declaration that “You Should Fear Me”. I don’t think it accomplishes that either, though it does cause domestic opponents here to quake in their congressional seats.

More than any before it, this administration claims to hold exemplary Christian beliefs. Many think it purposely misdefines those beliefs, as it misdefines the tenets of Islam, for partisan gain. An eye for an eye, for example, is not Biblical license to blind. It is a law of restraint, authorizing no more violence than was done to you. The latter half of the Holy Book even admonishes that we turn the other cheek in order to cut the cycle of violence and vendetta rather than perpetuate it. That this administration discards with a wave of its 9/11 hand.

This administration respects religion no more than it does the law. Those are just tools in game of power and pillage. Its guiding belief is the yacht and golf club credo: “He who dies with the most, wins.” ‘Fraid not.

Send them to the Hague!!!

Orders? could well be. But don’t forget that a bunch of the torturers at Abu Graib had been prison guards - and had been chosen because they HAD been prison guards.

Not near enough attention being paid to conditions and practices in American prisons.

Also I think porn is a factor here as a source for images/techniques and de-sensitisation to sexualized violence. I know, this always gets the freedom-of-speech argument going, but still, there is something about the fact that they photographed and videoed what they did that makes me think of porn.

Perris,
For me the true outrage is that it was done in my name. I am one of We The People. This memo is nothing more than the sanction of murder. Coldblooded, premeditated, with malace. Murder.

it was done in your name but not with your permission, this president was never elected to office, he was installed by the legasy his father and reagan, it was a silent and bloddless coup and you are innocent from the crimes that were committed

I believe Punaise is at Berkeley. Hopefully, we’ll get a current events report from him.

I trust the powers that be at Berkeley will come to the conclusion that having a hack lawyer teaching at one of the pre-eminent law schools in the country does nothing to enhance the school’s reputation or program.

Hey drop me an Email at facebook if Berkeley does get rid of Yoo. I’ll oreder a pizza and crack open a Saint Pauli Girl.

Scott Horton’s article ends with a prophecy, one we hope is accurate. Referring to the Torture Lawyers, and their political masters, he writes:

Around the world, and increasingly within the United States itself they are regarded as criminals whose day of reckoning is drawing closer on the horizon.

From the Woo memo:

Any effort by Congress to regulate the interrogation of enemy combatants would violate the Constitution’s sole vesting of the Commander-in-Chief authority in the President….Congress can no more interfere with the President’s conduct of the interrogation of enemy combatants than it can dictate strategic or tactical decisions on the battlefield.

From the US Constitution, Article I, Section 8:
“The Congress shall have the right …..To make rules concerning captures on Land and Water….. To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces.”

Could it be any clearer?

John Yoo is no Fall Guy, except in the sense that excess pride and ambition drove him to fly too close to the sun. His wings are melting before our eyes. Will he land safely or sink to the bottom of the Med?

He’s not a Fall Guy in the sense that he caved to Addington out of fear he would lose his job or livelihood like the many analysts and lawyers at State, DOD, CIA, GSA, HUD, EPA and others. Yoo’s a button man who still wants to make capo regime. His tenure at Berkeley is proof that he could obtain high-level employment in almost any legal capacity. He needn’t have kowtowed to Addington. He was and remains an eager, knowing participant.

From the US Constitution, Article I, Section 8:
“The Congress shall have the right …..To make rules concerning captures on Land and Water….. To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces.”

Could it be any clearer?

no

this is a crime that MUST be prosecuted, there are no two ways about this

This is just the type of crime the ICC should have the authority to try. Of course that’s why the US doesn’t want to be subject to it. Disgusting.

Bingo.

I am shamed that torture was authorized, planned, and carried out by my government. The leaders of our government who plotted to carry out these disgusting actions must be brought to Justice.

Are we a nation of laws or of men?

If we don’t prosecute, the ICC will.

Impeachment must be put back on the table.

Yoo’s funny.

Marty Lederman at JB’s place critiques John Yoo’s defense that his advice to the President reflected such “settled law” that his Torture Memo was 81 pages of boiler plate.

He’s right, but unintentionally so. He’s right in the “loan document” sense that he used 81 pages of complex-sounding jargon and arcane references to hide what he was really doing: authorizing the president to do WTF he wanted, and charge the people for it.

me wants more discussion on this and am heading over to the wheel’s house

Oh, and settled law doesn’t require 81 pages, while omitting reference to the principal case his advice needed to address: the Youngstown case.

That’s exactly what I meant. Thanks for putting it so well.

Not off topic: While I was away from the computer I just read a Yiddish story by Peretz called “The Pious Cat” which is exactly about the torturous (forgive the adjective) religious or ideological justifications this cat goes through for killing the canaries.

How will Yoo be held accountable? As long as these people walk amongst civilized people no one is safe.

John Yoo is nothing more than an overly ambitious greedy attorney that hitched his star to the Republican Party and their leader GW Bush. He was/is nothing more than a henchman in a Brooks Brothers suit at the bidding of the Bush regime. He didn’t need direct orders to craft his legal pretzel, he knew what was expected and acted accordingly. It seems to have paid off. A professor of law at a major university and a frequent commentor on the “news” shows. The Republicans do take care of their own, even when they are criminals. It’s really not that dissimilar in how the 3rd Reich functioned. Bureaucrats and even just plain citizens were expected to always be “working toward the Fuhrer” meaning they would, even without direct orders, promote Party policies and ideology. Fortunately those in Germany responsible were held accountable for their crimes. In the U.S., not so much.

Is it war-crime thirty yet? Or half past treason? Or impeachment cobbler?

BTW…why is Israel handing out gas masks to its entire population?

http://www.voanews.com/english.....-voa27.cfm

Yoo became, in effect, a torture team of lawyers, freeing the administration from the constraints of all international rules prohibiting abuse.

but this cannot possibly be the case, no team of lawyers can manufacture law in their own image, those findings are not final, they carry no weight what so ever, decisions regarding those memos are all that matters

now we need to make sure decisions regarding those memos go to the correct and responsible in the justice decision

this is an uphill battle, there are roberts and alito at the helm when the final decision is rendered

we might be lost before the fight but the fight needs to be waged

and congress needs to take the lead, congress must do what needs to be done, these despots must not reign victorious

they must not

Beuhler, Beuhler, anyone, anyone ;-)

Hey, does anyone know if John Yoo has a brother?

A few years ago I ran across this paper which is one in a series on the Unitary Executive Theory that is co-written a Christopher S. Yoo.

I can’t find anything linking the two but it seems pretty curious that two people with the same last name are thinking along seemingly similiar lines (haven’t read the paper yet … no time)

How hell does a person possessing the demonstrated legal incompetence of John Yoo get a tenured position at a top law school? … , but I have always assumed they have recruitment and tenure committees to screen out the dodos. It boggles the mind.

As to his oath of office when he joined DOJ, as Emily Lepita used to say, ‘nevermind.’

Hey now, you can redefine a word to mean whatever you want it to mean (and no more), but you’d better spell that name Litella, Emily Litella.

Alice! Alice! She’s not here, she went through the looking glass.

Sure beating a few prisoners I could understand but the stuff in the photos suggests a real Pervert.

So, if that was legal behavior, then why were some of the Abu Ghraib ‘offenders’ convicted and jailed?

there is something about the fact that they photographed and videoed what they did that makes me think of porn.

Clearly someone wanted knowledge of what happened there to get out to a broader audience. Why? What point has been or is being made with that?

John Yoo is nothing more than an overly ambitious greedy attorney that hitched his star to the Republican Party and their leader GW Bush. … It seems to have paid off. A professor of law at a major university and a frequent commentor on the “news” shows.

Well, we know the media are corrupt, but why did the UC Berkeley Boalt Hall law school hire him? What’s wrong with them?

but this cannot possibly be the case, no team of lawyers can manufacture law in their own image, those findings are not final, they carry no weight what so ever, decisions regarding those memos are all that matters

Yes.It.Can. Up until now, those OLC “opinions” have carried all they weight they needed to: the President and all his men agreed with them, or they left. The President kept the words out the public domain and avoided formal legal challenge to them in court or Congress. The President has packed our courts with men and women who would NOT challenge them, and persuaded waverers in Congress to lie idle and check the wind.

Those words have done their job, regardless of how reprehensible they may be. Only we and Congress can challenge them. If we don’t, and don’t persuade Congress to do the same, they stand. Or, we could hope that a later administration will not find them useful and publicly discard them. As has been said critically of this President’s hopes for success in Iraq, hope is not a plan.

John Yoo of the torture memo hangs out at Boalt Hall School of Law at the University of California Berkeley.

Brendan at brendancalling is trying to jam him up a little.

Check this link and if you can get behind the program, please, pass it on.

http://brendancalling.com/2008.....-shunning/

I am so sick of these turkeys screwing up my country and then walking off with the insufferable proud little struts.

well, make him feel a little pain.
try this link for a little satisfaction.

http://brendancalling.com/2008.....-shunning/