That’s one of the oddities about these Addingtonian fig leaves. As deputy head of OLC, Yoo knew he lacked authority to issue that opinion, something well-versed government lawyers like Addington would have also known. Bybee and Ashcroft could have delegated authority to him, but there’s no evidence they did so. So, presumptively, they’re void, but weren’t treated that way.

Ironically, that’s the kind of gap Rove often twists to his advantage in offering his Watergatish non-denial denials. He often uses, “there’s no evidence I did such and such,” as a denial. In fact, it’s nothing of the kind; it just means no one’s produced the evidence to support their claim yet.

That’s a convenient method for Rove for at least two reasons. It encourages opponents to cough up with what they know, telling Rove what knowledge he has to defend against. (Presumably, as the spider at the center of the web, he knows more.) It also helps Karl avoid perjury, because he hasn’t denied a fact, he’s only pointed out a lapse in evidence for it.

here’s marty:

I am reliably informed that although the Senate confirmed Jay Bybee to be a federal judge on March 13, 2003, Jay did not take the oath of office until March 28th, at which point his resignation from OLC became effective.

don’t know that this has any bearing on the issue, though.

I’ve been emailing the Dean since the last Dean about You and even though I am a life-time Alumni I’ve never received the courtesy of a response. I an my members, Drinking Liberally, Oakland will be discussing ways to move forward on applying real pressure on the Dean re: You.

One thing I do not believe has been made clear to the University: There exist many individuals who’ve been harmed, deeply, by those acting in accordance with Yoo memos. I cannot conceive that liability will not attached to the University for Yoo’s part as actively breaking the Geneva Conventions and his role in promoting torture in defiance of international law.

I wonder what the situation might look like in five years with numerous claimants in Federal Court asking for the University and the State to make them whole?

Just the possibility of this happening should be enough to make Dean Edley crap his Brooks Bros. briefs.

Academic freedom does not protect shoddy or fraudulent work, the intellectual inverse of “scholarship”. Yoo’s 2003 torture memo alone contains many examples of it. (How would his still secret memos fare?) He mis-cites cases for arguments they don’t support; he claims cases support his argument when they stand for the opposite; he mis-cites to suggest that cases support one part of his argument when, if at all, they support another. He fails to mention conspicuous cases that his arguments have to refute, failing which they fail.

For a lawyer who earned the academic distinctions Yoo did at Harvard College and Yale Law, who already held a tenured position at a top nationally ranked law school, it is virtually impossible to find mitigating factors for that shoddy work. The press of time doesn’t qualify, nor lack of resources. For such work, the OLC would have had carte blanche to borrow resources from elsewhere in the DOJ.

The highest hurdle this memo has to jump is that his missing cites and mis-citations are so artfully done. Which suggests considerable time and attention went into constructing his memo. All of which is damning, separate and apart from the evil done in reliance on them.