In "The Truth About Torture" (July 12, 2008 in Newsweek Magazine), Stuart Taylor Jr. asserts the following:
John Yoo acts with impunity. The notion that John Yoo did not act with criminal intent merely because he was in the OLC does not lay claim to the following facts:
See also: "US: No Amnesty for Cheney, et al, Say Torture Opponents."
(Image above from www.lacitybeat.com.)
- "One can argue that officials could have or should have resigned rather than implement questionable legal judgments, but there is no evidence that any high-level official acted with criminal intent. The officials involved appear to have approved only interrogation methods found legal by administration lawyers, and in particular by the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC). According to long tradition, the OLC is considered a sort of Supreme Court of the executive branch."
- "Absent pardons, pressure to go after
GOP "war criminals" would make it very hard to unite Americans of all
stripes behind solutions to the many economic and social challenges
facing the country. No new president--especially if he turns out to be
Barack Obama, who has made such a point of getting beyond partisan
bickering--needs that."
John Yoo acts with impunity. The notion that John Yoo did not act with criminal intent merely because he was in the OLC does not lay claim to the following facts:- John Yoo codified a legal definition of torture that gave the Bush Administration the institutional green light to allow and accellerate the use of "enhanced interrogation methods" that recklessly circumvents domestic and international legal principles.
- John Yoo has purposefully abrogated legal ethical principles of professional conduct as the sleeping giant of Legaldom falsely hopes that a systematic program of the widespread use of torture will go away with the next Administration.
- John Yoo was specifically brought into the OLC to articulate and "normalize" illegitimate and illegal principles, including:
- the use of torture and abuse in violation of both domestic and international law;
- the rendition of prisoners to foreign countries to be tortured;
- the secret detentions of persons seized throughout the world;
- the mass round-up and torture methods enacted on thousands of individuals of Muslim and South Asian decent in the United States immediately following September 11, 2001 and continuing today;
- the use of military forces to seize and detain any U.S. citizens without charges on order of the President; and
- the torture and assassination of persons that the President designates anywhere in the world.
See also: "US: No Amnesty for Cheney, et al, Say Torture Opponents."
(Image above from www.lacitybeat.com.)
