Both were seriously lacking in the 9th Circuit's holding that John Yoo could not [be] sued for the role he played in causing Jose Padilla's torture. Hopefully, the 9th Circuit will grant en banc review and reverse this decision. What was done to Padilla was cruel, inhumane, and torture by any definition. Those responsible should be held liable. -- Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean of UC Irvine School of Law
The European Court of Human Rights, based in Strasbourg, France, will hear arguments in El-Masri v. "the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia."
This represents the first case to come before the court against a European nation for complicity in the CIA's "extraordinary rendition" program.
see Victim of Torture Gets His First Day in Court
Mr Masri's case is still pending at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.
All claim to be protected by the "golden shield" offered by
their inside man, John Yoo, part of a group of lawyers who aggressively pushed
the lawlessness of the "war on terror." Abusing his position as a lawyer in the
Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, whose mandate is to provide
impartial legal advice to the executive branch, Yoo instead attempted to
redefine torture and approved its use -- including the use of waterboarding, an
ancient torture technique and a form of controlled drowning -- on an alleged "high-value
detainee," Abu Zubaydah, in two memos, dated August 1, 2002, that will forever
be known as the "torture memos"...
see Andy Worthington's Bush Administration on Trial
names of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Gonzales, Yoo, Bybee, Addington and Haynes to be entered and included in the Kuala Lampur War Crimes Commission's Register for public record
By now everyone at Boalt knows exactly what the orange ribbon means. Constant
protest, agitation and education everywhere Yoo goes have made it clear:
"No Torture In My Name."
More photos here... thanks Ashley!
Over the past few weeks we have witnessed a resurgence of
argument by Bush administration pundits that torture "works" to keep Americans safe. To attempt to justify use of this universally prohibited practice in the
interest of national security is a legal and moral travesty, as unconscionable
as the brutality inflicted upon those captured.
Torture is inhumane and immoral...period. Why is one of the central perpetrators of a systematic torture program (still) teaching at Boalt Hall?
Many people know the name of John Yoo, but most do not know his full role in the criminal enterprise known as the Bush Regime. Yoo is associated with the infamous 81-page "torture memo" written while he was a Department of Justice lawyer, on a two-year leave from the UC Berkeley Law faculty. He is one of the many Bush administration attorneys who provided legal justification and cover for the illegal actions of the Bush regime during its eight years in power, including the lies prefacing the immoral and illegitimate war on Iraq.
Well guess what, no surprise, John Yoo is at it again, promoting an exaggeration of Iran's nuclear capabilities and agitating for U.S. military action against Iran.
"It's amazing how lies grow. You start with a small one that seems easy to cover, then you get boxed in and tell another one. Then another. People believe you at first, and then act upon your lies, and you catch yourself wishing you'd simply told the truth." - 'The Client' by John Grisham
The University of California's advocacy for the current U.S. Torture State began with a rather banal defense of its employee John Yoo, whose conduct and work at the Bush/Cheney Justice Department fell far outside established ethical standards. Berkeley Law Dean Christopher Edley sticks with his misapplication of the principle of "academic freedom" to provide safe harbor to his subordinate, despite repeated rebuttals from those, including numerous constitutional lawyers, who correctly understand that unethical, criminal and immoral action in the service of government are not protected.
Dean Edley taught Barack Obama at Yale and provided consultation services for his presidential campaign, and has upheld the President's decision to avoid investigation of criminal actions of the Bush administration. But political calculation must not be the basis for decisions involving the most basic principles of universal human rights. World Can't Wait urges people of conscience to reject the pretext of Fear being sold to the American public and to repudiate the illegal practices being used in the global "war" on terror.
"this is the reality of the country we live in: those in elite political and intellectual circles exist in a special bubble where they can commit radical, far-reaching crimes of the highest order and never be subject to prosecution or punishment. The rest of us poor saps are lorded over by this law...
Routine
Exoneration for Government Criminals
Even the New York
Times finds Wednesday's decision by Ninth Circuit judges to grant immunity to torture advocate John Yoo "misguided and dangerous" and finds the ruling based on "an unworkable standard."
in unsettling example of
moral turpitude, judges pass the buck:
Today, the 9th Circuit Court, of which Jay Bybee is a member, ruled that Yoo is protected from the lawsuit, claiming that the law defining torture and the treatment of enemy combatants was unsettled when Yoo wrote the memos...
Ninth Circuit Court harbors war criminal, protects his coconspirator
More on judicial abdication of responsibility, c/o Glenn Greenwald, here.one viewer's response to "Hard Measures":
"I am deeply disturbed that you have chosen to give a platform to ex-CIA director Jose Rodriguez to defend the practice of water boarding and the destruction of 92 videos in which this torture practice is used. While it is your right to have this individual on your show I'd like to point out that the record of the mainstream covering the stories of those who have endured torture and indefinite detention has been sorely lacking. For example a large number of the American public has been kept from the fact that the torture and indefinite detention of many under the Global War On Terrorism was done so under erroneous and suspect circumstances. Lawrence Wilkerson, chief of staff to former Secretary of State Colin Powell stated that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld all knew that most of those detained were innocent. Wilkerson is quoted as saying, "more and more clear many of the men were innocent, or at a minimum their guilt was impossible to determine let alone prove in any court of law, civilian or military." . And yet nearly 200 remain in Guantanamo and over 2000 in Bagram under the Obama Presidency.
That the debate over torture is reduced to whether it works or not with regard to national security is a travesty and is as unconscionable as the torture and indefinite detention inflicted upon those captured. It is inhumane and immoral...period. Furthermore I should hope you would ask Jose Rodriguez that if there was nothing wrong with water boarding then why feel compelled to destroy the 92 videos? I shall also hope that in the near future you choose to interview those who have been detained and tortured.
Sincerely,
Jill McLaughlin, World Can't Wait National Steering Committee
The so-called "debate" about whether torture helped to keep us safe is reemerging... Washington's Blog quotes top military and intelligence interrogation experts who posit that not only does torture not "work" in terms of providing truthful information, torture has been continuing under President Obama.
see No Defending the Indefensible
The time has come to finally say loud and clear: the same
things that were crimes under Bush are crimes under Obama. Outrages under Bush
are outrages under Obama. All this
MUST STOP. And all this MUST BE
RESISTED by anyone who claims a shred of conscience or integrity...
