WP: Scholar Stands by Earlier Writings Sanctioning Torture, Eavesdropping

[sabra]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/25/AR2005122500570.html

Scholar Stands by Earlier Writings Sanctioning Torture, Eavesdropping
Former Justice Official Says He Was Interpreting Law, Not Making Policy

John Yoo knows the epithets of the libertarians, the liberals and the lefties. Widely considered the intellectual architect of the most dramatic assertion of White House power since the Nixon era, he has seen constitutional scholars skewer his reasoning and students call for his ouster from the University of California at Berkeley.

Civil liberties advocates were appalled by a memo he helped draft on torture. The State Department's chief legal adviser at the time, called his analysis of the Geneva Conventions "seriously flawed." Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote, in a critique of administration views espoused by Yoo, "a state of war is not a blank check for the President when it comes to the rights of the Nation's citizens."

Yoo has alienated so many influential opponents that he is considered unconfirmable for a judgeship or high office, not unlike a certain conservative jurist rejected by the Senate for the Supreme Court.

"Someone said to me that I was the Robert Bork of my generation," he reported the other day.

...

"The worst thing you could do, now that people are critical of your views, is to run and hide. I agree with the work I did. I have an obligation to explain it," Yoo said from his Berkeley office. "I'm one of the few people who is willing to defend decisions I made in government."

[UTUSN]

1. He's the A-hole of His Generation, He's the Sock up the Puppet of GONZALES

of his generation.

[peekaloo]

2. Fuck Yoo!

Asswipe.

[guruoo]

7. Wishing Yoo a Merry xmas...

[DELUSIONAL]

3. OK put him on the rack for war crimes

THEN ask him how he likes torture.

Ass holes like him are going to get more military folks killed.

Even in war there has to be rules -- and it seems to me that bushie and his gang are pushing the world back further in time -- abandon the rules -- rules don't apply to the bushie crime family.

[gulfcoastliberal]

4. Why is this shitheel in Berkeley?! He should move.

He stinks up the whole town.

[guruoo]

5. They should be careful what they wish for...

If they keep on with this, they might just convince American that torture,
'enemy combatant' designations, and military tribunals
are OK, right about the time that.....

[bpilgrim]

6. "the epithets of the libertarians, the liberals and the lefties" - no Cons

yeah, right... it's just us libbys/lefties who are OUTRAGED :eyes:

"The worst thing you could do, now that people are critical of your views, is to run and hide. I agree with the work I did. I have an obligation to explain it," Yoo said from his Berkeley office. "I'm one of the few people who is willing to defend decisions I made in government."

you could also admit a MISTAKE, then you'd truely be one of the few in DC

i'll have what he's hav'n ;->

peace

[Spinzonner]

8. Well, the Politburo had its lawyers also

[depakid]

9. He needs to be disbarred

This man has no morals and should be neither teaching law nor practicing as an attornery.

The California bar needs to have higher standards than that. The fact that he's still there is a smack in the face to every California lawyer.

[Democat]

10. Washington post calls him a "Scholar" - what would they say if...

...he was a Democrat? They'd call him a "liberal activist" or something. When it's a Republican, he gets to be a "Scholar".

The Washington Post is run by Bush supporters.

[cal04]

11. Scholar Stands by Post-9/11 Writings On Torture, Eavesdropping(Yoo)

Scholar Stands by Post-9/11 Writings On Torture, Domestic Eavesdropping
Former Justice Official Says He Was Interpreting Law, Not Making Policy
John Yoo knows the epithets of the libertarians, the liberals and the lefties. Widely considered the intellectual architect of the most dramatic assertion of White House power since the Nixon era, he has seen constitutional scholars skewer his reasoning and students call for his ouster from the University of California at Berkeley.

Civil liberties advocates were appalled by a memo he helped draft on torture. The State Department's chief legal adviser at the time called his analysis of the Geneva Conventions "seriously flawed." Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote, in a critique of administration views espoused by Yoo, "a state of war is not a blank check for the President when it comes to the rights of the Nation's citizens."

Yoo has alienated so many influential opponents that he is considered unconfirmable for a judgeship or high office, not unlike a certain conservative jurist rejected by the Senate for the Supreme Court. "Someone said to me that I was the Robert Bork of my generation," he reported the other day. Yet Yoo, 38, an engaging and outspoken lifelong conservative who clerked for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, can be found at seminars and radio microphones, standing up for Bush administration legal arguments that will be studied for decades.

"The worst thing you could do, now that people are critical of your views, is to run and hide. I agree with the work I did. I have an obligation to explain it," Yoo said from his Berkeley office. "I'm one of the few people who is willing to defend decisions I made in government." Those decisions, made when he was a mid-level Justice Department adviser, have been the most fiercely contested legal positions of the Bush presidency. Framing the battle against terrorism as a wartime emergency, Yoo redefined torture, reinterpreted the Constitution and classified as archaic the long-established humanitarian rules of the battlefield.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/25/AR2005122500570.html

[Bozita]

12. "... who clerked for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas" --

from the WaPo article.

Scary, fucking scary!

The NYT had a front page article on Yoo in recent days.

[LiberalPartisan]

16. Dumb and dumber? n/t

[lovuian]

13. Give him enough money and titles and he'll do anything...

lots of souls

being
corrupted
by Bush...

[Quetzal]

14. Here is an excellent comparison of John Yoo to Carl Schmitt

the Nazi international law sophist.

http://balkin.blogspot.com/2005/11/return-of-carl-schmitt.html

[teryang]

18. Brilliant analysis of the AEI, Yoo, Leo Strauss, Carl Schmidt ties

A fundamental concept of Straussian belief is that foreigners have no rights. Yoo is in very bad company and should be behind bars, along with Gonzales, Bush, and Rumsfeld.

The neo-con litany concerning the fight for "liberty" in Iraq is little more than cyncical balderdash. Colonialism is the model for totalitarianism rather than democracy.

[PA Democrat]

15. Yoo's parents emigrated to the US from Korea in 1967

The article says Yoo's parents were strong supporters of Reagan because of his anti-Communist stance. Interesting that their asshole of a son goes on to endorse the very tactics of the Communists that many true freedom-loving people find so abhorrent. Namely, torture and spying on out own citizens.

[Demeter]

17. I Always Thought Scholar Meant Someone Who Pursued Truth

not someone who fabricated plausible excuses for tyrants.

[Evergreen Emerald]

19. Damn straight he has an obligation to explain it.

His interpretations are flawed according to the legal scholars of our day (Like Sandra Day O'Connor). He was told by the administration to justify their actions. And like the current attorney general's weak arguments regarding warrant-less surveillance, his "legal interpretations" do not stand up to the most minimal of scrutinization.

[petgoat]

20. He was just interpreting the law, and those Good Germans

were just building labor camps. Sometimes your technical actions have to be
put in a moral context.

In June a hundred people protested











More recently protesters entered Yoo's class to ask him to justify torture
policies.



http://www.dailycal.org/article.php?id=20154]



At Hunter College in NYC five people were arrested for demonstrating against
torture.





http://www.worldcantwait.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=69&Itemid=41

You can see a video of the Hunter College protest here:

http://www.worldcantwait.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=68&Itemid=44

Maybe it's working. A recent NYT article called Yoo's torture memo "twisted".


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/18/opinion/18sun1.html?n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fEditorials

[Evergreen Emerald]

22. Thanks for the info

and great pictures!

[TankLV]

21. They problem is, we have to make the "climate" such that it is simply

UNACCEPTABLE and make these criminals AFRAID to espouse such things aloud again, as it used to be before ronnie raygun.

I still can't believe the climate has worsed to the point that these criminals are not only even the least bit afraid to be heard to espouse such views, but that they are actually PROUD of them and DEFENDING them!