Sunshine Week, according to its website, is “a national initiative to open a dialogue about the importance of open government and freedom of information. The University of Virginia here in Charlottesville is doing its part by hosting book tour stops for the chief author of the worst secret laws ever established. John Yoo will be speaking at the Miller Center and at an event hosted by the Federalist Society. Yoo will be speaking in support of unlimited presidential power, including the power to create secret laws.
As John Yoo’s visit to Mr. Jefferson’s university here in Charlottesville approaches, one is tempted to ask the same question people around here ask about everything: WWJD? What would Jefferson do? Of course, it’s almost taboo among the most serious peace and justice advocates to cite positive precedents from Jefferson, because he was a slave owner. But Jefferson’s views on the structure of a government don’t actually become less admirable (or more) when we remember the horrors he inflicted on the people at Monticello.
The Department of Justice is still working on the report prepared by an agency watchdog that probed several legal opinions John Yoo and two other former attorneys who worked at the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) wrote for the Bush White House on torture, an agency spokeswoman said Wednesday. “The [review] process is ongoing and we hope to have [the report] complete and released soon,” Justice Department spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler told Truthout.
January 8, 2010 | Filed under
Law |
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Much has occurred today with regards to Guantanamo Bay and many decisions are yet to come. But there is another milestone worthy of note: Today marks the eighth anniversary of the creation of the legal foundation for the prison and the second-tier justice system established to try terrorism suspects there.
November 13, 2009 | Filed under
Nation |
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David Cole’s new book is two things: First, a collection of six of the previously-published “torture memos” written between 2002 and 2006 by lawyers at the Bush-era Office of Legal Counsel. Yes, the ones that used law to justify the “enhanced interrogation techniques” now so well known. And, second, Cole’s commentary on this distortion of the law and its implications for our society
September 24, 2009 | Filed under
Commentary |
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The Spanish newspaper Público reported exclusively on Saturday that Judge Baltasar Garzón is pressing ahead with a case against six senior Bush administration lawyers for implementing torture at Guantánamo.
September 8, 2009 | Filed under
Torture |
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From the Archive: John Yoo, the author of one of the infamous Aug. 1, 2002, “torture” memos that formed the legal basis for so-called “enhanced” interrogation techniques against high-level terrorist detainees, used a statute governing health benefits when he provided the White House with a legal opinion defining torture.
August 31, 2009 | Filed under
Torture |
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CIA Director Leon Panetta has just shown himself to be an apologist of the highest order when it comes to torture-related crimes carried out by agency interrogators and contractors.
Panetta issued a statement in advance of the release later Monday of a critical 2004 inspector general’s report on the agency’s torture program. Panetta says the horrific [...]
August 24, 2009 | Filed under
Torture |
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In hopes that it may be of some assistance to Eric Holder, John Conyers, Patrick Leahy, active citizens, foreign courts, the International Criminal Court, law firms preparing civil suits, and local or state prosecutors with decency and nerve is a list of 50 top living U.S. war criminals. These are men and women who helped to launch wars of aggression or who have been complicit in lesser war crimes. These are not the lowest-ranking employees or troops who managed to stray from official criminal policies. These are the makers of those policies.
August 18, 2009 | Filed under
Commentary |
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Congressman Jerrold Nadler, D-NY, warned Attorney General Eric Holder that if he decides to authorize a criminal investigation into torture it should not be limited to rogue CIA interrogators, but should also determine whether high-level officials of the Bush administration committed war crimes.
August 9, 2009 | Filed under
Torture |
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