In other words: A discussion of The Bush Administration
BUSH CAN TORTURE WHOEVER HE WANTS
According to a March 2003 memo, administration lawyers concluded that Bush is immune from domestic and international prohibitions against torture.
"In order to respect the president's inherent constitutional authority to manage a military campaign," the lawyers wrote in the 56-page confidential memorandum, the prohibition against torture "must be construed as inapplicable to interrogation undertaken pursuant to his commander-in-chief authority."
See? That makes it okay if the president's own lawyers and the Justice Department say so. Never mind that "It was not a legal analysis" -- even according to the Pentagon chief spokesman. The brilliant legal reasoning behind this beauty is that the White House counsel decided that if (a) American military personnel need to skirt the Geneva Convention, then (b) the Geneva Convention doesn't apply.
I always said that Bush never met a law he didn't break.
The March memorandum, which was first reported by The Wall Street Journal on Monday, is the latest internal legal study to be disclosed that shows that after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks the administration's lawyers were set to work to find legal arguments to avoid restrictions imposed by international and American law. (Emphasis mine.)
Notice how this has absolutely nothing to do with precedent -- the founding principle of due process and basis of the rule of law. Why should Bush and his invading Army be concerned with anything that could be used against them in a court of law, international or otherwise? Might is right.
In addition, that memorandum, dated Feb. 2, 2002, noted that lawyers for the Central Intelligence Agency had asked for an explicit understanding that the administration's public pledge to abide by the spirit of the conventions did not apply to its operatives.
In other words, the lawyers insist that if the president makes a public pledge he can lie with impunity.
According to the general whose command oversees Guantánamo, his response to reporters about a working group investigating torture under his watch is that the group "wanted to do ... what is right for our soldiers." That's right: your responsibility isn't the lives of your captives -- who in many cases haven't done anything at all -- it's to make sure your men "do what is right" -- that is, torture the prisoners to the point where they hang themselves.
Jamie Fellner, the director of United States programs for Human Rights Watch, said Monday, "We believe that this memo shows that at the highest levels of the Pentagon there was an interest in using torture as well as a desire to evade the criminal consequences of doing so."
Hm. You think so? We need to do further research studies and get back to you.
The March memorandum also contains a curious section in which the lawyers argued that any torture committed at Guantánamo would not be a violation of the anti-torture statute because the base was under American legal jurisdiction and the statute concerns only torture committed overseas. That view is in direct conflict with the position the administration has taken in the Supreme Court, where it has argued that prisoners at Guantánamo Bay are not entitled to constitutional protections because the base is outside American jurisdiction.
That's my favorite part -- America can torture whoever it wants on its overseas bases, since they are within American jurisdiction, but the prisoners don't have any rights because the bases are overseas. A fine legal argument, boys.
Bush and the Justice Department are putting the final touches on Act One so they can finish Act Two over here.
- Michael 8:35 AM - [PermaLink] -
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