The Senate Intelligence Committee and Its Torture Report

The Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on CIA’s torture of prisoners in the “war on terror” was released today. We’re far past the euphemisms that have been used for years — we didn’t subject people to “enhanced interrogation techniques.” No, we tortured people. Torturing people didn’t produce the results that we wanted. Torturing people didn’t produceContinue reading “The Senate Intelligence Committee and Its Torture Report”

On the Reach of International Law

If President Obama’s administration is unwilling to commission a Truth Commission to investigate the crimes and moral failures of the Bush administration and bring the actors who authorized torture to justice, that’s okay. The Spanish are more than willing to make up for our lapse. And the Brits, too. Spain’s national newspapers, El País andContinue reading “On the Reach of International Law”

On John Yoo’s Constitution

Contrary to popular belief, I do not have an Enemy’s List. Yes, Warren Ellis is my nemesis, but only because his writing makes me feel like an amateur. (Though I’m not sure what to think — yet — about Crooked Little Vein, which makes me realize how completely undepraved I am. That is a goodContinue reading “On John Yoo’s Constitution”

On John Yoo and the Legality of Torture

I don’t like John Yoo. Yoo served in President Bush’s Office of Legal Counsel during the early years of his administration. Yoo was known to have penned two memos outlining the legal basis for detainee confinement at Guantanamo Bay and for coercive interrogation tactics — torture, let’s just say it — that led to prisonContinue reading “On John Yoo and the Legality of Torture”

On John Yoo

I'm sure many of you have heard about the NPR interview with legal scholar John Yoo. Yoo, in case you don't know, is the legal theorist behind many of President Bush's philosophies. Signing statements, the unitary executive–they all originate in the writings of John Yoo. Yoo was interviewed by NPR yesterday on the Congressional billContinue reading “On John Yoo”