Sorter Bush Administration According to the Senate Torure Report
If the law is against you, pound the facts
If the facts are against you, pound the law
If the law and the facts are against you, pound the prisoners.
of course I can’t keep it shorter so another
If the law an even the OLC opinions are against you, pound the facts
If the facts are against you, pound the OLC opinions
If the law and the OLC opionions are against you and top secret, lie.
The poinst is that when the office of legal council (OLC) claimed that “enhanced interrogation” of Abu Zubaydah wasn’t against the law, they stressed that the determination which they wree determined to make depended on the extraordinary facts of the particular case. But those supposed facts were falsehoods.
Futhermore the CIA torturers continued to torture Abu Zubaydah after they conceded that one key claim of fact — that he knew about imminent attacks on the USA, was almost certainly false. Also they tortured others and only afterwards went back to the OLC. Since the original deterination was explicitly case specific, they can’t claim the OLC mislead them. Since the OLC opinions are plainly incorrect as a matter of law, that would be their only shred of a defence.
Also all public defences of the torture program were based on extremely strong and false claims of fact (some made to congress and therefore felonies).
So the law bans torture, but maybe a defendent can win acquital using the necessity defence if the torture were necessary and sufficient to prevent a terrorist attack . This expplicitly requires that no other method would work (and that torture would work). Since Hassan Ghul, -Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri cooperated before being tortured and Khalid Sheik Muhammad kept lying after being tortured, the two conditions were never met. There is almost no evidence that the torture served any useful purpose let alone that it was necessary.
I think that, if for the sake of argument, one pretends that OLC opinions are authorotative, then one must conclude that crimes were committed.
And always note that paluasibly alleged violations of the Geneva Conventions (including common article three which bans torture of anyone ever) must be investigated, and, if there is proof, prosecuted. The conventions are an exception to the principle of prosecutorial discretion and are US law.
And to be clear, it is not the revelation of our misdeeds that shames and endangers us, it is those misdeeds themselves. (as well as our failure to prosecute those authorizing and committing them)
According to Fox News we are an “awesome country” and should not be revealing the torture report. A GOP senator talking on CSPAN essentially agreed and said that revealing the executive summary was a “partisan” trick. Now I have a lot of disdain for Dumbya and his administration and that includes his ignoring both U.S. and international law, but that is clearly not a partisan issue because the Democrats do exactly the same thing and I have just as much disdain for them including our current president. I guess that makes me a hater of my country–something I have tried to avoid despite its history of genocide, slavery(does any other democracy have slavery written into its constitution?), apartheid, domestic terrorism against minority groups which rivaled that of Germany under the Nazis until the “final solution”, the creation of a vast surveillance society which would stun George Orwell and the militarization of the police which at least is not secret although it might as well be given the lack of accountability. Somehow defending the mindless torture of human beings–=at least some of whom were completely innocent–is a bridge too far. And I am all for defending the country against foreign aggressors, but torture did not do that and if publication of the report is viewed as putting our citizens in danger perhaps somebody should have listened to the military way back when it suggested that we not torture as a way to protect our troops.
Bush and Obama make Hitler, Mao and Stalin seem like ordinary US presidents.
When asked about torture being forbidden under the Geneva Treaty, “it’s only a piece of paper” Bush.
If we are a country of rule and law then why do so many of the top leaders of our society feel that they have the right or are placing themselves above the law? Does it no matter how we justify breaking the law as long as it benefits me and my agenda. Law and Justice should not be granted and exploited to the highest bidder, but it almost always is. So this is how justice works in America. What brand of justice can you afford ? There seems to be justification for any brand of justice as long as you can politically and monetarily sway your opinion.