Perhaps nothing is surprising anymore - especially what occurred in the years of the Bush Administration - but for a Justice Department lawyer to have ok'd slaughter is astounding. Troubling is that this official, now teaching law at a US University [!] is not to be prosecuted for what must undoubtedly be professional misconduct - given that what he was advising Bush and Co. was clearly a violation of the law.
consortiumnews.com reports:
"Former Justice Department lawyer John Yoo argued that President George W. Bush’s commander-in-chief powers were so sweeping that he could willfully order the massacre of civilians, yet Yoo’s culpability in Bush administration abuses was deemed “poor judgment,” not a violation of “professional standards.”
That downgrading of criticism by the Justice Department – regarding the legal advice from Yoo and his boss at the Office of Legal Counsel, Jay Bybee, to Bush's White House and the CIA – means that the department will not refer them to state bar associations for possible disbarment as lawyers.
But an earlier version of the report by the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility concluded that the legal advice warranted the sterner conclusion and thus possible disbarment.
The judgment was softened by career prosecutor David Margolis, who was put in charge of the final recommendations and who said he was "unpersuaded" by OPR's "misconduct" conclusion, which faulted Yoo and Bybee for their approval of brutal interrogation techniques that were used against terrorism suspects after the 9/11 attacks.
Legal opinions written by Yoo in 2002 and signed by Bybee cleared the way for the Bush administration to subject detainees to the near drowning of waterboarding and other painful treatment at the hands of CIA interrogators.
Waterboarding and some of the other measures, such as slamming detainees against walls and depriving them of sleep, have long been considered acts of torture and have been treated as war crimes in other circumstances. However, Yoo – working closely with Bush administration officials – claimed that the techniques did not violate U.S. criminal laws and international treaties forbidding torture.
Further, Yoo asserted that Bush’s presidential powers were virtually unlimited in wartime, even a conflict as vaguely defined as the “war on terror.”
consortiumnews.com reports:
"Former Justice Department lawyer John Yoo argued that President George W. Bush’s commander-in-chief powers were so sweeping that he could willfully order the massacre of civilians, yet Yoo’s culpability in Bush administration abuses was deemed “poor judgment,” not a violation of “professional standards.”
That downgrading of criticism by the Justice Department – regarding the legal advice from Yoo and his boss at the Office of Legal Counsel, Jay Bybee, to Bush's White House and the CIA – means that the department will not refer them to state bar associations for possible disbarment as lawyers.
But an earlier version of the report by the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility concluded that the legal advice warranted the sterner conclusion and thus possible disbarment.
The judgment was softened by career prosecutor David Margolis, who was put in charge of the final recommendations and who said he was "unpersuaded" by OPR's "misconduct" conclusion, which faulted Yoo and Bybee for their approval of brutal interrogation techniques that were used against terrorism suspects after the 9/11 attacks.
Legal opinions written by Yoo in 2002 and signed by Bybee cleared the way for the Bush administration to subject detainees to the near drowning of waterboarding and other painful treatment at the hands of CIA interrogators.
Waterboarding and some of the other measures, such as slamming detainees against walls and depriving them of sleep, have long been considered acts of torture and have been treated as war crimes in other circumstances. However, Yoo – working closely with Bush administration officials – claimed that the techniques did not violate U.S. criminal laws and international treaties forbidding torture.
Further, Yoo asserted that Bush’s presidential powers were virtually unlimited in wartime, even a conflict as vaguely defined as the “war on terror.”
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