| Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy said the memo "reflects the expansive view of executive power that has been the hallmark of this administration" and called for it to be released four months ago.
An ACLU staff attorney, Amrit Singh, commented on the memo: "Senior officials at the Justice Department gave the Pentagon the green light to torture prisoners. It is outrageous that none of these high-level officials have been brought to task yet for their role in authorizing prisoner abuse."
I agree wholeheartedly.
You can view the entire memo here: Part 1 and Part 2 (both pdf). Here are some of the lowlights.
Page 8: "...The Eighth Amendment... applies solely to those persons upon whom criminal sanctions have been imposed. As the Supreme Court has explained, the "'Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause' was designed to protect those convicted of crimes... The Eight Amendment thus has no application to those individuals who have not been punished as part of a criminal proceeding, irrespective of the fact that they have been detained by the government... The Eighth Amendment therefore cannot extend to the detention of wartime detainees, who have been captured pursuant to the President's power as Commander in Chief..."
"The detention of enemy combatants can in no sense be deemed 'punishment' for purposes of the Eight Amendment... Indeed, it has long been established that captivity in wartime is neither a punishment nor an act of vengeance, but merely a temporary detention which is devoid of all penal character..."
Translation: Anyone detained by the government who hasn't been charged with a crime has no recourse against cruel and unusual punishment.
Page 38: "The key statutory phrase in the defintion of torture [this is according to US code -- icm] is the statement that acts amount to torture if they cause 'severe mental pain or suffering.' ... The statute does not, however, define the term 'severe.'
...to constitute torture, 'severe pain' must rise to a a similarly high level -- the level that would ordinarily ve associated with a physical condition or injury sufficiently serious that it would result in death, organ failure or serious impairment of bodily functions."
Translation: An interrogation technique should only be considered torture if it hurts really really bad and you think you might die.
Page 81: "Customary international law does not supply any additional standards."
Translation: Up yours, Geneva Conventions.
Page 81: "Finally, even if the criminal prohibitions outlined above applied, and an interrogation method might violate these provisions, necessity or self-defense could provide justifications for any criminal liability."
Translation: It doesn't really matter what you do, we'll back you up regardless.
The memo was written by then Deputy Assitant Attorney General and notorious warmonger John Yoo, who in 2005 said "It is no longer clear that the United States must seek to reduce the amount of warfare, and it certainly is no longer clear that the constitutional system ought to be fixed so as to make it difficult to use force. Rather than war disappearing from the world, the threat of war may well be increasing." Glenn Greenwald serves up a damning indictment, calling Yoo "not only the most authoritarian but also the most partisan and intellectually dishonest lawyer in the country."
Emptywheel has a fun game called Let's Pretend we're Lawyers, where you can mock Yoo's scholarship.
On the bright side, Yoo gave us some advice in a 2004 LA Times op-ed: If the American people disagree with that policy, they have options: Congress can change the law, or the electorate can change the administration.
Translation: So?
Originally posted at The Seminal. |
STATE BLOGS
