December 4, 2008 at 19:32:31

Prosecute Yoo?

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By David Swanson (about the author) Page 1 of 1 page(s)

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For OpEdNews: David Swanson - Writer

Requesting the prosecution of a known criminal ought not to be an action that requires any particular consideration or debate. If we are a society based on the rule of law, then this is simply what must be done. John Yoo, Professor of Law at Boalt Hall School of Law in Berkeley, California, (but a lawyer with the Pennsylvania bar from which he should be debarred and would be if enough people demanded it) counseled the White House on how to get away with war crimes, wrote this memo promoting presidential power to launch aggressive war, and claimed the power to decree that the federal statutes against torture, assault, maiming, and stalking do not apply to the military in the conduct of the war, and to announce a new definition of torture limiting it to acts causing intense pain or suffering equivalent to pain associated with serious physical injury so severe that death, organ failure or permanent damage resulting in loss of significant body functions will likely result. Yoo claimed in 2005 that a president has the right to enhance an interrogation by crushing the testicles of someone's child. Let's not talk about academic freedom in relation to a man who has lost the right to freedom of any sort and should be behind bars. Are we on the side of justice or the side of crushing children's testicles? Ask the City Council to vote yes!

David Swanson is the author of the upcoming book "Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union" by Seven Stories Press and of the introduction to "The 35 Articles of Impeachment and the Case for Prosecuting George W. (more...)

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