02 May
Jay Bybee Would Write Same Torture Memos Again
Not Only Does Bybee Show No Remorse, He’d Write The Same Torture
Memos AGAIN!
The Peace Team
First they floated sympathetic stories that Jay Bybee, currently a lifetime appellate judge for the 9th Circuit, had “private regrets” about his role in writing the torture memos. But when he finally and actually opened his own mouth recently in public, he declared he still believed they represented a “good faith analysis of the law”.In other words, given a chance, he’d do the same thing again today, in exactly the same way.
This is beyond outrageous. No contrition, no remorse, just the same self-serving self-justification which led to him signing off on indefensible and long settled war crimes in the first place. He is practically shouting at us, “Stop me before I write another legal atrocity!” Which he will, over and over, if not removed from the federal bench immediately.
To this non lawyer, Bybee’s memo is an affront to sanity, not because it is a shamefully hackneyed effort to paper over torture methods which were already in use and which then apparently required official legal sanction by Bush, Cheney et al. That’s obvious. What is insane to me is how shockingly bad it is as legal scholarship. No discussion of contrary case law or existing historic and legal traditions relating to the proposed torture techniques, no analysis of legislative history, no effort at statutory construction, and conclusory in the extreme to the point of madness.
Where was his mind at? Any thought as to Nuremberg, a direct precedent relating to Nazi lawyers who approved or failed to object to “legal” activities that were nonetheless crimes against humanity. The common man, such as I, know that lawyers and judges, acting as surrogates to criminal activities, must nonetheless be held accountable for the resulting crimes
If he is not capable of enough shame to resign, he must be impeached.
Petition for Impeachment
Addendum: And where in Hell is the American Bar Association?!
Question: On the Nomination (Confirmantion Jay S. Bybee, Of Nevada, To Be U.S. Circuit Judge, March 13, 2003
Democrats who voted in favor:
Alaska (D-HI), Yea
Baucus (D-MT), Yea
Bayh (D-IN), Yea
Bingaman (D-NM), Yea
Breaux (D-LA), Yea
Cantwell (D-WA), Yea
Carper (D-DE), Yea
Conrad (D-ND), Yea
Daschle (D-SD), Yea
Dodd (D-CT), Yea
Dorgan (D-ND), Yea
Graham (D-FL), Yea
Hollings (D-SC), Yea
Jeffords (I-VT), Yea
Johnson (D-SD), Yea
Kohl (D-WI), Yea
Landrieu (D-LA), Yea
Leahy (D-VT), Yea
Lieberman (D-CT), Yea
Lincoln (D-AR), Yea
Miller (D-GA), Yea
Nelson (D-FL), Yea
Nelson (D-NE), Yea
Pryor (D-AR), Yea
Reid (D-NV), Yea
Rockefeller (D-WV), Yea
Schumer (D-NY), Yea
It is Michigan’s honor that Senators Levin and Stabenow voted Nay.
