Good one. The man who wrote the Torture Memos would be defamed by virtue of an inquiry into whether that ‘legal advice’, and I do put that in quotes, exceeded the constraints of professional responsibility. I assume for the sake of argument that such a finding would be sufficient, not being sure what ‘actionable breach’ of professional ethics means.

Actually now I wonder what showing would be required? Anyway I doubt the charter and by-laws provide much in the way of guidance.

Interesting that he asserts the charter and by-laws do not provide him with standing, yet this actionable breach later is admitted as sufficient for the administration to file a complaint, and indeed he seems to acknowledge an active duty to file a complaint once such wrongdoing is known.

So it sounds like he is saying “Make the case first”. Which of course Delong wants him to make the case in the first place.

At the same time Delong made his point and focused a great deal of negative attention towards Yoo, which is a great thing, although any sort of like death treats or whatever are not. But he should be shunned. That he would be able to retreat safely to his right-wing sinecure after what he has done is just wrong.

When your country has been over throwing countries by using its “intelligence gathering” apparatus and in short manipulating the sovereignty of other nation states your country is inconsistent with it’s expectations for the inherent natural rights of your people.

The imagined loophole Yoo argues is that during “war time” the executive branch has preferential powers to all anything except perhaps heroic acts of democracy like a constituional amendment and a three-fifths majority in congress, you know things that will never happen since we broke off into red and blue teams, (lame.)

When a fascist seeks to restict your natural rights by changing the geometry of your balance of powers they are going to hide behind claims of “democracy” as they set their bars ever higher for the requirements for popular support for any progress. They jive, hustle and spin. They piss on your head and tell you it’s raining. FOX-News is like a 24/7 golden shower. They gum up the works of the machine and hopefully get it rolling backwards.

Yoo’s assertions are convenient loopholes masquerading as heroic intellectualism that begs the other two sides of the triangle to respond with equal ferocity to protect their power. That would be a natural expression of the reality of our checks and balances in action. Cal, like all the UC’s, specialize in the theoretical world of political science, while the State University System in California tends to feature the practical applications of political science for jobs outside the ivory tower. At Sonoma State in 1992 if your idea wasn’t feasible given the current political landscape, you better not raise your hand. Politics was taught with the real world in mind and people like Alice Rivlin was our pin-up girl. Sure you got as much theory as you wanted, but for example my thesis was a construction of a “winning” political campaign for then Gov. William Weld. I didn’t like William Weld, but in 1996 that was a fun challenge. My “internship” was as the Universities Commissioner of Student Elections, (just like Jimmy Carter.) At the UC’s the emphasis isn’t on application as much, that’s all.

Problems with correction: The judiciary favors the retention of GOP power, as appointments tend to follow. The public, those who are supposed to crack the whip of their representatives, don’t even know the name of their representatives in large enough number to counterbalance.

Yoo’s inclusion of the War Powers Act and laws that certainly aren’t declarations of war as the original founders intended. First the desire for war must imminent from the people in a democratic republic, not from the executive, down. The manufacture of consent for the Iraq War is text book, yet still invalid due to all the straight faced lies. I could only imagine Yoo’s powers being granted to POTUS in a case where congress declares war for realsies and it’s a serious muthafuckn’ war. Maybe The PRC invades in twenty years and cyborgs rule the night.

In the end it’s the people who must act, shout, demand, freakout, work, educate themselves, and act in a manner more shocking then a poll number. That’s what drives all the action. We forget the Civil Rights success, the labor law success, etc, or I suppose not enough people are willing to go take their lumps. blogs are great, but I’ll be first to admit that they are a passive aggressive way to vent frustration, instead of actually doing what it takes to make the major gains we did in the past towards the reaching the totality of what real representative democracy fully actualized could be.

Thanks for reading my book.

I love that you can’t even make the “torture is always wrong” argument and even expect an American Professor to hear you out.

Instead you have to hedge about how, of course torturing high level Al Qaeda operatives is a perfectly sensible idea, but Yoo wanted to torture people who probably didn’t have much information.

What the fuck happened to this country? At least ten years ago we had the decency to pretend we weren’t operating on medieval moral values.

I think he’s got you there. First, you’d have to find people at Berkeley who have backgrounds in moral philosophy and con law. Then, even if you could find those people, would they be non-wingnut crazies who wouldn’t just rubber-stamp Yoo.

Maybe they could import some libertarians from George Mason.

This is sad for Edley and Drummond. No one wants history to show up and make demands, but they were on watch when this dilemma arose. They got the chance to choose, and chose cowardly avoidance. What a shame for them and their families that they found out who they are like this.

One nightmare that I have is that somehow Condi comes back to the Farm proper (not Hoover). If that happens, I’ll need to start boycotting in the alum donation department. Not that they’ll notice………..

I’m enthusiastically eager for the both of ya’s to start lobbing insults and outrages over each other’s blog walls. Perhaps a little of the taunty-taunty, in the form of a Brady video, would be in order? Mm?

If you can keep it going, with feeling, until this primary nonsense is over, I’d sure be grateful. I think there’s a whole bunch of Americans who would be too.

Thank you both in advance. Good luck, we’re all counting on you.