law { unitary executive and torture isn't illegal when we do it

Well, the Pentagon finally released the John C. Yoo memo that pretty much signed off on any torture we wanted to conduct in the name of national security. Story here.

Memorandum Part 1 Part 2 [PDF].

(the memo is supposed to be 81 pages long but this is only 39).

My reaction:

1) The American Bar Association should immediately disbar John C. Yoo.
2) The University of California Berkeley Law School should immediately cancel any tenure and fire John C. Yoo.
3) John C. Yoo should be arrested and placed on a plane for the Hague for his war crimes tribunal
4) The U.S. Department of Justice should cooperate fully with his prosecution.
5) John C. Yoo should not be tortured or interrogated using harsh physical techniques he himself considered acceptable, because that is not how civilized, justice minded human beings operate, and because if we act with such disregard to legal and human rights, then we have no moral standing to demand that our enemies or even inconvenient Earth-mates do not do so as well

justice { Tripoli Six

The Tripoli Six have been freed.

politics { 18 1/2 minutes of tape

FIVE MILLION E-MAILS

Yeah, Nixonesque America is back and boy is it popular.

How many more crimes will these people be allowed to commit before they are removed from positions of power? Any one of the major scandals that this administration seems to have been part of would have earned the lot of them a prison cell. Almost every day there is a new one.

If this criminal syndicate in the executive branch is not brought to answer for their total failure to live up to any standards of justice and accountability, then it won't matter what happens in 2008, because the government will have revealed itself as so fundamentally broken so as to not be salvageable.

This culture of corruption sickens me. These men and women are sociopaths, and way outside the standards of acceptable behavior.