First, Jail All Bush's Lawyers-By Robert Parry

[kpete]

First, Jail All Bush's Lawyers

By Robert Parry
February 3, 2009


If new Attorney General Eric Holder really means what he said in his oath – that he will “support and defend the Constitution of the United States” – then he must give serious consideration to prosecuting crimes committed by the Bush administration, including its torturing of detainees.


And Holder might be advised to begin the process at his own agency, the Department of Justice. To paraphrase Shakespeare, Holder might start by first jailing all of George W. Bush’s lawyers.

The logic of targeting former Justice Department lawyers – the likes of John Yoo and Jay Bybee – is that they were the linchpin for justifying acts that were clearly illegal; they provided the paper cover for both the interrogators in the field and the senior officials back in Washington.

Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have repeatedly cited this legal guidance when insisting that the harsh interrogation of "war on terror" detainees – as well as other prisoners from the Iraq and Afghan wars – did not cross the line into torture.

In essence, the Bush-Cheney defense is that independent lawyers at the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel and elsewhere gave honest opinions – and that everyone from the President and Vice President, who approved specific interrogation techniques, to the interrogators, who carried out these acts, operated in good faith.

If, however, that narrative is false – if the lawyers colluded with policymakers in creating legal excuses for criminal acts – then the Bush-Cheney defense collapses. Rather than diligent lawyers providing professional advice, the picture is of consiglieres counseling crime bosses how to skirt the law.

more at:
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/020309.html