Nightmares made Law - Philippe Sands on Obama and the Torture Memos

[mix]

According to Law Professor and author Philippe Sands,

"Obama walks a tightrope on an issue that may yet come to dog his first term: what to do about torture practised during a "dark and painful" period? He balances an understandable desire for bipartisanship with obligations under the torture convention to pursue criminal investigations."

"Obama is right not to target the interrogators in the sense that real responsibility lies much higher up. The senior lawyers and their patrons should derive little comfort from his intervention: they remain at risk of criminal investigation - or worse, in a legal black hole of their own making."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/libertycentral/2009/apr/18/memo-2002-torture-techniques-obama

[Solly Mack]

1. K&R

[laststeamtrain]

2. K & R - n/t.

[HamdenRice]

3. Sands: "Obama is right not to target the interrogators

in the sense that real responsibility lies much higher up."

[pat_k]

4. EVERY Government official that failed to. . .

. . . ACT to stop the commission of a war crime, and failing that, to resign to avoid becoming a party to it, and then report the crimes, is an affirmative duty of Every government official.

Prosecution of Every Official who ordered, rubber stamped, or participated in committing outrages upon persons in the custody of the USA is demanded by our Constitution and the treaties that are part and parcel of that document.

From a http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=8349135&mesg_id=8349963">recent post:

Each and every person entrusted with power that can be abused to commit war crimes is bound by law to "Just Say No" and act to Stop the commission of such crimes. As Alberto Mora, General Counsel of the U.S. Navy did (The Memo). As the JAG Corps members recently praised by Holder did. Many, like the NCIS and FBI personnel who refused to participate in Joint Task Force 170, actually did act reasonably.

As I have said, we subject those who commit war crimes to the ultimate penalty for a reason -- to give any person acting under color of law a powerful reason not to even APPROACH "the line." Those who committed the atrocities -- who bashed heads against walls; who filled lungs with water, who forced people into impossible positions for days; who "monitored" or otherwise enabled -- went WAY over the line.

No "ruling" or "memo" can transform a cruel, inhumane, and degrading act into a humane act. No memo can suspend reality and common sense. As Nuremberg demonstrated to the world, "I was just following orders" does not excuse the commission of war crimes prohibited by the U.S. Constitution and the treaties that are part and parcel of that document as the "supreme law of the land."

We must prosecute Bush, Cheney, and the other officials responsible for implementing and rubber stamping "the program." We must prosecute the employees who refused to say "no" when asked to commit outrages upon the persons in their custody. To do anything less renders the law meaningless and ensures that there will be officials in the future who believe they can commit any act, however abhorrent, with impunity, as long as some authority gives the "go ahead."