John Barry has written what I will call the "move on" defense of the Bush administration in this week's Newsweek. The idea is that it is fairly clear that the Bush administration violated the law in several instances, but since we already know this and his party has already lost an election, let's just move on already.

You can read the piece here and you can see that I am not exaggerating at all. That is truly his argument. In fact, we will have Barry on the show on Monday to talk to him about this article.

If I seem incredulous at that argument, that's because I am. They never taught me that one in law school. "Look, your honor, we know my client committed this crime, we've already caught him and the victim is already dead. So, let's just move on already!"

To say Bush's defense is that his opponents want "political vengeance" is a non sequitur. Couldn't every trial in the country be characterized as some sort of "vengeance" based on this logic?

The reaction to his law breaking cannot be a defense for his law breaking. "Your honor, your attempt to try my client is an act of vengeance that justifies my client's original law breaking. Hence, he should not be held accountable for his crimes." Would that argument make any sense in the context of any other crime? You would get laughed out of court. They might revoke your admission to the bar.

But we're told that in the political context it makes sense. I think the exact opposite is true. I think it is even more important that we hold our elected leaders to an even higher standard than the average citizen. They are entrusted with enforcing the laws. If they are the ones who break them, society is in much larger trouble.

Bush clearly ordered spying on American citizens without a court order. Everyone knows this. Bush has even admitted it (after originally lying about it). This is clearly illegal. What is the defense? It's legal if the president does it? I think I've heard that one before.

This law is an admonition against the government. If no one in government can be tried for it because it would be "political vengeance" to do so, then the law has no meaning.

The same is true of torture. If a citizen waterboards someone, that is aggravated assault. If the state does it, it is torture. It is by definition a governmental crime. Who do we prosecute if the government has immunity because of the "move on" defense?

Torture is against federal statute and our treaties prohibiting its use are the law of the land. If you allow the Bush administration to do this without any repercussions at all, then you might as well take the law off the books. Because then the state can torture anyone they like. Because prosecuting them would be "political vengeance."

Some will argue that these things were not technically illegal because the Office of Legal Counsel at the Justice Department authorized them. In these cases, the OLC was not an independent actor; they were part of the executive branch and a partner in crime. If Bush said he would like the authorization to kill innocent people and the OLC gave it to him, would it be legal?

By the way, this is not theoretical. The Bush administration's orders did in fact lead to the deaths of many innocent people, like the murder by torture of a taxi-driver named Dilawar at Bagram Air Base. That's what happens when you do illegal torture. Sometimes it gets out of hand. That's part of the treason we passed laws against it.

Now, some can also make a persuasive case for investigating the Bush administration's lies that got us into the Iraq War. There is almost no doubt that the Bush administration manipulated intelligence to get us into that war, but I think that is a harder legal case to prove and it gets too close to policy-making for my comfort.

But these decisions are not mine to make. We should appoint a clearly unbiased independent prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald for example, and let him investigate what was and was not clearly illegal. Fitzgerald is a very careful prosecutor. As we saw in the Libby case, he is not going to overreach. I would be very surprised if he brought up charges on the Iraq War and I would be curious to see where he comes out on torture and illegal spying given the OLC defense. But at the very least, we have to have someone look into this. If we don't, our laws against government power become meaningless.

If the state can say that they have a "move on" defense and that any prosecution against them is an act of "political vengeance," then they will have carte blanche to break any law they like. For me, this isn't about politics. The American people have already rendered their judgment in that sphere. I'm very comfortable with their decision in that regard. I can even see some people's concerns that this might backfire politically on the Democrats. But that is not my concern.

This is about precedent. How many presidents can we allow to break the law before it becomes de facto legal for the president to break the law? In other words, before it becomes legal because the president did it!

Watch The Young Turks Here
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/19992

the man is gone.obsessed much?

So the party of Obama gets a win and is going to turn their backs now on the crimes committed by the Bush Admin.?

Nice.


The man may be gone, but the evil he authorized still permeates this country. Until those guilty have to face the rule of law, like the rest of would have to, then anyone taking the "Move On" defense might as well be accessories.

Turley: Obama ‘accessory’ to war crimes if no prosecution

David Edwards and Ron Brynaert
Raw Story
Wednesday, Jan 28, 2009

A few weeks ago, George Washington University Constitutional Law professor Jonathan Turley, while appearing on MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann, essentially said that the Obama administration would “own” any war crimes — such as the reported waterboarding of 9/11 suspect Khalid Sheikh Mohammed — if it chose to look the other way. On Monday’s show Turley went a little further and suggested that if Obama impedes investigations or prosecution that he wouldn’t just be an “apologist,” but also an “accessory.”

Olbermann started the segment by reading a statement released by the Obama administration in response to last week’s allegations from a former NSA analyst that President Bush’s national security agency targeted news organizations for surveillance and even pried into personal records like finance and travel.”

The response stated, “As the president made clear [last week] his administration is ensuring that all programs are conducted in accordance with our values and the rule of law. There will be no exceptions.”

Olbermann noted that that was similar to claims made by Bush the last few years, insisting that “all programs were conducted consistent with our values and rule of law,” even though most experts have pointed out that methods such as waterboarding are considered torture, inhumane and against the law.

“How much daylight might there be between that and any of the analogs from the Bush White House?” Olbermann asked Turley, who immediately responded, “Not much.”


Turley pointed out that the Obama administration response was written “in the future tense. You weren’t asking whether he would do these things. Nobody thinks that Obama is George Bush. I think we believe that he’s better than these past programs. But people are not asking about the future. We are asking about the past.”

“It takes a lot to avoid a very simple truism,” Turley argued. “That, if true, these would be crimes and we prosecute crimes. We call people criminals who commit them. It is very easy to say. All you need is the principals and the courage to say it.”

Turley said that he had “very little sympathy for the people that committed this torture. I’ve heard President Obama say we don’t want talented people at the CIA looking over their shoulders. Well those talented people in this circumstance would be torturers.”

“But in reality nobody thinks that they’re going to be prosecuted,” Turley continued. “They have something called the estoppel defense where they can say that they were told by people like John Yoo and others that what they did was legal. That does not protect the president and the vice president, and they’re the ones and the people just below them who deserve to be investigated and they must be prosecuted if they’ve committed war crimes or we will shred four treaties and at least four statutes.”

[Turley has more background about the estoppel arguments at his blog.]

“And the problem here is it wouldn’t make Obama an apologist it would make him an accessory,” Turley argued. “He would be preventing the investigation of war crimes. How could he go from that and say that he’s all about the rule of law?”

Referring to the fresh Rove subpoena, Turley said that “we could have an interesting fight where George Bush comes in and says ‘I’m still claiming executive privilege’ when the current president is saying we don’t recognize it. Indeed. Obama’s people could prosecute Rove and others and I think that the federal courts would give much greater rate to the man currently in the Oval Office than the man who just left it.”

Olbermann agreed that “the current executive is the one who gets to decide what executive privilege is.”

This video is from MSNBC’s Countdown, broadcast Jan. 26, 2009.

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Turley_Obama_accessory_to_war_crimes_0127.html

Pretty much what a person preparing to get paid to cover up for this latest, greatest mistake would do to prepare for the job, don't you think? LOL

It will take a lot of "spin" to make barry look good with the way he has started his term.

You can't lay the blame just at Obama's feet. Remember, he's carrying the Globalists ball, the ball Bush handed off to him.

I agree!
The Obama Administration needs to investigate and prosecute Bush and his cronies.

Thats going to be my standard, if Obama doesn't have the Bush criminal activities investigated and prosecuted as needed, then he's no better in my book.

the man and his cronies are not gone far enough.

Let's send them to Gitmo and torture their admissions from them...

Naa, I want to get Bush on that Fox show, the one I think it was called Minute of Truth, not sure, but it's the one where the contestant gets hooked up to the lie detector machine, during Fox primetime.

Might have to start with his underlings though and if you get the right ones and offer them some immunities or commuted sentences, the Bush World gang could be in for a long 2009.

Years ago, reporters for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer are reporting this week, the FBI knew that home mortgage scams were being perpetrated by banks all across the country. They told the Bush Administration, and were denied agents or resources to pursue their cases.

Two years ago then-New York Governor Elliot Spitzer tried to prosecute banks - along with governors or attorneys general of all 50 states - for just these types of crimes and the Bush administration used an obscure Civil War era law to stop him.

Today we learn that the very hustlers who helped destroy our economy, the so-called "investment bankers" at Morgan Stanley and AIG (who have gotten billions of our taxpayer dollars in the recent bailouts) will be getting their bonuses this year, to the tune of $1.13 million in cash for the 400 brokers at AIG.

But while they should be denied their bonuses, the criminals for whom we should re-open Gitmo are Phil Gramm, John Boner, and the other Republicans who changed laws reaching back to the Republican Great Depression of the 1930s to prevent exactly these types of scams.

Reopen Gitmo! Get it ready for the Republicans!

Thom can be heard daily on his radio show 12pm - 3pm ET visit www.thomhartmann.com to stream live or find a station near you
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/20051

Don't get me wrong, I am the last person to defend Bush, but it is becoming old really fast with the way everything barry does is being excused and blamed on Bush. Seriously, just what has come out of that scum bag's mouth since he was elected is plenty to have him up for impeachment, treason and attempted murder, so it is getting pretty hard to really see a difference between the two of them.

There it is.

"it is getting pretty hard to really see a difference between the two of them."

There isn't really any difference, just a gloss coating on Obama that Bush never had.

That old 19th century huckster, P.T. Barnum, is usually credited with the observation that "no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people," a quote that should be chiseled on the tombstone of just about every member of the Bush administration, all those cronies and thieves who have returned to private life ever so much richer for placing their faith in the stupidity of the American people.

They thought we were dumb as sticks, and we proved them right - twice. We elected a man who put his own stupidity on display just about every time he opened his mouth, and still we followed, blindly, as he led us into one disaster after another. With somewhat brighter and more nefarious henchmen manipulating him at every turn, Bush got us bogged down in Iraq, made a natural disaster on our gulf coast even worse than it needed to have been, appointed woefully incompetent people to key positions, squandered trillions, failed to provide proper oversight of our financial institutions, awarded a virtual blank check to his VP's old friends and acquaintances, sat idle as the economy was looted, threw money around in Iraq without accounting for where it was going, allowed such shoddy work to be done there that American servicemen were electrocuted in the showers built for them by Cheney's old company, permitted spying on American citizens in violation of the U.S. Constitution, transformed the image of the U.S. from the good guys to the torture people, and turned the Justice Department into an Injustice Department.

We were lied to, cheated, and stolen from. It was a horror show from start to finish, from the administration's inattention that allowed the attack on the World Trade Center, to the pictures, spread around the world, of American servicemen gleefully degrading prisoners at Abu Ghraib. Add to that the image of American bodies left rotting in the Louisiana sun after Katrina while the heads of FEMA and Homeland Security remained ignorant of the situation there, and you've got a trifecta of arrogance, ignorance, and incompetence rarely matched in the nation's history.

We are a people abused by bad leadership, and the fact that a large number of us chose those leaders only rubs salt in the wounds we've suffered, those scars on our national reputation, our heritage, our values, and our Constitution. The aforementioned P.T. Barnum also famously observed that "there's a sucker born every minute," and it took a great many suckers to fall for the George W. Bush dog-and-pony show. Part of the sham was that little ranch Bush bought in Crawford, Texas to serve as a backdrop to make himself Reagan-esque and portray himself as a simple country boy who loved nothing better than to go out to the boonies and cut brush.

But as soon as that Hollywood set was no longer needed for photo ops and propaganda purposes, George and Laura bought a mansion in an appropriately gated upscale community in the suburbs of Dallas, a place from which Dubya hopes, in his own words, to "replenish the ol' coffers" by taking on lots of lucrative speaking engagements at the conventions thrown by corporations who profited so handsomely during his time in office - until their unfettered greed caught up with them, that is. But lots of the scoundrels managed to make off with their loot, especially those no-bid contractors who took over functions the U.S. military once performed for itself.

As incompetent as Bush proved to be, as unsuited and unprepared for the job given to him by all that combined American stupidity and suckerdom, ol' Dubya never let his shortcomings get in the way of his down time. He barely missed a day on his little mountain bike, and he spent more time on vacation than any president before him - almost a third of his tenure in office was spent away from his desk.

Which is probably a good thing given how inept and hapless the man was. Though, to be fair, he did achieve the objectives set for him by the wealthy people whose money and influence put him in the Oval Office. They wanted an easily duped chief executive, one who would do their bidding, one who would put their very own foxes in charge of the henhouses and who would secure for them a gusher of tax breaks that would make their former wealth pale by comparison.

And now the Bush chauvinists and apologists want us all to believe that Bush kept us safe during his presidency (except for that minor little slip up on 9/11, of course). There is no evidence that anything Bush did thwarted any terrorist strike in the U.S., but that's what we're told to believe, even though there was no real need for terrorists to strike us after what they pulled off in 2001. The Bush administration took it from there, keeping the nation terrified whenever it suited their purposes, wasting our money and the lives of our young men and women in an Iraq sideshow that had nothing at all to do with a "war on terror." Osama bin Laden's wish had been to disrupt the economy and for the U.S. to bankrupt itself. Thanks to the Bush administration, that's pretty much what we did. The terrorists could not have had a better ally than the Bush bunch.

They should be in jail, these men - Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and the rest of the neo-cons who are, at the very least, international war criminals, men who sanctioned waterboarding and other "enhanced interrogation techniques" that disgraced us all, tarnished our image throughout the world, and increased the peril of our own servicemen. Bush and his facinorous friends, all those powerful yeggs with their saponaceous ways and ventripotent greed must never be forgiven nor forgotten.
_______

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/20076

My god...

It must be a really sad life when you wake up and what you want to endeavor for the day is what we can do to a former president.

WHy not get a cup of coffee, meet some friends for the SUper Bowl, and live life! Give it a rest already!

Seriously

Wow, that was informative, constructive and it leant so much to the discussion.

We the People have a responsibility to hold those placed in powers feet to the fire when it's needed. When we don't...

Would you let a murderer go or a rapist? or a child molester? This clown cannot get away with what he has done to our country.