November 2011 Archives

'the hook': setting the stage for war on Syria

November 28, 2011 9:50 AM | | TrackBacks (0)

Will the U.S. find torture allegations a pretext for military action? 

Friday, a United Nations human rights panel expressed alarm at reports of executions and torture of civilians. The Committee Against Torture said it had received "numerous, consistent and substantiated reports" of widespread abuse in the country. Panel chair Claudio Grossman cited his "particular concern" over allegations of child torture.

People should be outraged when any state brutalizes its citizens. And call out the crimes of their government wherever they occur. The U.S. has zero legitimacy on the issue of torture.

Down By Law

November 26, 2011 10:25 AM | | TrackBacks (0)

...one of the best ways to understand John Yoo's advocacy for waterboarding not being torture is not simply through a political lens, but also as someone who was an academic and not a real lawyer. Academics don't get exposed to what law really is: the exercise of imperative force by the state against a private person, or by a corporation or private person against another. Contracts or rules of procedure are not simply ideas. They are ways to get things from others, or to have things taken from you. These actions help and hurt real people, sometimes very deeply. Yoo's torture opinion is absurdly academic hair-splitting, reaching conclusions that are not only wrong as a matter of law, but which ignore willfully the fact that real people are on the receiving end of Yoo's tortured logic: the recipients of waterboarding, and to a lesser extent, the equally real people whose lives and values are compromised by being directed to inflict it. Lawyers understand these realities better than academics, because they have that "practical" thing the academy so abhors.

see WHAT'S WRONG WITH LAW SCHOOL? A LOT.

Trial of Bush, Blair

November 23, 2011 8:12 PM | | TrackBacks (0)

photos from the hearings 

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Following a two year investigation (more here), the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission heard charges brought against the two former heads of state and their accomplices Rumsfeld, Cheney, Gonzales, Addington, Haynes, Bybee and Yoo. Professors Gurdial Nijar and Francis Boyle lead the prosecution. Guilty parties will have their names entered in a Register of War Criminals, publicized worldwide.

MOHD RASFAN/AFP/Getty Images

The best way for Birgeneau to apologize* for police brutalization of students...

November 22, 2011 3:03 PM | | TrackBacks (0)
would be to Fire John Yoo.

The chancellor's approval of torture advocacy by Berkeley Law School dean 
Christopher Edley and professor John Yoo, and more particularly the adoption of the 
latter's martial law policy, has fed violent crack-down on free speech and challenges 
the legitimacy of the entire university system's claims to "academic excellence, 
social equity and public service".

Protest and resistance against John Yoo and his accomplices must expand. The 
"Torture Professor's" first day of class will be here before we know it. Check back here, 
soon, for action plans.

moral incompetence of academe, part III: Linda Katehi

November 21, 2011 8:14 PM | | TrackBacks (0)
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To the tune of "Resign!", "What's your excuse?" and "Not enough!", the tearful UC Davis administrator gets chased off campus.

Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

the ban on torture is absolute; it is not a foreign policy or defense issue

November 21, 2011 2:22 PM | | TrackBacks (0)
"[The Obama administration's] challenge was not only to stop the American government from torturing detainees, but to institutionalize the legal infrastructure that would prevent the resumption of torture. President Obama had the opportunity to leave an unambiguous legal legacy that prohibited torture and inhibited the torturers of tomorrow from finding legal cover. Instead, we may reap the whirlwind of his timidity, and soon. -- Eric Lewis, New York Times

chronicling the dark side

November 18, 2011 12:00 PM | | TrackBacks (0)
"If they were going to make a prison and a court out of reach of the American people, we're not going to allow it to be out of the reach of American journalism -- human rights reporter Carol Rosenberg shares insights on Guantanamo 

defending the Occupy movement

November 15, 2011 9:41 AM | | TrackBacks (0)
logo-main.gif
he System of Capitalist Imperialism is the most destructive force 
in the world. And as we're seeing, violence is the only tactic 
that system has at its disposal to deal with the threat that Occupy 
poses to the 1% that rule the planet.

"Once the infrastructure of a police state is created, it's only a matter of time before those aggressive powers are used...

November 14, 2011 11:02 AM | | TrackBacks (0)

moral incompetence of academe, part II: Christopher Edley

November 12, 2011 9:07 PM | | TrackBacks (0)
0518_03_1-thumb-350x336.jpg A snapshot of how the head of a reasonably prestigious legal program views issues of law, responsibility, accountability and the role of educational institutions in society.

The Berkeley Law dean (pictured here outside 2008 commencement ceremonies) has a disgraceful history of defending Bush regime war criminal John Yoo's continued employment at Boalt Hall.

A battle is raging right now over the future of the University of California. But the question should be not only about whether education will be affordable, but what kind of education it will be.

War Everywhere: (re)defining the Enemy

November 12, 2011 12:52 PM | | TrackBacks (0)
...instead of a pre-established battlefield, the US War on Terror has created a battlespace spanning the entire globe. This lack of geographical limit has led former chief prosecutor for the United States at Guantanamo Bay Morris Davis to declare that the Obama administration is attempting to operate in a "law-free zone".

setting the stage for martial law and a police state

November 9, 2011 12:45 PM | | TrackBacks (0)
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John Yoo did not limit his legal opinions to torture issues. In 2002, some in the Bush regime wanted to test the Constitution by using the military to make arrests in the war of terror within the U.S.  

Yoo's legal memos provided material support. See 

A question for the legal profession:

November 4, 2011 12:18 PM | | TrackBacks (0)
which is the greater crime against the Constitution... waterboarding Al Qaeda suspects or killing US citizens?


hint: you're not likely to find them at Berkeley Law

moral incompetence of academe, part I: Condoleezza Rice

November 4, 2011 11:08 AM | | TrackBacks (0)
1.jpgThe former Secretary of State might have improbably risen out of segregated Birmingham, but for what?



trailer to Sebastian Doggart's documentary film

John Yoo's war crimes

November 3, 2011 11:53 AM | | TrackBacks (0)
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"Why is one of the central  perpetrators of a systematic torture regime teaching at Berkeley law school and welcomed in our most respectable opinion venues? -- Glenn Greenwald 


KQED interviews Glenn here

"Security Searches" at Guantanamo defy rules for attorney-client communications

November 3, 2011 10:34 AM | | TrackBacks (0)
New Policy Allows Officals to Seize and Read Detainees' Privileged Legal Mail
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Physicians for Human Rights
Broken Laws, Broken Lives

NLG White Paper
ON THE LAW OF TORTURE...

The President's Executioner

Detention and torture in Guantanamo



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