No Justification for Torture

12/11/2014—I was afraid for a moment that some politicians would attempt to justify torture after the release by the Senate Committee of the report of its post-9/11 investigation of CIA interrogation methods. Thankfully, there has not been very much of that.

It’s nice to be a superpower. So our officials will not be tried as war criminals by any international court. That is too bad.

I would prefer an international tribunal to any attempt to try anyone here, which would just be dismissed as partisan.

Here is what the author of the torture memos, John Yoo, wrote: “‘You might even approve waterboarding in the time of emergency,’” Yoo wrote, “‘if limited only to enemy leaders thought to have information about pending attacks….I thought the CIA’s proposed interrogation methods were within the bounds of the law – just barely. They did not inflict serious, long-term pain or suffering, as prohibited in the federal statute banning torture.’”

Why is John Yoo not shunned by the legal academy? He is a law professor at UC Berkeley, treated as completely normal.