Report: Bush Lawyer Said President Could Order Civilians to Be 'Massacred'

I could honestly see certain individuals trying to drag this mans name through the mud in order to save face. If this is not the case then this is the worst lawyer in America. I would have to question anybody who would actually take these exact words and use them in real life. I can understand the White House needing lawyers to clarify what can an cannot be done. However, there is a line that you don't need a lawyer to understand that an action is wrong.

Uhh, aside from the title being incredibly mislabeled, as there was no "order," what on Earth does "waterboarding and other aggressive interrogation techniques" have to do with massacre?

Absolutely nothing.


Either make an honest statement, or divide this into two different posts. You aren't going to combine these two topics and make any sense. What exactly were you trying to do here?


Cheers,
Strype

[edit on 20-2-2010 by Strype]

Well, if I am not mistaken, this is the lawyer that advised the Bush administrations on what was and what was not considered torture, legally. \

Which would include waterboarding.

[edit on 20-2-2010 by Styki]

reply to post by Styki


So, supposedly Bush's lawyer told him Waterboarding was legal. Then what? I'm curious.


Strype


Edit: Well, you were a lot quicker to respond to my first post. Good defense, I'll give you that (*throws a huge foam finger up*). Unfortunately I need to hit the sack. I'd have liked to see what happened afterward, because I'm pretty sure it didn't involve an "order" to "massacre" anybody, but hey... To each his own.

Look forward to learning new things tomorrow. Help me out, folks.

[edit on 21-2-2010 by Strype]

ReEdit: (Continuing from post above)

Besides, what does Bush's lawyer have to do with the President anyway? Do they have ties? Show me why I should be worried about anything Bush's lawyer claims Obama "could" or.... "could not" do. He's obviously defending an individual who's known to be corrupt, who willingly lied to an entire nation several times. I'm supposed to believe what this guy has to say about my new President? Are you kidding me?


Cheers,
Strype

[edit on 21-2-2010 by Strype]

Originally posted by Pacal Votan

Originally posted by December_Rain
reply to post by ModernAcademia

 

Guess MR O'Reilly needs to see this video

(snip)

Guess he still feels bu#thurt being targeted by 4Chan Anons

[edit on 20-2-2010 by December_Rain]

so..um...which one is worse?
bill oreally (an adult) spouting off his nonsense, which he gets paid to do or this potty mouthed little girl who is obviously parroting her so called parents beliefs. they should be ashamed of themselves.

this little girl and the american public share one thing in common. they are both victims due to their ignorance.

bill is a cheerleader for the lying war mongers that have spent the fruits of our labors to cause the willful suffering of innocent people just like you & I... he's no better than one of goebbels useful idiots or tokyo rose.

The kid is hilarious and less mummy like...this will probably fade away as childhood memories do, but hopefully IMO she will grow up remembering that partys and their leaders divide, conquer and manipulate their tax paying pleebs into killing strangers... nazi, republican, democrat, communist, socialist, baath, likud are all lead by puppets of oligarchs who like to pick international fights for profit while sending other peoples kids to die fighting it.

We have had the national guard all over pa in the last few months. Its almost a joke how blatently they do it

Originally posted by Strype
Uhh, aside from the title being incredibly mislabeled, as there was no "order,"

Allow me to disagree. The title says Bush Lawyer because John Yoo served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General—a position you're appointed to by the administration—under President Bush.

Newsweek might also have referred to him this way because, as Styki pointed out, John Yoo is notorious for being the author of, or helping draft, several memoranda that shaped the Government's policies, including “indefinite detention,” waterboarding and warrantless wiretapping.

If you read the title carefully and not emotionally you will realize that it says that this person, John Yoo, claimed the President could order a village to be massacred. That is a fact, that you will find on page 70 of the OPR report (or viewing this image if you do not wish to download the 289 page report). No one is saying that the President did.

I think it's still relevant, however, to know the views of people who were advising the President of the United States and in effect telling him what was and wasn't legal, what he could and couldn't do. I understand if you don't care about that.

Now, the reason why I used this title is because this is the title of the article I linked. In case you aren't aware, that is a guideline set by ATS on the news submission page.

(Must be the exact same headline as used in the news story you're submitting.)

Welcome to war friend, the object is to stack piles of men, women, and children until the enemy says he has had enough. Look at the history of warfare as well, when we become overly concerned about civilian casualties we loose the war. Its sad, but its the way it is.

What gives the bloody government the bloody right to massacre anybody. We are all human at the end of the day. All i see them for are muppets for the elite, dress in fancy suits, make promises they can't keep, live off our taxes and expenses, take our boys to war, cause wars, provoke enemies to attack our nations when its not us in fault its our bliming governments who need to get on the front line with there men like back in the ages, real warriors, true fighter's who make a stand for what they think is in the best interest of the public.

Instead of the use of our government who use us as rodents of the bottomness. We need to rise higher than them as we the people should know better and return them to the serpents where they belong. What gives them the right to do such atrocidies.

Their's more of us than them a good 600,000 times more of us than them 6,000,000,000 worldwide population. 10,000 elite. I say @@ them and their system. Their's more of us that can work as a team. They will always be more of us than them. About time we make a stand.


[edit on 21-2-2010 by DClairvoyant]

reply to post by ExPostFacto

... Now we find out he is seeking advise on whether he had the ability to massacre citizens? ...

Take a deep breath. Count to ten. Let it out. There, that's better, isn't it?

As heinous as this 'advice' is, it isn't talking about massacring citizens of the good ol' USA.

It's only talking about those people who insist on living in a war zone on top of oil fields.

reply to post by Pacal Votan

...this potty mouthed little girl who is obviously parroting her so called parents beliefs...

A little homework could have saved you a little bit of tenseness here. This is obviously a piece of art, and the info on the YouTube submission clearly labels it as such. The girl is an actress, and of course she is 'reading her lines'. It probably took about 16 billion takes to get all that put together.

You can cry about exploitation all you want, but this is no different whatsoever from Shirley Temple or the 'Our Gang' films.

It is apparently an ad for a band with a political viewpoint, though I'm not sure I could identify the name of the band (which a 'good' ad should ensure), I am quite sure I understand the gist of their political stance.

reply to post by LibertarianConstitutional
Yes it's war, but even war has laws and being a nation of laws we have to uphold and defend them.

I must say I'm surprised by your apathetic response, especially taking into consideration your username and signature that explicitly emphasizes the importance you attribute to the Constitution, and upholding it I assume.

I say this because “indefinite detention,” a policy that John Yoo argued for and helped implement, is in direct violation of the Constitution, mainly Article I Section 9 that makes clear that “habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion”

Then we have Article 6 that—as I'm sure you are aware—says, under paragraph 2, “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; ...” As you know the United States has signed and ratified many treaties, including several Geneva Conventions, that are explicit on the matter of detention and treatment of prisoners. There's also the War Crimes Act that define “grave breach[es] of the Geneva Conventions” as war crimes, and torture is explicitly mentioned as being a grave breach.

I'm surprised to see that someone such as yourself, that emphatically views the Constitution—and therefor the law of the land—as being of the most importance, would react to blatant violations of said law with little or no emotion and dismiss these violations as merely the “cost of doing business” during war.

reply to post by ModernAcademia

This is exactly what they are against and Billy boy is making them look like crazies, interesting that they only want law enforcement, firefighters and army vets as members. Sends an even stronger message perhaps doesn't it?

Well, Bill did give voice to a bit of skepticism, and I gotta say, I can't remember ever coming close to agreeing with a Bill O'Reilly point of view. But in fact he did go extremely soft on the guy.

He did hit the nail on the head though: the oath takers are specifically repudiating the oath they originally gave as a public safety officer or as military service person. They are not, as they try to claim, 'renewing' their original oath, once taken public service oaths do not expire, ever. There is no need to renew it.

In fact, they are taking an 'new' oath that commits them to violate that original service oath. The new oath is specifically worded to cancel the effects of the original oath.

The original oath that a police officer, or a fireman, or a military recruit takes, is to serve the public good, uphold the Constitution and the Law, and to obey the chain of command.

What the new oath does is to attempt to specifically remove the requirement to obey the chain of command. This has the effect of reducing the management of an emergency situation to anarchy, and anyone attempting to manage an emergency situation is put into a hopeless situation.

Under the guise of empowering the 'man on the street' to fight back against foreign troops in our streets, or government mandated concentration camps, or whatever fantasy is this week's flavor of the month, they are actually trying to legitimize armed rebellion against the Government and overthrow the Constitution.

The Oathtaker (sorry as I write this I can't remember his name) claims that the confiscation of firearms in New Orleans during the emergency operations was unconstitutional. Well, yes, it possibly was, but what part of the word 'emergency' is misunderstood here?

Which part of 'law enforcement completely absent' is misunderstood here? Which part of 'armed looters operating in a lawless city' is misunderstood here? Which part of 'armed looters operating in a lawless city interfering with rescue operations' is misunderstood?.

Remember the Constitution specifically says "to ensure a well regulated militia" when it talks about the "right to bear arms". Looters are not a well regulated militia, nor are starving flood victims waiting to be evacuated from their drowned homes, nor are hoodlums preying on refugees stranded in a football stadium.

Even in the days of the "wild west" towns were declared "no gun zones" to protect the populace from violence that couldn't be controlled by the meager law enforcement services. And when a "well regulated militia" was needed, say for a posse to chase down some criminal, its members were 'deputized', that is sworn to obey the Sheriff or Marshal or whatever.

A public service officer is not a member of a 'well regulated militia' if they have repudiated their oath to obey the chain of command. And that is exactly what these 'Oath Take(back)ers' are doing.


[edit on 21/2/2010 by rnaa]

Originally posted by rnaa
As heinous as this 'advice' is, it isn't talking about massacring citizens of the good ol' USA. It's only talking about those people who insist on living in a war zone on top of oil fields.

It's important to clarify that this wasn't an advice given to the President. It's Yoo's opinion on the range of the President's powers and authority, when asked for the OPR report, in regards to that hypothetical scenario.


Your characterization of the civilian situation is curious.

As you know, John Yoo's opinions and work in the Office of Legal Counsel refer to the so called War on Terror, that is embodied by the military presence in Afghanistan and Iraq. Both the Afghans and Iraqis are not people “who insist on living in a war zone on top of oil fields,” but people whose neighborhoods were turned into a war zone. And those oil fields belong to them.

reply to post by converge

Your characterization of the civilian situation is curious.

Sorry.

What is the emoticon for sarcasm? Perhaps I wasn't as obvious as I thought I was.

reply to post by rnaa
Sorry, my sarcasm detector failed me

Peace

Is FDR and Truman war criminals?? How about Lincoln? How about now, is President Obama a war criminal? President Obama has the power to bring back almost every soldier right now, but he doesn't. Is he guilty, should the world bring the Nobel Peace Prize winning President up on charges?

Originally posted by thinline
How about now, is President Obama a war criminal?

If he sanctions such policies as “indefinite detention” and waterboarding, then in my opinion, yes.

President Obama has the power to bring back almost every soldier right now, but he doesn't. Is he guilty, should the world bring the Nobel Peace Prize winning President up on charges?

What charges are those? What war crimes do you think he is guilty of?