No. On Tue, Mar 3, 2009 at 10:57 AM, Scott Stroz <[email protected]> wrote: > > 9/11 pretty much shook up the Etch-a-Sketch.  I don't blame them for > thinking that some of this stuff may have been necessary (which is what most > of this article talks about). > > The blame would come from actually putting them into practice. > > On Tue, Mar 3, 2009 at 12:36 PM, Larry Lyons <[email protected]> wrote: > >> >> You have to give them credit at least for being consistent. I'm surprised >> that no one has commented on this already. >> >> http://www.newsweek.com/id/187342?from=rss >> >> Extraordinary Measures >> >> A new memo shows just how far the Bush administration considered going in >> fighting the war on terror. >> Michael Isikoff >> Newsweek Web Exclusive >> >> In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, the Justice Department secretly gave >> the green light for the U.S. military to attack apartment buildings and >> office complexes inside the United States, deploy high-tech surveillance >> against U.S. citizens and potentially suspend First Amendment >> freedom-of-the-press rights in order to combat the terror threat, according >> to a memo released Monday. >> >> Many of the actions discussed in the Oct. 23, 2001, memo to then White >> House counsel Alberto Gonzales and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's >> chief lawyer, William Haynes, were never actually taken. >> >> But the memo from the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counselâalong >> with others made public for the first time Mondayâillustrates with new >> details the extraordinary post-9/11 powers asserted by Bush administration >> lawyers. Those assertions ultimately led to such controversial policies as >> allowing the waterboarding of terror suspects and permitting warrantless >> wiretapping of U.S. citizensâsteps that remain the subject of ongoing >> investigations by Congress and the Justice Department. The memo was >> co-written by John Yoo, at the time a deputy attorney general in the Office >> of Legal Counsel. Yoo, now a professor at the Boalt Hall School of Law at >> the University of California, Berkeley, has emerged as one of the central >> figures in those ongoing investigations. >> >> In perhaps the most surprising assertion, the Oct. 23, 2001, memo suggested >> the president could even suspend press freedoms if he concluded it was >> necessary to wage the war on terror. "First Amendment speech and press >> rights may also be subordinated to the overriding need to wage war >> successfully," Yoo wrote in the memo entitled "Authority for Use of Military >> Force to Combat Terrorist Activity Within the United States." >> >> This claim was viewed as so extreme that it was essentially (and secretly) >> revokedâbut not until October of last year, seven years after the memo was >> written and with barely three and a half months left in the Bush >> administration. >> >> At that time, Steven Bradbury, who headed the Office of Legal Counsel >> throughout Bush's second term, concluded that Yoo's statements about >> overriding First Amendment freedoms were "unnecessary" and "overbroad and >> general and not sufficiently grounded in the particular circumstance of a >> concrete scenario," according to a memo from Bradbury also made public >> Monday. >> >> Kate Martin, the director for the Center for National Security Studies, a >> Washington think tank, said the newly disclosed memo by Yoo and Robert >> Delahunty, another OLC lawyer, was part of a broader legal reasoning that >> gave President Bush essentially unfettered powers in the war on terrorism. >> "In October 2001, they were trying to construct a legal regime that would >> basically have allowed for the imposition of martial law," said Martin. >> (Yoo, also a visiting scholar at the conservative American Enterprise >> Institute, did not respond to a request for comment. Gonzales's lawyer, >> George Terwilliger, said he had not yet had a chance to review the newly >> released memo and also declined to comment.) >> >> On Jan. 15, 2009âwith only five days left before Bush left >> officeâBradbury also rescinded three other legal memos written during the >> president's first term that claimed broad powers to unilaterally suspend >> treaties, bypass restrictions on domestic surveillance and take other >> actions to combat terrorism without the approval of Congress. Bradbury said >> in a separate legal memo that the claims made in these earlier memos were >> based on unsound legal reasoning and should not be viewed as >> "authoritative." But he offered no explanation for why he waited until the >> waning days of Bush's presidency to withdraw them. >> >> The most controversial, and best known, of Yoo's legal opinions was his >> Aug.. 1, 2002, memo that effectively approved the president's right to >> disregard a federal law banning torture in ordering the interrogation of >> terror suspects. An accompanying (and still unreleased) memo from the same >> day approved the CIA's authority to use "waterboarding" (or simulated >> drowning) against terror suspects. >> >> In a related matter, the CIA acknowledged in a legal filing Monday that it >> has destroyed 92 interrogation tapes of two suspects who were subjected to >> waterboarding. While it was previously known that the agency had destroyed >> some tapes, the number of destroyed tapes was far more "systemic" than had >> previously been known, according to Amrit Singh, a lawyer with the American >> Civil Liberties Union, which has been seeking records about the destroyed >> evidence under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. >> >> A U.S. government official familiar with the matter said all of the >> destructions took place in November 2005 and mostly involved the >> interrogations and detention of Abu Zubaydah, a "high-value" detainee who >> was captured in March 2002 and remains today at the U.S. detention facility >> at Guantánamo Bay. A small number of the destroyed tapes also involved the >> interrogation and detention of another suspect, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, an >> alleged architect of the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole. Justice >> Department special counsel John Durham, who is investigating the destruction >> of the tapes, previously said he planned to finish his interviews by the end >> of February, but has given no indication of whether he plans to charge >> anybody involved with a crime. >> >> The newly disclosed Oct. 23, 2001, memo was in response to a request from >> Gonzales, at the time President Bush's top lawyer, and Haynes, who was chief >> counsel at the Pentagon, to determine if there were any restrictions on the >> use of the U.S. military inside the country in targeting terror suspects. >> The Yoo memo essentially concluded there were none. The country, he argued, >> was in a "state of armed conflict." The scale of violence, he argued, was >> unprecedented and "legal and constitutional rules" governing law >> enforcementâsuch as the Fourth Amendment prohibition on "unreasonable" >> searches and seizuresâdid not apply. >> >> At one point, the memo says, the U.S. military could be used for "targeting >> and destroying" a hijacked airline or "attacking civilian targets, such as >> apartment buildings, offices or ships where suspected terrorists were >> thought to be." At another point, the memo advices: "Military action might >> encompass making arrests, seizing documents or other property, searching >> persons or places or keeping them under surveillance, intercepting >> electronic or wireless communications, setting up roadblocks, interviewing >> witnesses or searching for suspects." >> >> URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/187342 >> >> > >
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