John Yoo: "I certainly am not in favor of massacring civilians in a village"

[sabra]

http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/inq_ed_board/Chat_John_Yoo_on_the_end_of_an_investigation.html

Monday, March 1, 2010
Chat: John Yoo on the end of an investigation

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1:05


(Comment From JeffJeff: )
John, according to the OPR report, or at least the characterizations I've seen, you told investigators that it is within the president's power to authorize a civilian massacre. I'd really like to hear you elaborate on that position.
Monday March 1, 2010 1:05 Jeff
1:14


Jeff, thank you for the chance to make this clear. OPR's report rips the comment out of its context and I think was unfairly used by the investigators. I certainly am not in favor of massacring civilians in a village, nor did that have anything to do with the questions that we were facing in the Justice Department in the immediate months after the 9/11 attacks. OPR's investigators were asking me what I thought the limits of the President's Commander-in-Chief power were in time of war. My view is that the President's power is limited by military necessity. For example, President Lincoln freed the slaves only in the areas of fighting and Confederate control, but not in loyal parts of the North, because his Commander-in-Chief power did not reach that far. I told the investigators that it would depend on the circumstances, but that the United States has bombed and destroyed cities in past wars and no one at the time thought that the President had acted unconstitutionally. I specifically cited to the OPR investigators the examples of the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Allied strategic bombing campaign in World War II.

I also made clear that this is not to say that anything like this would be a good idea -- my only point is that this is a decision for the President, and not for Congress. I also made clear that under OPR's theory of war powers (Congress has the upper hand and decides strategic and military questions) that Congress could order the President to massacre civilians in a village. Does the Constitution really reserve these difficult wartime questions to Congress rather than the President? The hypothetical does not really answer the constitutional question.

Of course, none of this was quoted or described by OPR in their quest to distort the evidence and the law to reach their desired result. I think, unfortunately, that the insertion of this quotation was an attempt by the OPR investigators to be inflammatory without providing any serious analysis of the questions involved.

[bridgit]

1. Is that a step up from advocating crushing the testicles of a small boy to make his parents talk?

[leftstreet]

2. First thing I thought of, too

This guy is disgusting

:puke: