These folks should not only be driven from power, they should be jailed. It's amazing how much damage can be inflicted on institutions - like DOJ and the military - that have existed for generations in seven years. It's shocking to me that they've been able to do so much damage. Have we ever seen anything like this?

For almost two years I got to read about the investigation and impeachment of a president over a blow job on the front page of the paper and leading almost every newscast, screaming about how important it all was. The widespread committing of war crimes and other criminal acts? If it gets covered at all is one or two stores, probably on A17, with an analytical tone suggesting it's no more newsworthy than the weather. Ho hum, George Bush issued a signing statement saying he wasn't going to obey the law. Yawn, the United States is torturing people. Bored now, the United States is illegally spying on its citizens.

A better government is critical, but we also need better watchdogs in Congress and the media.

I hate John Yoo with the burning hate of a million suns.

I would like him to stand trial in the Hague for crimes against humanity. It's actually too good a fate for him but it's worse for everyone else to give him what he actually deserves.

He has betrayed his country, liberal democracy and the legal profession at the deepest levels.

We need to put pressure on Berkley, Harvard, U of Tenn, and every other law school to rid themselves of all pro-torture elements.

There is a jail cell with his name on it.

Should be ashamed of itself. It's one thing to hire and retain faculty with diverse political opinions, it's another to hire someone responsible for the U.S. torturing people. On top of that, his legal analysis sucks. I hate to think this guy is training people on how to be a lawyer.

Maybe it is time to contact the Board of Trustees. Maybe if they knew their names would be associated with torture they would do the right thing.

of the board (but no home addresses or other stalkery info). These are people who hire a war criminal, right? Does shame still exist in America (other than about sex)?

as you say, no addresses or stalkery info, but mebbe from the Berkley U website?
I am too lazy to do that.

For the University of California Regents:

http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/re...

... thereby combining our pleasures....

[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.

Calling for John Yoo’s expulsion from the UC Berkeley School of Law faculty is understandable from a viewpoint of anger at his work, but is unwise in the bigger picture of preserving the integrity of academia and the principle of diversity. I am opposed to the effort.

This is not a defense of Yoo himself, and certainly not of his work under the Bush criminal regime. His arguments are repulsive morally, repugnant from a Constitutional standpoint, and poorly argued from a legal perspective (necessarily so, since there is no plausible legal justification – he had nothing substantive from which to work). My argument is one of preserving, for all points of view, the principles of academic independence from political interference of any sort.

UC Berkeley, indeed the entire UC system, intends to operate on the principle that the widest possible diversity of opinion provides the greatest possible opportunity for freedom of expression and thereby a liberal education. Inherently, some members of the faculty will rub some members of the public – and the student body as well as some other faculty – the wrong way.

That is a good thing. It would be a great loss to the educational process if everyone were herded towards the middle of the road, and no one offensive were ever included in the conversation. If progressives want to have voices on faculty arguing for progressive ideals, they must also accept that there will be some voices arguing for anti-progressive positions; freedom is a two-edged sword.

John Yoo came to Boalt Hall (the archaic term for Berkeley Law, indulge me) with much to commend him. He was a Fulbright scholar, who clerked for U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Judge Laurence Silberman and United States Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. He was recruited for a faculty position in 1993, and granted tenure as a full professor in 1999. After his leave of absence for the Bush campaign and service in DOJ, he returned to Berkeley to resume teaching. Unless and until he is convicted of a crime or disbarred, he will retain his tenure as long as he wishes and that is as it should be.

The US Supreme Court in Sweezy v. New Hampshire, 354 U.S. 234 (1957) ruled that the Constitution protects four essentials of freedom that enable a university “…to determine for itself on academic grounds who may teach, what may be taught, how it shall be taught, and who may be admitted to study.’” I hold that it is far more important to protect these freedoms from all assault than it is to demand the firing of one man. If we are to protect the freedom of some academics to question and challenge governmental authority, then we must not only tolerate but protect the freedom of others to argue in favor of its expansion.

Only a lack of trust in the essential intelligence of mankind demands that dissenting voices be stilled. John Yoo is one man, teaching one class. If the UC System is so fragile that one man can corrupt or defame it entirely, then the whole system is already doomed to fail; it is not.

If Yoo has committed a crime, he should be charged and prosecuted and if found guilty then dismissed. Absence a legal demonstration of personally culpable illegality, he can only be punished as he now is - through the thorough and unrelenting disaffection and contempt of his faculty colleagues, his students and his neighbors. That’s how we do it here, in America.

If a conviction leaves him with tenure, then so be it.

[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.

Someone enterprising might want to explore the California process for ethics disbarment. No actual crime required, just breaching the ethical code.

If I get some time, I'll pull the California Rules.

really resolve the issue, IMNVHO.

John Yoo turned the United States of America into a pro-torture nation. His interpretation of the US Code and Geneva Convention amount to simple treason against the Constitution of the United States.

For that, he should hang.

John Yoo came to Boalt Hall (the archaic term for Berkeley Law, indulge me) with much to commend him. He was a Fulbright scholar, who clerked for U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Judge Laurence Silberman and United States Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

Considering that Thomas almost certainly perjured himself in his confirmation hearings and has proven to be a bitter nonentity as a SC judge, and committed treason in Bush v Gore, and that Silberman was grossly violating judicial rules during the hunting of Bill Clinton, I can't see why that pedigree is positive or why a graduate of such a system would surprise anyone by inventing legal grounds for torture.