Boo-hoo, John Yoo

Andrew Rice, summarizing news stories in Slate today, writes:

The WP reefers a profile of John Yoo, who is not exactly doing his part to uphold the image of Berkeley law professors. The author of the now-infamous memos justifying torture of alleged terrorists and eavesdropping on American citizens says that he's not concerned that one newspaper editorial board says his way of thinking "threatens the very idea of America." He tells the paper: "It would be inappropriate for a lawyer to say, 'The law means A, but I'm going to say B because to interpret it as A would violate American values.' " Perhaps he ought to check on that with the American Bar Association.

In the same vein, I heard John Yoo take part in a radio panel on NPR's "Talk of the Nation" program on Dec 15, the day that the President agreed to Sen. John McCain's anti-torture amendment. I was appalled to hear how absolutely amoral Yoo's comments were. Everything was calculated in terms of what advantage it gave to the administration and its practices ("practices", as in less than "policies")-- nothing had to do with right and wrong, with humanity, with American values or principles. One was tempted to attribute this to his being a lawyer. But Rice's summary in Slate and the three links (count 'em!) he provides to ABA statements suggest that it is just that Yoo is a particularly amoral lawyer, perhaps even a bad lawyer in one or more senses of the term.

The fact that John Yoo advised, so significantly, our self-proclaimedly Jesus-loving President is highly disturbing. Except of course that our President has demonstrated that he possesses no particularly meaningful morality either, and his so-called allegiance to Jesus seems remarkably content-free.

Addendum: Having just read the original Washington Post article, I am reminded of how deeply the amoral, no, immoral strain in American (American Enterprise Institute-style) conservatism runs, from Dick Cheney to the religious Sen. Orrin Hatch who brought John Yoo to the staff of the Judiciary Committee. One university law professor says Yoo should not be demonized. I suppose I must agree to this: the issue is whether he is being demon-ized or whether we are recognizing the demonic element present in his positions and work, and calling it what it is. Obviously, I believe the latter.