A Spanish court has taken the first steps toward opening a criminal investigation into allegations that six former high-level Bush administration officials violated international law by providing the legal framework to justify the torture of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, an official close to the case said.The case, against former Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales and others, was sent to the prosecutor’s office for review by Baltasar Garzón, the crusading investigative judge who ordered the arrest of the former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. The official said that it was “highly probable” that the case would go forward and that it could lead to arrest warrants.
I would agree that Alberto Gonzales is guilty of a grave crime . Alas, there is no actual criminal liability that attaches to being criminally stupid.
The others are simply being abused by the "international" legal system which seems determined to give succor to the likes of Saddam Hussein and various GITMO inmates.
The complaint under review also names John C. Yoo, the former Justice Department lawyer who wrote secret legal opinions saying the president had the authority to circumvent the Geneva Conventions, and Douglas J. Feith, the former under secretary of defense for policy.....The other Americans named in the complaint were William J. Haynes II, former general counsel for the Department of Defense; Jay S. Bybee, Mr. Yoo’s former boss at the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel; and David S. Addington, who was the chief of staff and legal adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney.
If indictments are actually handed down against these men, they would be badges of honor. Feith, for one, is confused as to why he would even be dragged into this:
Mr. Feith, who was the top policy official at the Pentagon when the prison at Guantánamo was established, said he did not make the decision on interrogation methods and was baffled by the allegations. “I didn’t even argue for the thing I understand they’re objecting to,” he said.
There are a lot of people out there who think that, but for a small cabal of neo-cons, there would have been no 9/11, no GITMO, no "torture," and no Iraq War. These are also the same people who think that the ice caps are going to melt in 5 years, and that they can stop this by driving Priuses. "Judge" Garzon, who has determined that he has jurisdiction over the entire planet, is no impartial observer. He is yet another leftist trying to tie America down in legalisms and arrest warrants. That he would never bring such harassing charges against left wingers like the rulers of Cuba, Venezuela, China, Viet Nam, and Nicaragua shows not only his ideological proclivities, but also his intellectual cowardice. That this comes out of one of our ostensible allies shows, once again, that we need to re-think some of our most basic alliances.
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