... that in the view of the British government, "the intelligence [in the U.S.] was being fixed around the policy [of war by the Bush administration.]

Yoo's memo reveals that the legal analysis was being fixed around the policy of approving torture as well, as Yoo's memo was issued on a Saturday, the day after Jay Bybee left the OLC. As Marty Lederman states as "soon [Bybee] was quite literally out the door, John Yoo did not hesitate to issue the opinion on a weekend, [March 13, 2003 was a Saturday] presumably bypassing the head of the office (Acting AAG Ed Whelan) and the Attorney General."

In other words, the first thing you do isn't "kill all the lawyers" as Dick the Butcher advised. It's "kill all the lawyers" who aren't willing to tell you that the policy you want to enact is lawful.

Thus, Yoo not only approves torture, but uses tortured logic to arrive where his bosses need him to arrive, concluding in the memo that "to constitute torture "severe pain" must rise to... the level that would ordinarily be associated with a physical condition or injury sufficiently serious that it would result in death, organ failure, or serious impairment of body functions."

Just months later, Army Spec. Sabrina Harman would write home from Abu Ghraib, that "Not many people know this sh*% goes on. The only reason I want to be there is to get the pictures and prove that the US is not what they think. But I don’t know if I can take it mentally. What if that was me in their shoes.

These people will be our future terrorist... Both sides of me think its wrong. I thought I could handle anything. I was wrong."

Spec. Harman isn't famous for her words as much as for her pictures, which documented the scenes taking place at Abu Ghraib. Yoo's memo opened the door to this abuse, but thus far only a few of the "specialists" have been punished, while the supposed legal specialists at the top were rewarded for serving their masters so well.

The New Yorker article on Spec. Harman is at http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/03/24/080324fa_fact_gourevitch?currentPage=all

You got right to the source of the problem. Not only is the headline "Fourth and Fifth Amendments Removed by White House Lawyer" not an Onion headline, it's not even a headline.

The institution charged with informing citizens about their government has decided bowling form trumps a candidate's view on whether the Bill of Rights apply.

And Brian Ross, a journalist who's been targeted by this administration, now focuses not on its excesses but instead on where Hillary was on the "infamous night" decades ago. Either (1) he learned his lesson from the administration about coloring outside the lines and was scared off or, (2) he learned it from his editors and started focussing on the "Drudgery" of the modern, corporate journalist.

From this morning's AP article spork_incident described:

"Mukasey... came to the Justice Department after 18 years on the bench and a lucrative 21 months as a partner at New York law firm Patterson, Belknap Webb & Tyler, during which he netted almost $2 million."

But the poor former federal judge, being a regular guy like McCain, describes himself as needing the cash:

"With only nine months left on the job, Mukasey is not sure what he's going to do after he leaves the Justice Department. He still will be working — "I have to because my creditors want to be paid," he said."

Aww.

And a longtime friend provides more evidence of Mukasey's "regular guy" status as he "has a dry and self-deprecating wit that "maybe doesn't come across when you first meet him," said longtime pal Rudy Giuliani."

"It's annoying to eat with him because he doesn't gain weight," Giuliani said.Recalling a trial they worked on together, Giuliani said, "every day we would have lunch together and he would order Ring Dings." Giuliani added: "He is a very regular guy — no pretenses. He has a lot of humility."

The article then illustrates this humility, which comes through even when he's subjected to tough questioning from the "press:"

"At times, the job is more visible than Mukasey might care for. During a Los Angeles news conference, he shut down a reporter who suggested gang members should be considered domestic terrorists and subjected to waterboarding, an interrogation tactic that simulates drowning and is called torture by critics. "I'm not going to talk about interrogation techniques," Mukasey snapped."

It's a tough gig he landed. Imagine being subjected to a press conference question about whether we should expand our use of torture to gang members and having to answer it with a glorified "no comment."

Here is the article's money quote, however:

"Given last year's tumult at the department... it is important for the public to feel comfortable with Mukasey, said political scientist and psychoanalyst Stanley Renshon.

"People want to make sure they're not getting another controversial figure," said Renshon... "You want to have someone up there who gives the impression that they know what's going on. And once you have that confidence, I think you've really done your due diligence."

Nothing to see here folks. We found a guy whose due diligence consists of creating a good "impression... that they know what's going on." So the question of whether they either divulged or invented a call from AQ to the USA isn't relevant. After all, he can cry on demand.

I bet he's a hell of a bowler too, being a regular, Ring-ding eating guy and all.

(the article's at my name link)