Progress in Bush torture case

Remember change.gov? This statement still exists there:

The United States was founded on the idea that all people are endowed with inalienable rights, and that principle has allowed us to work to perfect our union at home while standing as a beacon of hope to the world. Today, that principle is embodied in agreements Americans helped forge -- the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Geneva Conventions, and treaties against torture and genocide -- and it unites us with people from every country and culture.

Michael Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights has prepared an indictment of former US President George W. Bush:

The case against Bush in Switzerland is, in some ways, a commentary on law and politics in the United States. But not in the way Frum presents it. Sadly, it is a commentary on the failure of the U.S. legal system to demonstrate its strength and independence from politics. Bush has openly admitted authorizing acts that constitute torture. The case against him will be investigated and tried — if not in the United States then in a country that has the courage to give meaning to its legal obligation to investigate and prosecute torturers.

This from Joe Palazzolo at the Legal Times:

The Justice Department has taken steps to avoid the appearance of impropriety. Ethics officials have advised lawyers -- including Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. -- to recuse themselves in matters involving detainees represented by their former firms. Holder, for one, is disqualified from participating in matters involving 16 Yemeni detainees represented by his former firm, Covington and Burling. Holder never participated directly in the firm's Guantanamo work, and the American Bar Association's Rules for Professional Conduct wouldn't require a recusal in this case. Principal Deputy Solictor General Neal Katyal successfully argued Hamdan v. Bush while a professor at the Georgetown University Law Center. In Hamdan, the Supreme Court found that the Bush administration's military commissions for trying suspected terrorists violated the Uniform Code of Military Justice and the Geneva Conventions.

With Michele Batshitmann entering the Republican presidential primary, nothing would change the tone of the campaign quite like indicting a war criminal, innit? Howard Zinn tag at DemocracyNow!