Monday, May 17, 2004
MILITARY NECESSITY Brad DeLong links to this Road to Surfdom post comparing and contrasting White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales' statements on the Geneva Convention:
Notice that while the two statements cut in opposite directions, they don't directly contradict one another. So what we've got is more Clintonesque, "legally accurate" flimflam.
"At the same time, President Bush recognized that our nation will continue to be a strong supporter of the Geneva treaties. The president also reaffirmed our policy in the United States armed forces to treat Al Qaeda and Taliban detainees at Guantánamo Bay humanely and, to the extent appropriate and consistent with military necessity, in keeping with the principles of the Third Geneva Convention."--Alberto Gonzales, 5/15/04 (NYT Op-Ed)vs.
"The nature of the new war places a high premium on other factors, such as the ability to quickly obtain information from captured terrorists and their sponsors in order to avoid further atrocities against American civilians...In my judgment, this new paradigm renders obsolete Geneva's strict limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners and renders quaint some of its provisions."--Alberto Gonzales, 1/25/02 (Memorandum to the President, as reported in Newsweek 5/16/04)
Notice that while the two statements cut in opposite directions, they don't directly contradict one another. So what we've got is more Clintonesque, "legally accurate" flimflam.
If only the stakes were still as low as they were during the Monica Lewinsky mess.
