When your nation's only accountability is a late-night comedian

I watch The Daily Show every night. When John Yoo was on the other night flogging his manifesto of self-serving lies I turned it off. I don't need to hear that son of a bitch try to spin his enabling of war crimes into something noble and patriotic. He makes me sick and angry. I will watch his war crimes trial. Fat chance.

Attytood, links at site:

I did indeed watch the interview that torture-enabler, Inquirer op-ed columnist and Episcopal Academy alum John Yoo did with Jon Stewart on "The Daily Show." And...it was what it was, which was an interview of a highly intelligent, unflappable and affable man who did some very, very bad things.

An interview conducted not by a prosecutor, or a congressional investigator, the kind of people who should be asking questions of the former Bush administration official who wrote the memos authorizing torture at Guantanamo and elsewhere.

But by a comedian.

Why didn't Stewart nail him on these statements?! Maybe, um, because he's a comedian -- one that people admire because he has a sense of moral outrage in addition to a sense of humor, but a comedian nonetheless. Stewart was able to "compel" Yoo to testify in the court of public opinion because Yoo needed the Daily Show to help sell his new book. Of course, there's plenty of folks who could compel Yoo to testify in a real court or investigate hearing. But this is America -- we don't really do the whole accountabilty thing.

Call it the new American exceptionalism. As Glenn Greenwald and others have noted, other nations around the world are going through exhaustive investigations of what went wrong during the decade of the 2000s in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, even as the United States -- which masterminded the Iraq invasion, opened up Gitmo, and waterboarded prisoners during that period -- is the nation with the most to answer for. Consider England, where the Chilcot inquiry into the launching of the Iraq war continues to make front-page news. Heck, even Iran is charging people in the deaths of its detainees. Here at home, we refuse to look back, fearful that our massive Jenga tower of militaristic foreign policy might collapse.

The selling of John Yoo is made even more frustrating by the fact that in his case, there actually is the potential for some measure of accountability. More than a year ago, in the waning days of the Bush administration, the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility wrapped up a report that is said to be quite damning toward Yoo and a colleague -- reportedly accusing the lawyers of "sloppy legal analysis, misjudgments and possible political interference" and recommending them for possible disbarment. Amazingly, the report has been kept under wraps by an Obama administration that seems no more motivated to hold torture (d?-G) criminals accountable than the administration that committed the crimes.

In a perfect world, there would be criminal investigations and charges against Yoo and the others behind the Bush torture regime. At the very least, the Justice report on Yoo must be released and disbarment proceedings must begin. Because the idea that America can handle one of the worst stains on our nation's legacy through a late-night comedy show is the biggest joke of all.

Ha-fuckin'-ha. Some joke.

Note to AG Holder: Do your job, which, if you need to be reminded, is to investigate crimes and prosecute criminals wherever you find them and no matter who committed them. These are in plain sight and are a festering sore on this nation.