I just came across a website set up as a clearinghouse page for sanctions against Bush torture enabler John Yoo. Such possible sanctions include disbarment, dismissal from his tenured position at the UC Berkeley Law School, and, hopefully, a war crimes trial.
It seems that, with Spain taking the lead against the Bush-Cheney torture team, we need to do all we can to see that justice is served. Giving John Yoo the punishment he deserves is thus one such place.
Jonathan Turley provides a link on his blog to a website to coordinate the campaign to fire John Yoo
The sponsoring organization is the The NO TO TORTURE - JOHN YOO MUST GO! Coalition
Their statement:
The NO TO TORTURE - JOHN YOO MUST GO! coalition was initially convened by members of the Bay Area chapters of the National Lawyers Guild (NLG) and the World Can't Wait. The immediate impetus was the release of torture memos written by UC law professor John Yoo, one of the main architects of the legal justification for U.S. torture policies that have shocked the conscience of the world, and the NLG's announcement of its demands that Yoo be dismissed, disbarred, and put on trial for war crimes.
Coalition meetings have quickly expanded to include Boalt and UC alumni, students, and scholars; the Coalition for an Ethical American Psychological Association; two organizations who work for rights of torture survivors; Act Against Torture; the Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute; and other community, human rights, and anti-war activists. The coalition seeks to give effective support to the NLG's demands, and to rally this support throughout the UC community and from the legal profession and the larger community as well.
Work of the NO TO TORTURE - JOHN YOO MUST GO! Coalition:
The coalition's first action in May was a mobilization at the BOALT HALL GRADUATION, initially called by Act Against Torture. Over 200 protestors, many in hoods and orange jumpsuits representing torture victims, greeted the graduates and their guests offering orange ribbons and fact sheets, and performing street theater. We called on graduates to help stop torture. A small plane flew over the stadium towing a banner: Shame on Yoo and UC - End Torture Now!
ON JUNE 27, the coalition hosted a TOWN HALL featuring attorney Stephen Rohde, constitutional lawyer, writer, activist and past president of the ACLU of Southern California. He and other experts debated issues of academic freedom, university tenure and culpability for torture.
Early this Fall, a major WAR CRIMES TRIBUNAL will gather legal and human rights experts to present evidence against John Yoo and the Bush administration on the matter of torture. This tribunal will attract national media coverage.
The coalition is taking out dramatic PUBLIC ADVERTISEMENTS about this campaign, so that hundreds of thousands of people will learn more about, and join into, the demand for U.C. to stop harboring war criminals.
And as far as what UC Berkeley could possibly do:
Under UC Berkeley's code of conduct, a criminal conviction would lead to dismissal even for tenured professors, although criminal conviction may not be necessary in Yoo's case, according to Christopher Kutz, law professor at UC Berkeley. Disbarment proceedings and "serious professional ethical violations," such as knowingly giving bad advice, could also lead to Yoo's firing, he said.
"I know many faculty, like all citizens, are very concerned about the production of these memoranda, and about possible breaches of professional ethics," said Kutz.
Berkeley's administrators do not plan to dismiss or disciplining Yoo yet, but its Academic Senate - which handles disciplinary actions against faculty including tenured professors - has received complaints about Yoo's actions while working for the Bush administration from faculty, students and alumni, said Kutz, who is also vice chairman of UC Berkeley's Academic Senate.
"It is possible that the Academic Senate will take up an inquiry based on these complaints," he said. "Yoo would not be disciplined for his work outside the university unless, and until, there are credible findings."
I recommend joining this coalition and demanding justice be served.
Meanwhile, here is some blowback from the editorialists which is distorting the very concept of academic freedom, a concept that right wingers, whose rhetoric they are parroting generally have much problem with.