Spain Has Named Names

Spain is indicting 6 men from the Bush administration for war crimes. Like torture, for instance.
[Kind of a reverse Spanish Inquisition, if you will. YOU torture—WE put you on trial. Cool!]

Here are the Inquisition Six:
Former Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales
Cheney’s former Chief of Staff, David Addington
Former Undersecretary of Defense, Douglas Feith
Pentagon General Counsel, William Haynes
Justice Dept lawyer, John Yu
Justice Dept official and current Federal Judge (and ain’t that a kick in the head?), Jay Bybee
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Meanwhile, back in this country, Dawn Johnsen has been nominated for the post of the head of the Office of Legal Counsel.
This is the same Dawn Johnsen who wrote a piece for Slate in which she asked, “Where is the outrage? . . . . We must regain our ability to feel outrage whenever our government acts lawlessly.”
[I guess she hadn’t read my blog or all the blogs I follow every day— to which the only adjective I can apply is —outrage.]

Still, even if she should get out more and maybe increase her reading, she’s apparently an ok kind of person. She sees her job as reversing all the policies followed by the former Office of Legal Counsel.

So, guess who is working like hell to block her confirmation to her new post?

OK. No guess necessary. You know who’s blocking her. I just hope the Rethugs are as effective in her case as they were in blocking the stimulus package.

SIC EM, DAWN!
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Also, meanwhile, it looks like Obama would like the BushCo legal problems to just go away. He’s not appointing a Special Prosecutor to begin the investigation into the previous administration’s lawbreaking.
Even though a lawyer [whose name I forget, sorry] wrote an op-ed recently announcing the profoundly UNsurprising conclusion that Bush’s presidency met all the qualifications of a dictatorship.
Duh.
Another guy who doesn’t get out into blogsville much, I guess. How many times have I—and have you—come to that conclusion? Huh? How many?

Well, since our president doesn’t have the gonads to go after the former administration for its crimes, I’m glad Baltasar Garzón, at least, is doing something.

Of course, the chances of anything coming of the— whatever the Spanish word for ‘indictments’ is —are virtually nil so long as the people involved don’t go out of the country.
And, as we all know, Bush went to Canada last month. But, so far, he’s not on the list— so maybe that doesn’t count.

btw—there has, I think, been a hint that not all names have been named yet and more indictments will be forthcoming. Gee, I hope so.
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You can find more on this at yglesias.