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I prefer politico-legal advocacy books where fewer than half of the authors are war criminals, but that could just be me. (I also prefer such books where none of the authors are Federalist Society members, but I’m a bit more flexible on that than the preceding preference…)
John Yoo, one of the principal architects of the Bush Administration’s campaign of torture as state policy in the War on Terror.
First, no, people commonly speak based on beliefs about commission of crime without conviction. Similarly, they often do not describe people as criminals who are convicted, if they disagree with the conviction.
Second, in any case, Yoo is, aside from being a person who has committed war crimes, in fact, strictly speaking, a convicted war criminal. (One might, of course, disagree with either the accuracy or the process of that conviction, or both, but if conviction is all that you think matters…)
If you’re going to speak this strictly, then in the interest of intellectual honesty you should at least mention he was tried in absentia, and that the court in question — the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal — is not recognized by the United Nations.
That's awfully rich coming from a guy who signed off on warrantless wiretapping on American soil, "enhanced interrogation techniques", and believes in "Unitary Executive Theory".
- ZERO indictments, unlike Trump
- ZERO impeachments, unlike Trump
Also none of Obama's lawyers have ever been tried + convicted of a crime either, unlike Trump.
HN is so overrun by ultra-lefties and is so unmoderated (on such topics), that is impossible to have productive discussion here.