This afternoon, the Federalist Society at the University of Chicago Law School sponsored an interesting debate. It featured Berkeley law professor John Yoo, author of the so-called “torture memos,” and Bob Barr, the prominent libertarian and former congressman, debating the following subject: “Presidential Power v. Civil Liberties in Times of War.”
(Executive power is the subject of Professor Yoo’s new — and well-reviewed — book, Crisis and Command.)
Reports on the proceedings from attendees — plus comment from Professor Yoo, who apparently accused the Bush Administration of “incompetence and stupidity” — after the jump.
UPDATE: Photos added, after the jump.
One correspondent who attended the event emailed us the following collection of highlights:
1. John Yoo basically reaffirmed the thesis of his book, Crisis and Command, which is that the best US presidents are those that have acted strongly (and sometimes extra-constitutionally) during difficult times of crisis: Lincoln, FDR, and Andrew Jackson being the major examples.
2. Bob Barr accused Yoo of advocating a position that says that the best presidents of the US are the ones that act illegally.
3. Barr also said that those “below the Mason-Dixon line” don’t think that Lincoln was a good president, and that he had denied them their “fundamental rights” to secede from the union.
4. After being asked a question about whether one could criticize the Bush Administration for acting outside of Jeffersonian and Lockean theories of acting extra-legally, Yoo responded something very close to the following: “If you’re going to criticize the Bush Administration, there’s no need to limit yourself to fancy theories; the starting point to criticize the Bush Administration is ‘complete incompetence and stupidity.’” (The last four words are a direct quote.)
Professor Yoo, whom we contacted to check the accuracy of this write-up, had a correction here:
I think the quote is a little different. After “fancy theories,” I said more something along the lines “why not just try incompetence and stupidity?”. I think your correspondent is giving me too many words.
Note, by the way, that this comment is arguably ambiguous. Was Yoo himself calling the Bush Administration incompetent and stupid, or was he saying that a liberal critic might label it as such? It’s not perfectly clear (although multiple sources who were at the debate lean in favor of the former).
5. It wasn’t until the very last question during the question period that anybody said anything about the torture memos. Someone asked what he would have done differently if he had to do the torture memos over again. Yoo said that he would draw the line in “exactly the same place,” but that he would have been sure to “say nice things about everyone, I guess” if he had known that the torture memos would have been made public. He also said that it was difficult, that there were lots of time and political pressures involved, that it was a difficult legal issue that there wasn’t much authority about. But basically, he told everyone who disagrees with him about the torture memos to go fly a kite.
6. Barr added that he thought all of the crazy liberals (he didn’t quite say that, but implied it) who wanted to arrest John Yoo were trying to undermine the role of advocates in the legal process.
7. Oh yeah, John Yoo said that he “hate[s]” James Madison and Thomas Jefferson as presidents.
Our correspondent wasn’t the only person taking notes. A certain Zach Stephenson covered the debate on Twitter (but not in real-time; as he tweeted, and as we’ve reported before, Chicago Law doesn’t have wireless in its classrooms).
Stephenson’s tweets are basically consistent with what our correspondent sent us via email. Regarding the incompetence / stupidity comment, Stephenson tweeted as follows:
Yoo said that he thought it was fair to criticize the Bush Admin for being “stupid” and “incompetent.”
Let’s get to the bottom line: Who won? In Stephenson’s opinion, “I think Yoo won, though at times it did feel like they were trying to out crazy each other.”
P.S. We have a soft spot for the U. Chicago chapter of the Federalist Society. They were kind enough to invite us to participate in a joint event with Judge Richard Posner, on the topic of judges as public figures (podcast here, via the U. Chicago Faculty Blog).
Federalist Society Presents John Yoo & Bob Barr on “Presidential Power v. Civil Liberties in Times of War” [University of Chicago Law School]
zackstephenson [Twitter]
UPDATE: Here are two photographs from the debate. Click on each image to enlarge.
John Yoo is my kind of lawyer. He gave us cover to waterboard at will. He is a credit to the legal profession.
Lat is dying to suck on Yoo’s tiny little pee-pee. Clearly that explains as to why Little Lat writes about this patently obvious war criminal Yoo every other week. Lat’s got a vicarious obsession with Yoo’s wang.
More importantly, Lat, why the fuck do you like to suck on conservative dongs? Don’t you know they (a la GOP types) loathe gays? Get a clue, dufus.
John Yoo could not teach for testmasters.
–Irina Lymar
Fuck Yoo
2 –
Spoken like a true liberal.
Bob Barr’s mustache was as sexy as ever.
Bobb Barr hates black people.
??????
Yoo is calling the Bush Administration incompetent and stupid? What the hell?
Betta check Yooself befo Yoo reck Yooself.
- Ice Cube
Who says that FDR and Andrew Jackson are two of the best Presidents? I would actually list them as two of the worst, with Jackson probably being the very worst.
The problem seems to be that Yoo hates freedom. Or at least hates freedom if there is any slightly compelling reason to curtail it. That is the only reasonable conclusion to be drawn from him “hat[ing]” Madison and Jefferson.
If no more liberals show up on this board in the next 20 minutes…I’m going to declare that John Yoo has won the national debate on the unitary executive power theory.
And that will be the end of that.
“the best US presidents are those that have acted strongly (and sometimes extra-constitutionally) during difficult times of crisis”
So he thinks that the founding fathers are idiots.
“the best US presidents are those that have acted strongly (and sometimes extra-constitutionally) during difficult times of crisis”
So he thinks that the founding fathers are idiots.
3. Barr also said that those “below the Mason-Dixon line” don’t think that Lincoln was a good president, and that he had denied them their “fundamental rights” to secede from the union.
Really? I can’t believe any rational human being said this and meant it. First, there are 10s – maybe 100s of us wacky madcap native southerners who think our ancestors were just plain evil for the whole slavery thing (that doesn’t let off the Yankees who held slaves until it wasn’t economically feasible anymore). Also, there are a surprising number of folks “below the Mason Dixon line who are originally from above the Mason Dixon linie. Finally, Barr appears to forget that a remarkable number of people “below the Mason Dixon line” are NOT white. Gracious. Do African American southerners not think Lincoln was great either? Hmmmmm. Perhaps Barr was engaging in a tiny bit of hyperbole?
I was present at the debate, and I think it’s clear that Yoo was criticizing the Bush administration, not simply proposing what liberals “might do.”
CHECK YOU YOO!!
16 –
Agreed. He was definitely criticizing Bush Administration. No doubt.
Funny. This exact debate occurred at Northwestern (sponsored by their own federalist society), and ATL decided to post their inane listserv bs instead?
Yoo seemed thoughtful and serious, and even made a couple of decent points. I was pleasantly surprised.
How do the super-executive power set respond to Obama’s wishy-washy attitude towards “don’t ask don’t tell”? We’ll work with Congress? YOU’RE THE GODDAMN COMMANDER IN CHIEF!!! Issue an order already!! Fucking pussy.
CHECK YOU SEPARATION OF POWERS!
“don’t ask don’t tell” was codified by an act of congress. Even the commander in chief can’t override that. The judiciary could. But not the executive branch.
Yoo was remarkably boring for such a heinous man. He spent most of his time listing presidents and their policies in a monotone, with his actual arguments crammed into the final few seconds as unstructured claims.
Bob Barr was genial, engaging, and not sane.
Yoo’s basic thesis conflates the mere exercise of power with proper governance in an attempt to shield the evils of the last administration. It’s a remarkably weak argument as presented. Correlation is not causation. Maybe in the book it has actual content, but not here.
Barr’s suggestion that it would be “unlawyerly” to hold Yoo responsible for the torture memos suggests to me that we need to start thinking of ourselves as citizens and people rather than simply lawyers.
23 is retarded.
21 –
Obama is weak. He wants to negotiate with Congress, Iran, and probably the underground traffickers of children’s organs.
What did you expect? Should have voted for Clinton instead. Or McCain.
@23 – CHECK YOU HANNAH ARENDT
Does anyone else recall from today both john yoo and bob barr making references to what an shit hole norTTThwestern was and the inherent incomptency of their student body and faculty?
Does anyone else recall from today both john yoo and bob barr making references to what an shit hole norTTThwestern was and the inherent incomptency of their student body and faculty?
Note: Both Yoo and Barr presented at norTTThwestern the previous day!
Does anyone else recall from today both john yoo and bob barr making references to what an shit hole norTTThwestern was and the inherent incomptency of their student body and faculty?
Note: Both Yoo and Barr presented at norTTThwestern the previous day!
no, but they did refer to the incompetency and stupidity of the nU student body where they had spoken the day before!
Yeah…with a speaker like Yoo, you pretty much have to violently protest or spinelessly bootlick to earn his respect.
They did the same debate a few years ago when I was a 2L at Boalt. Yoo made Bob Barr look like a babbling idiot.
This happened at Northwestern yesterday!!!!!!!!
Yeah, same event at Northwestern Law yesterday.
19:
Northwestern’s douchey PC crap has made it a laughing stock. It will be a while before anyone (at least anyone who reads this site) will look to Northwestern for anything serious.
I think UChicago organized and Northwestern piggybacked afterward since the speakers were in town anyway. Ergo UChicago deservedly gets the credit.
36 FTW! nU is a shit hole that it always piggybacking off the success of others!
Northwestern has a law school?
@27-37 UChicago takes repeated shots at NU, and not a single one demonstrates even a glimmer of wit. All you succeed in doing is highlighting the inferiority complex amongst students of what anyone practicing in the Midwest knows is Chicago’s #2 law school, USNWR rankings notwithstanding.
@39 … it’s important for future generations to understand just how inferior nU truly is … I would have for someone to have a norTTThwestern grad representing them in court … such a shame (unless of course I am pitted against them).
@39 … it’s important for future generations to understand just how inferior nU truly is … I would hate for someone to have a norTTThwestern grad representing them in court … such a shame (unless of course I am pitted against them).
“I would have for someone to have”
40’s writing skills make my point far better than I ever could.
- 39
Chicago’s lack of wireless should automatically bump it down a tier.
Crazy right wing fascist versus crazy right wing libertarian. It’s Lat’s idea of the political spectrum.
39– I think the comments about Northwestern are truly out of line and undeserved.
However, it is true that Chicago organized this event, and asked Northwestern if they would also like to host John Yoo. The Northwestern Fed Soc leadership will admit as much. The only reason this event took place at Northwestern first is because Chicago had a different event yesterday (former NRA Pres. Sandy Froman).
@22–
My question was a challenge to the super-executive power types. Also, CHECK YOUR NON-DELEGABLE POWERS DOCTRINE! The president, not Congress, is CiC. There’s a really strong case that that statute is unconstitutional and, therefore, ignorable by the CiC.
-21
@15, you idiot. Slavery is not the only reason for the South wanting to secede.
I was at the Northwestern event yesterday, and while one student provided a cringe-worthy moment in his questioning of Mr. Barr, the student questions for the most part were very good. Troubling however was the complete lack of faculty participation. At one point in the Q&A a challenge was issued to faculty to fire away, and the response amounted to a collective shrug. Seems as though none bothered to show up.
I went to the clerkship talk next door. They had better food (thai), and it more directly affected my future. Thank you.
@49
Hi, CK.
49, that Thai food is the most rancid stuff ever…and we get it every other day
13/14…
Yes. That’s correct. John Yoo believes the founding fathers were stupid, and they should have made our country a bit more totalitarian like China.
Basically, that’s the gist of it, yeah.
26 – I was thinking of Arendt the whole time. Yoo is an exemplar of the banality of evil. Listening to him gave me a really visceral understanding of that phrase that I’d previously lacked.
-23
evil=doesn’t agree with you?
@54 CHECK YOU TORTURE MEMO
I attended the event today, and theres no question that Yoo was calling the Bush administration incompetent.
@45 – Sandy Froman, the sausage King of Chicago?
Gotta love those Berkeley professors–what a suck up.
Gotta love those Berkeley professors–what a suck up.
@21 CHECK YOU ENUMERATED POWER TO MAKE RULES FOR THE REGULATION OF THE LAND AND NAVAL FORCES
@47 – Idiot? Hmmm. I don’t recall saying that slavery was the only issue. But it certainly was key. Had the issue of limiting and potentially outlawing slavery not been at the fore, it seems highly unlikely that succession would have happened. But I don’t want to interrupt your revelry there at the center of your universe with polite discourse so frolic on with your slings and arrows. –15
57
You mean Abe don’t you?
Ferris Fail!
44 = crazy liberal hippie douche
Interesting that Yoo is in enough touch with reality to know that the Bush Admin was incompetent and stupid. He does realize that he served in the Bush Admin, right?
62 he didn’t get it wrong, he was making a Ferris joke using Sandy Froman’s name.