John Yoo Used Newspaper Gig To Attack Critics Calling For Torture Probe
You may have heard the news that the Philadelphia Inquirer has given infamous torture memo author John Yoo a contract to write a monthly column for the paper. A bunch of folks, understandably, have already registered their objections to the hire.
The Inquirer has defended the decision by arguing that Yoo is “knowledgeable” about legal subjects, which has “promoted further discourse, which is the objective of newspaper commentary.”
But there’s another dimension to the story that’s also worth noting. Yoo is using his platform for more than just writing opinion columns.
Indeed, he actually used his newspaper gig to attack his political opponents — those who are pushing for a torture probe — at a time when government officials were mulling whether to investigate those who created the torture program, including him.
Yoo was quietly put on contract at the end of 2008. On March 15, he published a long broadside against “civil libertarians” who have criticized the Bush administration’s expansion of executive powers amid the war on terror — expansions that Yoo helped author.
Needless to say, those “civil libertarians” are the same people that are demanding a probe into the Bush era torture program — one that Yoo himself helped create. At the time of Yoo’s piece, of course, it was still unclear how or whether to probe the architects of that program, as it remains today. You’d think the paper would ask Yoo to recuse himself from writing about such stuff.
It would be one thing for a paper to invite someone under scrutiny to air his side of the story in an occasional Op ed. It’s quite another for a paper to give such a person a regular platform on contract for use in attacking political opponents in an ongoing governmental dispute.
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Update: The Inquirer’s editorial page editor gets in touch to argue that the paper has been good on torture.
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Yeah, well, Berkeley hired him back, too.
I can only surmise that they know what they’re getting – he has no ethics or scruples, so of course he will wrongly use his gig there to defend his views on torture.
He’s a gawd-ammed torturer, so what does anyone expect?
Its called allowing propaganda and no self respecting editor should allow such practices. And they wonder why newspapers are dying…
It’s actually convenient for me. My subscription ran out on the 7th and I was gonna renew with the next paycheck. I’ve been wanting to get the NYT delivered so now I’ll just change to the Times weekend subscription. I guess I’ll get the Glouchester paper for the local news.
Greg, I think you mean (title) “to Attack” not “Attacks.”
I live in Philly & since the paper was bought by RWer Tierney about 5 years ago, it has moved far to the right. On the news section, he has investigative journalism that goes after liberal elected officials. – one example: the paper did a front page expose on the most liberal state rep, Cohen, for using alloted funds from the state to buy $1000 of books on policy. Pennsylvania is a very corrupt state where the Repubs have dominated state government for most of the past 30 years. Yet, with the tons of corruption, their idea of investigative journalism, under Tierney, was to go after the most liberal rep for purchasing policy books with state money. The editorial pages have been filled with RW op ed writers, including former senator Santorium. The paper is now on the edge of bankrupcy & Tierney who doesn’t believe government should be involved in economic matters went to the state for a bailout. He cut employees’ salaries by about 15% because of lagging revenue, then his hand picked board gave him an annual bonus of $350,000 & 2 other top investors got $150,000 each.
well I have been convinced for some time that the media are essentially war criminals
Tena, he didn’t get “hired” back. He had tenure – was on leave. But right now he’s teaching at teensy joke of a college in Southern CA. But there’s a movement afoot to get his tenure yanked.
The paper is now owned by Brian Tierney (heading up a group of investors). Tierney worked in Reagan’s administration and for the Bush 2000 election campaign. His background is marketing.
In other words, as with Fox or with Clear Channel, propaganda is the function and purpose of media ownership for some.
Yoo is teaching at Chapman College in Orange County..it has a number of far right think tank types teaching there.
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