Where Olbermann Gets It Wrong

I watched Keith Olbermann's special comment from last night on Youtube, as I was too busy wrapping Passover to watch the show.

While I generally agree with him, I find him powerful even when I disagree with him, or find his conclusions lacking, as was the case last night, and I'm not referring to the Kaiser thing.^*

In this case, I believe that KO did not go far enough.

While he is correct that letting people off for "just following orders", as is implied by the statements that those , "carried out their duties relying in good faith upon legal advice from the Department of Justice," will not be subject to prosecution.

This is wrong, and there is a bigger point, made ably by Glenn Greenwald, that there is a real and legally binding obligation obligation under the Convention Against Torture, which was signed in 1988 and ratified in 1994, to actively pursue and prosecute torturers ( roll Article 7 para 7):

The State Party in territory under whose jurisdiction a person alleged to have committed any offence referred to in article 4 is found, shall in the cases contemplated in article 5, if it does not extradite him, submit the case to its competent authorities for the purpose of prosecution.

This is not to say that refraining from after the little fish to target the big fish is a violation of this.

That is a legitimate prosecution strategy.

However, it increasingly appears that President Obama and Attorney General Holder do not intend to go after anyone, and in so doing, they are, but not going after anyone, with the explanation that this is, "moving forward".

This is a obstruction of the prosecution of these acts is a war crime, and if this means no prosecution, it is an affirmative act to obstruct the course of justice.

Certainly, there are alternate venues, such as some sort of "Truth and Reconciliation Commission," but all indications are that the White House are fighting even this weak tea.

I believe that, in the absence for support for some sort of fact official fact finding process, it makes Eric Holder and Barack Obama accessories after the fact to a crime against humanity.

In the short form, people who actively work to subvert any process of judicial or semi-judicial fact finding inquiry, outside of the context of legitimate activities of defense counsel, are war criminals, including the current President and Attorney General of the United States of America if they choose to continue this course.

That being, said, I am an engineer, not a lawyer, dammit,^‡ and I would be interested in hearing opinions from people with a deeper knowledge of both US and international law.

^*The Kaiser committed no war crimes by the standards of the day, notwithstanding the accusations of amputation Belgian babies hands^† made in the early days of the war. The rules had not yet caught up with the technology of war, and if the Kaiser were guilty, than every participant in the war would have been guilty.
^†Ironically, the Belgians, during the genocide phase of their rule over what was then the Belgian Congo DID require their native levees to return a human hand for each bullet fired, in order to prevent them from "wasting" bullets hunting game for food, along with holding families hostage, etc.
^‡I LOVE IT when I get to go all Doctor McCoy!!!