RAY MCGOVERN: Yeah, I’m just fresh actually from writing an Op-Ed on the general question of the president seeking private counsel. I think he’s learned from one very large mistake. That is he’s learned by going to a private counsel to get advice on the Valerie Plame case. I think he’s probably by now read the memorandum of 25 January 2002 that Alberto Gonzalez, his chief White House counsel wrote to him. This is the one that says, well you know, Geneva Conventions, that’s kind of a nettle here. We have US law actually, dated 1996 which makes it a crime punishable by death to rescind from or to ignore or to exempt people from the Geneva Conventions on prisoners of war. But Ashcroft says it’s okay as far as the Al Qaeda people are concerned, and I think it’s probably okay to exempt the Taliban as well. And the only downside is that exempting people is a slippery slope and people might come up with some ambiguity with respect to which prisoners qualify for such protection and which do not. And so he finished up by saying, there’s a reasonable basis in law Mr. President, that you will not be prosecuted for war crimes under the US code, War Crimes Act of 1996. Now if I’m President Bush and I finally read that thing because Newsweek has it printed, and I say, my goodness, there’s a reasonable basis in law that I won’t be prosecuted? I’m going to have a couple of really second thoughts here. One is that next time I’m in a situation like this I’m certainly going to seek independent counsel. But another is, my God, four more years becomes even more important to me and to Ashcroft and to Rumsfeld. Gonzalez specifically warns that who knows, some future administration or some future group might sue you for violating the Geneva Conventions. And not only the Geneva Conventions but to the degree that they are embedded in this US law of 1996, and so you’re really, we have a strong basis in law but we can’t exclude the possibility. So four more years? Why do I say all this? I say all this because I am more frightened now than at any time over the last three and a half years, that this administration will resort to extra-legal methods to do something to ensure that there are four more years for George Bush. And Ashcroft’s statement last week, gratuitous statement, uncoordinated with the department of, CIA, with the Department of Homeland Security, his warning that there is bound to be a terrorist strike before the US elections. That can be viewed and this can be reasonably viewed as the opening salvo in the justification for doing, taking measures to ensure that whatever happens in November comes out so that four more years can be devoted to maybe changing that war crimes act or protecting at least these vulnerable people for four more years.
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