"War of aggression," defined as the "supreme international crime, differing from other war crimes only in that it contains the accumulated evil of the whole."

From Life After Torture: Righteousness Can Still Overcome Evil to Achieve Justice for Bush Crimes by Ray McGovern, AlterNet

With damning disclosures coming left and right about the torture procedures unleashed by that president, it seems a good guess that, rather than making merry, he was sweating the evenings away, as well. You see, President George W. Bush had left his fingerprints on accumulated evils for which he was likely eventually to be held accountable, in one way or another. And during the summer of 2006 the chickens were coming home to roost.

On June 29 of that year, in a 5 to 3 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that the Bush administration was wrong in denying detainees the protections afforded by the Geneva Conventions.  Bush had done so by Executive Order of February 7, 2002. Don't look for it in the Fawning Corporate Media (FCM); simply Google it.

Worse still from Bush's point of view, Justice Anthony Kennedy saw fit to say out loud the obvious; i. e., that disregarding Geneva amounts to a war crime. One Bush aide is reported to have gone quite pale when Kennedy warned that violations of Geneva “are considered 'war crimes,' punishable as federal offenses.”

So as we stood watch in Crawford in August 2006, Bush sweat was dripping not so much from clearing brush, but rather from a hasty effort to have the Republican-controlled Congress pass a law granting administration officials -- from Bush on down -- retroactive immunity from prosecution for the illegal detainment and abuse of detainees. That effort came to fruition in September when Democrats as well as Republicans acquiesced in passing the so-called “Military Commissions Act.”

“Is this a great country, or what?” you may be saying to yourself.  But wait; laws can be amended, changed; new laws can be passed. The stay-out-of-jail pass that was given to the perpetrators of accumulated evil can bear an expiration date.  Despite the best efforts of crafty lawyers and loyal legislators, perpetual immunity is probably not in the cards.

Still Feeling the Heat

On December 11, 2008, after a two-year investigation, Sen. John McCain and Sen. Carl Levin released the summary of a Senate Armed Services Committee report, issued without dissent, demonstrating that Bush's Executive Order of February 7, 2002 had “opened the way to considering aggressive techniques” that were then ordered implemented by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Coming soon: the full text, which, even with heavy redactions, will provide ample grist for courses in criminal law for years to come.

More damning still is an authoritative report by the International Committee of the Red Cross -- the body legally responsible for monitoring compliance with the Geneva Conventions and supervising the treatment of prisoners of war -- that was given initially to CIA acting general counsel John Rizzo in February 2007 but not published in full until this past Monday. That report describes in gory detail the torture techniques let loose by Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/ and their Mafia-style attorneys for use on so-called “high-value” detainees. Google that report too, if you have the stomach for it and can bear the shame.

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