John Yoo: "I'll Never Resign."

Cynthia Papermaster's report on John Yoo follows:

First, a report on our Yoo action yesterday and YouTube of the rousing song "Tell John Yoo That Torture is a Crime." Our next Yoo protest is Wednesday, Nov. 18, 3 p.m. at the law school.

I'm beginning to get to know this guy John Yoo. Today Toby Blome and I went into his civil procedure class as soon as it ended. Toby beat her beautiful drum and I called him out for enabling torture. Yoo packed up his briefcase and as he was leaving we kept asking him when he was going to resign from teaching at UC. And I said you ARE going to be prosecuted, Mr. Yoo. He said "have a nice day." Toby followed him down the hall and up the stairs and he said to her "I'll never resign." What's he thinking? Is he getting us at all? As Toby pointed out, he's not going to show it if we ARE getting to him. But I digress. We're not doing these actions for him, we're trying to alert the campus and community to Yoo's presence and complicity in torture. And at that we're succeeding. As we discussed Yoo with his students we heard that because of our actions the level of discussions about Yoo have risen. About 20 students stayed around in the hallway discussing him with us. I mostly heard them saying his opinions are protected by academic freedom. But I also heard several students say that they have mixed feelings about him, and one even argued that he shouldn't be teaching at UC. Another student we talked to later said she wouldn't take a class from him as that legitimizes his presence at the school. As I stood outside with the "ARREST YOO" banner I saw students nod their heads in agreement. Some stopped and chatted, wanting to know about him.

Watch the YouTube of "Tell John Yoo That Torture Is A Crime" by Vic Sadot & The Code Pink Police Chorus

Finally, what is UC's position? Below is a description of the Lehrer tv segment on Yoo from the UC Law School website. Watch the segment if you haven't yet. It's actually pretty good. But Edley, Kutz and Choper's pronouncements indicate the problem -- they have framed the Yoo situation in terms of academic freedom and/or avoid the torture issue entirely. I will invite these men to the teach in. Will they agree to debate this with legal professionals who say academic freedom isn't the issue? Dan Siegal, a Boalt alum, says it well at the Aug. 17 Yoo press conference:

Chris Edley, Chris Kutz, Jesse Choper Discuss Academic Freedom and Prof Yoo

PBS, The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer, October 20, 2009 by Spencer Michels Yoo's Tenure Questioned Over Bush Torture Policy

Excerpt:

Christopher Edley, dean, U.C. Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law: While many students and faculty are critical of the Bush administration policies and even of some of John’s actions, they think that academic freedom means that his right to be here and to teach has to be protected, until or unless there’s some sort of a conviction.

Christopher Kutz, president, U.C. Berkeley Academic Senate: You need something more than simply incompetence to revoke a professor’s tenure, especially somebody who’s been hired, promoted, published in the top journals. John is one of the most prolific scholars on the Boalt faculty.

Jesse Choper, law professor: He gave them an approach that was wholly consistent with virtually everything he did as a scholar beforehand.