The House just passed a bill that pardons all members of the U.S. administration for any torture for detainees.

Elizabeth Holtzman, former NY congresswoman, explains,

Avoiding prosecution under the War Crimes Act has been an obsession of this administration since shortly after 9/11. In a January 2002 memorandum to the president, then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales pointed out the problem of prosecution for detainee mistreatment under the War Crimes Act. He notes that given the vague language of the statute, no one could predict what future ”prosecutors and independent counsels” might do if they decided to bring charges under the act. As an author of the 1978 special prosecutor statute, I know that independent counsels (who used to be called ”special prosecutors” prior to the statute’s reauthorization in 1994) aren’t for low-level government officials such as CIA interrogators, but for the president and his Cabinet. It is clear that Gonzales was concerned about top administration officials.

CNN reports,

Under the War Crimes Act, violations of the Geneva Conventions are felonies, in some cases punishable by death. When the Supreme Court ruled that the Geneva Conventions applied to Al-Qa’ida and Taliban detainees, President Bush and his boys were suddenly in big trouble. They’ve been working these prisoners pretty good.

The U.S. is holding at least one Canadian citizen at Guantanamo Bay.

A previous move to prevent similar charges at the ICC failed in 2004.

In response to this Bill, Michael Morris has said, I Am Ashamed to Call Myself Republican,

I have been a Republican since I was 18. I am now 48…
In case anyone has not noticed, this Government is in shambles and the election this November will not change that…

Hey, let’s beat and torture POW’s – woops – detainees (want to be politically correct here). Hell while we are at it, why not start hanging Blacks and gassing Jews. Why don’t we make the prisoners at our bases overseas march back across the oceans to prisons here in America. Just because people hanged at Nuremburg for doing the same thing, it must be ok for us to do it because we are America and we would never do anything wrong. That is why the Bush administration attached a line item to a bill absolving anyone who, in this administration, may have violated the Geneva Convention Articles for the Conduct of War. If they were doing what was right, then why do they need protection? (emphasis added)

Updates

Chet Scoville points out that despite the recent coverage and video availability, this story is probably dated from over a year ago. If anyone has an update about what followed in the Senate, please do let us know.

Geneva Convention/Third Geneva Convention

Article 3

In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each Party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:

1. Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria. To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:
   • violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
   • taking of hostages;
   • outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment;
   • the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.
2. The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.

An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.

The Parties to the conflict should further endeavour to bring into force, by means of special agreements, all or part of the other provisions of the present Convention.

The application of the preceding provisions shall not affect the legal status of the Parties to the conflict.

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Aug. 22, 2008 …And the Cow Goes Moo investigates the issue and discovers the following:

The Nation magazine seems to have an article discussing a draft of this bill (or a similar one) from 2006!

The Washington Post had this covered in 2006 as well.

“Bush administration officials have considered the law [the 1996 War Crimes Act] a potential threat to U.S. personnel involved in interrogations. While serving as White House legal counsel in 2002, Gonzales helped prepare a Jan. 25 draft memo to Bush — written in large part by David Addington, then Vice President Cheney’s legal counsel and now Cheney’s chief of staff — in which he cited the threat of prosecution under the act as a reason to declare that detainees captured in Afghanistan were not eligible for Geneva Conventions protections.”

…As far as I can tell, the bill that the Senate at one point was considering is bill S. 3930, which passed. Of course, the bill description there seems to suggest the exact opposite of what we’ve been discussing, however I have enough experience with bill descriptions to know that means absolutely nothing.

A blog post at The Nation seems to clarify that the Senate did pass the bill, and that the bill does absolve those who committed violations to the War Crimes Act of 1996 from prosecution. The blogger indicates that all that is left is for President Bush to sign it. I don’t see an update past that in my cursory search, but perhaps the whole Internet unanimously agreed that the possibility of Bush NOT signing a bill that covers his ass into law was not worth wasting scarce bytes on.