That was, um, unexpected. Not only did Michael Mukasey repudiate the so-called 2002 "torture memo" signed by Office of Legal Counsel chief Jay Bybee -- which appears to have survived in spirit, if not in letter -- but he compared U.S. torture to the Holocaust.
So far, eyebrow-raising.
Most significantly, Mukasey said that he is unaware of any inherent commander-in-chief authority to override legal restrictions on torture -- a huge repudiation of Dick Cheney, David Addington and John Yoo's perspective on broad constitutional powers possessed by the president in wartime -- or to immunize practitioners of torture from prosecution.
If he's lying to get the job, then I hope there is a chair in hell reserved for him. On the face of it, though, I just have to wonder how someone who says things like this made it past Cheney. Honestly.
