decades. .. [applause] thank you for that warm reception and for coming this afternoon in a >> thank you for coming this afternoon. it is indescribely gratifying to write a book and then attend a conference with the bravest atavist. i'm particularly grateful. i just want to begin by making a couple points that i think will frame the discussion we're going to have nicely, and i don't know

what the discussion will be because we have not talked about it on purpose, but a couple points will help to highlight that i think i'd like to just briefly describe. the book really makes the argument that the rule of law, as we've always understood it, has been ratically degraded in the way not previously true, and the interesting thing about the rule of law is that it's a term that has a pretty clear meaning by con consensus. it's not a complex term. it simply means nothing more than the fact that in society, we are all bound on equal terms by a common set of rules. look to contemporary scholars defining it that way or look more interestingly to the 1980s and 1990s when western institutions like the imf and world bank began demanding that lending countries that received lending comported with the rule of law, and there were lectures issued about what they were required to do in order to

comport with the rule of law, and there was an article in foreign affairs that warned that countries who don't live under the rule of law, elites can use their financial sue -- superior power and the requirement to live under the rule of law, they cease places themselves above the rule of law and subjected to it on equal terms. go back to the founders, and as much as disagreement as they had what you continuously find is this emphasis that's central to the american founding in order to be legitimate and just had to venner rate the rule of law despite the fact that founders almost across the board believed in the inevidentability and desirability and virtue of vast levels of inequality in all sorts of realms, and they emphasize the only way it's

legitimate and just is if everyone were equal before the law. now, you know, any time you make the argument or point out that the rule of law and the quality before the law was important in the founding, you're met with the objection which is obviously an accurate one as far as it goes that the founders violently breached those principles in all sorts of way, and that the country did as well, and this concept of quality under law has never been the predominant theme to describe american political reality. although that is true, the reason i don't think it goes far is because the important part of that writing and that history is that that principle has always been affirmed as being central to violating it radically. the reason that's important because if you affirm a principle and deviate from it in your actions, there's an obvious aspect to the believer that's

hypocritical, but if it's sincere and ringing and consistent, then those principles, even though you're not comporting with them, become aspirational. they become guides to what progress means, how it's understood, and how it's achieved, so even though the founders violated that principle in all sorts of ways, the fact they continuously enshrined it meant that most of the events that we consider to be progress in the american history were driven by the reverence for this concept that we're all equal under the law, that equality under the law is how we determine if we're perfecting the union, and there's a real value in atirming principles if if they are not perfectly applied. what's radically different about today is not that the rule of law is not being applied faithfully because that's always been true, but what's today radically is that we no longer to affirm the principle. we pay lip service to the

phrased rule of law, but in terms of the substance of what it requires, you can often, and i would say more than not in leading opinion making elite circles, find an expressed renouncement or repudiation of that principle, so you begin with the pardon of nixon continuing through the shielding of iron contra criminals into the obama administration's decision to shield torture, obstruction of justice, aggressive attacks on iraq, the decision now not to prosecute wall street criminals for the 2008 crisis with financial fraud. these acts all entail very aggressive and explicit arguments that the most powerful elites in the society are not subject to the rule of law because it's too disruptive, too devicive, more important to look forward that we find ways to avoid repeating the problem, and

so you see constant arguments than you did whether or not the telecom industry should be in trouble for the illegal eves -- eavesdropping. he said, of course, i believe in the rule of law. the idea that the law is no republic -- respecter of persons, but the law is a respecter of reality meaning if it's too devicive, it's in our common good, not the criminals, but our common good to exempt the most powerful from the consequences of their criminal agents, and that's really become the template used in each instance, and i think that radically is different than how things were in the past. the other point i want to make just to begin, and then i'll turn it over to the professor is that the other difference is that if we had a society that

just decided we were going to be very lean yebt yept, forgiving, and merciful when people committed crimes, you could have debates about whether that was advisable policy or approach to criminality about whether or not that produces good results, but applied across the board, and if we were a country that applied that same leniency. if you bashed the owner in the head with a baseball bat and stole their belongings or a week later or two weeks later were caught by the police, and you said, look, officer, you got me, i did what you think i did, but i just thought it's more important to look at the future? why focus on the past? if that worked for you or for people who sold drugs on street

corners and the like, then there would not be a rule of law issue, but the fact that applies only to political and financial elites and not ordinary americans is the reason why there's a rule 6 law problem. at the same time we've created this template of elite immiewnty, we have, in the name of law and order and tough on crime bilt the world's largest prison state, the most merciless systems, and the irony that richard nixon was the one who received the pardon when in the 1960s he rejuvenated his political career by becoming the law and order candidate, running against the unrest of the 1960s, demanding harsh sentences, lesser patrol, lesser opportunity of release from prison, the drug war was accelerated under him, and the fact he built the political career based on a harsh law and

order mentality and when he was caught committing crimes was completely shielded from the consequence which is the personification of the two-chaired justice system i write about, and the war on terror brought all new tiers of justice where people accused of terrorism, just accused, can have every right deprived from them including the right to life without any legal process of any kind. it's a new class. there's not even a pretense of due process. it's a sub person class where the government can do anything without any legal constraints at all, and it's this contrast between the shielding and immunity that we invested in the elite class or more accurately, they invested in themselves. it's the harsh punishment system imposed on everyone else that's the real menace to the rule of law and that i think is the most responsible factor for the loss

of faith in our political institutions and the widespread accurate belief that you see motivating the occupy movement and other widespread citizen rage that our political institutions have lost all meme innocents of legitimacy and can no longer be used to affect change. it's one of the most menacing problems and the most consequential. [applause] >> well, let me just pick up on the comments and say a few things about the rule of law. happens that last night i was reading the current journal, the current edition of the main journal of the american society

for historical relations of diplomatic history, and it's devoted to the nuremberg trial and how it formed and so on, and the article points out that one of the most honorable and admired elements of the tradition is the principle of presumption of innocence, that is a person is presumed innocent until brought to a fair trail and convicted with proper guarantees. that's the proudest achievement of the american, legal, and ethical tradition, and, of course, it was recognized they

wanted to kill the nazi war criminal, but justice jackson, the u.s. chief prosecutor, insisted that even though the people could be the worst criminals in history, they should be brought to trial, subjected to a fair trial, condemned if they were proven guilty, and furthermore, added that we're giving these defendants a poisenned glass, and if we ever sip from it, do the things they are accused of, we must suffer the same consequences otherwise the proceedings are a complete farce. the core element, the main crime of which they were condemned and

hanged was called the see -- supreme international crime, clearly aggression defined, which they said, the tribunal said is the worst of all war crimes because it encompassing all evil that follows. well, i won't run through the way that's been -- the way we applied that to ourselves, but it's correct. the presumption of innocence is a very deeply rooted principle, not only of american law, but anglo-american law, or it used to be. by now, it's simply totally dismissed, and with praise. for example, when osama bin laden was the prime suspect for 9/11, plausible, though, in fact, the fact of the matter is that the government has yet to provide the kind of evidence that would hold up in a cred

call court and more or less conceded that it doesn't have have it, but was the prime suspect, and obama invaded another country, commandos apprehended him and murdered him, tossed his body into the ocean without autopsy, and this was praised. this was praised as a great achievement. great achievement of the obama administration. a couple months later, the concept was extended in a manner that when talked about in the book, a terrific book i should say, that's the case of anwar al-awlaki, an american citizen, a cleric accused not of committing -- although some talk about involvement in crimes, but no evidence presented -- and the main charge was a fluent speaker

of english and giving support for jihadi operations. he was killed a couple weeks ago, and the general reaction was illustrated adequately in a "new york times" headline that said west celebrates death of radical cleric. it was not just death, but murder, and while it's true -- and there were some who didn't join in the celebration completely -- almost all of them criticized it because he was an american citizen, which makes him a person in theory as distinct from non-citizens who may look like persons but are not. that's incidentally a core principle of current american law with regard to undocumented

aliens. interesting interpretation of the 14th amendment, but so he was an actual person and maybe we're not supposed to murder people suspected of citing others to carry out terrorist acts. now, again, there were some critics and the response who went beyond that and said we should believe in the principle of presumption of innocence, and the reaction to them, actually, it was one, was quite interesting. most was the usual shrieking, which you can disregard, but some was interesting. in fact, the most interesting, i thought, was a column by a well-known respected left liberal commentator who wrote that it is, as he put it, amazingly naive to criticize the united states for violation of international law or other

crimes because the international, the international order is established precisely in order to legitimate the use of violence by the west, and by the west, he doesn't mean norway, but by the united states, so that's the nature of the international order. it's set up to legitimate our source of violence and therefore it's naive to raise anything against this and silly to raise questions that happens to be directed to me, and i'm happy to accept guilt for that charge. if you look beyond and ask what it means to be a non-person, say accused of terrorism, well, there's a striking example in the book.

as he points out, the first child soldier in american history to be brought to trial for crimes. that's worth looking at. it's a 15-year-old boy who was app prehennedded -- apprehended in afghanistan, and the charge against him is when american soldiers were invading afghanistan and attacking his village, he picked up a gun to defend his village, so that makes him a terrorist, a non-person, and interesting con cement of terrorism, and he was then sent to the secret prison in afghanistan, and then sent off to guantanamo, no charges, eight years in prison, he was going to be brought before the military commission, but he

pleaded guilty and a plea bargain, and he was given eight year sentence in addition to the eight years he spent without charges. we all know what it means to plead guilty in a plea bargain after eight years in torture chambers. he actually is a canadian citizen, and canada could extradite him, but nay are courageously refusing to step on the toes of the master. the concept of terror and presumption of innocence is by now so far gone. nobody even bothers to discuss it. it's not -- maybe it was once an ancient tradition, but not for us. and it doesn't change the fact by now we changed the principle, abandoned even the principle,

not abandoned it, but forcefully rejected it even to the extent of saying the international order is established precisely to legit mate or violation of elementary, legal, and miranda rule -- moral principles. it goes beyond one of them. one last example. one of the most -- there was an article recently by a law profession who, in fact, glenn sites a couple times in the book and john who argues that obama may be breaking the record as u.s. president of violation of civil rights and law. you can make a case. one example, which actually involves the former dean of the harvard law school, is -- happens to be obama's latest friend in court, appointee,

elena kagan, and she brought a case against want humanitarian law project with the support of the far right justices, obama won the case, and the charges is one that might implicate plenty of people here. the charge is they provided material assistance to a group that's on the terrorist list. the material assistance in this case was legal advice to the pkk, a turkish group, not a curdish group, but they expanded the concept of material assistance from say, you know, providing guns or something like that to providing the legal advice and even advice to turn to non-violent means.

that's now criminal under u.s. law, thanks to president obama, and it extends very broadly. in fact, shortly after this supreme court decision, dozens of fbi agents raided homes in chicago and other cities, destroyed documents, usual thing when a couple dozen fbi agents raid your home. the charge was -- they were trying to find evidence of the people they were -- finally indicted with a grand jury or supporting the palestinian group and a columbian group and the farc. well, maybe they are and maybe they aren't, but the idea expressing support for groups on the terrorist list is a crime is material assistance, now, that's

novel, and the justice department position was explained by kagan, that if you provide legal advice to a terrorist group, say advising them to refrain from terror and pursue non-violent means, you're legitimizing them and freeing up their resources to carry out terrorist attacks. well, just think how broadly that can apply as in these cases which are, in fact, underway. a final comment, at which has to do with the notion of the terrorist list. if that's accepted in the united states as a legitimate category, why is it a legitimate category? how is the terrorist list established? it's established by executive fiat. they don't have to give any just -- justification for it. they can't say they don't belong there. it's just a decision by the executive that i don't like you,

and we're going to kill you and prosecute anyone now who advices you not to pursue terror. look at the history of the terrorist list. it's very striking. i mean one person who was just removed from it two years ago is nelson mandela with the reason that the african national congress was characterized by the reagan administration in 1988, right near the end, as one of the more notorious terrorist groups in the world, and therefore, the u.s. was entitled to support south africa as it did not only in its atrocities internally, but in its attacks on neighboring countries which apparently killed about a million and a half people, but that's all okay. it's part of the war on terror that, in fact, reagan had declared, and we have to defend

the regime against one of the more notorious terrorist groups in the world. by today's standard, holder versus humanitarian law project, almost anyone involved in any par activity could be regarded as it, and he was just removeed from the list. there's other cases, and in 1982, there was a state on the terrorism list, hussein's iraq, but the united states wanted to provide aid and assistance to iran, so therefore they removed them from the terrorist list and proceeded to provide aid and assistance right through his worst crime, but denying the crimes, and, in fact, rather

strikingly when saddam was tried, it was for crimes he committed in 1982 by his standards, three minor crimes, excluding the major crimes, i presume, but they were all supported by the united states, and, in fact, even denied by the reagan administration. well, there was a gap in the terrorist list because iraq was removed, had to be filled, so it was filled by cuba. cuba was added to the terrorist list, partly in order to give some justification for outlandish claims about why we were entitled to support murder ous terrorist regimes in central america leaving a couple hundred thousand corpses and much worse thanks to our involvement, and so the argument was well, they are supported by cuba, so it must be a terrorist state, fab bring cation, but it doesn't -- fabrication, but it doesn't

matter in these cases. however, cuba was a good choice. in the proceeding years, cuba was the target of more international terrorism than probably the rest of the world combined. a lot of it coming from right here, so, therefore, cuba went into the terrorist list, and saddam was taken off, and so we could support his major crimes, which were coming. well, these ought to -- we ought to think about why we even tolerate the concept of a terrorism list. if the government says you're on the terrorism list, period, end of discussion, but now if you give legal advice or other advice to whoever they designate, you're a criminal, and if you're a 15-year-old child allegedly picking up a gun that's under attack by u.s. soldiers, you're sent off for 16 years of prison, torture, and so on.

if that's what the rule of law comes to, it's a sad situation. [applause] >> so i think -- do we have a few minutes 1234 i want to make sure there's substantial time, but i'm surprisingly what we just heard provoked a lot of thoughts that that -- i want to make because i think so many points were raised, so one of the interesting aspects of the two-tiered justice system with the idea that elites impose standards on everyone else from which they exempt themselves is something that is obviously mirrored in the relations and probably was pioneered there, this idea that the united states imposes standards on everybody else, and exempts itself is the template that got imported

domestically, and one of the fascinating things to do is look at what current political leaders say about things like war crimes and accountability when they are in other countries and dulling out sermons about what the other countries should do. for example, president obama who prom -- promulgated us as u.s. citizens to look forward rather than backwards and shielding crimes gave an interview last year on television in indonesia, and the obama administration has been pushing that government to prosecute certain war criminals whom the united states has long disliked, and what he told indonesia was it's impossible to move forward into a prosperous future until you resolve the past. secretary of state clinton visited kenya and come bode ya where -- cambodia where the united states is similarly urging war crime investigations to proceed and told them the same thing essentially that you cannot be

among the community of decent nations while you continue to harbor and shield workers, and the time she visited kenya and said that was the time george bush's book was released on every major television station and if you read and i recommend you do, i did this because i heard the professor many years ago talk about it and read it, the opening and closing statements of jackson at the nuremberg trials. it was supposed to be the modern justice, and not only did he point out that aggressive ora was the kingpin crime, the crime above all others, but he said the tribunals would have value only if they were applied, not only to the defendants, but also to all the nations here assembled, meaning the united states and its ally, and yet if

you were to cite that and argue that that meant that george bush and dick cheney and rumsfeld should be prosecuted as war criminals, there's almost nothing you can do that's more self-marginalizing than that. even people sympathetic to the idea they should be investigated for the torture and some coil at the idea they should be held accountable for the the 100,000 innocent dead iraqis because they view the act of congress authorizing it and the large majorities of the american citizens on each hearing for it to immunize them from that, and i think that shows just how lawless we've become that you can't cite principles and argue for applicability in the clearest case without becomeing self-marginalized. i agree with the professor from a miranda rule and ethical

perspective, there's zero difference from sending a sky robot over a country and eradicating lives of non-citizens as opposed to doing that to citizens based upon mere suspicion or even a lack of suspicion if this is just a desire to kill them. i think there's a practical difference. that is there's a greater enhanced danger on self levels when the government murders its own citizens opposed to citizens of other countries on foreign soil. the difference is this. irng that, you know, just legally said that the constitution applies to foreigners on u.s. soil and to american citizens wherever they are found in the world, but more importantly than that is when the government acts against its own citizens, it can grow a climate of fear that can lead to political suppression, and that's what you have seep in the united states. one of the most striking

experiences i had in writing about politics is the first time i wrote about wick -- wikileaks. this was back in early 2010, and this was before really almost nobody knew who wikileaks was at the time. before, they released any news making disclosures inside the united states, they released several important documents and exposed wrong doing among corporations and governments in other parts of the world and nobody knew much about them. the pentagon preamped a top secret report in 2008 that declared wikileaks to be an enemy of the state describes ways to destroy wikileaks, and it's incredible because the way in which wikileaks has been rendered all but inoperateble, but in any event, the 2008 report ironically was leak to wikileaks, then published, and

"new york times" wrote about it saying there's a report leaked declaring wikileaks as an enemy of the state and how to destroy it. i assumed any organization that had been target the that way, by the pentagon, was one that was more encouraging, and i read about them, interview assange for the article i wrote, and i wrote about it, posted the interview, and i encouraged people to donate to wikileaks because there were budgetary constraints preventing them from going public. takes time and energy to authenticate documents. one of the things the pentagon talked about was submitting fraudulent documents to them so when they published it, it would destroy their credibility and credibility of future disclosures. in response to donating them and how to do that online and through paypal, dozens of

people, literally, told me in many different venues in the comment sections of which i wrote, in e-mails, that although they agree whole-heartedly what i wrote about with the potential of wikileaks to achieve great good, they were afraid of donating money to wikileaks because they would end up on a government list somewhere or they could even be sujtsed to criminal liability under the extruer theirly broad material support for terrorism statutes that the professor just talked about. these were not people prone to conspiracy theories, but sober americans who i interacted with in the past with other issue, and i could tell from the way they expressed fears they were rational people, and they were well grounded the the reason it was amazing to me is because it really highlighted how this extraordinary climate of fear is created in the united states. wikileaks is a group that's never been and still has never been charged with a crime, let

alone convicted of one, and they couldn't be because it's mere the first amendment, and they just publish leaks given to them by other people an yet these are american citizens were scared to donate, and they were basically intimidated over things they saw in the last ten years by what the government did by exercising the rights. you can offer all the rights in the world on a piece of parchment that you want. you don't need to eliminate them if you can bully the population into refraining from exercising them. this really interested me more writing about the oppressive conditions, and i remember when i first wrote about it, people wondered, and i wondered myself, why would the obama

administration basically turn manning into a martyr and jeopardize its own ability to prosecute him by subjecting him to this extremely severe, you could call it torture, but at the very least, inhumane treatment, in prolonged sol dare treatment for nine months, clothes taken from him, stripped nude and forced to stand naked for many of the days, just punitive measures. at some point thereafter, i realized the reason it was done is the same reason the bush administration took people completely innocent by the hundreds shipping them away to the caribbean island, jumped them in shackles and showed the world what we had done. it's a way of signaling to the world and to would-be challengers to american power domestically and internationally that we are not constrained by law, we don't have limits on what we can do. if you think about challenging what we can do, look at the pictures of people at guantanamo

who will be there for as long as we want to keep them there even if they are innocent or if you discover wrong doing at the highest level of the government, and you the to expose it to the world, look at what we've done to manning or wikileaks without any pro pretense to legal authority. it's the use of law as a means of coercion, the exact opposite. it's those in power using law as a weapon to entrench the power and shield their ill-gotten gains. the fact we call terrorism whatever we want it to be, the fact that people who, as professor said, take up arms and fight against american troops are terrorists, the fact we indicted someone nine months ago for raising funds to kill american troops in iraq, an iraqi who raised money to defend his village.

if you take up arms against them, you're a terrorist. one who spent ten years proclaiming weir at war, he's a terrorist as well, and yet in the united states or israel or allies directly target and kill civilians by enormous numbers whether wrecklessly or deliberate ri, it's a radical act to describe that as flood watch. -- as terrorism. it's designed to criminalize whoever the united states wants. that really is the use of law coercively to entrench those in power rather than equalize the playing field. the final point, and then we can turn it over to questions and answers is the professor referenced the post who is a by-product of this school, and he works for the center of american progress, basically an

organization run by the former clinton white house official founded in essence to justify whatever the obama white house does with exceptions here and there, but basically, that's the function. the fact that people who write for them do things and say things to mitigate or defend things like assassinating an american citizen with no due process is the most radical act to think of, underscores the point how the obama legacy is defined and lawlessness is normalized. if three years ago, saying this as somebody whose going it, go to an event like this, fill the room with 50% republicans and 50% democrats and talk about and condemn things like wild assertions of executive authority, the idea that the president can act against anybody he wants including killing so in total secrecy with no transparency or checks, and

after we killed anwar al-awlaki, a drone attack killed his 16-year-old son and 17-year-old cousin in yemen and the u.s. government refuses to account what happened there. if you talked about those things and the other secrecy doctrines, you'd have 50% of the room, the ones identified as republicans supporting it, cheering for it, justifying it, apologizing for it, and happy with it. 50% of the room, the democrats, would be angry over it, objecting it to as not following the constitution and right wing republicans. you would now have 90% of the room cheering for it and supporting it or at least justifying it in mitigating it the way matt did in the post or acquiescence it and 10% of the room would be angry about it because they were angry about

its being done the first time around and not pretending to be angry for partisan gain, and this has really changed the way these issues are discussed. the fact that now it's not just the republican party standing for this form of lawlessness, but it's become under president obama bipartisan con consensus meaning it's removed from political debate, it is hardly controversial any longer, and it's entrenched as orthodoxy in american political life for at least a generation. there's a yale law professor who talked about how what when one party objects a policy and the other supports it, what happens when the other party gets into office and continues it? it becomes no longer a controversial policy, but it becomes american consensus, and it endures without challenge for at least a generation. that's what happened to the policies of lawlessness and wild theories of american power and the right of the american president to target nip for violence or incarceration

without any oversight. it's now taken on the face of both parties and likely to be normalized for a very long time, and to me, that's the most significant legacies of the obama presidency. with that, i think it's a good time to take questions. the mechanics were described at the start, i think, i didn't hear it, but i'll rely on you. >> well, first, thanks to our speakers. [applause] >> we have 15 minutes for questions. head to the mike and keep the questions brief to get to as many of you as possible. thanks. >> how do you feel after all these years and all you've done

see what happened to our country. to you, professor, first. >> i had more years. [laughter] well, actually, it's pretty bad, but we should recognize it's not really all that new go back to the modern conception of international law which was well-founded right after the second world war and the tribunal, but what was the position in the united states then? well, the united states was instrumental in setting up the world court, but once the united states declared that it is not subject to any charges based on international treaties, meaning

the u.n. charter, the charter of the american states or others, and, in fact, that actually came to the court. it came to the court during the reagan years when the government brought a charge against the united states for essentially war against nick radical act gay. the case was distinguished by a harvard law school professor, and most was thrown out because the case appealed to the core principles of modern international law, so, in fact, when the case was finally judged, it was restricted to very narrow grounds, bilateral u.s. treaties in what's called the common international law that was generally understood,

and even on that narrow basis, the u.s. was accused of unlawful use of force, which means terrorism and lay language and in order to pay substantial reparations. how did the congress react? by increasing aid to the contras increases the actions just condemned this criminal. meanwhile, the "new york times," for example, dismissed the court as proof it's hostile and therefore insignificant, hostile forum because they made charges against the u.s.. a couple years earlier, the other commentators praise the court because it put the u.s. not charged against iran, and, well, if that's, in fact, the united states went on to veto two security counsel resolutions calling on all states to observe international law. that all passed with no comment,

almost nobody knows about it other than specialists, and it goes beyond in 1948, the united nations passed a genocide condemnation of genocide, genocide, major crime. forty years later, the united states ratified it, but with reservation inapplicable to the united states, and that came to the courts too a couple years later. yugoslavia brought charges against nato for bombing, and among the charges was a reference to genocide. the united states represented appealed to the court and said that the united states would withdraw from the proceedings because the united states was formally entitled to commit genocide, which is true by this reservation, and the court accepted that correctly.

the court rules are that they can't try it unless they agree to the proceedings, and so the united states was excluded from the charges. the rest of the nato powers were not. that was reported, but with no comment. if we declare we can't carry out genocide, fine, but these things are pretty true that bush broke -- let's take even the torture charges. if you look carefully, it's not so clear that bush was in serious violation of u.s. law when they carried out torture at guantanamo because the u.s. never signed the convention. it was rewritten by the senate to exclude certain categories of torture, and they are the categories that the cia carries

out. the cia back in the 50s basing themselves on kgb manuals and so on, redefined torture to allow mental torture, the kind that doesn't leave marks. for example, even water boarding, you know, take bradley manning, solitary confinement, torture by any means, but not by u.s. law. that was then signed into legislation under clinton and what's called torture here is a very narrow category and a great deal of torture the u.s. carried out is legal under u.s. law. this is discussed by specialists and constitutional law and others, but almost nobody knows about it. they are things everybody should know. >> two suggestions i drew from

the boom. the first is that i think -- excuse me -- there's really the unmistakable conclusion that our officials, you know, judges, politicians, won't or can't, which is more scary, hold powerful criminal behavior accountable even in the most egregious examples like torture, and the possibility that the dissonance this raises that they are not aware their fulfilling that role as officials may be driving this need to sort of scapegoat, to find the most vulnerable, the least politically powerful, for the most trivial offenses accountable, to be able to demonstrate, okay, we're holding a lot of people accountable, just not holding accountable to a lot, so it's this kind of charade that passes for lawfulness behind it that may be, you know, this knowledge of the imbalance driving this kind

of balance and the second implication was that when our officials give up on law enforcement as their role, that perhaps law breaking, greater extremes of law breaking are a means of expressing power so, yes, our financial system engages in widespread fraud, but only the president violates the constitution. >> yeah, those are both interesting and important points. you know, it is true that law and order basically tends to mean get drug dealers off the corner who are selling small quantitities of drugs to other adults who want to buy them, and, of course, there's all kinds of implications. the drug war is incredibly racist and disproportional effects on the poor or at the same time the rule of law means, you know, pepper spraying protesters and putting them into prison for peacefully assembling

at the same time the police are protecting criminals on wall street who destroyed the economy and committed fraud on an income preensble scale. these transgressions punished harshly is a way 6 obscuring the fact the most consequential crimes are shielded and that the biggest criminals are allowed to continue to run ram participant. the other point is one of the fascinating thicks about this whole idea of looking forward, not backwards and the like, at the same time, the same administration who invoked the slogan means we shouldn't look to political crimes of the bush era waged the most, the harshest, and the most precedented war on whistle-blowers, people who have leeked what unquestionably is evidence of serious wrong doing.

for example, the nsa scandal revealing the bush administration spied on american citizens without the warrants of the criminal law says is required and calls felony if you do, the only person to suffer any consequences from that scandal is someone named thomas ham, a mid-level department of justice lawyer who found out the busch administration was doing this and called eric at the "new york times" to tell him this was going on. he was a grand jury convened, subpoenaed, lost the job, couldn't afford lawyers, went bankrupt, had serious emotional and psychological problems as a result of that persecution. all of the people who broke the law have been completely shielded, wrote books, became rich. only the person who exposed it has been suggest of subjected to any form of sanction and punishment, and that absolutely is a expressing power saying if you expose things we're doing

that's criminal and wrong, you will be the one who will be punished using the law to do it while we shield ourselves. >> hi. i hope you both have time to answer this. first, professor, i came down from occupy burg -- vermont today to be here. [applause] thank you. i'm really inspired by the number of people who rose up to protest the bullying, as you put it, of american elites through the occupy movement. do you think that the occupy movement has the potential to revolutionize the system to the point that we can topple the power that has so corrupted the rule of law? what do you think the movement will need to achieve in order to overcome in order to do this? >> that's for me?

for me? well, i think the occupy movements now all over the country and all over the world now are very exciting development. in fact, inspiring in a lot of ways, and really unprecedented. i don't know of anything quite like them in the past which is making sense. this is an unprecedented period in many ways. what can they achieve? they already achieveed a lot, i think. they put things, shifted the range of discussion, which is quite important. they've, at the very least, are laying down a legacy from which you can move on. there are short term things that they might be able to achieve which are quite urgent, so to take one, in just a couple weeks, the deficit commission is

due to reach decision when will be stalemate, but whether it reaches decision or stalemates, it's a dagger point either way because if it doesn't, there's a trap set up aimed at doing exactly the opposite of what americans want. a striking fact. look at polls and people don't think deficit is the problem and they are right. it's joblessness. there shouldn't be a deficit commission. keep to the miner problem of the deficit, there's a solution of tax fee for the super rich, bring taxes back to what they were during the period of rapid growth, in fact, so tax the super rich, and preserve benefits. even tea party supporters take that position.

support and protect the benefits which are not great, but crucial for people. the commission, if it reaches decision or if they don't, they'll cut at the benefits and ignoring the reason why they are in fiscal problems, social security's not a problem at all, just thrown in order to destroy it. medicare is a problem because it works through the privatetized unregulated insurance based health care system, a complete international scandal. if the u.s. had a health care system like other countries, there would not be any deficit. [applause]

that's coming right awai. it's possible. it's a long shot, but if the occupy movements get enough kind of force and energy and influence, they might do something about this short term problem. that's far from revolutionizing the society. you talk about long term problems, it has to be understood, and i think it is, that you don't get the things overnight. take, say, the civil rights movement. that really began in a militant form in the 1930s, years of struggle before it reached the possibility of where you could discuss it, and finally, thanks to very courageous activities, student sitting at lunch counters, freedom riders, all sorts of other things, it was possible to get to the point where martin luter king, a great

figure in mod eastern life was able to give the i have a dream talk, and some gains were won, should not be underestimated. the south is a different place than what it was. let's take people around here, boston, as long as civil rights movement was aimed at racist alabama sheriffs, a lot of support for it, as soon as king moved on to opposition to the vietnam war and class issues, remember, that when he was killed, he was on his way to organize a poor people's movement and he was killed dug the sanitation strike. as soon as he moved on to those, he was dismissed when you listen to the idea on martin luther king day, and after many years of hard struggle, a long way to go, the criminalization that

glenn talked about is basically a reinstituting what was done in the -- not long after the civil war, court reporting schoolizing black life -- criminalizing block life and the conditions that existed. that's a successful movement. it's true of other things too. there can be very significant gains, in the long term, revolutionary gains, but they don't come quickly, and the main task the occupy movement, in my opinion, is make use of the quite remarkable network of associations and linkages and mutual support and building of communities, make use of all of that to turn it into something that will be a long lasting and enduring and will face the inevitable failures and go on to

overcome them which is a hard, long course to follow. .. would not be part of their

strategy. at any price for what i can do to get this subject on the radar, my hero, glenn greenwald? >> i'm about to address it, but you know, i think just conceptually and i will address this in the question in the second, but it raises whether or not significant economic wealth inequality can coexist with rough political equality. or whether or not once there is a small faction that can gain so much power through as well, then political equality or democratic institutions cannot possibly resist any longer order will remain in vulnerable to it. and there are ways and even the problem that if you're going to allow wealth and income equality there's a danger become so concentrated that it will pull a legal institutions was not supposed to make a difference. in every same periods of time in

american history with a sauce of wealth and income inequality at the same time political and democratic institutions have been able to act fairly meaningfully against the most powerful oligarchs. and jpmorgan were broken up, synchronous buck is able to create lots of redistributive and social programs, lots of social progress at the time that professor chomsky was just describing. it is been proven you cannot and can inequality good that is contingent upon suggesting subjecting us for the wealthiest and most politically powerful to single some limitations to which the rest of us are bound to be democratically imposed on them. once that starts not to happen, and that's when you get the corruption that season two of the other institutions. as far as control of the voting machines in the late, you know, our political processes are subject to corruption and

coercion in light. i haven't seen evidence their systematic fraud on the part of the torah process that comes from voting machine control of the same time not particularly convinced that someone who has such overwhelming interest in the party think it's fair at the same anyway. i'm not really sure who would be motivated to care enough about that other than the two parties themselves. but certainly there's instances where does it make you their deeds. i think the most important dangers the one you typed about, which is to start restricting the right to vote more and returned to the poll tax care what people have certain political views have huge impediments thrown in the way and the generally strand of using what is supposed to be raw and political equality to achieve exactly the opposite. >> last question here.

>> hi, all the hassle and trying to get me to ask this question this reflect that of how my civil rights in the civil rights of other people that can't be here with me with disabilities are violated by the elites of cambridge who also exempt themselves from the basic civil rights of access. for 20 years at the rate rate to fall free and track your access to every building in the country. but the elite of cambridge in the good people of cambridge to support them accent this elite using the term historic, which is an ideological term meaning looks good and keeps property values. and by that process, and there's

a special interest for me that i got got to go when and which the elevator fellate inch and a half when i got in. when we got to the top agreement to handcart in boxes blocking my way out and then the door into the auditorium was locked and when i came in finally after knocking to get in, no one knew what to do with me where to put me. so i called this olene. it is really a constant ongoing humiliation. now of course the burden that would be placed on the brattle playmaking submit fully accessible through the front entrance would cost a lot, but maybe that money is meanwhile being used to put the torturing brick sidewalks on the way to try to get to the front entrance, which everyone knows tortures people with disabilities and 91 pushing any wheels and yet they are all over this area because the elite that exempted themselves right in

front of everyone and unfortunately you end up participating by coming to an event, where people can't get bullied all the time. i was in this treat most of the way up on the way to get here and i hope that in the future to you which not speak in a place that didn't have every single person who could come in come in the front door because coming in the front door used to be some pain that was seen as a civil rights in itself. tina very much. >> yeah, so obviously i wasn't aware of this building never before. there are laws that require steps to be taken to provide access to people who are disabled and i've litigated those cases on behalf of people who are disabled.

whether there's issues around historic designations and the like is something i'm just not aware of. i'm appreciative of your bring it to my attention and the attention of everyone here. most are thinking of some thoughts here. >> just to head over to that, i think it's quite legitimate, but they're also bears on the preceding question is can we do anything about it? and the answer is yes we can. it's very different than what it was four years ago. and those changes, which are part of -- a part of the generals the blessing of the in many ways, that traces back to many things. but in particular to the activism of the 60s and its aftermath, the large part of the civilizing effect of the 60s have to begin later or so the feminist movement, for example it's had a huge change, a support for access of disabled

people. that assault be much post-60s. and it shows what can be achieved by popular engagement, recognition of serious issues, pressures to do something about them in progress. progress still has big gaps. we shouldn't overlook the fact fact -- two facts. one that there's been progress and two, that the progress has not done a gift from above, that has been achieved through popular engagement, often struggle and let us a lesson for the future. [applause] >> for more information about glenn greenwald, visit salon.com/writers/glide -underscore greenwald.

>> yours a short author in a fruit from c-span twice told us as it travels the country. >> ophelia de laine gona, tell me about briggs versus elliott. >> briggs versus elliott was the first of five law students that were arguing that schools -- public schools should be desegregated. briggs versus elliott started in clarion county, south carolina. my father was a person that wrote the people together and encourage them to sue. they did not start out suing for desegregation, but rather for equal they were very poor and they were little more than shacks. most of them built by churches are independent people they were

acclaimed by this date. the teachers salaries didn't support schools. the teachers salaries for a very and that is a four tiered pain. white males are in the lowest. then white females in black males and there were lots enforcement that corrected that situation. but the right people in those days we were called color people. we were still without transportation. so my father's role began with some people trying to get them to sue and they actually

catalogued through the school district. at last it was withdrawn. >> what was his position in the trinity at that time quite >> my father? >> yeah. >> my father was a teacher, pastor. this is difficult for me to understand that he didn't work with his parishioners and he was not working with her parents at the school. my father forced himself to be the shepherd asks locke was anything who listened to him so that people that he worked for, pearson said that great or just keep in the community and not his parishioners. >> how old were you at that

time? >> when i saw began, i was i supposed about a, but by the time the supreme court decision was passed in 1955. >> and what was your experience during this time? >> my experience is very limited as far as it was happening because my father -- people didn't come into her house. pete will were more afraid -- they did that others would be watching because if they didn't come to my father's house to discuss we traveled with my father emmanuel little bit more.

so they remember the people involved. >> or your brothers and sisters mention your book? it was written by the three of us, which is not quite true. they provided information for me. i should have put my father is my co-author because it's a series about what he had done they were rather just destroying and. in addition he had