War crimes trials would be a good start

The New York Times has finally said what so many others have said for so long about the Bush Administration and Guantanamo (and Abu Ghraib, and Bagram, and the we-don't-really-know-how-many "black sites"): investigate and punish. Frankly, I'd like to see us just hand over Bush, Cheney, Addington, Yoo, Rumsfeld, Feith, and any of the rest of them that are implicated to the International Criminal Court and be done with it. That's the most reasonable approach, as far as I am concerned.

Really— plainly and simply, any American official or officer above the rank of Colonel who approved of torture (in the sense of "agreed that it was an acceptable policy or helped to implement it") should be handed over to the ICC for trial on crimes against humanity. Bush, for those not sure of his culpability on simple grounds of mental capacity, deserves attention because he agreed that the United States would unilaterally abrogate its responsibility under the Geneva Convention.

I've argued elsewhere that Scalia ought to be impeached for ignoring the plain language of the 4th Amendment, but this is arguably worse. My own father, who is very much a partisan Republican most of the time, said at the time of Abu Ghraib that it was a horrible stain on our country. If we can publicly acknowledge that these horrible things were done in our name, and still not feel compelled to punish them, then we are weak, and deserve the horrible things that will be done to us. If by-then-President Obama wants to be a true leader for all people, one thing he will have to lead us to do is to see that torturers are punished fittingly.