Responding to a Legacy of Torture: Reconciliation, Reform and Retribution in Obama's First Year

Session Submission Type: Paper Session

Abstract

This panel explores the conundrum presented by the juxtaposition of the Obama administration's rhetoric of transcendence with the finding of the top federal judicial official with jurisdiction over U.S. military commissions that treatment of Guantanamo detainee Mohammed al-Qahtani "met the legal definition of torture." Panelists consider what rhetorical pressure this finding places on the Obama administration's strategy of attempting to transcend the torture issue by "not wanting to criminalize policy differences."

Sub Unit

• Public Address Division

Chair

• Gordon Mitchell, Univ of Pittsburgh

Individual Presentations

• We Don't Want to Criminalize Policy Differences: How the Obama Administration’s Approach to Torture Evidence Might Amount to Obstruction of Justice - David Seitz, Univ of Pittsburgh

• Pain, Purpose, and Precedent: Models for Obama’s New Interrogation Program in Ireland v. U.K. - Michael Vicaro, Univ of Pittsburgh

• Jack Bauer's 'Need for Speed' and the Ticking Time Bomb's Rhetorical Throw-weight - Sean Lawson, University of Utah; Gordon Mitchell, Univ of Pittsburgh

Respondents

• Stephen Hartnett, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

• David Zarefsky, Northwestern University

Session Organizer

• Gordon Mitchell, Univ of Pittsburgh