Ethics

Former DOJ Officials Blast Liz Cheney

By Ed Brayton

Liz Cheney is getting some serious blowback from former DOJ officials, including conservatives, for her astonishingly idiotic and unethical attack on DOJ lawyers who have defended Guantanamo detainees. Former Bush DOJ official Peter Keisler chimes in:

Peter D. Keisler, who was assistant attorney general for the civil division in the Bush administration, said in an interview that it was "wrong" to attack lawyers who volunteered to help such lawsuits before joining the Justice Department.

"There is a longstanding and very honorable tradition of lawyers representing unpopular or controversial clients," Mr. Keisler said. "The fact that someone has acted within that tradition, as many lawyers, civilian and military, have done with respect to people who are accused of terrorism - that should never be a basis for suggesting that they are unfit in any way to serve in the Department of Justice."

Full post as published by Dispatches from the Culture Wars on March 08, 2010 (boomark / email).