"It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood."

Gerard VanderLeun has a quote from Karl Popper that seems particularly appropriate whenever there is a political discussion: "It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood."

I have been thinking about that ever since I posted a comment about the blog run by several law professors: “the Volokh Conspiracy.” The posts by the law professors are usually interesting, but the responses are often even more so. They range from the thoughtful to the inane.

Some very popular websites don’t accept comments, but most do. You get a feeling for the audience by reading the comments. And in some cases the responses are more interesting than the original posting.

I assume (I could be wrong) that a law blog would attract lawyers, law students and interested laypeople. What intrigues me about the responses is what it reveals about the people who either teach law, practice law or who are studying the law.

It’s not reassuring.

Which gets to being misunderstood.

Glenn Reynolds has been interested enough to link to me several times in the past and “Instapundit” is a valuable source of links to the issues of the day. I am in awe is his ability to post a prodigious amount daily. I frankly don’t know how he finds the time to do all that reading and posting while holding down a job as a law professor and having a life … all at the same time.

But … and here’s a big but … to post that much he has to skim lots of stuff. And that’s where the problem lies – whether it’s the press or the blogosphere.

So he linked to my blog and said:

SAY WHAT YOU WILL ABOUT THE VOLOKH CONSPIRATORS, but I don’t really think they’re a bunch of crazed leftists.

Whoa! I don't either! But they attract some who could be qualified as such.

Here's what my original post said:

The Volokh Conspirators and an interesting bunch of guys. It may not be their fault that they attract a bunch of nuts and Jacobins to their blog site.

The individual contributors are capable of making reasonable-sounding arguments as to why the detention of enemy combatants should not be held indefinitely at Guantanamo (assuming you view our war against Islamic radicals as a civil police action in which the US military got involved). But, as I said, their arguments usually avoid the foam flecked comments that follow these postings.

There is no question that I found the law professors who are the people who post the essays on Volokh to be interesting and reasonable. I referred to some of the people who commented on the articles they posted as “nuts and Jacobins.” And why did I characterize them that way?

Well here is the manner in which one law professor who commented would prosecute the Bush administration:

--Impeachment of Bush and Cheney. If necessary, after they leave office!

--Impeachment of a federal judge for writing a memo that enabled “torture”

--Local, State, and federal prosecutions such as the Brattleboro, Vermont, ordinance that calls for the arrest on sight of Bush and/or Cheney…

--Charge Bush and Cheney with murder of U.S. soldiers who have died in the Iraq and Afghanistan war under state law.

--Use of common law courts … as a means to turn revisionist international law theory by asserting international humanitarian and human rights law violations as common law in state courts prosecutions.

--Having citizens file charges with the police in various countries

--Foreign and International Prosecution of US officials.

--Complaints to licensing boards for professionals who assisted the government

I leave it to Glenn and others to determine if these are really rational recommendations for the way we want to handle administrative transitions in this country. Things like this have been done in other countries and at other times. As a student of history, it’s rather shocking that there are serious people in this country who are seriously suggesting that this is how we deal with national leaders after they leave office.

And let’s remind ourselves that this was not some teen ager living revenge fantasies in his parents’ basement. The list of actions I quoted was provided by John Moore (a "good guy" who I should have acknowledged) who summarized the recommendations of Benjamin Davis who teaches law at the University of Toledo College of Law. Davis, in turn wrote of these actions as a result of a lawyers conference:

On September 13-14, 2008, over two hundred people from the United States and abroad gathered in Andover. Massachusetts for the Justice Robert Jackson Conference on the Planning for Prosecution of High Level American War Criminals sponsored by the Massachusetts School of Law.

Davis, pictured here, is one of a group of lawyers who – ignoring the threat of Islamofascism – focus its efforts on stopping any effective response on the part of the American people. Information on the Mass. School of law conference can be found here. Here is how George Bush is described:

"He is a former drunk, was a serial failure in business who had to repeatedly be bailed out by daddy's friends and wanna-be-friends, was unable to speak articulately despite the finest education(s) that money and influence can buy, has a dislike of reading, so that 100-page memos have to be boiled down to one page for him, is heedless of facts and evidence, and appears not even to know the meaning of truth,"

The conference will focus on:

# What international and domestic crimes were committed, which facts show crimes under which laws, and what punishments are possible.

# Which high level Executive officials -- and Federal judges and legislators as well, if any -- are chargeable with crimes.

# Which international tribunals, foreign tribunals and domestic tribunals (if any) can be used and how to begin cases and/or obtain prosecutions before them.

# The possibility of establishing a Chief Prosecutor’s Office such as the one at Nuremburg.

# An examination of cases already brought and their outcomes.

# Creating an umbrella Coordinating Committee with representatives from the increasing number of organizations involved in war crimes cases.

# Creating a Center to keep track of and organize compilations of relevant briefs, articles, books, opinions, and facts, etc., on war crimes and prosecutions of war criminals.

This is serious stuff.

As we are reminded even today as a result of Israeli reaction to attacks from Gaza, the world is filled with people who believe the West is evil and that Hitler didn’t finish the job.



Of course we need to remind ourselves that there are respected people in our country, even those have received Chicago’s designation as “Citizen of the Year,” who have seriously contemplated liquidating 25 million of his fellow citizens. And remind ourselves that in other times and other countries this has actually been done.

Many of the great mass killers of the past were considered as nuts and gadflies by the good burghers who dismissed their rants. Former criminals, failed artists, students, cranks all found their time and opportunity and managed to bring death and misery because they were not taken seriously. What’s ridiculed today becomes commonplace tomorrow. Jacobins were real and their rule led to mass death in Europe. And many were lawyers.

So, to Glenn and all who misread my comments, I stand by them and as time goes on, I stand by them even more firmly.