A lot of folks in the Twittersphere are pointing to a New York Times story this morning and saying that John Yoo — John Yoo! — has thrown Liz Cheney and Keep America Safe under the bus.

I don’t think that’s the case.  Here’s the original quote, along with the NYT’s framing of it (emphasis mine):

John C. Yoo, the former Justice official whose memorandums on torture and presidential power were used to justify some of the most controversial policies of the Bush administration, said he had not seen the material from Ms. Cheney’s group. But Professor Yoo, who now teaches at the University of California, Berkeley, and is active in the Federalist Society, said the debate about lawyers who once represented detainees at the American prison in Guantánamo Bay serving in the Justice Department was overheated.

“What’s the big whoop?” he asked. “The Constitution makes the president the chief law enforcement officer. We had an election. President Obama has softer policies on terror than his predecessor.” He said, “He can and should put people into office who share his views.” Once the American people know who the policy makers are, he said, “they can decide whether they agree with him or not.”

Right now, everyone is focusing on the first half of Yoo’s comments.  But it is, in fact, the last sentence that is most telling.  Yoo is saying that DOJ should name names.  And that’s the core message of Keep America First’s ad:  why is DOJ refusing to name names?

One of the things that made McCarthyism so dangerous — and so corrosive — was the Senator’s constant brandishment of supposed lists and his demand that the government give him the names of the people already supposedly on the list.  In essence, he was demanding that the government become complicit in the smear, either by naming names or by insisting that names were not on the list — either way giving McCarthy a win and destroying careers.

Yoo is suggesting that once DOJ names names, then “the American people know who the policy makers are, they can decide whether they agree with” the President.

But people shouldn’t be making up their minds over whether they agree with a policy based on who executes it.  They should be making their decision based on the policy itself.  The whole KAS argument — and Yoo’s implicit support for it — is predicated on the idea that “wrongheaded” people somehow can’t implement good policy.  And since the Obama Administration can’t be hit for the actual policy, they’re going after the people responsible for making it work.

And that’s why the KAS ad is so outrageous  What Cheney, Thiessen, Kristol — and yes, John Yoo — are arguing is that you should blame the messenger — and demand that she be fired because you didn’t like a message she delivered before she had her current job.  It’s a straw man argument at its worst, because it is designed not only to damage the Administration by association, but to destroy the lives — and livelihoods — of good and decent public servants.

To its credit, the DOJ has refused to respond to the demands.  From the same NYT piece:

Matthew Miller, a Justice Department spokesman, said accusations that the administration had been secretive or had dragged its feet in responding to the inquiry were untrue. But Mr. Miller said the department would not participate “in an attempt to drag people’s names through the mud for political purposes.”

In a letter sent to Senator Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama, the Justice Department said in February that the lawyers understood that they had to take different positions while working for the United States than they did as private lawyers, and that in any case they would recuse themselves from matters in which they had participated earlier.

That’s the real answer, and all we can do is hope that DOJ will not back down.

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