secret torture memos

Anyone who has spent four seconds within fifty feet of me is probably quite aware of the fact that I have a good many issues with the way this country is run. But I’ll also be one of the first to defend us when we do something right.

Like attorney-client privilege.

I know that the whole attorney/client thing pisses people off—especially people who watch a lot of procedural dramas. It’s one of those things like the fourth amendment or the inadmissibility of hearsay as evidence that makes us think “we know he’s guilty, fuck the technicalities!” (The bad guy is always a guy). But procedural dramas aren’t really known for the accuracy. The cops aren’t always the good guy (or, if nothing else, they’re often fairly concerned with their close rate), the easy-to-accuse guy isn’t always guilty, and more crimes go to trial with very little physical evidence. We have rights for a very many good reasons.

But all the written rights in the world mean nothing if those with the rights don’t know they “have” said rights. Which is to say that if someone who appears to be in authority tells you to stand against the wall and you don’t know that you don’t have the right to walk away, then you won’t walk away—which means that in practice you don’t have that right.

It would be entirely impractical for the average US citizen to know the intricacies of the law and all their legal rights. Ergo lawyers. And in order for a lawyer to be as effective as possible in protecting the rights of the average uninformed citizen, they have to act as closely as possible to a surrogate legal brain—giving the client the freest possibly access to the lawyer’s knowledge. Naturally, your average citizen won’t feel free to ask all their questions if they know they’re being listened to—and since they don’t necessarily even know what kinds of questions they should be asking, they also need to be able to tell the lawyer secrets in order to take advantage of the lawyer’s legal understanding of the client-citizen’s situation.

Thus attorney-client privilege.

And thus why, even though I’m passionately in favor of extremely tough sunshine laws, the most recent call to expose Bush’s secrets is deeply problematic. If the president asks the attorney general whether something is legal, the attorney general’s answer to that question (ie, those secret memos on torture) is an attorney’s answer to a client—something no one else has the right to force the client to expose, no matter who that client is.

Those of us who are riled up about the encroachments on our own rights should maybe take another look here. I want my attorney-client privilege, and the best way to protect it is to help protect everyone else’s right to it… Including the president.