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As far as the "circumvention" of Geneva and the USCoT, my position is that Geneva doesn't apply, and the USCoT seems to lack the specific language needed to make a legal case. It doesn't mention waterboarding and doesn't give concrete examples in its definition of torture. It's weak, as is the entire notion of international law in the first place.
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Undertoad...your position appears to be pretty much in line with the DoJ attorneys who wrote the "torture" memos, but not in line with the DoJ Office of Professional Responsibility who suggest that they may have been politically motivated.
I have no argument with those holding your position..other than, IMO, it should be resolved by an independent third party before it is codified into law or a precedent as an acceptable practice.
Why should the benefit of doubt be given to one side or the other?
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An internal Justice Department report on the conduct of senior lawyers who approved waterboarding and other harsh interrogation tactics is causing anxiety among former Bush administration officials. H. Marshall Jarrett, chief of the department's ethics watchdog unit, the Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR), confirmed last year he was investigating whether the legal advice in crucial interrogation memos "was consistent with the professional standards that apply to Department of Justice attorneys."
...the OPR probe began after Jack Goldsmith, a Bush appointee who took over OLC in 2003, protested the legal arguments made in the memos. Goldsmith resigned the following year after withdrawing the memos, and later wrote that he was "astonished" by the "deeply flawed" and "sloppily reasoned" legal analysis in the memos by Yoo and Bybee, including their assertion (challenged by many scholars) that the president could unilaterally disregard a law passed by Congress banning torture.
OPR investigators focused on whether the memo's authors deliberately slanted their legal advice to provide the White House with the conclusions it wanted, according to three former Bush lawyers who asked not to be identified discussing an ongoing probe. One of the lawyers said he was stunned to discover how much material the investigators had gathered, including internal e-mails and multiple drafts that allowed OPR to reconstruct how the memos were crafted.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/184801
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The DoJ attorneys in question should absolutely have the right to include their side in the report.
But, IMO, again, the issue should ultimately be resolved by the judiciary so that clear legal standards are in place for the future.