Earlier today, I attended a presentation at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy by Todd Hinnen, Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Law and Policy in the Department of Justice’s National Security Division. The division was created in 2006 by the USA Patriot Reauthorization and Improvement Act, merging the core national security functions of the DOJ, as recommended in March 2005 by the Iraq Intelligence Commission.

Hinnen described his team at the DOJ as doing the “30,000 foot level strategic thinking, policy development and legal analysis” for the Department’s national security work. Hinnen stated his belief that the development of an appropriate and enduring legal framework was “essential to effectively combating terrorism for reasons that are both principled and pragmatic.”

It is essential on grounds of principle because the law has defined this nation, a nation of laws, since its founding…It would be a Pyrrhic victory if, in our struggle the preserve this country against the threat of international terrorism we sacrificed so central a part of what this country stands for and why it has been a model for the rest of the world.

It is essential on grounds of pragmatism because a lawless response to terrorism — one for instance that includes torture, black site prisons, and indefinite detention without due process — undermines our moral credibility and standing abroad, weakens the coalitions with foreign governments that we need to effectively combat terrorism, and provides terrorist recruiters with some of their most effective material.

It’s good to hear government officials expressing this kind of understanding of what it is that really makes America exceptional — and what really makes us safe.

Our guest blogger is Nina Hachigian, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

In his column this morning, David Brooks claims that the response to swine flu “suggests that a decentralized approach is best,” relying on nations and localities to deal with the threat. He rejects the idea of building “centralized global institutions that are strong enough to respond to transnational threats,” an idea he attributes to G. John Ikenberry, of Princeton.

Dan Drezner, quoting an email exchange with Ikenberry himself, makes the point that jumped to my mind, (as I was muttering “no, no, no!” at the breakfast table) which is that the two are not mutually exclusive. Both a local response and international coordination are necessary to fight a global threat.

Why do you need those international architectures, like, in this case, the World Health Organization (WHO)? There are many reasons, but to name a few:

1. To track the spread of the flu globally, and see how it is mutating as it goes, you need flu samples from around the world. Some countries, for political reasons, would not offer them freely to the US. Only a politically neutral body like the World Health Organization can collect those (and sometimes, not even it can).

2. The WHO helps create and foster the very networks among scientists and government officials around the world that Brooks cites as useful.

3. Some countries don’t have the capacity to mount what Brooks calls a “bottom-up, highly aggressive response.” Some organization needs to help create that capacity and call attention to its absence as a weak link in the global chain. If every country had a CDC like ours, there would be less reason to worry. But they don’t. Not even close.

Global threats need a global response. Nations are the ultimate actors, but international organizations can go a long way toward making the global response more effective.

Demonstrating the peculiar conservative belief that a central component of American exceptionalism is the constant assertion of “American exceptionalism” by American politicians, Jamie Kirchick accuses President Obama of giving the wrong answer when asked about this at the NATO conference earlier this month:

Rather than endorse the proposition — as every president in recent memory has done one way or another — Obama offered a strange response: “I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.”

This is impossible. If all countries are “exceptional,” then none are, and to claim otherwise robs the word, and the idea of American exceptionalism, of any meaning. Besides, American exceptionalism is demonstrable — Cuban journalists, Chinese political dissidents, Eastern Europeans once again living in the shadow of a belligerent Russia and, yes, even some Brits and Greeks look toward the U.S. and nowhere else to defend freedom.

Yes, isn’t it amazing how, if you take one small section of a longer answer, you can generate an entire op-ed’s worth of outrage?

Leaving aside how silly it is to insist that the president go around insisting how much better his country is than every other country, looking at Obama’s answer in its entirety reveals Kirchick’s tendentiousness. After noting his pride, and the rightful pride of all Americans, of the fact that he stood on European ground that had been liberated by American troops and rebuilt with American money, Obama continued:

I see no contradiction between believing that America has a continued extraordinary role in leading the world towards peace and prosperity and recognizing that that leadership is incumbent — depends on our ability to create partnerships because we can’t solve these problems alone.

Watch it:

It was President Bush’s open belligerence and defiant unilateralism — what author Michael Signer has called “vulgar exceptionalism” — that represented the genuine departure from the traditions of American foreign policy. In seeking to re-establish the United States as the moral leader in an international system based upon the rule of law, President Obama is trying to reinvigorate those traditions.

I understand that this more nuanced and rigorous understanding of American exceptionalism is a bit complex for many conservatives. As evidenced by their continuing support for the policies of George W. Bush, they tend to be much more delighted by simple assertions of American power than by policies that actually strengthen it.

Just before launching his invasion of Iraq, President Bush went on national television to issue an ultimatum to Saddam Hussein, urging him to leave his country within 48 hours. Bush also had this message for “all Iraqi military and civilian personnel”:

War crimes will be prosecuted, war criminals will be punished and it will be no defense to say, “I was just following orders.”

Watch it:

George Washington law professor Jonathan Turley argues that this statement by Bush shows that “he and his administration knew that there is no ‘good faith defense’ in committing war crimes.”

Bush also understood the need for full investigations and accountability when it comes to torture. After the Abu Ghraib scandal, Bush told Al Arabiya: “It’s important for people to understand that in a democracy, there will be a full investigation. In other words, we want to know the truth. In our country, when there’s an allegation of abuse … there will be a full investigation, and justice will be delivered.” (See the video here.)

Steve Benen responds, “It seems to me if Democrats are looking for an excuse to do the right thing, they don’t have to say much more than, ‘We’re doing what Bush told us to do.’”

Please join our campaign calling on Congress to begin impeachment hearings against Jay Bybee.