When asked at a recent Congressional hearing, John Yoo–chief legal architect of the Bush torture policy and former Deputy Assistant Attorney General at the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel–refused declare that burying prisoners alive would be illegal for the president to order.  Watch here.

As noted previously here and here, in prior Congressional hearings in 2007 and 2008, current attorney general Michael Mukasey refused to say whether he thought waterboarding, beatings, electric shocks, or the use of the rack and screw could be authorized by the president.  Watch those videos here and here.