Rational Security 2.0: The 'How Many Cs in Accountability' Edition

Jen Patja, Alan Z. Rozenshtein, Quinta Jurecic, Scott R. Anderson, Molly E. Reynolds
Wednesday, April 6, 2022, 12:00 PM

Published by The Lawfare Institute
in Cooperation With
Brookings

This week, Alan, Quinta and Scott were joined by their fellow Lawfare senior editor and Brookings Institution senior fellow Molly Reynolds to hash through some of the week's big national security news, including:

  • “The Butchers of Bucha.” Russian troops who recently retreated from the Kyiv suburb of Bucha appear to have engaged in a weeks-long campaign of violence against the Ukrainian civilians living there, leading some—including President Biden—to call for a war crimes trial. Why would Russia do this? And how should the United States and the world respond? 
  • “To Refer, or Not to Refer, That is the Question.” Even as they rush to get ready for public hearings, Jan. 6 committee members have begun to cast shade on the idea that they will produce a criminal referral of President Trump or anyone else for matters other than contempt of Congress for refusing to comply with its subpoenas. Is this the right move on the committee’s part? 
  • “When Texas Messes with You.” The Supreme Court recently heard oral argument in Torres v. Texas Department of Public Safety, the first case to seriously test the limits of congressional war powers in several decades. What should we expect from this case? And what will it tell us about how our new Supreme Court views war powers and national security?

For object lessons, Alan brought our attention to the possibility that one can be buried not just in a cemetery but in a living forest. Quinta endorsed a New Yorker article by Rachel Aviv on how an Ivy League university turned on a promising young student with a difficult past. Scott recommended the show "Single Drunk Female," a darkly funny exploration of alcoholism and its aftermath that is set in a menagerie of Massachusetts accents. And Molly noted that the U.S. Census Bureau had recently posted a very searchable version of the 1950 census records, which included the following observation on her own grandfather: 

Here are a few other articles and items we discussed:

  • The television classic "Mork & Mindy," which was a spinoff from Happy Days;
  • Mark Galeotti's discussion of Russian atrocities and military discipline in his podcast "In Moscow's Shadows";
  • Mike Debonis's deep dive in the Washington Post on Congress’s struggle to respond to events in Ukraine

Jen Patja is the editor and producer of The Lawfare Podcast and Rational Security. She currently serves as the Co-Executive Director of Virginia Civics, a nonprofit organization that empowers the next generation of leaders in Virginia by promoting constitutional literacy, critical thinking, and civic engagement. She is the former Deputy Director of the Robert H. Smith Center for the Constitution at James Madison's Montpelier and has been a freelance editor for over 20 years.
Alan Z. Rozenshtein is an Associate Professor of Law at the University of Minnesota Law School, a senior editor at Lawfare, and a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Previously, he served as an Attorney Advisor with the Office of Law and Policy in the National Security Division of the U.S. Department of Justice and a Special Assistant United States Attorney in the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Maryland.
Quinta Jurecic is a fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution and a senior editor at Lawfare. She previously served as Lawfare's managing editor and as an editorial writer for the Washington Post.
Scott R. Anderson is a fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution and a Senior Fellow in the National Security Law Program at Columbia Law School. He previously served as an Attorney-Adviser in the Office of the Legal Adviser at the U.S. Department of State and as the legal advisor for the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq.
Molly Reynolds is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution. She studies Congress, with an emphasis on how congressional rules and procedure affect domestic policy outcomes.

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