Froomkin notes that
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As summarized by the WSJ, the crux of the government’s position in this memo is that the executive has full unreviewable power in Guantanamo, not subject to check by the courts (at least absent some congressional action?). That this might be legally possible does not make it legally or morally correct.
Thus, it appears that the memo somewhat undermines the argument that the government made before the Supreme Court, where it argued that Gitmo was outside the jurisdiction of the courts because, being subject to residual Cuban sovereignty albeit US control, it was not part of the US for jurisdictional purposes. It’s not impossible to have different conceptions of ‘domestic’ jurisdiction for the reach of a statute and judicial review — but it’s uncomfortable and IMHO presumptively wrong.
This memo may also strengthen the case, set out by Eric Muller, that Deputy Solicitor General Paul D. Clement knew or (more likely) should have known that he was making a false statement when he said “[i]t’s … the judgment of those involved in this process [of interrogating POW’s and enemy combatants] that the last thing you want to do is torture somebody or try to do something along those lines.”
...Josh Marshall has more.
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So the right to set aside law is "inherent in the president". That claim alone should stop everyone in their tracks and prompt a serious consideration of the safety of the American republic under this president. It is the very definition of a constitutional monarchy, let alone a constitutional republic, that the law is superior to the executive, not the other way around. This is the essence of what the rule of law means -- a government of laws, not men, and all that.