the thief to chief ratio in DC is getting downright out of hand…the party of lincoln is
now the party of anarchy…do anything but never cop a plea…unless Fitz gets on you…its just like the mob if you squeeze hard enough you get cooperation…big fish selling little fish up the river…maybe we’ll get lucky and some big fish will be fried…
mad about RH…

Fitz …. *sigh* ….. happy birthday, handsome.

(Dear Lord, please help me. I am pathetic. )

*happy [birthday] sigh*

[/schoolgirl]

Blub ,

I just saw your last post in the Washington Post Strikes Again thread.
I scrolled from the bottom up and ran across wilson’s post first. I took off to do a scandal check on the next-in-line for prez and didn’t see your post till much later. THANK YOU. I often start at the bottom and work up. It helps me find posts I want to scan for. I have to admit I shoot by a lot posts because the arguments and name-calling don’t interest me.
,,,,,,,

New thread, an hour ago

Just called that number today, and I got through this time. They aren’t very happy Ralston put the number in the newspaper. After asking, “Why do you want to know? Who are you? What organization do you represent?”, the man finally replied, “Well, yes, Miss Ralston is employed by us.” But so touchy, so touchy.

Try the number yourself: 202-456-1414.

OT, in an article with Philippinenews.com, Susan Ralston expressed her displeasure that they had reported she has been questioned by Fitzgerald on two separate occasions. As to speculation if she was still working in the White House, Ralston said flippantly, “Call the White House directly at 202-456-1414 and ask them if I still work there.”

I tried that number; it doesn’t go through. Ralston, hope you’re better at being an executive assistant than you are at giving correct phone numbers! The inmates running the Institution aren’t very smart.

Stevens very clearly said at the end of his rant “goodbye to the Senate.” Perhaps, like Richard Nixon, he only meant to say “au revoir,” but coupled with his November promise to resign if the “bridge to nowhere” money was sacrificed for aid to Katrina victims, he should be called out and asked to keep his word — and resign.

Thanks for the links, BobbyG. I’ve got to run Xmas shopping errands now, but I’ll check them out when I get back.

Thesis (1998) predates the newer HIPAA rules…

Anytime Bush brings up the question of bin Laden and his choice of communication, somebody should remind him that had he gone after OBL in Bora Bora (before the Iraq invasion), we wouldn’t even be having this converstion.

new thread

More Wingnuts will be crying soon.

Stevens gets more and more emotional and has more and more sad days as his worldview collapses in on itself.

I like it when wingnuts cry.

mainsailset–One Rover is indicted, they will hold a fund raiser to pay his legal bills. Big Business bought Reagan his CA ranch; they will surely raise millions for Rover.

Thanks John, that is interesting. I’ll check that thread.

Primordial ooze–I watched the video link you provided. True to his political ethics, today Stevens isn’t leaving the Senate. Imagine–yesterday was the saddest day of his life, as he said. Guess he hasn’t been to any memorial services of slain troops who were serving in Iraq.

Stevens’ political leanings are to the right of Ivan the Terrible.

Interesting that unlike Libby, no one seems to be offering up $ to help Abramoff or Rove. One would think that, with old Jack on the edge of giving up the party that someone would find the backdoor way to pay for his defense unless of course they don’t believe he’s broke anymore than me. I’m hoping that Rove/Fitz are so quiet this week because Rove is busy selling Cheney’s ass down the river in plea bargaining negotiations. One can hope.

Let’s assume they used a wide-net sniffing-monitoring system of ALL electronic traffic. Surely somewhere in there the government sniffed citizens’ health records…
Rayne

***

Such was the intent of “Total Information Awareness”

e.g., http://www.bgladd.com/Total_Information_Awareness

also, about 80% of my (1998) thesis draft is still up, here: http://www.bgladd.com/drugwar

—

Primordial Ooze: I am not sure if this helps at all, but I thought scarecrow’s post from the previous thread might at least tangentially reference the issue you raised. Sorry if this is not the case.

“Redd,

Thanks much for this excellent post. Several themes to work on.

wrt to the WaPo article, its worth reading all the way through, because it shows several layers that haven’t hit the rest of the media yet.

First, the example used by Bush et al to berate “leaks” by the press of our intelligence capabilities goes back to a 1998 or so Washington Times article, but as the WaPo article notes, that Times article did not say that the US could monitor bin Laden’s use of satellite phones, only that he used one. Further it turns out there were numerous public reports well before that that he was using such phones.

But the supposed “harm” is about reporting our ability to monitor, not reporting bin Laden’s use. The NYT expose is about reporting the ability to monitor. So I expect we’ll here more from the other side about this distinction.

But the WaPo goes on to report conversations by reporters with bin Laden in which he expressed concerns, way back in 1997, about the US ability to monitor any electronic communications. So it’s not as though the NYT telling us that we can monitor electronic communications is news to anyone except the most naive. It certainty would NOT be news to those who regard themsevles as at war with the US.

So then the question becomes, is publically emphasizing that “guess what, we can listen to anything that’s electronically communicated” a good thing or a bad thing? I suppose one can argue that if the bad guys are incredibly stupid, they will assume they can chat with each other without being overheard, and we’ll get useful intelligence. But another view might be to send out a message that any way they pick to talk to each other outside their own cave can be monitored. So it forces the bad guys to move to much lower levels of communication. Is there a tradeoff here?

The point is, it’s not clear that the NYT has done anything harmful, even if you buy some of their arguments, and the only people who didn’t quite understand what was going on were naive Americans who might be shocked that our Prez would do such a thing as spy on Americans.
scarecrow | 12.22.05 – 8:18 am |”

We aren’t lucky enough that Stevens would actually make good on his threat and quit the Senate.

I haven’t been THAT good this year!

…clarification, sorry: I was referrring to Stevens, and his statements yesterday. I’ll see whether I can confirm this over at MSNBC.

BobbyG — I’m afraid I don’t have a lot of background on the issue of corporations as drug war proxies; given the newer HIPAA laws regarding privacy of health records, I suspect there may be some new ammunition against corporations doing anything more than checking for a black-and-white compliance/non-compliance urinalysis.

The public drove the HIPAA laws, too, demanding greater protection of personal health records. Not being an attorney, I wonder if there are any precedents set after HIPAA privacy laws were enacted that might bolster the position for the public’s expectation of privacy.

Let’s assume they used a wide-net sniffing-monitoring system of ALL electronic traffic. Surely somewhere in there the government sniffed citizens’ health records…

I believe he did say “I say goodbye to the senate tonight”, and when pushed later as to whether he was reesigning, he said “I don’t know”.

From MSNBC via dailydissent (760KB audio file)

Happiest ever of birthdays, fellow-Capricorn Patrick Fitzgerald! Will pop a cork on the good stuff tonight to drink your long good health!

Now that I know your birth sign, I know that the Evil Regime’s days are numbered. Word to Bushco: You *really* don’t want to get the goat of a workaholic Goat, unless you fancy being chewed to pieces and swallowed for lunch like the proverbial tin can.

Sorry to harp on this Rehm show, but Ron Kessler’s take on Osama’s satphone was that his use of a satphone was well known, but there was an August 17, 1998 WaPo article that stated that the CIA was intercepting the calls on that phone.

Yesterday’s WaPo article just talks about leaking the use of the satphone, not leaking the fact of the intercepting of calls. Which is it?

Oh, btw. In today’s show, since I gave the URL in a previous post, I thought I’d let you know that this is at ~34 min, and the other stuff is at ~41 minutes. I di just come across an earlier statement by Cole (~23 mins) that lays out the FISA warrant requirements better. I’m happier with the whole thing, but Kessler’s still a lying sack.

GSD–I just called Sen. Stevens office. His staff member tells me Stevens made that comment in November regarding a tacked-on amendment where Sen. Coburn wanted to take the bridge funding from AK and give it to New Orleans for bridges. Staff member says Stevens didn’t make such a comment yesterday about ANWR, it was just relating to Coburn’s earlier amendment which was defeated 84-15.

Any comments, clarification?

Rayne -

Yeah, others have alluded to the “unenumerated rights” principle. I agree, but in the case of what is truly known and documented about the 4th, it’s not even necessary.

My anti drug testing screed was based upon the fact that the government is incontrovertibly using the private sector in unconstitutional Hue and Cry fashion as drug war enforcement proxies. I wrote about that at considerable length.

—

—

I don’t think we should forget the Pentagon spying program (the Quaker meeting, etc.). We, the people, are being spied on by all areas of this administration as if we are all suspect. They’re so busy spying on the political opposition it’s no wonder they heven’t been able to attend to the real problems of the nation!

“Several Constitutional scholars like Prof. Susan Low Bloch of Georgetown University see the presidentÂ’s actions as both unconstitutional and illegal.”

Prof, I forgot to put quotations around this sentence. My entire post was a quoting from the linked article. I did not write that sentence.

South Carolina Fox News affiliate ran a story appearing to cheer a white supremacist website — and the leader of the group says that Fox News staff are members of his white supremacy forum, RAW STORY can reveal.

The story was picked up by Jesus’ General Dec. 18. Fox apparently aired a video news segment which was also pulled; RAW STORY has not seen the video. The Fox affiliate is owned by Meredith Corporation.

The story, which profiled white supremacist website Stormfront.org, ran on Fox Carolina’s WHNS website in late November. It is still available in Google’s cache.

Agh. BobbyG, that’s a good-news-bad-news picture. Corporations establishing benchmarks of performance and expectations is horrible.

Although I’d have to say that the expectations that the public and consumer place upon private corporations is the driving force behind drug screening; the public’s safety is compromised if, for example, a FedEx driver or pilot is operating truck/plane under the influence. In this respect, it is the public that is driving the compromise of privacy. An employee cannot expect to be under the influence and possibly in violation of multiple laws if they are working for the public or in the creation of publicly consumed products or goods, or utilizing commonly owned space/assets while employed.

But communications, whether that of the individual or business should be private unless there is probable cause to believe there is a crime in progress. Talking on the phone is not like driving a vehicle; one is using common space maintained and concurrently used by others when on a public road. One’s communications on the telephone or internet are performed over privately contracted services and resources; it is the expectation of privacy in this electronic space that makes spam so hated, since it injects itself into a privately contracted service.

Corporations have the same expectation of privacy in communications since it is a requirement for competition and for compliance with laws (like HIPAA laws, for example).

I’d also like to see some arguments about unenumerated rights when it comes to privacy; just because privacy is not specifically cited in the Constitution or Amendments, it doesn’t mean that citizens do not have a right to privacy.

Beyond “mere” principle, this is what you get in practical terms when you allow an incoherent, narcissistic dilettante like Bush into power:

Could warrantless spying backfire on the war on terror?

We suggested yesterday that the Bush administration’s decision to help itself to warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens might actually cause damage to its war on terror. From the Washington Post today comes evidence that we were right.

The Post reports that Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, who presides over the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, has asked top-ranking officials from the National Security Agency and the Justice Department to brief judges on the court about Bush’s secret surveillance program. Depending on what they hear, the Post says, the judges could then “demand that the Justice Department produce proof that previous wiretaps were not tainted.” Warrants obtained based on information obtained through warrantless surveillance could be called into question, the Post says. And one judge on the court said that there could even be calls — from the judges themselves — to disband the secret FISA court in protest of the president’s actions.

Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court Judge Dee Benson, a former staffer for Sen. Orrin Hatch who was appointed to the bench by the president’s father, said he needs more information before deciding just how troubled he is by the revelations of warrantless spying. “But I wonder,” he tells the Post, “if you’ve got us here, why didn’t you go through us? They’ve said it’s faster [to bypass FISA], but they have emergency authority under FISA, so I don’t know.”

– Tim Grieve, Salon.com

Prof->With respect to your 10:25; I was familiar with Youngstown before I began reading your posts about it. Doesn’t “silence imply consent?” I, like you, think Youngstown is very important. If my posts suggested anything else to you about it, I am sorry, that was not my intent. With that said, I have not yet found anything sufficiently objectionable in my posts today to warrant a retraction or a restatement.

Happy Birthday—So today’s fitzy’s birthday? A sag? He will go far!

Happy Birthday, Attorney Fitgerald, sir.

Yeeehawww!

hey zennurse – I am in the middle of Manhattan and we talk like thta to each other in the office – it is playfully meant… sorta like when I use “hellloooooo???”

The different levels of interaction are kinda interesting…it does strike me that this is a very California website…

I posted this late last night and it got buried I think. Here it is again.

WASHINGTON (Dec. 21) – Vice President Dick Cheney on Tuesday called for “strong and robust” presidential powers, saying executive authority was eroded during the Watergate and Vietnam eras. Some lawmakers objected that President Bush’s decision to spy on Americans to foil terrorists showed he was flexing more muscle than the Constitution allows.”

And sadly they’ll get away with it. Throw out some vague references to Article 2, blah blah blah and there you go. Distort, misrepresent, use the word “briefing” and “notification’ interchangeably with “oversight”… This isn’t going to any court for a ruling and the votes aren’t there for impeachment.

So has Bush won on getting around FISA with the NSA? No, not entirely. If the reports are true that the story was leaked to the NYT by “current and former officials at the NSA”, there’s your “oversight”, sort of. It’s no longer a secret at least. Will there be an investigation to find the leakers? No e’ fin way. The last thing the administration wants is to get this in court and have to produce an endless stream of discovery and depositions to what would be the defense in a potential Whistle blower case.

sonate- that’s what I’m doing.

drshow@wamu.org

The unchallenged false statement is

Ron Kessler, lying pig
RK: “..information on Al Quaeda just be torn up because you don’t have a FISA warrant…”

DR: “My understanding that they can immediately wiretap”

RK”once they get an emergency alert, they can start immediately, but to get that takes at least a day” “…they have to get all these signatures”

This was Cole’s response
DC: “they’ve gotten approvals from the FISA court within hours, and if they’re taking too long within the executive branch to put an emergency tap in place, and there is nothing in the law that limits them, number one, and number two, if that was the problem, why didn’t they say that that was the problem, a week after 9/11 they put on the table before Congress the PATRIOT Act, and they said ‘change this about FISA’, instead they went ahead and ignored what FISA said and violated criminal statute”

Cole rebuts some of it, but there is this outstanding issue of the pre-approval. I wanted to post his statement (transcribed sloppily by me, go to http://www.wamu.org/programs/dr/ if you want to listen) in order to show what i believe to be a fallacy left on the table. If any of you interpret Cole’s response as setting the record straight (although he tried and did a pretty good job) please let me know. An unclear aspect of Cole’s response is what is the source of the delay? Is it FISA rules, or is it just the technical delay of implementing the wiretap?

Clusterfuck’s defense:

“I did it to make you safer- is of course not a LEGAL defense at all- it’s a prayer for jury nullification—

Like a guy who killed his neighbor cause he thought he was a threat to others-

“Yeah- I murdered him- but he NEEDED murdering”.

Here Prof,

Youngstown

Rayne -

“Presumptively” simply maps to the word “unreasonable” in the 4th. The STATE has the burden of proof (”probable cause”) when arguing the necessity for breaching someone’s privacy. This whole pseudo-conservative fallacious whine about “privacy to do WHAT?” is irrelevant. There IS NO a priori list of privacy-protected activities The right is properly presumptive on its face. It can be lawfully breached upon sufficient showing, so it’s not “absolute.” The whiners invariably confuse this point.

That said, in reality indeed “privacy” has been operationally devalued down to a mere “interest” seen to be in utiliarian competition with other more powerful interests.

As I wrote in my Thesis:

The devolution of constitutional privacy

In his 1991 American Business Law Journal article Workplace Privacy and the Fourth Amendment: An End to Reasonable Expectations?(Vol. 29), legal scholar Don Mayer argues that the major drug testing cases have served a central role in the devaluation the original meaning of “privacy” under the Fourth Amendment. Mayer notes that in Fourth Amendment criminal cases generally, “the Court has generally found individual expectations unreasonable, and in civil cases has generally discarded both probable cause and warrant requirements” and that “ the Court’s contractarian thinking encourages the notion that not only statutory but constitutional rights can be explicitly or implicitly waived by the demands of employers or the ‘operational realities of the workplace’.” (p. 631)

Mayer observes that what was once a constitutional “right” has been downgraded to a mere “interest” in competition with other, more powerful interests: an individual interest whose worth must be calculated on the basis of “reasonable expectations.” What are “reasonable expectations”? Well, whatever society is prepared to accept as “reasonable,” a notion with a charmingly bootstrap quality where drug testing cases are concerned. For example, Mayer cites Willner v. Thornburgh (928 F.2d 1185, D.C. Cir. 1991), wherein the majority wrote that

[m]ore than 85 percent of employers with drug-testing programs tested job applicants . . . Some of the nation’s largest employers, including American Telephone & Telegraph, DuPont, Exxon, Federal Express, Trans World Airlines, and United Airlines . . . What is occurring generally outside government is some indication of what expectations of privacy “society is prepared to accept as reasonable” when the government engages in the hiring process. (Mayer, p. 650)

So, the very fact that private sector corporations, “unguarded” by the Fourth Amendment (recall Ginsberg earlier in Chandler), screen for illegal drugs willy-nilly without cause becomes itself the reference standard for “reasonable expectations” under the Fourth Amendment. How conveniently circular.

In essence, on this line of reasoning the scope of the Fourth Amendment is determined by Disney and its corporate brethren, not by the courts. Whatever is required to meet the “operational realities of the workplace” trumps, by virtue of its mere declaration and enactment, an employee’s puny privacy “interest.”

—

Please indulge me for an interruption of this celebration with an off-topic post. I’m tracked down as many of the Koufax Award nominees as possible to let readers learn a little more about the Koufaxes. This year, for the first time, every winner gets $100.

They have gotten a little thin-skinned over at Fort Stevens. Ted Stevens, the steamed Senator from Alaska has threatened to leave the Senate over the failure to pass the ANWR drilling amendment.

Give Ted Stevens a call and let him know he should be a man of his word and leave the Senate.

The Honorable Ted Stevens
United States Senate
522 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510

(202) 224-3004
(202) 224-2354 FAX

Although if he leaves, does Governor Murkowski(R-Nepostist) have ANOTHER daughter he can appoint to the Senate

-GSD

One of the things goopers do well is to come up with a simple message and stick to it..All interviews and stories about goopers inevitably present the same united front message..

The left, on the other hand, is all over the place- no central guidance on the message..

The message on spygate is critical..It has to:

Lay out the criminality of Clusterfuck’s actions

Disentangle the criminal behavior from the policy to fight terrorism

Suggest ONE next step in taking action on the issue..

Something like:

“The president has broken the FISA law- that’s a felony- he has defied congress, the courts, and the constitution.

We cannot know his motivation for doing this- it may have been to protect the country from terrorism- it may have been political- we can’t know.

Whatever his motivation- he has broken the law- and jeopordized constitutional rights of all americans–this cannot be allowed to stand.

A special prosecutor must be assigned to this case immediately- one who is in no way tied to the administration-and he or she must be given adequate power to conduct a thorough investigation and write a report for congress and the american people on legality of this behavior”

Or something like that- could the group here come up with a succinct and powerful message?

In the post Hurricane Katrina aftermath, when George W. Bush was seriously wounded in the public eye, he began the campaign to revive his image by appearing over and over again in the hurricane zone to burnish his “caring” image.

At one point he spoke briefly with the press. He said: “I am down here working hard. By that I mean I am thanking people”.

I realized that when you spend your life getting things from other people without any real effort on your part besides being who you are, things like jobs, money, praise(”You are cool and deserve respect”-Harriet Miers vapid words), hotels, food, power and probably piles of cocaine.. you consider thanking them to be hard work.

Astonishing. Pathetic.

And a hearty Amen.

-GSD

Results released Tuesday showed the governing Shiite grouping, the United Iraqi Alliance, winning strong majorities not only in Baghdad but in the largely Shiite southern provinces. Sunni Arabs turned out in large numbers, unlike January’s election.

The electoral commission put total turnout at nearly 70% of the country’s 15.5 million voters. The Jan. 30 elections saw a turnout of 58%, while 63% participated in the October referendum.

Politicians say that based on preliminary results, the alliance seems on course to win between 120 and 130 seats — compared with 140 now.

Sunni Arabs may increase their seats from 17 to more than 40, while the Kurds are expected to hold between 40 and 50. Allawi, who controls 40 seats, is expected to drop to 20 seats or fewer.

Despite the lead, the Shiite religious bloc likely will fall short of the 184 seats necessary to choose a new president, the first step needed to form a government, and will have to find a coalition partner in the 275-member parliament.

USA Today on the results of the Iraq elections– sounds like–no significant change from the composition of the current interim govt.. lots of screaming and threatening going on about cheating..situation normal.

BobbyG —

A-F*CKING-MEN, BAY-BEE.

Now elaborate a bit on “absolutely” versus “presumptively”.

I suspect this is where they could argue that their use of wide net monitoring-sniffing through ALL electronic communications (versus specific communications from a specific source) is blind to content and only looking for context.

We need to be able to argue this back and forth so that it is stone-solid. Besides, they’re watching us. They might as well know they aren’t messing with fools and that we’re ready for them — bring it on.

Primordial Ooze writes “Ron Kessler is such a tool.”

I also listened to that show on my way to work, and “tool” is the kindest descrriptor I used to describe Ron Kessler. (Fortunately, noone else was in my car listening to my Ron Kessler rants.)

In asking Diane for a correction, do we just e-mail the show?

Lott is critical, but if he manages to regain his formal/former status in the House, it’s an open question (and that’s the best we can hope for, really) as to whether he’d turn on them or try to use his regained power to leverage something for his promised inaction/foot dragging.

It would be nice for once if a Pug actually regretted their past transgressions while there was still something they could do to redeem a few of them – seems to hit them on their deathbed or after they’ve gotten to know their grandkids.

Who knows, maybe the Katrina BS woke up Mr. Lott; that coupled with a desire for paybacks could carry the day.

Or I could be channeling Pollyanna…

Damn! Someone else paste it, please.

.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/ getcase.pl?court=us&vol=343&invol=579

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/sc…ipts/ getcase.pl?court=us&vol=343&invol=579

BobbyG, Amen, and then:

John Casper,

Several Constitutional scholars like Prof. Susan Low Bloch of Georgetown University see the presidentÂ’s actions as both unconstitutional and illegal.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, FDLers should read Youngstown for themselves.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl? court=us&vol=343&invol=579

Citizens should not simply rely on the words of constitutional law professors (of which I am one). Our words mean nothing. You must empower yourself through reading.

We can all recognize a broken leg without asking a doctor if it is broken.

After Youngstown, we can move on to more subtle variations, such as the O’Connor opinion in a more recent terrorism case (which had to navigate Youngstown), the 4th Circuit recent decision, and others.

It may just be that if the Supremes take the Padilla case, they could blow all the President-as-King rationale out of the water.

Meanwhile, you can visit a Member of Congress and Senator during their holiday break.

.

In case you all missed it, I thought Dahlia Lithwick wrote a brilliant summation yesterday on why the Bush administration is unable to play by the rules.

goodnight and goodluck -

Yeah, Mr. Swaggering Self-Reliance. What a friggin’ joke:

http://utwatch.org/utimco/nativeson.html

—

Ron Kessler is such a tool. I was just listening to Diane Rehm on the way to work and he was setting up straw men faster than they could be knocked down. It seems that the “FISA causes delays” meme is alive and well. He started off by drawing up a scenario in which a wiretap had turned up plotting of a terrorist attack, and stated that this information would have to be thrown out if a warrant had not been obtained. Bullshit. He then said that it took 1-2 days to get the warrant. Diane called him on that, describing the 72-hour retroactive warrant, but he still persisted in saying that emergency authorization was needed under FISA, which could take a few hours’ delay. Neither Diane nor David Cole called him on that, so this has been allowed to stand.

First, I want to make sure that there is no such emergency approval required, which is my understanding, and second, I wanted to vent about the lies. I will be asking Diane to air a correction for the record.

BobbyG,

Amen and thanks for some great posting on this.

Let us remember the words of Barbara Jordan during the Watergate hearings:

“My faith in the Constitution is whole, it is complete, it is total. I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction of the Constitution.”

Here’s praying we can get some “Amens” on that. Especially relating to the 4th Amen-dment!

Trent Lott voted against the Bill of Impeachment on Nixon. I doubt that he would support Shrub’s impeachment under any circumstances.

It’s so interesting. Here’s a man who struts around in cowboy clothing and pretends he’s some sort of altruistic, concerned and loving Lone Ranger from Texas, put here by God for our benifit. The Bush life has been one of illusion, wealth, and privilege and who probably has never done what most of us call an honest day’s work in his pathetic life. But above all else, this president’s existence is characterized by failure and insulation from from life’s nuances, suffering and stuggles. He is an original. This man takes and takes without ever giving in return, except of course to his rich compatriot in crime enablers. And what’s so offensive, is that he views this despicable and reprehensible attitude as a right inherent with having accidently been born with the Bush name, fortune and connections.

Bush has failed at every turn. One could hardly refer to his brief dalliance with the oil business, given him by his father and friends, the partnership in a major league baseball team, also financed by his wealthy cohorts, his embarassing college experiance and certainly not his cowards-way-out during the Vietnam War as being successful. And now he is poised on the precipice of the biggest failure of his life. He has failed the American people miserably. This man has failed as president of what used to be the most respected nation on earth. And most importantly, he has failed “his” God. His legacy is already written.

But, Bush and the rest will not win. The Leviathan Bush is trying so desparately to construct will fail. The Bush plan will succumb in the end. How do I know this? Because of my undying faith in those like the FDLers and others who are convinced that good will out. And because there are enough folks left here in these United States that can and will do the heavy lifting necessary to cast out the fiendish philosophy which is the Bush Administration. Triumph, is, through our concerted efforts and hard, hard work ours in the end. Make no mistake about it, Bush.

Fitz is the real Lone ranger.

Happy Christmas, or whatever, and a Merry New Year! And may the light of life shine on you all. When we get back from the holidays, you know, the real work begins.

Amen, AMEN, fellow FDLers. And, we hold these truths to be self-evident, Mr. Dubya, in spite of your war mongering, lie spewing, money grubbing cronies efforts otherwise.

AUSTIN, Texas – A Texas appeals court Thursday thwarted former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s bid for a speedy trial.

ADVERTISEMENT

The money laundering and conspiracy case against the Republican congressman has been on hold while prosecutors appeal a judge’s dismissal of some of the charges.

DeLay’s attorneys asked the 3rd Court of Appeals to speed up the appeals process by shortening the filing periods from 20 days to five days. But the court said no.

DeLay has been pressing for a quick resolution to his case so he can regain his post as majority leader before his colleagues call for new leadership elections next month.

The congressman is accused of illegally funneling corporate campaign contributions to GOP candidates for the state Legislature. Under Republican House rules, he was forced to step down when he was indicted.

Raw Story

emptywheel has already pointed out how critical Trent (I love Strom Thurmond) Lott is to any movement on impeachment. The WSJ, Warren Rudman, and George Will carry very significant weight with Trent. As karen allen has pointed out most recently, the fact that Trent is still really pissed off at Karl Rove and Bill Frist for pushing him out as Majority Leader (for remarks he made at Strom’s birthday party that sounded suspiciously like support of Jim Crow segregation laws), doesn’t hurt.

Blub,

The concept in progress of “permanant Republican majority” espoused by Rove, Delay and Norquist would be the monkey wrench in you positing of a Democrat grabbing a hold of the imperial reigns.

They are gaming the system to prevent that changing of the guard from happening.

Let’s hope that the Rubicon is a little longer and harder to cross than expected.

-GSD

BobbyG,

I hereby declare myself the holder of a daypass to “the Amen corner.”

{awaiting lightning strike}

Amen.

Casey L:
Shrub maintains pardon power even if Fitz names him as an unindicted co-conspirator. Only a bill of impeachment trumps the pardon power.

In grad school I studied in rather fine detail the history and political/jurisprudential interpretive nuances of the Fourth Amendment. Among my voluminous research sources, I slogged through Cuddihy’s 1,800+ page 4 volume seminal reference work “Origins and Original Meaning of the Fourth Amendment,” an exhaustive tome cited by the Supremes in some of their privacy rulings.

HereÂ’s what we know, if we take the time to review the history:

The intent of the Framers was to make the private affairs of citizens presumptively PRIVATE (not “absolutely,” “presumptively”- there’s a difference) and, conversely, the affairs of those doing the governing presumptively PUBLIC absent independently verified objective cause for their being held in secret. It is a goal of the current administration to complete the total inversion of this founding principle in their quest for a panoptic Police State. The Fourth Amendment phrase “secure in their persons, papers, houses, and effects…” was deliberately intended to confer this presumptive right of privacy – the lack of the actual word “privacy” notwithstanding (I hate that particular lame whine). A principal cause of the American Revolution was the Colonials’ hatred of the Crown’s oppressive practice of Writs of Assistance (offspring of the medieval vigilante “Hue and Cry”) and General Warrants (the blank check for bashing in doors in search of untaxed contraband anytime, anywhere).

You can look it up.

We neuter that hard-won principle at our peril. Without constitutionally respected and protected “privacy” there can be no “liberty” – an aggregated concept utterly beyond the ken of the hapless George W. Bush (as it impacts US, that is. He will certainly go to any extreme to safeguard his own privacy).

Now, David Brin argues (see “The Transparent Society”) that our efforts to “blind the powerful” are quixotic in this time of total surveillance technology, and that the only remedy is two-way transparency. But, again, the powerful will do whatever it takes to continue to make it a one-way street. They must be fought relentlessly. It is nothing less than our Constitutional duty as self-governing citizens. The burden of proof regarding Fourth Amendment “reasonableness” is properly on THEM, not us.

So endeth the Original Intent / Textualist Lesson of the Day.

Can I get an ‘Amen’?

—

ooooooo!!!! Ahhhhhhh!!! ooooooooo!!

This sounds less like Fitzmas and more like the 4th of July! Now we just have to wait till the Fireworks start!!!!

To John Casper’s (and others points here), this is an interesting point in history..filled with opportunity but potentially disasterous if things go the wrong way. A president, along with cronies, is apparently, on multiple issues and in multiple ways, openly breaking the law of the land, in open repudiation of the constitution and bill of rights. In the case of FISA, he has pretty much said so outright and maintained that he will continue to do so. If he is not held to account, both in law and in the court of conscience, then we’re in fuckedcountry.com territory.. the rubicon scenario.. any president that comes afterward, including Dems, will be Imperial Presidents. This isn’t about politics anymore.. he has to be impeached and quickly, regardless of the political implications. Do people just not get what’s going on?

Back to All Things Fitz for a second: I’m sure this question has been asked previously, but I can’t remember the answer.

If Fitzgerald really wanted to prevent Bush’s pardoning Libby/Rove/et al., could he name Bush as an uninidicted co-conspirator? Because, see, IIRC, that’s the only check on the President’s power to pardon; he can’t pardon if he’s a party to the case.

Now, whether Ftizgerald would actually do so is another issue. On the one hand, I doubt he’d use the power of indictment as a tactic. On the other hand, he can be creative when he feels the need to be. And, on yet a third hand (*G*), I betcha Fitzgerald does have enough evidence to name Bush as ain Unindicted Coconspirator – on false statement charges, if Bush told the GJ he had no idea who was involved in the leak story, when it turns out he knew Rove was involved all along.

If I had spent 2 years investigating a case, and if I had been systemically lied to by senior WH officials, and if I found out that the perps were expecting to get pardons so they could just walk, I’d be plenty pissed. I’d be pissed off enough to try an in-your-face tactic like naming someone an unindicted co-conspirator, in order to spike his guns so he couldn’t pardon anyone.

Is that something he could do?

It is my grandfather’s 94th birthday today, and I hope that Fitz lives as long and healthy as he has.

Happy Birthday Fitz!

Several Constitutional scholars like Prof. Susan Low Bloch of Georgetown University see the presidentÂ’s actions as both unconstitutional and illegal. As professor Bloch indicated in an interview on MSNBC last evening, the president is not specifically empowered to order the secret surveillance by either the Constitution or any existing federal statute.

Moreover, the administration is not, and does not claim to be, following the statute known as the Foreign Service Intelligence Authority which gives the president certain limited authority to conduct surveillance activity.

When former presidents Clinton and Carter acted under FISA (Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act) they did so pursuant to specific subdivisions of the statute and after making the Executive Order public.

President Bush has failed to comply with the statute, and has kept the order under which he authorized the surveillance activities, secret. Had it not been for the N.Y. Times report, the activity would have remained secret.

Quotations above taken from
http://www.newsinferno.com/sto…..5~001.html

Oops! I should have typed clemency regulations in my previous post.

I’m not a lawyer, but it seems to me that if Scanlon flipped and Abramoff doesn’t know what Scanlon has coughed up then Abramoff is under tremendous pressure to spill the whole nine yards, no?

Here is some information I obtained from the Department of Justice’s Web site about pardons:

The Office of the Pardon Attorney, in consultation with the Attorney General or his designee, assists the President in the exercise of executive clemency as authorized under Article II, Section 2, of the Constitution. Under the Constitution, the President’s clemency power extends only to federal criminal offenses. All requests for executive clemency for federal offenses are directed to the Pardon Attorney for investigation and review. The Pardon Attorney prepares the Department’s recommendation to the President for final disposition of each application. Executive clemency may take several forms, including pardon, commutation of sentence, remission of fine or restitution, and reprieve.

Here’s a link to the page from which I obtained the preceding paragraph:

http://www.usdoj.gov/pardon/index.html

Here are some more links:

Clemecy regulations:

http://www.usdoj.gov/pardon/clemency.htm

Standards for Consideration of Clemency Petitions:

http://www.usdoj.gov/pardon/petitions.htm

When you have a chance, please click on those links – hope this information will preclude or alleviate concerns.

scarecrow-> I found your WSJ link very, very helpful. I have posted some of the quotations that I found most helpful.

“It seems to me that if you’re the president, you have to proceed with great caution when you do anything that flies in the face of the Constitution,” said Warren Rudman, a former Republican senator from New Hampshire who has served on a number of government intelligence advisory boards. He calls the administration’s surveillance program “a matter of grave concern.”

David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union, described the spy program as a case of “presidential overreaching” that he said most Americans would reject.

Columnist George Will wrote in a Washington Post opinion piece that “conservatives’ wholesome wariness of presidential power has been a casualty of conservative presidents winning seven of the past 10 elections.”

Bob Barr, a Georgia conservative who was one of the Republican Party’s loudest opponents of government snooping until he left Congress in 2003, says the furor should stand as a test of Republicans’ willingness to call their president to task. “This is just such an egregious violation of the electronic surveillance laws,” Mr. Barr says.

Sen. Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who chairs the Judiciary Committee, has called the program “inappropriate” and promised to hold hearings early next year. Republicans joining him include centrist Sens. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and John Sununu of New Hampshire, along with limited-government types like Larry Craig of Idaho.

The three, along with Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine, have sided with Democrats in the Patriot Act fight, citing concerns the government is running rough-shod over civil liberties in the name of the war on terrorism. Without Senate approval by Dec. 31, a bulk of the law’s key provisions would expire. Negotiations over a compromise continued yesterday.

“From the beginning, the folks who thought it was a good idea to go into Iraq have found good reason to think that all other Bush policies, from torture to domestic surveillance, are justified,” said Robert Levy, a conservative legal scholar at the libertarian Cato Institute. “This is just one in a litany of ongoing events that have separated the noninterventionist wing of the Republican Party from the neocon wing.”

ck– no. Prez may pardon Federal crimes only.

The governor has the parallel power in most states.

dont forget

the job of the attorney general is to keep the doj from being a headache for the president.

gonzales doesn’t seem to have done too good a job at that, but that doen’t mean he won’t keep trying.

i am hopeful but i’ll wait to celebrate until i see that abramoff et al. have not been allowed to cope pleas for relatively small crimes with the doj then spiking the case at say noe.

we’ll just have to see how much control the doj professionals have over matters relative to the political appointees.

Thanks scarecrow—have been waiting for that card to be played- there is a joker in this deck!

Libertarians are going to absolutely HATE this action- probably more than the left- it runs smack into the middle of their distrust of government.. could be one of those rare times when the right and the left are banded together against the middle.

Rayne: Am I right about this, Prof?

Absolutely.

.

An article in WSJ about how warrant-less spying is driving a wedge between libertarian conservatives and others.

http://online.wsj.com/public/a…..?mod=blogs

Mrs.K8,
You’re so very welcome. I copied it from my cache to harddrive so I could watch it when I needed to.

I well up every time I watch it.

Thanks, rw. Will do.

Oh, BQ, thank you ever so much for that link!

Hey, everybody, if you haven’t yet seen that video — The Battle For America– linked to in BQ’s 8:54am comment,

YOU SIMPLY MUST!

Excuse me for yelling, but it is extraordinary. Inspiring, rousing, gets the blood pumping, it even brought tears to my eyes (same for Mr. K8, too!).

If you EVER feel down, discouraged, depressed about the dark cloud of the regime hanging over everyone’s heads (and who doesn’t?), viewing this short, beautiful, amazing little video will lift your soul.

You won’t be sorry you took the time to see it — and you’ll want to bookmark it for future “lifts” of the spirit.

Mrs. K8: re “laser focus” or broader inquiry? So many outrages, so little time.

Just a thought: during Watergate, it wasn’t just a single issue that eventually brought down the President and his men. It was the cumulative weight of all of them. Different folks seem to respond to different outrages. A coalition of the outraged is what’s needed, IMO.

excuse–others have e-mailed Redd or Jane their e-mail addresses and asked them to forward it to another poster- guess it works.

Bush can only pardon Federal crimes.

I thought the constitutional power of Presidential Pardon was absolute — not limited by anything, including jurisdiction.

Map’s really cool, John. Seeing whom in Southern CA donated to whom is fun fun fun…. A lot of the zip codes that I always thought of as being Republican are really quite Democratic. In Del Mar (the site of Dukester’s worst indiscretions), it looks like Dem donors outflanked rethugs by 4:1. Maybe I was wrong and voters there will elect a Dem to replace Mr Golden Toilet Bowl

OT:

Has anyone seen or heard from Valley Girl? I’d like to contact her. I checked the last few threads and she is nowhere to be found.

Is there a way to put my email address on this site without blowing my cover, so to speak? Thanks much if you can help.

What’s to prevent Bush from pardoning Abramoff?

Nothing! But he would do so at his own peril … ;-)

BTW, OT – but it is looking like the NYC transit strike may end sometime today.

Mrs. K– This website already own traitorgate- and should never give it up. It’s currently in a pretty quiet phase right now though- and there is a danger of chasing too many rabbits in the interim..I was suggesting focus on spygate in the interim.

I believe it would be a mistake to begin to chase every headline–that’s what the other bloggers do- in the end- they accomplish nothing.

I heartily recommend Aaron Freeman’s essay at HuffPo, “Spy on Me. Make my Day!”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..12720.html

Even while we must fight this unconstitutional Bushie mendacity, we must NOT fear these pricks. That’s what they intend, intimidation.

Fuck ‘em.

—

rwcole — I think Prof did with the Youngstown case, already killed dead the “but Congress said I could” defense.

But I can see where the AUMF could be construed as permission by the ‘wingers.

The problem the Executive office has with the AUMF is that they never offered adequate assurances to Congress or the Judiciary that the seizure of communications was absolutely limited to al Qaeda and its network. They had no permission to seize any other communications save for those specifically related to the terms of the AUMF. If they acquired any other communications even though they did not use them (sniffing or monitoring all communications traffic to evesdrop on a potential communication by al Qaeda, for example), they violated the AUMF.

Am I right about this, Prof?

What’s to prevent Bush from pardoning Abramoff?

Actually… The DoJ people are pretty smart Karen. DeLay and Abramoff were indicted on state charges where the preznot cannot pardon. Bush can only pardon Federal crimes.

rwcole –

I agree that having a laser focus is very powerful. However, in the case of NSA spying — which should absolutely be pounded upon like a giant drum here — we may (we hope!) need to move back to the CIA leak prosecution if/when our hero makes our Fitzmas bright. Then toss in the Abramoff public corruption case, and —

Gee, I dunno, I guess GOP corruption and treason to the Constitution, whatever its form, are too multifaceted to nail down to just one or two topics. Same theme, though, so it’s all good, and here, thanks to our hosts’ fine writing, it still has the quality of a bright laser-lit focus.

Here’s another idea for Redd and Jane to ponder..

You have managed to attract some nimble and dedicated minds- who are willing to spend time and effort with you..

We would be willing to get into harness to help in the development of a “message” and a strategy for spygate- or any other issue that you chose..

Group work is always difficult- but it is part of the untapped power of the internet.. If you want to try an experiment in “group power” on the internet- I for one would love to be involved.

“Does that strike anyone as odd? Are none of Bob Ney’s and Tom DeLay’s current staffmembers involved in this?”

It sure would be fun if this turns out to be a message from the prosecutors to Ney, DeLay and their attorneys that everyone in both staffs has “flipped.”

Does anyone who reads Drudge sense a certain desperateness now, since he is adding so much Conservative drivel and lies, even more than usual?

Jane, Redd, commenters, et al–Before I descend into the bowels of the holidays, let me say–again and again–thank you for this clean, well-lighted place….

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10562904#survey

Do you believe President Bush’s actions justify impeachment?

74594 responses

87% Yes

One week in the middle of the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, more than 200,000 people took part in an MSNBC Live Vote that asked whether President Clinton should leave office. Seventy-three percent said yes. That same week, an NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll found that only 34 percent of about 2,000 people who were surveyed thought so.

They explain the differences in “popular” polls as opposed to “scientific” polls. But they do not tell us exactly when the “middle” of the Clinton scandal was. They do tell us the poll ran for one week and they got 200,000 responses, 73% thought Clinton should leave office.

Now this poll is close to 75,000 people responding and has been up only a day. 87% of the respondents support impeachment…. 14% higher than those who thought Clinton should leave office.

Clinton was impeached.

Even taking the “non-scientific” aspects of this poll into account, this means something.

This dog hunts.

Wilson46201 -

Yeah, when I saw that I laughed also. WHICH of the myriad aspects of my privacy? Some I gladly give up, others — like data mining or otherwise surveilling me absent ANY rational cause, or stopping me at random in public generally for a show of my “papers” — I will fight loudly and relentlessly.

—

Damn, I gotta’ do something else for a while. I seem to have a real problem today with typing and linking.

Youngstown.

Preview is my friend.

FDL is in my “daily” bookmark folder, one of the first and last I hit every day.

Thanks you for excellent information, and thanks for focusing on Traitorgate, which is the most important story this year (and last year, for that matter).

I was outraged about Traitorgate from the start, and now we have Surveillancegate right up ther with it.

Have a Happy Peace Day…

Karen–nothing prevents it- but it’s well into the ninth inning on that issue–once Abramoff spills the beans- the horse is out of the barn.

Prof — I know I saw that someone in the media cited Youngstown yesterday. I’m hoping it catches fire as a meme.

Keep your fingers crossed. Would be nice if some of the folks who drop in here — you media types, ya’ dig? — would start pushing this a bit.

Youngstown.http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/…..;invol=579

Heh. Youngstown OH might even be happy for the name buzz.

New msnbc poll.

Are you willing to give up your privacy to help track down terrorists? yes 25%, No 76%

What a loaded question! Phrased just like Karl Rove would do! Even so, Americans stated the desire for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Next msnbc poll: Have you stopped beating your spouse yet?

Happy fitzday! And may all our gifts flow from plea bargains.

And I also concur with rw: the Jane/Redd site has given us wonderful gifts all year long. Thanks much ladies, and all who contribute here.

For those joining late, there was a first rate class on Constitutional Law, using the Youngstown decision, by Prof in the last thread. He’s made Con Law very accessible and gives us lots of legal insights on how to assess the WH extravagant and dangerous claims about the power of the Executive Branch.

Finally, gotta go to work, but when John Casper stood up last night to defend our hosts against over-the-line personal statements, he was right to do so, but I’m ashamed to say I let him stand alone. Won’t happen again. Sorry John.

What’s to prevent Bush from pardoning Abramoff?

Redd,
An opinion that should make you smile (an example of taking the attorney’s head off in writing), from Michael Luttig, no less, thrashing the govt for their contemptuous treatment of the 4th Circuit in the Padilla case. (PDF warning)http://pacer.ca4.uscourts.gov/opinion.pdf/056396R1.P.pdf

Stephen Kaus blogs it at Huff Po http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..12711.html

Enjoy, it’s a beautiful, subtle fillet job. And it poses FrankProbst’s question of what exactly they gained by sacrificing their credibility before the Court?

Another “enjoy” moment I posted after Mrs.K8’s thread that may have been missed is a stirring video at http://www.thebattleforamerica.com/
Inspiring.

and happy birthday to Fitz!

Now starring as the Grinch: Jack Abramoff

If you happen to be sharing Christmas morning with Tom DeLay, Bob Ney or any number of other Republicans in Congress, don’t be surprised if they keep excusing themselves from the festivities to check Google News. The Justice Department seems to be fairly far along in wrapping up a plea agreement with indicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff — a deal that could involve Abramoff’s providing testimony about his business dealings with members of Congress.

One participant in the plea discussions tells the New York Times that a deal could be announced early next week. The Associated Press says the deal could resolve both cases in which Abramoff is implicated — the criminal case pending against him in Florida as well as the investigation into his lobbying activities in Washington.

Not since the 1992 House banking scandal has a corruption probe “struck fear in so many hearts on Capitol Hill,” the AP’s Pete Yost writes. Even without Abramoff’s testimony, Yost says prosecutors are looking into the actions of as many as 20 members of Congress and their aides. Under any plea deal involving the Washington investigation, Abramoff would get a reduced — but still lengthy — prison sentence in exchange for telling everything he knows. “And,” Yost writes ominously, “he knows a lot.”

– Tim Grieve, Salon.com

—

This site is powerful. Redd and Jane can have a massive impact on the nation- depending on where they decide to take the thing–my advice- which doesn’t count for much of course- would be to continue to focus on one key issue at a time- and absolutely steamroll it…like spygate.

Anyone else wanna get their two cents worth in?

New msnbc poll.

Are you willing to give up your privacy to help track down terrorists? yes 25%, No 76%

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7545983/

I assume this is the correct address. I voted so all i see is the results.

Prof–thank you for educating us about it..

As I said- it appears to this non-legal mind that you have shattered the “inherrent powers in the second amendment” defense..

The other defense (congress authorized it in the use of force act) also needs a good douche- have you already addressed it?

rwcole -

I heartily second the sentiment. FDL is doing very important work, and having a significant impact.

I am LOVIN’ it.

—

Zennurse, rwcole, GrandmaJ, Rayne, Professor Foland — that’s at least six of us now and maybe more.

Thank you and Merry Fitzmas for reading Youngstown

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/…..;invol=579

.

Wow! I’m on the
map…

“Hats off again to Redd and Jane!

The Plamegate affair brought this site to the attention of many..

The combination of an eloquent legal mind and a gifted essayist- and total focus on the issue made this place a one stop shopping experience for those who wanted to know what was going on.. The focus was intense- we stayed on topic and ground through every fact presented.

I think that there is a similar opportunity now with the spy scandal..Most websites report a bit about it here and there- no one “owns” it yet.. It fits the talents of our hostesses.. It could be the springboard for the development of a message and a strategy for those who treasure the constitution to fight back–focus-focus-focus.. That’s what made ya great ladies!
rwcole | 12.22.05 – 8:41 am | # “

I completely agree. You two are doing a great job.

Hats off again to Redd and Jane!

The Plamegate affair brought this site to the attention of many..

The combination of an eloquent legal mind and a gifted essayist- and total focus on the issue made this place a one stop shopping experience for those who wanted to know what was going on.. The focus was intense- we stayed on topic and ground through every fact presented.

I think that there is a similar opportunity now with the spy scandal..Most websites report a bit about it here and there- no one “owns” it yet.. It fits the talents of our hostesses.. It could be the springboard for the development of a message and a strategy for those who treasure the constitution to fight back–focus-focus-focus.. That’s what made ya great ladies!

speaking of Abramoff, here’s a tidbit the WaPo buried on page B8 after the obituaries

http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..02216.html

Fun with Dick and George

mrsandcoop–I think you may be onto something! What’s to prevent BushCo, with their bragging about illegal surveillance, from listening in on the US attorney and Justice Department investigation strategy talks?

When I was in high school, some boys placed a rudimentary bugging device in the principal’s office to find out what he was planning. BushCo, with the most sophisticated spying devices known to man, with their careers and power on the line, is probably doing this on a much higher level.

roxtar — I was counting the bribery-taking folks in Congress as his “associates,” since they would have been involved in a common scheme and purpose. I’m assuming they are netting all of them into the conspiracy together, since the scheme was put together that way. I wasn’t thinking only in terms of business associates — but in terms of criminal associates — with the use of that term.

“Substantial testimony against his associates?”

I’m not sure what part of West Virginia you’re in, Redd, but up north here, snitching up is the rule. Kidan and Scanlon are already in the net… If Abramoff gets a deal without giving up elected officials, I will be very, very disappointed in the Public Integrity section of DOJ.

What are the chances of the Whitehouse being able to undermine parts of this investigation?

What are the chances of the Whitehouse pressuring the JD to wrangle as many Democrats as possible into this?

Wow! I’m on the
map…

Integrity schmagegrity.

These guys have no SHAME. You can’t make them have shame. You can try to guilt-trip them, but you can’t force them to have SHAME. And that is a shame.

“respectfully,

OOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHH PPPPPPPPPUUUUUUUUUUULLLLLLLLLLLEEEEEEEEEEEEEZZZZZZ ZZ”

I appreciate the information posted by Anonymous about the economic motivation behind the mess we’re in, but this is an oxymoron and I find it difficult to read the rest of the comment when it is prefaced this way. I just find it really offensive. Everyone has information to share, but nobody else needs this kind of “in your face” attitude to get it across.

JMO. respectfully
z

gee, I wonder if the NSA is listening in on those conversations at the Justice Dept………………..you know, so Dubya’s cronies can get out ahead of time

EW — I think they may be referring to the scheme that was reported on earlier — where the members of Congress were trading legislative favors in order to get lucrative KStreet jobs for their staffers when they left work on the Hill. It was a quid pro quo — job for legislation, and you got to put your former staffer in a position of influence to funnel more money into your campaign coffers.

I’ll second the happy birthday wishes

But I’ve also got a question. See in the NYT article it talks about a dozen lawmakers and their former staff members?

Does that strike anyone as odd? Are none of Bob Ney’s and Tom DeLay’s current staffmembers involved in this?

I don’t know what to make of it, but it strikes me as odd that somehow the only staffers under the gun here are former.

One more question. Is Susan Ralston among those dozen? Is she going to leak to the newspapers again about what a burden it is to have to get a lawyer and so forth? Or does she accept that she’s really involved in this one?

OT but important: my brother just sent me this.

—————–

Wow! I’ve just discovered a very interesting google map hack that integrates with public records of political campaign contributions.

Interesting and scary at the same time.

——————

Attempting to embed link here…

Plea deals: the gifts that keep on giving.

lOVE YA, BABY!