Thus, the only way to deal with the Republican Hydra of the Bush administration is to cut off all their heads at once, conducting simultaneous impeachment hearings of all of them, kind of like the Nuremberg Trials.

Of course, cutting off the heads of the Republican Hydra will not guarantee that these arrogant, anti-American creeps won’t reappear. Just look at how many corrupt Republicans from the Nixon administration and Reagan administration have shown up again in the Bush administration, pulling the very same nefarious, anti-American stunts. But at least, once the Republican Hydra’s heads start to roll, it will take them awhile to find their heads again and screw them back on, which will give all the rest of us patriotic Americans a little breathing room…before the Republican Hydra attempts it’s next totalitarian takeover of our democracy.

yes, one would think that would be part of the job description — in a lawful administration.

So, litigatormom, you’re a mom and a litigator? I am too, in addition to being, obviously, odd.

oldmommy @ 147

As far as solid citizen lawyers with flake clients….the rules of ethics require that “a lawyer represent his client zealously within the bounds of the law.” (immortally quoted by Robert DeNiro in “Cape Fear”). Of course, there ARE no “bounds of the law” in the Bush white house, so who knows……

Exactly my query. FF’s clients are acting completely outside the bounds of the law, so what must FF do to represent them within the bounds of his professional oath? As I remember from L&O, he cannot allow his clients to perjure themselves or commit other unlawful acts that FF knows about. Doesn’t that put him in a terrible bind, unless he’s as bad as them?

If Fielding knows that his clients will lie under oath, he must either keep them off the stand, or resign. Resignation is the “nuclear” option for a lawyer with a bent-on-lying client, because the impact of the resignation is, as you can imagine, very negative, even though the counsel cannot say WHY he/she is resigning.

Fielding need not resign if he learns that his clients have lied or obstructed justice in the past. The clients are entitled to a zealous defense for past acts, which includes as much stonewalling (i.e., delay) on discovery as they can get away with. But Fielding cannot allow himself to become involved with, condone, or permit continuing obstruction of justice.

Who is paying FF’s salary?

Perfect question. IIRC, taxpayers are. Where should that place his loyalites? He’s W’s lawyer in W’s conduct of presidential duties, not W’s personal lawyer. Lawyers on line chime in on this complication plz.

but he’s still an advocate for the president — in the conduct of his official duties, as you say. And all of this mess, godawful though it is, did arise out of W’s, er, “performance” of his official duties. Thus, it’s different from…..oh, say, defending a president whose “high crime” was getting a f******g blow job.

Actually, the job of the White House Counsel is supposed to be to counsel the President on how to perform his duties lawfully.

The proposal reflects a series of balanced compromises designed to respect and accommodate your interests in obtaining information while also protecting the institution of the Presidency. Although it consists of individual components, the proposal reflects a unified offer that, if accepted, would result in your Committees receiving a significant amount of information.

Translation: “I’ve already taken your interests into account and have balanced them against my client’s need to avoid embarrassment and inconvenience. Having negotiated with myself and reached a satisfactory resolution, there is no need for me to negotiate with you.”

among the comments, one idea i found especially intertesting was the suggestion to subpeona the IT people – to find out what was done and who gave the orders…

Ding! This should be the committees next move in my opinion. They were the people who “did” whatever they were ordered to do with the supposed missing email. They will without question know what happened to the data and under who’s direction it occurred.

I work in IT for a government contractor. I would suspect that whoever the IT person(s) ordered to erase/delete/whatever would have had it drilled into him what the WH technical policies were. ALL organizations, and especially government organizations, have them, along with what is called an “Acceptable Use Policy” that sets out what you can and cannot do with the computer resources at your disposal.

Anyway, if I were that particular IT person who was asked/told/ordered to do something of that order, I would have written it all down in great detail and stashed the notes somewhere in case I ever needed them…

Yes, yes, I realize we are talking about Karl Rove, but since when does he get more privileges with the law than any other American?

Bill Durbin @ 54

Bill Durbin @ 48

In reading Texas Betty I’m reminded of how much I miss another Texas lady, who’s sad, untimely death recently deprives all of us of the wit and wisdom she brought to the party.

Ah, yes. She would be just giddy (and vindicated) to see all this going down. In some way I believe her passing may have paved the way for the sunlight. Having said that…I miss her work and spirit immensely!

Reading her columns early on in the maladministration kept the light shining with the snarkalicious, and with that ‘MORE POTS & PANS’. Thankyou EW!

Here is Peterr’s list in one place. Did I just reconstruct somethign that’s already on a govt website?

No. Or at least, not that I know of. I went to each deparment’s website, and pulled them together one by one.

Should have mentioned this earlier.

Knapp jumped out at me, too, as I was preparing the list of legal folks. Any time an “acting” person’s bio says “career civil service” or words to that effect, that’s a good thing in my book.

I wanted to get the list out fast, before the thread got too much further away, so I didn’t read much of the bios. Also, I figured that some of those more attuned to the finer points of legal education might notice things I didn’t. Glad you are following up.

And I’ve got to say, some departments have much better websites than others.