Dialectic
Mar 15th, 2007, 12:56 AM
Terrific new entry in Steven Grant's comic blog:
http://www.comicbookresources.com/columns/?column=10
Wow, another fascinating week of paradox politics. Newt Gingrich, who once rallied the troops to impeach Bill Clinton for having an extramarital affair, announced even as he was feeling out a 2008 White House run that during that same impeachment period he was himself having an extramarital affair. (Which I'm pretty sure everyone who was paying attention at the time already knew, but it's been awhile.) Faced with accusations of hypocrisy for doing what he simultaneously excoriated Clinton for doing (though no mention was made of whether cigars were involved) Gingrich stated the affair wasn't the crux of the Clinton matter, but Clinton's lying to a federal court about it. Clinton had to be tried because he lied.
Which is doubtless just what the defenders of Scooter Libby did not want to hear last week, as the jury in Libby's trial on counts of perjuring himself before a grand jury and obstructing an FBI investigation brought in guilty verdicts on the several charges. The right wing hype machine has been in full groove this last week - when it hasn't been outraged at Marvel's callous execution of Captain America right at the moment when our boys in Iraq will be severely demoralized by it (it was on Fox News, honest!) - talking about "railroading" and how Libby should never have been tried for perjury because the investigation he perjured himself during turned up no prosecutions of anyone who illegally released the name of CIA field operative Valerie Plame to the press. Oddly, the press itself could easily push for more investigations into the incident, based on evidence entered into the public record during Libby's trial and often by Libby's own defense attorneys, who tried to make a case for Libby as scapegoat hung out to dry by White House insider Karl Rove, ex-Iran/Contra trickster and Ghost-era State dept. undersecretary Richard Armitage (who cut a deal with prosecutors to avoid prosecution, thus generating a "control" by which the prosecutor and grand jury could judge statements from other witnesses, including Libby) and Libby's boss Dick Cheney, resulting in pretty damn clear indications that the Ghost himself was either lying his ass off or was totally ignorant when he proclaimed that no one connected with the White House had anything to do with the leak, and if he found out anyone did they would be fired. (We now know the State Dept. was aware of it a long, long time ago.) Another argument is that since Armitage leaked Plame's identity, Libby should not be held responsible for it, even though trial testimony also drew a clear picture of Dick Cheney's office orchestrating a "Get Joseph Wilson" campaign (Wilson outted the administration as using disproved intelligence as justification for the Iraq war, and Plame is his wife) by blabbing Plame's identity to any journalist they could get to listen before any announcement via Armitage's leak was made public. At any rate, Gingrich made the case that lying during a federal investigation is a serious enough offense to put a president on trial, regardless of whether that investigation produced any other actionable crimes or not, so it's hard to suggest that lesser government officials should be allowed to lie to federal investigators with impunity.
Of course, if worst comes to worst you can always fire the prosecutors, if you're president. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who apparently hasn't figured out that he's no longer the Ghost's personal attorney but the main figure south of the Ghost responsible for upholding US law, a short while back fired a slew of U.S. Attorneys for various regions, then his flunkies swore to Congress the decision was purely administrative and was in no way influenced by the White House and had no political motivation. Except one U.S. attorney, from New Mexico, was called by New Mexican Senator Pete Domenici about whether charges in an investigation against a state Democrat would be brought before last election day; when told no, Domenici hung up and started calling administration officials to complain about the prosecutor, and when the head of the state's Republican party called Rove, Rove promised him the prosecutor would be gone. (A fired Seattle US attorney was also criticized by Republicans for not bringing indictments against a Democrat quickly enough, and a news story today has the White House admitting that the Ghost told Gonzales personally he wanted various attorneys including the New Mexican attorney gone for exactly the reason Domenici complained about.) The defrocked U.S. attorney for Las Vegas was flat out told on his way out that the administration was clearing positions so the Ghost to make new appointees to help them with their political careers. A San Diego prosecutor with a highly successful corruption trial against Republican bigwig Randy Cunningham on her belt and about to prosecute the CIA's #3 man on charges involved defense contract abuses was abruptly replaced by a Republican ideologue without substantive experience in criminal law. An Arkansas US Attorney, a loyal Republican, made no objection to his own firing (one of Karl Rove's aides was given his job) or any others - but started getting emails from a DoJ official threatening retaliation when he made a statement for a news story about the incident. Further e-mail correspondence between current Ghost attorney (and Supreme Court reject) Harriet Miers discussing the firing plan with Gonzales' (now resigned) chief aide, and later authorizing the action; nobody Gonzales was told the White House had their fingers in the whole thing. (The Nevada and New Mexico prosecutors weren't on the original list; the Arkansas prosecutor was.)
So it's amusing to see Gonzales, himself one of the architects of war on terror policies, scolding the FBI over the recent revelation that the country's stories law enforcement agency was violating the law right and left by freely abusing powers given them by the Patriot Act and later additions to gather information. Amusingly, in a sick way, what they're getting flak over was intended to make their jobs much easier, by relaxing their need to get court authorization to get records in a hurry; they could simply issue what's known as a "National Security Letter," which basically said they could gather the information now and get a subpoena for it later. Turns out what the FBI's been doing since getting this power is handing out NSLs like candy on Halloween - hundreds of thousands of the letters - then going after the authorization on virtually none of them. They used them in many instances where there was no investigation! They went after records that weren't covered by the act authorizing the use of NSLs. In many cases they didn't even bother with the letters, and handed them out after the fact only to cover their asses. Long time readers may recall when the Patriot Act was being discussed, I pointed up the tendency of law enforcement agencies, particularly federal ones, to fish for new powers with promises of restraint and oversight, and then run amok with them if allowed to; trust me, being proven right doesn't feel very good at all. Caught with its hand in the cookie jar, the FBI claimed the abuses were "unintentional." The FBI "unintentionally" seized hundreds of thousands of personal records of American citizens. Gonzales chastised them for sloppy oversight, apparently having forgotten the FBI is part of his operation and oversight is ultimately his responsibility. But Gonzales also promised Arlen Spector, after getting Spector to quietly include in the Patriot Act a clause allowing the Attorney General to fire and assign US prosecutors without Congressional authorization, that he would never use that power for political reasons. So all this is just par for the course.
http://www.comicbookresources.com/columns/?column=10
Wow, another fascinating week of paradox politics. Newt Gingrich, who once rallied the troops to impeach Bill Clinton for having an extramarital affair, announced even as he was feeling out a 2008 White House run that during that same impeachment period he was himself having an extramarital affair. (Which I'm pretty sure everyone who was paying attention at the time already knew, but it's been awhile.) Faced with accusations of hypocrisy for doing what he simultaneously excoriated Clinton for doing (though no mention was made of whether cigars were involved) Gingrich stated the affair wasn't the crux of the Clinton matter, but Clinton's lying to a federal court about it. Clinton had to be tried because he lied.
Which is doubtless just what the defenders of Scooter Libby did not want to hear last week, as the jury in Libby's trial on counts of perjuring himself before a grand jury and obstructing an FBI investigation brought in guilty verdicts on the several charges. The right wing hype machine has been in full groove this last week - when it hasn't been outraged at Marvel's callous execution of Captain America right at the moment when our boys in Iraq will be severely demoralized by it (it was on Fox News, honest!) - talking about "railroading" and how Libby should never have been tried for perjury because the investigation he perjured himself during turned up no prosecutions of anyone who illegally released the name of CIA field operative Valerie Plame to the press. Oddly, the press itself could easily push for more investigations into the incident, based on evidence entered into the public record during Libby's trial and often by Libby's own defense attorneys, who tried to make a case for Libby as scapegoat hung out to dry by White House insider Karl Rove, ex-Iran/Contra trickster and Ghost-era State dept. undersecretary Richard Armitage (who cut a deal with prosecutors to avoid prosecution, thus generating a "control" by which the prosecutor and grand jury could judge statements from other witnesses, including Libby) and Libby's boss Dick Cheney, resulting in pretty damn clear indications that the Ghost himself was either lying his ass off or was totally ignorant when he proclaimed that no one connected with the White House had anything to do with the leak, and if he found out anyone did they would be fired. (We now know the State Dept. was aware of it a long, long time ago.) Another argument is that since Armitage leaked Plame's identity, Libby should not be held responsible for it, even though trial testimony also drew a clear picture of Dick Cheney's office orchestrating a "Get Joseph Wilson" campaign (Wilson outted the administration as using disproved intelligence as justification for the Iraq war, and Plame is his wife) by blabbing Plame's identity to any journalist they could get to listen before any announcement via Armitage's leak was made public. At any rate, Gingrich made the case that lying during a federal investigation is a serious enough offense to put a president on trial, regardless of whether that investigation produced any other actionable crimes or not, so it's hard to suggest that lesser government officials should be allowed to lie to federal investigators with impunity.
Of course, if worst comes to worst you can always fire the prosecutors, if you're president. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who apparently hasn't figured out that he's no longer the Ghost's personal attorney but the main figure south of the Ghost responsible for upholding US law, a short while back fired a slew of U.S. Attorneys for various regions, then his flunkies swore to Congress the decision was purely administrative and was in no way influenced by the White House and had no political motivation. Except one U.S. attorney, from New Mexico, was called by New Mexican Senator Pete Domenici about whether charges in an investigation against a state Democrat would be brought before last election day; when told no, Domenici hung up and started calling administration officials to complain about the prosecutor, and when the head of the state's Republican party called Rove, Rove promised him the prosecutor would be gone. (A fired Seattle US attorney was also criticized by Republicans for not bringing indictments against a Democrat quickly enough, and a news story today has the White House admitting that the Ghost told Gonzales personally he wanted various attorneys including the New Mexican attorney gone for exactly the reason Domenici complained about.) The defrocked U.S. attorney for Las Vegas was flat out told on his way out that the administration was clearing positions so the Ghost to make new appointees to help them with their political careers. A San Diego prosecutor with a highly successful corruption trial against Republican bigwig Randy Cunningham on her belt and about to prosecute the CIA's #3 man on charges involved defense contract abuses was abruptly replaced by a Republican ideologue without substantive experience in criminal law. An Arkansas US Attorney, a loyal Republican, made no objection to his own firing (one of Karl Rove's aides was given his job) or any others - but started getting emails from a DoJ official threatening retaliation when he made a statement for a news story about the incident. Further e-mail correspondence between current Ghost attorney (and Supreme Court reject) Harriet Miers discussing the firing plan with Gonzales' (now resigned) chief aide, and later authorizing the action; nobody Gonzales was told the White House had their fingers in the whole thing. (The Nevada and New Mexico prosecutors weren't on the original list; the Arkansas prosecutor was.)
So it's amusing to see Gonzales, himself one of the architects of war on terror policies, scolding the FBI over the recent revelation that the country's stories law enforcement agency was violating the law right and left by freely abusing powers given them by the Patriot Act and later additions to gather information. Amusingly, in a sick way, what they're getting flak over was intended to make their jobs much easier, by relaxing their need to get court authorization to get records in a hurry; they could simply issue what's known as a "National Security Letter," which basically said they could gather the information now and get a subpoena for it later. Turns out what the FBI's been doing since getting this power is handing out NSLs like candy on Halloween - hundreds of thousands of the letters - then going after the authorization on virtually none of them. They used them in many instances where there was no investigation! They went after records that weren't covered by the act authorizing the use of NSLs. In many cases they didn't even bother with the letters, and handed them out after the fact only to cover their asses. Long time readers may recall when the Patriot Act was being discussed, I pointed up the tendency of law enforcement agencies, particularly federal ones, to fish for new powers with promises of restraint and oversight, and then run amok with them if allowed to; trust me, being proven right doesn't feel very good at all. Caught with its hand in the cookie jar, the FBI claimed the abuses were "unintentional." The FBI "unintentionally" seized hundreds of thousands of personal records of American citizens. Gonzales chastised them for sloppy oversight, apparently having forgotten the FBI is part of his operation and oversight is ultimately his responsibility. But Gonzales also promised Arlen Spector, after getting Spector to quietly include in the Patriot Act a clause allowing the Attorney General to fire and assign US prosecutors without Congressional authorization, that he would never use that power for political reasons. So all this is just par for the course.