Mukasey blubbers about how a missed phone call from a 9/11 Hijacker, if intercepted, could have stopped 9/11. Hamilton refutes this by essentially saying this is important, yet was not shared with the 9/11 Commission, implying one of three things:
Mukasey was making it up for dramatic appeal.
He was repeating something heard elsewhere, believing it to be true.
Somehow, something quite important was suppressed from the 9/11 Commision.
I’ve wanted to write something about John Yoo and the torture memos, but it’s depressing and secondly I don’t like to write things that the more well-read political junkies already know, and I’m not sure how to sum up the intricacies of the entirety of Yoo, Bush, and the law in a way that will challenge any of the uninformed, misinformed, or Bush cheerleaders.Regardless, I’m tackling it anyway.
Among the general population, there seems to be no question over immunity for the telecoms. Either the public is unaware of the scope of the story or they believe - erroneously - that any domestic spying undertaken has actually kept us safer and not diminished our rights, or even inconvenienced us.
Knowledgeable readers have been following this since the Mark Klein, an AT&T whistleblower, broke the story broke nearly two years ago. To briefly surmise, the ENTIRE internet passes through the NSA. They grab huge chunks of it - your emails, Amazon purchases, credit card transaction, web browsing, instant messages, Facebook stalking - and then winnow it down to find what they are looking for. The presumption is that everyone could be guilty, and that we don't need probable cause to monitor communications and go on fishing expeditions.
Even worse still, much of that actionable intelligence is no longer processed and disseminated by Federal employees, who behavior is governed by law, legislation, and the threat of losing a well-paying government job, but rather outsourced to private industry, outside of Congressional oversite.
The President's call for immunity hints at the 'alleged' law breaking that industry 'might' have done in 'cooperating' with law enforcement, promising to veto legislation that does not tender complete retroactive immunity to the industry, all the way back to September 11th, 2001 (Which is interesting, since they started their efforts on 2/27/2007). He uses "complicated language" as reported by Crooks and Liars:
“When Congress returns in September the Intelligence committees and leaders in both parties will need to complete work on the comprehensive reforms requested by Director McConnell, including the important issue of providing meaningful liability protection to those who are alleged to have assisted our Nation following the attacks of September 11, 2001[.]”
It's very difficult to wrap your head around the technology and legal concepts surrounding the issue. Fortunately, Senator Chris Dodd, the first Presidential candidate willing to go to the mat over telecomm immunity, has posted this short video with Klein breaking down the issue [via EFF]:
Between digg and crazy college boys, the fandom and fawning for Ron Paul rivals some sort of political 'Tiger Beat'.
Although I don't doubt the sincerity of many libertarians, and welcome their splintering with the GOP, the fact remains that some of them, at their heart, are no more than Republicans who like to smoke pot.
I'll admit, there is an appeal to the skepticism of the modern libertarian. Their goal though, of limited government, when taken to its logical extremes, actually results in the outcomes of GOP activist Grover Norquist, advocating the "drowning of government in the bathtub". Mind you, the GOP still wants to collect taxes for the services they outsource and privatize, they just want them performed outside of governmental oversight and be able to be incentivized by them via campaign contributions.
Here is the win-win for liberals, conservatives, and libertarians…
John Stauber has a post at PR Watch that is sourced from Matt Bai's book, The Argument: Billionaires, Bloggers and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics, where former NY Governor Mario Cuomo speaks to a group of wealthy Democratic activists:
Shortly after the November 2006 election the Democracy Alliance, an exclusive group of about 100 Democratic Party millionaire activists, met in Miami, Florida. Members and their guests heard their keynote speaker and liberal legend Mario Cuomo analyze the Democratic Party in the wake of its stunning electoral victories that had given Democrats control of the US Congress. Cuomo criticized the Democratic Party for lacking vision, big ideas and a winning political argument. His recipe for future Democratic victories was simple: "You seize the biggest idea you can, the biggest idea you can understand. And this is what moves elections."
Cuomo then dared to voice an inconvenient truth: "Now it's 2006 and we're all rejoicing. Why? Because of Iraq. A GIFT. A gift to the Democrats. A lot of whom voted for the war anyway." The former New York governor challenged his partisan audience, "If Iraq is not an issue, then what issues do we have to talk about? … Where does that leave you? It leaves you in the same position you were in in 2004 – without an issue. Because you have no big idea."
Stauber goes on to illustrate why Iraq is a "gift":
The Argument is an important book but Bai muffed the title. He should have titled it “The Gift,” because as Cuomo points out it was primarily the political gift of voter anger and revulsion over a horrific, continuing war that caused them to oust Republicans.
He then goes on to lament how the current Democratic Congressional Leadership is failing to deliver on the voting public's wishes (he is, of course, correct, but that's a whole-another-post).
It's simply too easy to beat the administration over the head with their incompetence regarding Iraq, and that's even if totally ignoring the deceptions and ideology driven mechanisms that created, sold, and marketed this war. Strangely, most pundits choose to look at the war in isolation, as though it were a unique creature born of unique circumstances.
America's fabric is pulling apart like a cheap sweater.
What would sew us back together?
Another 9/11 attack.
[…]
Is there any doubt they are planning to hit us again?
If it is to be, then let it be. It will take another attack on the homeland to quell the chattering of chipmunks and to restore America's righteous rage and singular purpose to prevail.
The unity brought by such an attack sadly won't last forever.
This last 6-years has been a slow-motion train wreck. OBL is still on the loose. The Anthrax attackers are still on the loose. We're stuck in a quagmire in a war of choice in Iraq, losing a winnable war in Afghanistan, and then contemplating opening a third front of the Great War on Terror in Iran (and Pakistan).
I'm tired of staring into the abyss. In addition to the 3000 lives lost on 9/11 and the near 5000 (3600 military deaths, and an estimated 1000 contractor deaths) in Iraq and Afghanistan, we can chalk up threats to free speech, habeas corpus, our own privacy, and any semblance for advocacy for the middle class in Washington. We are distracted from true threats like class inequality, our aging infrastructure, precarious financial environment, and global warming with bright and shiny objects like Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan, and divisive social wedge issues like abortion, gay marriage, and evolution.
Although Bykofsky takes the easy way out and (correctly) states that another 9/11 would finally unite us, he's correct, but I hope he's thinking of the wrong outcome. He thinks that another 9/11 would would cause us to put aside our partisan differences to get "it" done - I'm assuming by "it" he means the War on Islamofacism. But there's danger in these thoughts. With the right proudly proclaiming that we are safer BECAUSE there have been no new attacks, another 9/11 might have the complete opposite consequences - reinforces the disgust and despair many of us are feeling towards our media and political institutions.
The next-9/11 will preceed one of two outcomes - either the police state, or the beginning of the American Renaissance, where we cast of the dead weight and corrupt institutions of the past and become the America we thought, hoped, and dreamed we were.
Should Bykofsky get fired? Should free speech have consequences? Vote here.
It confirmed what most people long ago concluded: that Mr. Gonzales is more concerned about doing political-damage control for Mr. Bush — in this case insisting that there was never a Justice Department objection to a clearly illegal program — than in doing his duty. But the White House continued to defend him.
As far as we can tell, there are three possible explanations for Mr. Gonzales’s talk about a dispute over other — unspecified — intelligence activities. One, he lied to Congress. Two, he used a bureaucratic dodge to mislead lawmakers and the public: the spying program was modified after Mr. Ashcroft refused to endorse it, which made it “different” from the one Mr. Bush has acknowledged. The third is that there was more wiretapping than has been disclosed, perhaps even purely domestic wiretapping, and Mr. Gonzales is helping Mr. Bush cover it up.
Democratic lawmakers are asking for a special prosecutor to look into Mr. Gonzales’s words and deeds. Solicitor General Paul Clement has a last chance to show that the Justice Department is still minimally functional by fulfilling that request.
If that does not happen, Congress should impeach Mr. Gonzales.
Ironically enough, Bush's nickname for Abu Gonzalez is "Fredo".
There's a tendency amongst the blogosphere's rhetorical bomb throwers to talk in absolutes - everyone is "like Hitler", a fascists, socialist, communist, or terrorists. Those labels don't necessarily fit, and although they are convenient, they are seldom complete enough to draw an accurate picture of the character of a man.
Based on his circle of (notorious) friends, such as Perle, Kisinger, Wolfowitz, and the like, and his being described as Dick Cheney's Dick Cheney, one must assume that he must have gotten his hands dirty doing his master's bidding. At the same time, there are scores of others, well outside the oublic sphere, who speak warmly of Scooter as a loving family man, who loved his kids, and was generous and compassionate. I have to hedge this to say that most of them, based on the paragraph or two of their credentials that they include prior to their plea leads me to believe that the share ideology and party affiliation with Scooter - therefore, the values that they bestow on Scooter have to be evaluated within a certain value framework.
In thinking about these letters, there is an outstanding opportunity for datamining. In the details of these letters, you have a timeline and placeline of Scooter for where he was, what he was doing, and who he was doing it with, as well as those he associated with. This is the kind of ancillary research which can give you great insight as to who the Neocon and Conservative cultures operate. But that's neither here nor there.
There was one letter (all of them are here) that gave me pause, just for something mentioned in passing in the letter from Stan Crock - page 63 of 373 in this PDF :
When he again left private practice for public service during the George H. W. Bush Administration, he did not want a post that required Senate confirmation. He is intensely private and didn't want to be in the limelight. He was especially concerned that someone may look at his record and in hindsight consider something untoward that was perfectly acceptable at the time. Eventually, then-Defense Secretary Dick Cheney thought Scooter was at a disadvantage at the table when meeting with counterparts from other agencies who had been confirmed. Mr. Cheney created a confirmable post at the Pentagon for Scooter. The confirmation hearing was uneventful. I had the priviledge of attending his swearing in.
Now, Cheney's protege would certainly be a shadow operator, but to what exactly does "being especially concerned that someone may look into his record and in hindsight consider something untoward that was perfectly acceptable at the time" refer? What made the position that he eventually took "confirmable"? And how exactly did Dick Cheney "create" a post for him? Perhaps, embedded within this story, is the tale of how the namesake of Irving Lewis Leibowitz became Scooter Libby, Jr.? [Updated: I got nothing to support this except crackpot websites.]
Monica Goodling, often referred to as the keeper of the "keys to the kingdom" testified yesterday before the House Judiciary Committee. Her appearance was blogged at both Firedoglake and TPMMuckracker, both of which deserve your attention.
I've been wondering how BushCo could so flagrantly abuse the law and expect to leave office and remained unscathed, given that the incoming Administration, either Republican or Democrat, will be eager to through anyone and everyone under the bus.
Not so fast, you crazy libertarians.
Let me be absolutely clear.