House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D Mich.)

Scott McClellan Voluntarily Appeared Before House Judiciary Committee And Testified About The Valerie Plame Leak. Doesn’t Think Bush Was Involved, Cheney He Doesn’t Know If Involved. Basically It Was A Book Promotion.

On Friday, June 20, 2008 Scott McClellan appeared before the House Judiciary Committee voluntarily and testified under oath as to his knowledge about the leak of C.I.A. agent Valerie Plame’s name to the press. He testified he didn’t believe President Bush either knew or was involved in the leak. As to Vice President Cheney’s role he didn’t know the extent if any. He referred to Patrick Fitzgerald’s statement that the conduct of Scooter Libbey , Cheney’s aide, cast a cloud over the Vice President’s office. Fitzgerald was the prosecutor in the Libbey case.

Libbey was convicted of obstruction of justice and lying to the FBI but not for the disclosure of Plame’s identity to the press.

McClellan testified that the White House and the Vice President have not been forthright in disclosing the details and motivation for the Plame disclosure.

While concurring with the validity of the House Judiciary Committees investigation into the firing of the U.S. Attorneys and the Plame leak he had nothing of a substantive nature to add to the investigation

Basically he seems to have been given an opportunity to publicize his book.

Labels: Scott McClellan

Scott McClellan, Delivering The Daily Spin

In former presidential spokesperson Scott McClellan’s recent book, What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception he discusses the Valerie Plame affair, over which Scooter Libbey was convicted of one count of obstruction, two counts of perjury and one count of lying to the FBI about how he learned Plame’s identity and whom he told. Now Chairman Conyers has invited McClellan to testify under oath before the House Judiciary Committee. In a press release Representative Conyers said “In his book, Mr. McClellan suggests that senior White House officials may have obstructed justice and engaged in a cover-up regarding the Valerie Plame leak. This alleged activity could well extend beyond the scope of the offenses for which Scooter Libby has been convicted and deserves further attention.”

Representative Conyers further said "I find Mr. McClellan's revelations about attempts to cover-up the Valerie Plame leak extremely troubling. Particularly disturbing is McClellan's assertion that he was specifically directed by Andy Card to 'vouch' for Scooter Libby after the investigation had begun, which, if true, could amount to obstruction of justice beyond that for which Mr. Libby has already been convicted.”

McClellan may have made a mistake in trying to front run the Bush Administration’s final days with a tell all book criticizing the administrations management of the news.

The letter inviting McClellan to testify on June 20^th 2008 is usually a precursor to a subpoena if the “invitee” fails to agree to appear and testify.

Citizen Rove. Why Is He Afraid To Testify Under Oath?

After refusing to appear voluntarily, Karl Rove has been subpoenaed to testify before the House Judiciary Committee regarding the politicization of the Department Of Justice and the prosecution of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman . Previously it was noted in an Article entitled “WILL MUKASEY APPOINT A SPECIAL PROSECUTOR OR IS HE ANOTHER GONZALES?” posted Tuesday, April 01, 2008 as follows;

"Siegelman after serving nine months in Federal Prison has been released on bond by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals pending resolution of his appeal. This conviction and others is under investigation by the House Judiciary Committee for the practice of targeting Democrats by the Bush Justice Department. Jill Simpson a Republican attorney who had worked for Mr. Siegelman’s opponent in the 2002 election, which Siegelman lost by 2300 votes, has given a sworn affidavit stating that an associate of Karl Rove had assured her that Mr. Rove and two U.S. Attorney were “going to take care of Mr. Siegelman.” Forty four states attorneys general signed a petition urging the Judiciary Committee to investigate the prosecution, conviction and detention of Mr. Siegelman in that there were allegations of jury tampering and other irregularities connected with his trial and conviction.”

Rove has been subpoenaed to testify before the Committee on July 10, 2008. Rove who is a private citizen is represented by Robert Luskin Esq. of Patton Boggs LLP. Previously Harriet Miers, the former Presidential Counselor and Fred Fielding Bush’s Chief of Staff were subpoenaed and failed to appear on a similar issue. The Attorney General refused to enforce the subpoenas by a criminal contempt action and the matter is now the subject of a civil contempt suit filed in Federal District Court. They are being defended by the Justice Department under the theories of Executive Privilege and Separation Of Powers . Rove through his attorney has claimed the same protections.

I t now remains to be seen if Rove will appear or like Miers and Fielding, not appear at all, not even to refuse to answer question on the basis of privilege.

Executive Privilege is an unlikely defense. No allegation was made in correspondence between the Committee and Mr. Luskin that Mr. Rove’s testimony was related to advice given the President and therefore it is doubtful the privilege would apply. The Separation Of Powers defense is weak and not well taken.

Also even in instances where Executive Privilege might apply there is a balancing test weighing the need for privilege over the need for the information to formulate necessary legislation.

These defenses, in the immortal words of John Nance Garner, (are) "not worth a warm bucket of piss."

However, Mukasey and the members of the Federalist Society on the bench will protect him. If not then Bush will pardon him.

Mr. Rove could finally face justice for his actions if Obama is elected President and a new Attorney General is appointed. However as said Bush will pardon him before leaves the White House.

Labels: Karl Rove

" I'm still going to be Cruella de Vil.", Katherine Harris. Well she called something right.

This film written by Danny Strong and directed by Jay Roach is about the 2000 Florida recount. The election was ultimately decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in Bush v. Gore in favor of George W. Bush by a five to four vote along party lines. The film stars Kevin Spacey , as Ron Klain, Gore's demoted chief of staff who rises to be in charge of the confrontation; Bob Balaban, as Ben Ginsberg the Bush campaigns chief counsel; Ed Begley, Jr. as David Boies a lawyer who handles the appellate work for the Democrats; Laura Dern, the Florida Republican Secretary of State; John Hurt as Warren Christopher, Democratic eminence grise who abandons the field because of a family illness; Denis Leary, as Michael Whouley, chief Gore field operative; Bruce McGill as Mac Stipanovich a Republican operative ( akin to a Nixon plumber) and Tom Wilkinson as Jim Baker, The legal and tactical chief of the Bush side. Baker filed a federal action early on based on the theory that Bush's civil rights had been violated that was the basis of the later appeal to the Supreme Court. Irony of ironies.

The premise of this film is that the Florida vote was too close to call because of the flawed mechanical counting machines that were ineffective in resolving a difference of less that .05 percent between the candidates. Because of this the U.S. Supreme Court decided the election along party lines which should have been decided by the will of the voters.

Scalia, Thomas, O'Conner, Kennedy and Rehnquist, all Republican appointees, were in the majority while Ginsberg and Breyer, Democratic appointees and Souter (by George H.W. Bush) and Stevens, Republican appointees where in the minority. The kicker was that three of the majority, Scalia, Thomas and Rehnquist were previously on record as holding that elections were the province of the states and state law. In this case the majority limited their ruling to the facts in this case. Therefore the holding cannot be cited as precedent. This gives rise to the inference that this was a political decision not a legal one.

The film reveals many fascinating facts. Katherine Harris had Mac Stipanovich in her office advising her how to manage the conflict in Bush's favor. She is painted as a vacuous Republican without the intellectual, moral and ethical qualities to carry out the duties of a Secretary of State. Laura Dern's characterization of her is over the top as is Tom Wilkinson’s depiction of Jim Baker as a Republican strategist who is willing to take to the streets in order to win the election. It is revealed that Baker was a Democrat until age forty when his first wife died and he became a George H.W.Bush supporter. Baker comes off as the astute strategist who sees that the dispute will ultimately end in the Supreme Court where the Republicans had many friends. Boies the Democratic lawyer believes that the matter will be settled in the state courts on settled legal principles.

We see Republican operatives, flown in on an Enron jet, mob the Miami-Dade election offices to shut down a hand recount ordered by the Florida Supreme Court. Republican public relations experts call in colorful characters to parade the Bush mantra of “no recount” in front of the cable and network cameras massed outside the Florida Supreme Court. Bob Dole and other Republican leaders are seen on talk shows and the news condemning the recount because it was "impossible" to discern a voters intent by hanging chad or dimpled ballots.

The film explains that dimpled and hanging chad on punch ballots are not always the fault of the voter. Problems arise because there is a build up of chad from prior voters in the machine that prevent subsequent voters being able to fully detach the chad signifying their vote. However in a hand recount it can be discerned that the voter intended to punch a chad signifying a vote for a particular candidate. The Republican effort was to prevent a hand recount at all costs.

Gore lost Florida long before Election Day because Secretary Of State Harris purged twenty thousand African-American voters from the rolls for allegedly being a convicted felons or having a name similar to a convicted felon. This was not learned until the excluded persons went to vote. Also there was no recourse by that time. Now if a person’s right to vote is challenged he is allowed to complete a provisional ballot and then have the matter adjudicated. The way Harris purged the rolls no one knew until he or she showed up to the polls that they had been purged and there and was no way of submitting a tentative ballot and having the issue adjudicated.

So Harris excluded twenty thousand and Blacks by fiat with no right of recourse if a mistake had been made. In the film a black minister named Willie Williams was prevented from voting because his name was similar to William Williams an allegedly convicted felon. What the real status of these persons was no one knew because an outside software company was hired by Harris for millions of dollars to conduct the purge of registered voters. How the twenty thousand voters would have voted is unknown except African Americans tend to vote Democratic. Harris comes across as so unethical and partisan that the purge was obviously done to benefit the Republican side. (In 2004 Jeb Bush ordered 48000 thousand persons purged as felons. However this was stopped by lawsuits before the election.)

Gore also had to contend with Ralph Nader who received ninety thousand votes most of which would have gone to him if Nader was not a third party candidate. However this fact was not discussed in the film

Finally voters in Palm Beach County cast six thousand votes for Pat Buchanan which even he said must have been a mistake because of the confusing butterfly ballots. The county is heavenly populated by retired Jewish Democrats who would not have voted for conservative Buchanan except for the fact of the confusing butterfly ballot.

Thus Florida should have been a Democratic state if the aforesaid forces had not come into play allowing the matter to be decided on a partisan basis by the conservative justices of the Supreme Court. The hand recount had been stopped by the Supreme court while they considered the matter and then the Court declared there wasn't enough time for a recount to be accomplished within the Florida statutory deadline which effectively decided the election for Bush

This result occurred despite the fact that Gore won the national popular vote.

This film will probably be released to DVD later for those who don't subscribe to HBO

Labels: Movie Review: Recount.

The Chongqing Metropolitan Area, Midway Up the Yangtze, Is Home To 30.9 Million People.


In 1958 Mao Zedong initiated the Great Leap Forward wherein he conceived that China could advance economically by making the communes responsible for economic development. Thus we saw peasants trying to increase steel production in back yard foundries. The plan failed.

Another economic plan which Mao supported was the Three Gorges Hydroelectric Project which will be the largest in the World when completed in 2011. The dam will be five times larger than Hoover Dam. This film deals with the consequences of the project on the people and environment along the Yangtze.

First this film is beautifully photographed and if you thought the Three Gorges area of the Yangtze and its surrounding areas were rural and agricultural think again. The river is a super highway for industrial barges and ships ferrying commerce up and down the river from the many factories and industries along its 6300 kilometer length. Numerous excursion boats, ships and other boats are also seen navigating the river. There is very little sunlight in this film as pollution blots out the direct rays of the sun most of the time.

I am not sure whether to call this film a documentary, a docudrama or by some new designation because it also depicts a sixteen year old Chinese girl, Yu Shui, born of illiterate, peasant squatters who farm a marginal plot of land at the rivers edge. The jerry built shack that houses her mother, father and younger brother and sister looks to be well below the lowest flood level.

The Yangtze has flooded its banks on numerous occasions. Most recently, in the summer of 1998, it over flowed its banks causing 3,004 deaths, 14 million homeless and $24 billion in economic loss.

Yu Shui has finished middle school and she wants to go to high school but the family has no money for her education. In fact she needs to work to help support the family. To this end she reluctantly takes a job on the river cruise ship Victoria as a dish washer. The cruise line caters to western tourists who are on an oxymoranic “Farewell Cruise” before the new dam raises the Yangtze 175 meters. Yu Shui is assigned the name Cindy apparently for the convenience of the tourists. Her family’s life and her life are intimately photographed and so we are not sure how much is staged for the camera and how much is real and spontaneous.

We learn from Yu Shui’s father that he was the son of a minor bureaucrat before the revolution and that after the fall of the Nationalist Government his father was denounced as a counter revolutionary. As to the father’s ultimate fate we are left in the dark other than to learn that his wife starved to death in the famine of 1960. The year the Great Leap Forward ended in failure.

We never learn why Yu Shui’s parents are illiterate in a communist state where education is supposed to be available to all unless they were excluded because of the grandfather’s politics. Another thing that is not explained is why there are three children in Yu Shui’s family when China has a policy of one child per family. Does this fact account for the family’s economic status? We also learn that the father was a “coolie” working on the Fengdu docks before he took up subsistence farming and that his job was lost because of the rising river. Later in the film we see the father working as a laborer on the river’s embankments.

There is another person featured in this film named Chen Bo Yu who is given the name “Jerry”. He is nineteen, handsome, self centered and speaks English. He is a male “little emperor” from a one child middleclass family who can afford to educate him. He is assigned to work directly with the tourists on the cruise which means he receives tips. He also runs afoul of the management when it is learned that he solicits tips from the passengers.

Later in the film Jerry gives and impromptu speech for the camera that all he cares about is money and that he doesn’t want work for the older passengers as they don’t tip as well as the middle aged tourists on the boat. Still, later he is let go at the end of the trip for his attitude but he doesn’t care because his family will send him to college. Why both he and Yu Shui must pay for their education in a socialist state is left unstated. It may be that education is based on competitive testing or political connections and that those who fail to be accepted in a state school can buy an education at a private school.

In the end we see Yu Shui’s family laboriously drag their shabby belongings by hand and push cart to a run down apartment where they have been resettled. The river rises and their small plot and shack disappears. Yu Shui returns to her lowly position as a dish washer on the cruise ship. The best she can hope for is to learn enough English so she can be assigned to the dinning room as a waitress and earn tips.

This film is about the monumental changes that have and are taking place in China and the social consequences to the people. The film is ambivalent as to whether it is a good thing to inundate the Three Gorges Area, an area of greater significance in cultural and environmental terms than our Grand Canyon.

The film is prefaced by this quote from Confucius: "By 3 methods we may learn wisdom: first, by reflection which is noblest; second, by imitation which is easiest; and third, by experience which is the bitterest."

Thus we will have to wait and see whether the destruction of the natural beauty of the Three Gorges area and the dislocation of two million people is worth the electricity and flood control the dam will bring.

DOES THE RULE OF LAW HAVE A CHANCE IN WASHINGTON?

On February 28, 2008 House speaker Nancy Pelosi Sent Attorney General Mukasey a letter requesting that he order the U. S. Attorney for the District of Columbia to enforce the House Resolution citing Harriet Miers and Jeffrey Bolton for criminal Contempt of Congress.

Ms. Miers, a former Counselor to the President and Mr. Bolton, White House Chief of Staff, were cited by a House contempt resolution for failure to respond to subpoenas for Mier’s testimony and for Bolton to produce documents concerning the Judiciary Committee’s investigation into the dismissal of 7 U.S. Attorneys.

The dismissed U.S. Attorneys alleged they were dismissed because they refused to bring invalid actions against political candidates for corruption and for voter fraud. The 7 U.S. Attorneys had previously been appointed by the Bush Administration and now were being dismissed mid- term for refusing to bow to political pressure from the White House to indict candidates adverse to the administration or bring voter fraud cases to inhibit Democratic turnout in close elections.

Mukasey wrote back to Speaker Pelosi that he would not order the U.S. Attorney to enforce the House Resolution because the parties in question claimed executive privilege and therefore a crime had not been committed.

Neither Miers nor Bolton had appeared before the Committee and claimed the privilege on a question by question basis or provided a privilege log listing the document and stating the grounds for application of the privilege. This is a statutory procedure to claim testimony or documents as privileged.

Miers and Bolton’s failure to appear in person and their claim of executive privilege, by letter, as to all communications including ones between the White House and the Justice Department or the White House and third parties is clearly not covered by executive privilege. Communications between Ms. Miers and the President may be privileged depending on the nature and type of communication. No allegation was made in correspondence between the Committee and the White House that the subpoenaed documents or testimony was related to advice given the President and therefore it is unlikely the privilege would apply.

Also even in instances where the privilege might apply there is a balancing test weighing the need for privilege over the need for the information to formulate necessary legislation.

Mukasey has a statutory duty to enpanel a grand jury for the investigation and enforcement of a Congressional Contempt citation.

In refusing to honor the citation at the request of Speaker Pelosi he is in violation of the law and probably himself in Contempt of Congress.

Thus he is a feckless lackey of the Bush Administration like Gonzales.

The House Judiciary Committee thorough the House General Counsels office has filed a Civil Contempt Complaint for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief against Miers, individually and Bolton as custodian of White House records. The case is filed in the Federal District court for the District of Columbia and Assigned to Judge John D. Bates who was appointed to the Federal bench in 2001 by George W. Bush.

Prior to his appointment Bates served as a Deputy Counsel to the discredited Kenneth Starr in the Whitewater Investigation. Further he dismissed Valerie Plames civil suit for damages against Cheney, Libby, Rove and Armitage for the disclosure of her identity as a CIA agent. This despite the Supreme Court ruling that even a sitting president could be sued civilly in the Paula Jones case. She sued Clinton for sexual harassment.

The disgraced Kenneth Starr used the discovery in Jones’s case as support in his witch hunt against the Clintons. Starr proved himself to be a man without self respect or integrity in that matter. Mukasey and Bates appear to be other diehard Bush loyalists cut from the same cloth as Starr. .

Thus the partisan fecklessness continues in the Justice Department and apparently in the judiciary. The members of both bodies are sworn to impartially uphold the laws and Constitution of the United States.

It looks like it will be a long time before the subpoenas will be enforced or the rule of law will prevail in this matter.

ABSOLUTE PROSECUTORIAL IMMUNITY VERSUS QUALIFIED IMMUNITY.
Which protects the public, innocent accused and the prosecutorial community?

Numerous cases have revealed that prosecutors have been guilty of concealing exculpatory evidence presenting false evidence or other practices that deprive the accused in a criminal case of his due process rights under the 5th and 14th Amendments. When exposed this usually results in a reversal of the conviction and release of the wrongfully convicted from jail. Of course if the defendant has been executed then exoneration is meaningless.

However the Supreme Court in Imbler v. Pachtman has ruled that prosecutors have absolute immunity even when they knowingly present false evidence at trial or suppress exculpatory evidence at trial. This leaves them to be disciplined on some occasions by their state bar.

Absolute prosecutorial immunity only attaches when it is intimately connected with the trial of a case. For instance it does not attach when a prosecutor is assisting the police in investigatory functions or in activities not directly involved in the trial of a particular case. It is not based on the job title, prosecutor, but on the function the prosecutor is performing namely intimately trying a particular case. Intimately is a word used by the courts to describe when absolute immunity attaches usually during the trial of a particular case


Recent civil cases against supervisory prosecutors for damages due to a failure to set standards or office procedures for the protection of constitutional rights of the accused are not accorded absolute immunity but may have qualified immunity.

This occurred in Goldstein v. Van De Kamp, where the Los Angeles County District Attorney and his chief deputy were sued for failure to set up an index to alert prosecutors of all relevant information to each prosecution including promises made to jail house informants in return for favorable testimony.

Goldstein served twenty four years in jail on a conviction for murder based on the testimony of Edward Floyd Fink a notorious jail house snitch who had received numerous reduced sentences in the past and in Goldstein’s case had been promised favorable treatment on a pending case for testifying that Goldstein had confessed to him while they were incarcerated together in the Long Beach, California city jail.

Ultimately Goldstein won his freedom on a writ of Habeas Corpus when it came out that Fink had perjured himself by denying that a promise of favorable treatment had been made or that he had received such treatment in the past for similar jail house “confession” testimony.

Fink was well known by the Long Beach police and other prosecutors as a jail house snitch but allegedly not known by the deputy district attorney handling Goldstein’s case.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Goldstein’s suit for civil damages against the District Attorney and his chief deputy could proceed since their failure to set up a proper index disclosing a witness’s status and the promises made to him or her was administrative and not intimately connected to the Goldstein prosecution. Therefore Goldstein’s right to due process had been violated. This case has been appealed to the Supreme Court which has placed it on its calendar of cases to be heard.

However it will only hear the issue of qualified immunity as it relates to administrative duties and not absolute prosecutorial immunity.

It seems that there should not be absolute immunity for a prosecutor who either deliberately or with wanton disregard for the truth or falsity thereof offers false evidence or suppresses relevant evidence in a criminal trial.

The policy reason given for absolute immunity is that it would require prosecutors to spend too much time defending themselves civilly and thus take them away from their main prosecutorial functions. This argument sounds hollow. This is particularly true in the light of recent studies such as the Benjamin Cardozo Law School Innocence Project which found that based on DNA studies 154 innocent people have spent time in prison. In many cases the convictions of the innocent were the result of prosecutorial misconduct.


Prosecutors should only be accorded qualified immunity in all cases even those functions intimately connected with the trial of a particular case.

In doing so decent hard working prosecutors as well as the innocent will be protected from by those who would build a career and reputation on the conviction of the innocent using false evidence or suppressing relevant evidence.

A notorious case of prosecutorial misconduct in recent years was that of Michael Byron Nifong. Nifong charged white, Duke Lacrosse players with the sexual assault of a black woman who was working as an escort, prostitute, and stripper. At the time he was running for district attorney in a county with a large black population

Nifong was later disbarred and dismissed as a prosecutor after it was determined that he never interviewed the accuser who changed her story at least six times, used photographs for identification that only depicted Duke Lacrosse players and failed to timely provide defendants with exculpatory DNA evidence.

The three Lacrosse players ultimately charged spent over three million dollars defending themselves against the false accusations which also had national and international publicity. Had the players not had the resources to defend themselves as is the case in so many prosecutions Nifong might have gotten away with his conduct perpetrated to help his election as district attorney.

He did win election as district attorney but has been since dismissed. He now has taken bankruptcy to avoid the consequences of a civil suit brought by the falsely accused. He may not have absolute prosecutorial immunity since many of his actions were administrative or investigative and not intimately related to prosecution of the Duke players.

However his case shows how a corrupt prosecutor can suppress evidence or manipulate evidence to enhance his reputation and electabilty over his honest opponents. Nifong is a good example of how a corrupt prosecutor can advance his career by the prosecution of the innocent and a defining reason why there should be no absolute prosecutorial immunity

The Bush Justice Department targeted Democratic Politicians For Investigation or Prosecution Seven To One Over Republicans.

A recent study by two academics from the University of Minnesota, Donald Sheilds Ph.D and John F. Craigan, determined that of 375 investigations/ prosecutions by U.S. Attorneys since 2001 of candidates or elected officials 298 involved Democrats, 67 involved Republicans and 10 involved Independents.

One case was that of the Don Siegelman ex-Governor of Alabama who was indicted and convicted of bribery, mail fraud and conspiracy for accepting a campaign contribution of $500,000 to pay off a remaining debt on a campaign to establish a state lottery to fund public schools. He later appointed Richard Scrushy, the donor, to the state hospital licensing board.

Siegelman after serving nine months in Federal Prison has been released on bond by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals pending resolution of his appeal. This conviction and others is under investigation by the House Judiciary Committee for the practice of targeting Democrats by the Bush Justice Department. Jill Simpson a Republican attorney who had worked for Mr. Siegelman’s opponent in the 2002 election, which Siegelman lost by 2300 votes, has given a sworn affidavit stating that an associate of Karl Rove had assured her that Mr. Rove and two U.S. Attorney were “going to take care of Mr. Siegelman.” Forty four states attorneys general signed a petition urging the Judiciary Committee to investigate the prosecution, conviction and detention of Mr. Siegelman in that there were allegations of jury tampering and other irregularities connected with his trial and conviction.

Concurrent with this investigation is the investigation into the firing of
7 U.S Attorneys in 2007 under suspicious circumstances. The exact circumstances were never admitted by the Administration but it appeared that they were fired for failing to indict Democratic politicians in sensitive elections.

The White House says it can’t find 140,000 emails sent or received on the official White House email system by Karl Rove before he resigned. The Republic National Committee says it will not recover the emails that Karl Rove and other White House personnel sent or received under a separate illegal non- governmental email system operated by the RNC in the White House. The emails would likely reveal the facts about the pressuring of the 93 U.S Attorneys for political purposes in elections. If they would exonerate the Administration they would have been produced in response to the Judiciary Committee’s subpoenas long ago.

Normally, Presidents appoint U.S. Attorneys at the beginning of their term and the attorneys remain at their post for at least four years or are reappointed at the conclusion of the next election cycle. Amendments in the 2005 Patriot Act sponsored by the Administration allowed the Attorney General to replace dismissed U.S. Attorneys without approval by the Senate for unlimited periods. This provision of the Act has since been deleted when Congress found out what the Administration was up to.

Before The amendment vacancies filled by an interim attorney could last just 120 days before a nominee had to be approved by the Senate or a replacement was appointed by the Federal Court in the District were the attorney was going to serve on an emergency basis until a candidate was confirmed by the Senate.

Obviously this clause in the Patriot Act was an attempt to appoint U.S. Attorneys with out approval by The Senate by Gonzales, Rove and Bush. One wonders that if the seven dismissals in 2007 were for failure to prosecute political rivals of the Administration or Republican candidates for office what the 86 other U. S. Attorneys had done or were doing to please Gonzales, Rove, Miers and Bush so as to avoid dismissal.

Harriet Miers the former counsel to the president is refusing to appear and testify before the committee on the subject of political pressures and interference with the selection and duties of U.S. Attorneys although she has been subpoenaed to do so. Fred Fielding the new Counsel to the President is claiming executive privilege on her behalf.

Normally subpoenaed witnesses appear and claim the privilege in person. The matter is now on its way to the courts for a decision.

It is obvious that crimes of obstruction of justice and malfeasance are likely to have been committed by Alberto Gonzales, Karl Rove, Harriet Miers and probably others. Therefore a special prosecutor should be appointed by Attorney General Mukasey and a grand jury impaneled to determine what crimes have been committed and to charge the responsible parties.

EXACTLY WHO WINS AND LOSES? THE COST BENEFIT ANALYSIS.


“Let he who is without sin cast the first stone…” Jesus Christ.
It seems Eliot Spitzer may be sinner but he was not offered forgiveness or succor by the flacks and mob that relished the downfall of such and able and powerful man. Many of those who condemned him were guilty of their own sexual misadventures like Bill O’Reilly at Fox News. He was one of the loudest and longest to condemn.

Spitzer had been a very effective Attorney General who brought many suits against the powerful. These included actions against fraudulent practices in the banking, securities and insurance communities. As a result billions of dollars were returned to average citizens and small investors or paid as fines. Thus he had many powerful enemies. Then he ran as the Democratic candidate for the Governor of New York and won by sixty-nine percent of the vote. This win and his past work as a hard charging Attorney General against the misdeeds of the rich and powerful made him a contender for higher political office such as Vice President or possibly President.

One wonders why a bank would find cash transactions over a number of years allegedly totaling $80,000.00 so unusual in a place like New York, the financial capital of the world. The exception here being that the account belonged to a man they knew to be an adversary to unlawful and fraudulent banking practices.

The bank's questions were not bought to his attention for an explanation like any good bank would do with a valued customer. Instead it was turned over the Internal Revenue Service for investigation. The IRS finding no violation passed it on to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New York. The result: 6000 wire taped conversations on an escort service that received about $16000 of Spitzer’s money. The taps allegedly revealed some of the money was used by Spitzer to pay for an escort. This service was naïve enough in these days of the Patriot Act to require clients to transfer money to an offshore bank account. A complaint was filed against the escort service referring to a client number nine. Spitzer’s identity as client number nine was leaked to the NY Times and later the escort’s name came out as she was compelled to testify in court. No one has identified the leaker.

Strangely, no other client’s name has been revealed or leaked and there must be hundreds if not thousands of them. One wonders what all the 6000 wire taped conversations revealed, not just the ones related to Spitzer which found there way so easily into the press.

Was Spitzer targeted as a strong democrat to be destroyed by the Bush appointed U.S. Attorney? That office was upstaged and embarrassed by the work of Spitzer as the State Attorney General. Many of the actions could have been bought by the SEC or the U.S. Attorneys office if the Bush Justice Department was interested in protecting the public. There was a score to settle here as well as the opportunity to cripple a strong democratic candidate.
EXACTLY WHO WINS AND LOSES? THE COST BENEFIT ANALYSIS. Read more...

Bank Failures Were Common during The Great Depression Caused When The Federal Reserve Bank (Fed) Tightened the Money Supply Instead Of Increasing It.

On February 28, 2008 Bernanke told Congress that economic conditions were worsening and that he intended to lower interest rates to counter the slow down despite the inflationary pressures. He believes the slowing economy will act as a brake on inflationary pressures in the short term. However look for the Fed to raise interest rates when the economy starts to revive if inflation remains a problem. Hopefully this will not trigger a new sub prime crisis and a credit crunch.

While interest rates were cut by 125 basis points in January the reduction had little effect on mortgage rates. Bankers also stiffened their lending requirements. This means that the Fed cuts, so far, has had little impact on the sub prime crisis which has spread to other parts of the economy causing a general down turn.

Despite the fact the Federal Reserve Bank decreased the cost of money to lenders the reduced interest rates are not being passed on to borrowers. Lenders are also raising the qualifications necessary for loans. Therefore the persons most likely to default on their loans, the sub prime borrowers, are not being allowed to refinance
by lenders.

Isn’t this what happened in the Great Depression. Bankers panicked and stopped lending and called in loans which decreased the money supply which caused the economy to spiral down with increased business and bank failures coupled with mortgage foreclosures. The Fed at the time, contrary to what Bernanke is doing now, also tightened the money supply by raising interest rates. The result: a massive decrease in productivity and 25% unemployment.

Mr. Bernanke, I hope we are not living in interesting times.

(click here) FOR ANNOUNCEMENT.
Ralph Nader, who is 74, announced he is intending to run for the presidency in 2008. This is the man who steadfastly denies that his campaign in 2000 siphoned enough votes away from Al Gore to George Bush, in Florida, to cause a recount dispute and give the Republican dominated Supreme Court the chance to decide in Bush's favor.
This is the equivalent of Nader cutting his nose off to spite his face for the third time. Maybe like Pinocchio his nose just keeps growing.

Whatever his goals are, his chances of making a difference in this election are nil.
In 2000 he received 2.7 percent of the vote. In 2004, he received only 0.3 percent. With that kind of rejection he still says he is not a spoiler.
In 2000 Nader received 97000 votes in Florida. Votes that mostly would have gone to Gore and eliminated the counting and judicial skullduggery that followed. Gore would have been President these last eight years with decidedly different consequences for the United States and the World.

In 2004 Nader was only on the ballot in thirty three states and he had to file numerous lawsuits to reach that total. I wonder who paid for registering in those states as well as the litigation. Do you think he was helped by the Republican Party, who he served so well in 2000?

With just .3 percent of the vote in 2004 it seems Nader's capacity for doing damage in a presidential election is gone. Nader was at his best working inside the Democratic Party it is a shame that the first paragraph of his obituary will state the fact he was the spoiler who enabled George Bush and his cadre to seize the Presidency in 2000.

It should be said that Ralph Nader has raised and spent a lot money on noble causes in behalf of the American people. Therefore he must believe what he is doing is for a worthwhile cause and not just for his personal enrichment or aggrandizement.

In his announcement he states the what is wrong with our democracy and the refusal of both parties to redress these issues. He points out that approximately 1500 corporations through their lobbyists receive the attention and much of the benefits of the government. What he says is true but for him the best way to address these problems is to work through the Democratic Party not by starting a third party.

However he appears hell-bent on having the term spoiler on his tombstone even when his capacity to be one is gone no matter what the loss to his reputation

Labels: Ralph Nader

Bernanke’s Hobson’s Choice. Interest Rate Cuts that Stimulate the Economy Or Cause Runaway Inflation?
The policies of the Bush Administration are coming home to roost.


Over just eight days in January, The Federal Reserve cut interest rates by 1.25 percentage points. This was the biggest one-month rate decrease in a quarter-century. Ostensibly this was to ease credit rates particularly with mortgage lenders so many people could refinance their fixed and adjustable rate mortgages and avoid default. This would help defuse the sub prime mortgage crisis. However inflation has reared its ugly head and the lenders have not dropped mortgage rates but raised lending standards requiring more creditworthy borrowers than those who need to refinance the most. In fact since the initial January cuts mortgage rates have steadily drifted upward because bankers see the threat of inflation on the horizon. The CPI increased at a 4% annual rate in December.

Now we have the spectre of stagflation, no growth or negative growth and inflation confronting the economy. We have seen this before under Ronald Reagan. Paul Volcker the chairman of the Federal Reserve at the time countered the crisis by sharply raising interest rates to stop the inflationary spiral. It resulted in the highest unemployment rates since the Great Depression. It was a bitter pill but it worked. Bernanke is not facing the same degree of inflationary pressure as Volcker. However decreasing interest rates to loosen credit, along with increasing oil prices coupled with the expenditures for the Iraqi War and the Bush tax cuts have created an explosive situation that could lead to run away in inflation.

Greensphan was able to cut interest rates to 1% after the tech bubble burst but he didn’t have to contend with inflation. His concern was deflation which is as bad as uncontrolled inflation but fortunately it never occurred.

Bernanke has only one choice, which is a Hobson’s choice, and that is to cut interest rates again to avoid a recession and hope inflation doesn’t get a foot hold on the economy.

Bernanke will Earn His Pay Over The Next Year.

Did Shakespeare foresee Bill Clinton’s Misstep in South Carolina as indeed he foresaw the other stages of his life? “His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide For his shrunk shank;”

THE SIXTH AGE SHIFTS
INTO THE LEAN AND SLIPPERED'D PANTALOON,
WITH SPECTACLES ON NOSE AND POUCH ON SIDE,
HIS YOUTHFUL HOSE, WELL SAVED, A WORLD TOO WIDE
FOR HIS SHRUNK SHANK; AND HIS BIG MANLY VOICE,
TURNING AGAIN TOWARD CHILDISH TREBLE, PIPES
AND WHISTLES IN HIS SOUND.



Bill Clinton gave words to his thoughts and a lot of other people’s thoughts when he inferred that the election in S. Carolina was being skewed by issues of race and gender. It turns out that the exit polls demonstrated that many people appeared to have voted along race and gender lines instead of on experience and qualifications. However to make an issue out of this would tear the Democratic Party asunder. This thought was best left unsaid as it would weaken the fabric of the Democratic Party and make who ever is nominated vulnerable to the Republican onslaught of vilification, aspersions and lies that is sure to come in the general election. Shakespeare seems to have foreseen this phase of Bill Clinton’s life or perhaps it is more evidence in general of life’s “tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” Let’s hope this event was an anomaly or sound and fury signifying nothing that will not be true of the remaining primaries or the general election. Bill Clinton being as close as he is to Hillary and her quest is to be forgiven for speaking his mind in a situation so emotionally charged for him and his family. The passage from Shakespeare follows and the bolding and insertion are by another.

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,(politician warrior in Clinton’s case)
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. THE SIXTH AGE SHIFTS
INTO THE LEAN AND SLIPPERED'D PANTALOON,
WITH SPECTACLES ON NOSE AND POUCH ON SIDE,
HIS YOUTHFUL HOSE, WELL SAVED, A WORLD TOO WIDE
FOR HIS SHRUNK SHANK; AND HIS BIG MANLY VOICE,
TURNING AGAIN TOWARD CHILDISH TREBLE, PIPES
AND WHISTLES IN HIS SOUND. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
William Shakespeare - All the world's a stage (from As You Like It 2/7)