DoJustice [was "The prosecutor purge"]

[fern hill]

House panel authorizes subpoenas

[skdadl]

The wheels are really coming off now.

The leader of the Justice Department team that prosecuted a landmark lawsuit against tobacco companies said yesterday that Bush administration political appointees repeatedly ordered her to take steps that weakened the government's racketeering case.

Sharon Y. Eubanks said Bush loyalists in Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales's office began micromanaging the team's strategy in the final weeks of the 2005 trial, to the detriment of the government's claim that the industry had conspired to lie to U.S. smokers.
   
She said a supervisor demanded that she and her trial team drop recommendations that tobacco executives be removed from their corporate positions as a possible penalty. He and two others instructed her to tell key witnesses to change their testimony. And they ordered Eubanks to read verbatim a closing argument they had rewritten for her, she said.

"The political people were pushing the buttons and ordering us to say what we said," Eubanks said. "And because of that, we failed to zealously represent the interests of the American public."

Via a commenter at FDL.

[belva]

I suspect it's going to become even worse for the White House! :D

They're busy circlin' the wagons!!!!!!

[transplant]

The wheels are really coming off now.

For some reason this topic is of little interest over on em.

Clearly this is shaping up to be a constitutional crisis of high order.

[skdadl]

Oh, yes, I think so, transplant.

In a press conference yesterday, when he was asked a tough question about the 18-day gap (which is now being called a "lull," since a few emails from that period have turned up), Tony Snow, WH press secretary, said something bitter and sarcastic like, "I guess you've heard that from the left-wing blogs" -- something close to that.

Ha! Indeed! That is exactly where the WH press corps had learned about it ... and clearly, it's where the White House learned about it too.  :D

If you check in a few times every day to TPMuckraker (links above), you'll see them uncovering one damn thing after another. I don't know whether we've hit tipping point yet, but I should think the Republican party elders are beginning to gather and mutter amongst themselves.

Canadian Cynic and Pretty Shaved Ape have said some nice things about this.  You're right.  It's huge.  Look at the unelected "Commander in Chief" shitting his pants here

... another post ...

http://canadiancynic.blogspot.com/2007/ ... html#links

[skdadl]

Thanks for the reminder, thwap. I haven't been doing my appointed rounds very well lately.

[transplant]

Oh, yes, I think so, transplant.

Well, I 'm glad it's being discussed somewhere. Guess I should stop by more often. :wink:

[skdadl]

Ooh! Ooh! We have a Fitz fix on this topic!

In his first public appearance in Chicago since the Libby trial, Fitzgerald noted that he had just left "the D.C. fishbowl" and declined to reveal his views on the firings of the eight U.S. attorneys amid allegations of improper political interference.

"I'm going to let that sort itself out in D.C.," Fitzgerald said. "Obviously there are some important issues to be resolved. I'm not going to wade into it. I don't think it would be appropriate for me to do so."

Pressed further, Fitzgerald said the most important thing he and other U.S. attorneys can do "is to plow ahead and keep doing our work."

A reporter tried one last stab, asking if Fitzgerald thought Atty. Gen. Alberto Gonzales would be fired.

"There's no way I'm putting one toe in that pool and not going head-first," Fitzgerald said, "so I'm just keeping the toe out of the pool and just not going there."

He was a bit more forthcoming on his undistinguished rating by Gonzales' chief of staff, who resigned last week.

He said he hadn't discussed the matter with anyone at the Justice Department but made it clear he had been kidded plenty.

James Comey, a close friend and a former deputy attorney general who appointed Fitzgerald special counsel in the leak probe, agreed that it has been "the source of great merriment" among Fitzgerald's friends.

"I called him when it came out, and he said 'I'm just an average guy having an average day,'" Comey said. "He just laughed about it. It doesn't require its own rebuttal. It's sort of like saying, 'Derek Jeter is an average shortstop.'"

Fitzgerald acknowledged having some fun with the mediocre grade himself but chose to keep his jokes private.

"You think you've done a good job or a lousy job?" a reporter asked.

"I think I've done the best job I can, and that's all I expect myself to do," Fitzgerald said.

[skdadl]

Let's play Spot John Yoo Lying Again!

Can you see the lie? (I'll give you a weensy hint.)

John Yoo (author of the Justice Department's now-repudiated " Torture Memo") jumps to Bush's defense in a Wall Street Journal op-ed (subscription required): "Since the very beginnings of the Republic, presidents have always had the constitutional right to remove their political appointees, for any reason or no reason at all. . . .

"Patrick Fitzgerald's pursuit of Scooter Libby shows us what happens when a prosecutor reports to no higher authority. He single-mindedly persecuted Mr. Libby, at great taxpayer expense, without any sense of the damage caused to the workings of our government in wartime -- and over a confused sequence of misstatements later characterized all too easily as 'lies' about a crime that Mr. Fitzgerald found had not happened anyway. . . .

"Unless there are more clear facts of interference with prosecutors for partisan purposes, Mr. Gonzales should keep his job. His dismissal wouldn't placate the critics anyway, and probably only whet their appetite for more."

When we're drawing up indictments a few years from now, let's not forget John Yoo.  

Via Froomkin at the WaPo, whose whole column is fascinating, as usual.

[GDKitty]

James Comey, a close friend and a former deputy attorney general who appointed Fitzgerald special counsel in the leak probe, agreed that it has been "the source of great merriment" among Fitzgerald's friends.

"I called him when it came out, and he said 'I'm just an average guy having an average day,'" Comey said.

:kiss  *swoon*

I visited the Tribune article, in hopes of finding a brand-new picture, but alas...shut out again

[skdadl]

Yeah, no new photo -- bummer, eh?   :wink:

You know what has been too endearing, though? He is apparently turning up at the Black trial day after day, sitting in the cheap seats and taking careful notes. I think that is soooo cute!  :D

[GDKitty]

When we're drawing up indictments a few years from now, let's not forget John Yoo.

Talk about "Conservatives without Conscience," eh?
BTW, do you remember the "Few Bad Apples" 5th Estate?  You can watch it here, if you missed it. The transcript of the Yoo interview is available here.

Findlay's interview with John Yoo made me furious. She did a great job and asked all of the appropriate questions, and he treated her like an annoying gnat, an annoyance....

It is clear that prisoners/detainees aren't fully human to Mr. Yoo.

[skdadl]

I missed it (I haven't seen much TV for the last five years or so, not because I'm a snob but for other reasons), so I'll find some time to watch that.

The NYRB of 15 March brought me news that the li'l creep had dared to publish another book. The review is very good; unfortunately, it's behind a subscription wall, although you can buy access for a week for $3. Or, y'know, you could have a chat with someone you know who has a sub.   :wink:

[skdadl]

Maybe it's just because I'm a vet of the summers of 1973 and 1974, but it amazes me that so few Canadians are watching what looks to me more and more like a repeat.

Like it or not, our lives -- the goodness of our lives or the horror of our lives -- depend on what happens to the powermongers in Washington. Even more urgently, the lives of millions elsewhere depend on the collapse of the neo-con house of cards, which may be happening in Washington now ... or maybe not, but things are gathering to a head there more powerfully and more quickly than ever since 9/11.

I don't delude myself that any Democratic U.S. president would cease to be an imperialist, not yet. But some regimes are beyond the pale, and the current criminal conspiracy occupying the White House has got to be brought down. That may be happening. Let's hope.

A lot of good Americans are doing their best to fight back in defence of democracy and sheer human decency. That's why I spent the week reading them, and writing this footnote to their splendid work. Some of these guys have been heroic. They made a point, not just against the Bushies but about the flabby journalism that has helped to drug the North American public -- in Canada as much as in the U.S. -- out of any kind of critical intelligence, any healthy political awareness.

This could take longer than we think (hope) right now -- but then again, it could happen very fast.