Speaker Pelosi ENABLES Karl Rove, Harriet Meirs, and Joshua Bolton to IGNORE CONGRESSIONAL SUBPOENAS!
Speaker of Congress Nancy Pelosi is a disgrace: far more than passively turning a blind eye to the criminal corruption of the Bush-Cheney White House, Speaker Pelosi ACTIVELY ENABLES Bush administration OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE at every turn; including:
#1. ALLOWING President Bush to COMMUTE the prison sentence for Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's CHIEF OF STAFF during the lead up to the Iraq war in 2003.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_leak_scandal
Libby was also concurrently a senior advisor to the president during his 5 years in the White House. On March 6, 2007, Mr. Libby was CONVICTED of PERJURY and OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE re the FBI/Justice Department's investigation into the "outing" of an undercover CIA operative and her entire CIA undercover organization. Libby's CONVICTION, and 30 month prison sentence, was the perfect opportunity for prosecutors to get to the root of the scandal for which the perjury and obstruction of justice came later - but SPEAKER PELOSI did NOTHING to demand that President Bush not pardon or commute the sentence of Mr. Libby, which Bush promptly did before Mr. Libby saw a single hour in jail.
A BLEATING SHEEP puts up more resistance to being shorn of its wool, than SPEAKER PELOSI PUT UP to President Bush's OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE in the Libby perjury/CIA outing investigations CRIMINAL CONVICTIONS!
And all the jurors, and everyone in that Washington courtroom where Libby was found guilty - everyone realized that Mr. Libby was merely the fall guy, that Libby would never have LIED to investigators, but for the DIRECTION OF HIS SUPERIORS. Since Libby was Chief of Staff to the president, his "superiors" could be counted on the fingers of one hand: Vice President Cheney, President Bush, Presidential Chief of Staff Andrew Card, and Presidential Political Affairs Director Karl Rove.
Sadly, ALLOWING President Bush to write his former top advisor Mr. Libby a "GET OUT OF JAIL FREE" pass, without a blip of protest, is only ONE of Speaker Pelosi's appalling failures, measures made or not made to ENABLE Bush administration OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE.
Currently, THREE FORMER WHITE HOUSE OFFICIALS are under CONGRESSIONAL SUBPOENA - yet Speaker Pelosi DOES NOTHING as the White House & Justice Department REFUSE to send law officers to enforce Harriet Miers, Joshua Bolton, and Karl Rove to COMPLY WITH those subpoenas!
Can anyone IMAGINE Mafia crime lords, Tobacco company executives, Vietnam War generals, Clinton White House officials, and Nixon administration "Watergate" officials, REFUSING TO COMPLY WITH CONGRESSIONAL SUBPOENAS?!!
Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in her cowering corruption, has taken the American Congress BACKWARDS 232 years, to the "UNITARY EXECUTIVE" powers of KING GEORGE III before the American Revolution!
----------------------------------
The above 2 scandals, alone - AIDING ADMINISTRATION OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE in the Lewis Libby CONVICTION, and in the Rove/Meirs/Bolton subpoenas - is enough to cement Nancy Pelosi's reputation as the WORST SPEAKER in the entire history of Congress.
But, unfortunately, those two scandals are just the tip of the iceberg, with Speaker Pelosi HELPING the Bush White House and bought-and-kept corporate media WHITEWASH these other MAJOR SCANDALS as well:
#1. Bush White House links to Jack Abramoff - Mr. Abramoff was only CONVICTED of BRIBING CONGRESS, but Speaker Pelosi, the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the US "major media" have NO, ZERO INTEREST in what Mr. Abramoff discussed at the White House on his several visits there?
#2. Vice President DICK CHENEY _CONTINUES_ to have FINANCIAL CONNECTIONS TO HALLIBURTON corporation - yet Speaker Pelosi has NO, ZERO INTEREST in those connections, even as Halliburton (and its spin-off former subsidiary, KBR corporation) get tens of millions upon billions of dollars of NO BID, NO OVERSIGHT government contracts, many of them awarded directly from the VP's office?
#3. The Bush White House's connection with Enron corporation CONVICTED OF FRAUD executive KEN LAY - Speaker Pelosi, the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the "Democratic" Congress have ZERO interest in what connection President Bush had with Enron's Chairman at the time that Enron accounting fraud was DEFRAUDING INVESTORS, and at a time when Enron was DEFRAUDING rate-paying customers in the California-Washington State-Oregon utility markets?
#4. MASSIVE CORRUPTION in Iraq War and Katrina rebuilding contracts - $90 billion, NINETY BILLION DOLLARS missing and unaccounted for, in the FIRST WEEKS OF US OCCUPATION OF IRAQ, alone!
#5. President Bush flew Air Force 1 Arizona to present John McCain WITH A BIRTHDAY CAKE - at a time when New Orleans residents were DROWNING, when the FEDERAL dikes and levees failed there. Can ANYONE IMAGINE a REPUBLICAN CONGRESS giving (former) President BILL CLINTON a _FREE PASS_ to fly Air Force 1, at TAXPAYER EXPENSE, to a DEMOCRATIC PHOTO-OP, while an American city drowned?
#6. We are already into a 5 page rant, and we haven't even mentioned LIES-TO-WAR, or the 9-11 Commission whitewash, or
#7. TORTURE or
#8. ILLEGAL SURVEILLANCE - Pelosi had NO NEED to bring the Telecom Surveillance "reform" bill to the floor - she did so ENTIRELY OUT OF COMPLICIT involvement in the surveillance and torture policies...
#9. stolen elections..
Energy Policy: the best thing anyone can say about President Bush's energy "policy" is that it is a reversion to... 1974, THIRTY FOUR YEARS AGO, when the Arab oil embargo BROUGHT THE ENTIRE AMERICAN ECONOMY to its knees!
But the Speaker's conduct of energy hearings are farcical, like the Republican Congress' 9-11 Commission Whitewash (that couldn't even quite make the connection that the CIA Director urgently visited the White House on July 10, 2001, to warn of pending Al Qaida terrorist attacks in the United States - the ONLY measure the Bush White House took in response to those urgent warnings about a known deadly threat to US airline passengers and flight crews, was to give Attorney General Ashcroft HIS OWN PRIVATE CHARTER JET, without so much as a "General Traveller's Advisory" PAPER WARNING delivered to American passengers and flight crews!
SPEAKER PELOSI HAS MADE A PACT WITH THE DEVIL: "Prosecution of Justice BE DAMNED! As long as she gets her campaign contributions and quiescent press coverage leading up to the 2008 elections."
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Friday, June 20, 2008
BOWING to the ISRAEL lobby and Republican War Lobby, House Democrats WILL VOTE FOR WAR (Blockade) on IRAN
Corrupt House Democrats, in voting for an EMBARGO OF IRAN, will effectively vote to CALL OFF THE ELECTIONS OF 2008, when SOARING GAS PRICES from a US embargo of the Persian Gulf leads to an economic collapse and massive unrest in America.
The Right-Wing pro-war lobby (defense contractors, mercenary "security" contractors, oil companies, financial service companies & banks, and big corporate media companies like the Washington Post Group, the New York Times Group, the CNN/Time Warner group, and Murdoch's FOX media empire) STRANGLEHOLD on America's government CONTINUES UNABATED, with the PELOSI-HOYER-REID-ROCKEFELLER "Democrat" Congress stepping up TO DECLARE A STATE OF WAR between the United States and Iran, a Congressional authorization for a US military blockade on Iran that would effectively give the US military command authorization to SHOOT, seize, and DESTROY ANY IRANIAN SHIPPING the US command wants to bomb and sink.
Paul Craig Roberts gives us a timely illustration of what such a US blockade of Iran will loook like, in his description of the Israeli BOMBING of the USS LIBERTY intel/surveillance ship on June 8th of 1967, during the Arab-Israel war of that year:
http://hustlermagazine.com/features/?p=85
The House and Senate "DEMOCRATIC" "Leadership" is now entirely subservient to the Israel lobby and war lobbies; which are dominated by the right-wing of Israeli politics, people who cheered when Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin WAS ASSASSINATED on November 4, 1995, for resisting the right-wing/theocratic/Likudnik goals of expansion into Arab/Palestinian territory
Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Yitzhak_Rabin
=========================================
House Resolution Calls for Naval Blockade against Iran
America’s powerful pro-Israel lobby pressures the US Congress
by Andrew W Cheetham
Global Research, June 18, 2008
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9377
A US House of Representatives Resolution effectively requiring a naval blockade on Iran seems fast tracked for passage, gaining co-sponsors at a remarkable speed, but experts say the measures called for in the resolutions amount to an act of war.
H.CON.RES 362 calls on the president to stop all shipments of refined petroleum products from reaching Iran. It also "demands" that the President impose "stringent inspection requirements on all persons, vehicles, ships, planes, trains and cargo entering or departing Iran."
Analysts say that this would require a US naval blockade in the Strait of Hormuz.
Since its introduction three weeks ago, the resolution has attracted 146 cosponsors. Forty-three members added their names to the bill in the past two days.
In the Senate, a sister resolution S.RES 580 has gained co-sponsors with similar speed. The Senate measure was introduced by Indiana Democrat Evan Bayh on June 2. In little more than a week’s time, it has accrued 19 co-sponsors.
AIPAC's Endorsement
Congressional insiders credit America’s powerful pro-Israel lobby for the rapid endorsement of the bills. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) held its annual policy conference June 2-4, in which it sent thousands of members to Capitol Hill to push for tougher measures against Iran. On its website, AIPAC endorses the resolutions as a way to ''Stop Irans Nuclear Proliferation" and tells readers to lobby Congress to pass the bill.
AIPAC has been ramping up the rhetoric against Iran over the last 3 years delivering 9 issue memos to Congress in 2006, 17 in 2007 and in the first five months of 2008 has delivered no less than 11 issue memos to the Congress and Senate predominantly warning of Irans nuclear weapons involvement and support for terrorism.
The Resolutions put forward in the House and the Senate bear a resounding similarity to AIPAC analysis and Issue Memos in both its analysis and proposals even down to its individual components.
Proponents say the resolutions advocate constructive steps toward reducing the threat posed by Iran. "It is my hope that…this Congress will urge this and future administrations to lead the world in economically isolating Iran in real and substantial ways," said Congressman Mike Pence(R-IN), who is the original cosponsor of the House resolution along with Gary Ackerman (D-NY), Chairman of the sub committee on Middle East and South Asia of the Foreign Affairs Committee.
Foreign policy analysts worry that such unilateral sanctions make it harder for the US to win the cooperation of the international community on a more effective multilateral effort. In his online blog, Senior Fellow in the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies Ethan Chorin points out that some US allies seek the economic ties to Iran that these resolutions ban. "The Swiss have recently signed an MOU with Iran on gas imports; the Omanis are close to a firm deal (also) on gas imports from Iran; a limited-services joint Iranian-European bank just opened a branch on Kish Island," he writes.
These resolutions could severely escalate US-Iran tensions, experts say. Recalling the perception of the naval blockade of Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the international norms classifying a naval blockade an act of war, critics argue endorsement of these bills would signal US intentions of war with Iran.
Last week’s sharp rise in the cost of oil following Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz’s threat to attack Iran indicated the impact that global fear of military action against Iran can have on the world petroleum market. It remains unclear if extensive congressional endorsement of these measures could have a similar effect.
In late May, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert reportedly urged the United States to impose a blockade on Iran. During a meeting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) in Jersusalem, Olmert said economic sanctions have "exhausted themselves" and called a blockade a "good possibility."
The Right-Wing pro-war lobby (defense contractors, mercenary "security" contractors, oil companies, financial service companies & banks, and big corporate media companies like the Washington Post Group, the New York Times Group, the CNN/Time Warner group, and Murdoch's FOX media empire) STRANGLEHOLD on America's government CONTINUES UNABATED, with the PELOSI-HOYER-REID-ROCKEFELLER "Democrat" Congress stepping up TO DECLARE A STATE OF WAR between the United States and Iran, a Congressional authorization for a US military blockade on Iran that would effectively give the US military command authorization to SHOOT, seize, and DESTROY ANY IRANIAN SHIPPING the US command wants to bomb and sink.
Paul Craig Roberts gives us a timely illustration of what such a US blockade of Iran will loook like, in his description of the Israeli BOMBING of the USS LIBERTY intel/surveillance ship on June 8th of 1967, during the Arab-Israel war of that year:
http://hustlermagazine.com/features/?p=85
The House and Senate "DEMOCRATIC" "Leadership" is now entirely subservient to the Israel lobby and war lobbies; which are dominated by the right-wing of Israeli politics, people who cheered when Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin WAS ASSASSINATED on November 4, 1995, for resisting the right-wing/theocratic/Likudnik goals of expansion into Arab/Palestinian territory
Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Yitzhak_Rabin
=========================================
House Resolution Calls for Naval Blockade against Iran
America’s powerful pro-Israel lobby pressures the US Congress
by Andrew W Cheetham
Global Research, June 18, 2008
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9377
A US House of Representatives Resolution effectively requiring a naval blockade on Iran seems fast tracked for passage, gaining co-sponsors at a remarkable speed, but experts say the measures called for in the resolutions amount to an act of war.
H.CON.RES 362 calls on the president to stop all shipments of refined petroleum products from reaching Iran. It also "demands" that the President impose "stringent inspection requirements on all persons, vehicles, ships, planes, trains and cargo entering or departing Iran."
Analysts say that this would require a US naval blockade in the Strait of Hormuz.
Since its introduction three weeks ago, the resolution has attracted 146 cosponsors. Forty-three members added their names to the bill in the past two days.
In the Senate, a sister resolution S.RES 580 has gained co-sponsors with similar speed. The Senate measure was introduced by Indiana Democrat Evan Bayh on June 2. In little more than a week’s time, it has accrued 19 co-sponsors.
AIPAC's Endorsement
Congressional insiders credit America’s powerful pro-Israel lobby for the rapid endorsement of the bills. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) held its annual policy conference June 2-4, in which it sent thousands of members to Capitol Hill to push for tougher measures against Iran. On its website, AIPAC endorses the resolutions as a way to ''Stop Irans Nuclear Proliferation" and tells readers to lobby Congress to pass the bill.
AIPAC has been ramping up the rhetoric against Iran over the last 3 years delivering 9 issue memos to Congress in 2006, 17 in 2007 and in the first five months of 2008 has delivered no less than 11 issue memos to the Congress and Senate predominantly warning of Irans nuclear weapons involvement and support for terrorism.
The Resolutions put forward in the House and the Senate bear a resounding similarity to AIPAC analysis and Issue Memos in both its analysis and proposals even down to its individual components.
Proponents say the resolutions advocate constructive steps toward reducing the threat posed by Iran. "It is my hope that…this Congress will urge this and future administrations to lead the world in economically isolating Iran in real and substantial ways," said Congressman Mike Pence(R-IN), who is the original cosponsor of the House resolution along with Gary Ackerman (D-NY), Chairman of the sub committee on Middle East and South Asia of the Foreign Affairs Committee.
Foreign policy analysts worry that such unilateral sanctions make it harder for the US to win the cooperation of the international community on a more effective multilateral effort. In his online blog, Senior Fellow in the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies Ethan Chorin points out that some US allies seek the economic ties to Iran that these resolutions ban. "The Swiss have recently signed an MOU with Iran on gas imports; the Omanis are close to a firm deal (also) on gas imports from Iran; a limited-services joint Iranian-European bank just opened a branch on Kish Island," he writes.
These resolutions could severely escalate US-Iran tensions, experts say. Recalling the perception of the naval blockade of Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the international norms classifying a naval blockade an act of war, critics argue endorsement of these bills would signal US intentions of war with Iran.
Last week’s sharp rise in the cost of oil following Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz’s threat to attack Iran indicated the impact that global fear of military action against Iran can have on the world petroleum market. It remains unclear if extensive congressional endorsement of these measures could have a similar effect.
In late May, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert reportedly urged the United States to impose a blockade on Iran. During a meeting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) in Jersusalem, Olmert said economic sanctions have "exhausted themselves" and called a blockade a "good possibility."
Pelosi TREACHERY, continued: Pelosi seeks to grant UNLIMITED SPYING in Telecom IMMUNITY bill, June 2008
MORE ABJECT, pro-war, UNLIMITED GOVERNMENT SURVEILLANCE from the treacherous Speaker of the House.
The GOOD NEWS about Speaker Pelosi and Steny Hoyer trying to push the White House's TELECOM IMMUNITY BILL through Congress?
- The notion that Pelosi and Hoyer are JOE LIEBERMAN TURNCOATS finally starts to filter through to the Democratic voting public.
TRYING TO KEEP UP WITH THE SPEAKER's RIGHT-WING, Democrat-in-name-only TREACHERY, is like TRYING TO KEEP UP WITH the abject corruption of the billions and billions and billions of American taxpayer dollars "misallocated" in no-oversight war spending and corrupt rebuilding contracts.
Constitutional expert: Pelosi's FISA 'reform' bill "is AN EVISCERATION OF THE FOURTH AMENDMENT"
by Nick Langewis and David Edwards
Published: Thursday June 19, 2008
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Turley_FISA_bill_is_evisceration_of_0619.html
Note the NEW YORK TIMES' wishy-washy, pro-spying headline and reporting in their report on UNLIMITED, STAZI style government SURVEILLANCE of ALL American personal and business conversations.
"Deal Reached in Congress to Rewrite Rules on Wiretapping" to mean "DEMOCRATS, Congress CAVE IN to BUSH White House, telecom industry call for UNLIMITED, NO OVERSIGHT SPYING ON AMERICAN CITIZENS."
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/20/washington/20fisacnd.html
The GOOD NEWS about Speaker Pelosi and Steny Hoyer trying to push the White House's TELECOM IMMUNITY BILL through Congress?
- The notion that Pelosi and Hoyer are JOE LIEBERMAN TURNCOATS finally starts to filter through to the Democratic voting public.
TRYING TO KEEP UP WITH THE SPEAKER's RIGHT-WING, Democrat-in-name-only TREACHERY, is like TRYING TO KEEP UP WITH the abject corruption of the billions and billions and billions of American taxpayer dollars "misallocated" in no-oversight war spending and corrupt rebuilding contracts.
Constitutional expert: Pelosi's FISA 'reform' bill "is AN EVISCERATION OF THE FOURTH AMENDMENT"
by Nick Langewis and David Edwards
Published: Thursday June 19, 2008
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Turley_FISA_bill_is_evisceration_of_0619.html
Note the NEW YORK TIMES' wishy-washy, pro-spying headline and reporting in their report on UNLIMITED, STAZI style government SURVEILLANCE of ALL American personal and business conversations.
"Deal Reached in Congress to Rewrite Rules on Wiretapping" to mean "DEMOCRATS, Congress CAVE IN to BUSH White House, telecom industry call for UNLIMITED, NO OVERSIGHT SPYING ON AMERICAN CITIZENS."
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/20/washington/20fisacnd.html
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
PELOSI'S CORRUPTION... PELOSI'S WAR. Speaker Pelosi gives Bush GREEN LIGHT for war vs Iran...
Speaker Nancy Pelosi can forget about leaving a legacy of TRUST FUNDS and the historical honor of being the first woman Speaker of the House for her grandchildren...
If she doesn't reign in Bush and Cheney's disastrous war-mongering (with long overdue impeachment hearings, budgetary restraints, subpoenas, or any other means) HER LEGACY TO HER GRANDCHILDREN will be TEN-DOLLAR PER GALLON gas, the blood of thousands of dead civilians in more Mideast cities, more fear and loathing for the unrestrained American empire on the march... and an American economy spiraling down the Bush2 black holes of red ink, deficits, job losses, massive corruption, stolen elections, a grotesquely antiquated energy policy, and bankruptcies.
http://www.247wallst.com/2008/06/the-247-wal-st.html
Congratulations, SPEAKER PELOSI: you are now SOLIDLY ON THE SIDE of the people who REJOICED when PRIME MINISTER RABIN was ASSASSINATED.
--------------------------------------------------------
Even the Neo-Con war propagandists at the New York Times report accurately on the Bush administration's serial lies and deceptions - - if you wait patiently enough, and read carefully between the lines.
According to HuffPost contributor Robert Naiman, Mr. Bush's latest foray into international doublespeak is no more, and no less, than a fig leaf over the Bush administration's PLANS TO EXPAND THE US WARS IN THE MIDDLE EAST, with a NAVAL BLOCKADE of Iran, all of which is reported by the Times.
<< Who is the audience for this "show" [President Bush's fake "generous offer", Naiman writes]? People who don't read the New York Times, apparently. These people will be told that "all efforts at dialogue" have been exhausted and there is no alternative to "other punitive moves against Iran that could be taken by a 'coalition of the willing' outside the United Nations":
[direct quote from the Times:]
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/15/world/middleeast/15iran.html
"Officials would not provide details, but analysts suggest those could include a naval embargo of the Persian Gulf or the refusal to supply Western-made technology required for Iran's oil industry, creating bottlenecks in Iran's oil production."
Naiman: << For those scoring at home, A NAVAL EMBARGO WOULD BE AN ACT OF WAR. If undertaken "outside the United Nations" -- i.e. without the authorization of the UN Security Council -- it would be a war crime. If you don't think Iran would retaliate for this act of war, or that it doesn't have effective means of doing so, then you are, as John McCain might say, "naïve and inexperienced."
Once again a FALSE CHOICE is placed before the world -- the FAKE DIPLOMACY of the Bush administration, or war. Are there no other alternatives? >>
========================================
Robert Naiman's commentary outlining Bush's FIG LEAF WARMONGERING...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-naiman/nyt-exposes-fraud-of-gene_b_107569.html
Pro-war New York Times read-between-the-lines documentation of same:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/15/world/middleeast/15iran.html
Monday, June 16, 2008
The New York Times finally notices: the LYNCH MOB PROSECUTION of Alabama's former Dem. Governor Don Siegelman. How timely....
The New York Times finally notices: the LYNCH MOB PROSECUTION of Alabama's former Dem. Governor Don Siegelman, who was ROBBED of his winning re-election win by the usual Republican "middle of nigh vote counting crew behind locked doors" "discovery" of some 5,000 previously uncounted votes. Gov. Siegelman took his 2002 election "defeat" in stride, but when he had the temerity to protest the vote rigging, and pledged to run for governor again.... KARL ROVE and the Bush White House SICKED FEDERAL PROSECUTORS on Siegelman, INCLUDING US ATTORNEY Leura Canary - the WIFE of Bill Canary, SENIOR CAMPAIGN ADVISOR to Seigelman's Republican opponent, Republican nominee and Governor (by the above disputed election count) BOB RILEY!
The New York Times, the leading pro-war Neo-Con media organization in America (far more influential than even Rupert Murdoch's Fox "news" or Rev. Sung Yung Moon's Washington Times) actually deigns to take notice of the Karl Rove orchestrated partisan mugging of Governor Siegelman.
But even so, notice the bland, uninformative headline the Times' neo-con editors assign to the commentary - the old "Nothing to see here, move along, move along" theme. Were a Democratic administration to have put a Republican Governor in prison with such a partisan prosecution that quashed conflicting evidence, the Times editors would be putting that story on the front page, under blaring headlines.
===========================================
[The Seigelman Prosecution in Alabama by Republican prosecutors smacks of]
A CASE OF POLITICS
a New York Times eitorial board editorial
Published: June 16, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/16/opinion/16mon2.html
Don Siegelman, the former Alabama governor, is asking a federal appeals court to throw out his conviction on dubious corruption charges. His appeal has some surprising backers: a bipartisan group of 54 former state attorneys general has submitted a brief on his behalf. Congress is also investigating charges that Mr. Siegelman was politically targeted.
Skip to next paragraph
The Board Blog
Additional commentary, background information and other items by Times editorial writers.
Go to The Board » Mr. Siegelman was the Democrats’ strongest candidate to retake the Alabama governorship, and Congress has uncovered evidence that the United States attorney’s office in Montgomery — with possible White House input — may have decided to prosecute him to undermine his campaign. The former presidential adviser Karl Rove, who has been accused of pushing to have Mr. Siegelman indicted, has been subpoenaed by both the House and Senate, but has refused to testify.
While Congress examines those allegations, Mr. Siegelman is asking the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta, to reverse his case on the law. Mr. Siegelman was accused of reappointing Richard Scrushy, then the chief executive of HealthSouth, to a health care board in exchange for a contribution to a referendum campaign for a state lottery.
Mr. Siegelman was convicted of bribery and related crimes and sentenced to more than seven years, and served nine months before being freed on appeal.
Laws against bribery must be used carefully. It is not a crime for an elected official to appoint a campaign contributor to a position. If it were, many ambassadors and judges — and the presidents and governors who appointed them — would be in jail. And partisan prosecutors would have far too much power to punish elected officials they did not like.
For an appointment to be illegal, there needs to be an express quid pro quo — something the prosecutors did not prove in Mr. Siegelman’s case.
Even the highly partisan Bush Justice Department appears to be losing confidence in its case. It originally appealed Mr. Siegelman’s sentence, hoping to add more than 20 years. It recently withdrew the appeal without explanation.
Congress should compel Mr. Rove to testify. And it should keep investigating this prosecution and what role crass politics may have played. While it does, the 11th Circuit should cast a skeptical eye on this case, based on the law and the facts.
The New York Times, the leading pro-war Neo-Con media organization in America (far more influential than even Rupert Murdoch's Fox "news" or Rev. Sung Yung Moon's Washington Times) actually deigns to take notice of the Karl Rove orchestrated partisan mugging of Governor Siegelman.
But even so, notice the bland, uninformative headline the Times' neo-con editors assign to the commentary - the old "Nothing to see here, move along, move along" theme. Were a Democratic administration to have put a Republican Governor in prison with such a partisan prosecution that quashed conflicting evidence, the Times editors would be putting that story on the front page, under blaring headlines.
===========================================
[The Seigelman Prosecution in Alabama by Republican prosecutors smacks of]
A CASE OF POLITICS
a New York Times eitorial board editorial
Published: June 16, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/16/opinion/16mon2.html
Don Siegelman, the former Alabama governor, is asking a federal appeals court to throw out his conviction on dubious corruption charges. His appeal has some surprising backers: a bipartisan group of 54 former state attorneys general has submitted a brief on his behalf. Congress is also investigating charges that Mr. Siegelman was politically targeted.
Skip to next paragraph
The Board Blog
Additional commentary, background information and other items by Times editorial writers.
Go to The Board » Mr. Siegelman was the Democrats’ strongest candidate to retake the Alabama governorship, and Congress has uncovered evidence that the United States attorney’s office in Montgomery — with possible White House input — may have decided to prosecute him to undermine his campaign. The former presidential adviser Karl Rove, who has been accused of pushing to have Mr. Siegelman indicted, has been subpoenaed by both the House and Senate, but has refused to testify.
While Congress examines those allegations, Mr. Siegelman is asking the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta, to reverse his case on the law. Mr. Siegelman was accused of reappointing Richard Scrushy, then the chief executive of HealthSouth, to a health care board in exchange for a contribution to a referendum campaign for a state lottery.
Mr. Siegelman was convicted of bribery and related crimes and sentenced to more than seven years, and served nine months before being freed on appeal.
Laws against bribery must be used carefully. It is not a crime for an elected official to appoint a campaign contributor to a position. If it were, many ambassadors and judges — and the presidents and governors who appointed them — would be in jail. And partisan prosecutors would have far too much power to punish elected officials they did not like.
For an appointment to be illegal, there needs to be an express quid pro quo — something the prosecutors did not prove in Mr. Siegelman’s case.
Even the highly partisan Bush Justice Department appears to be losing confidence in its case. It originally appealed Mr. Siegelman’s sentence, hoping to add more than 20 years. It recently withdrew the appeal without explanation.
Congress should compel Mr. Rove to testify. And it should keep investigating this prosecution and what role crass politics may have played. While it does, the 11th Circuit should cast a skeptical eye on this case, based on the law and the facts.
Friday, June 13, 2008
Pelosi's CORRUPTION: Taking orders from the war lobby, the Israel lobby, and the oil lobby, over US Constitution....
Congressman Ron Paul: Speaker Pelosi removed the "no attack on Iran WITHOUT SPECIFIC APPROVAL BY CONGRESS" bill from consideration, at demand of Israel leadership:
=============================
Thanks to the courage of Congressional Representative Dennis Kucinich, the House Democratic 'leadership', Congress, and US press-media can no longer pretend ignorance ("hear no evil, see no evil, and for God's sake, speak no evil!") about the abuses of power and obstructions of justice warranting impeachment by President Bush and Vice President Cheney.
Article 5 of the 35 Articles of Impeachment brought up by Congressman Kucinich, while far from the "heaviest" of charges, reminds this Congress and the pubic that President Bush and Vice President Cheney _DIVERTED_ funds approved by Congress for the wrap up of the AFGHANISTAN war, and instead used those funds to pre-position US forces for the Iraq war which the Bush White House so desperately wanted. This article, alone, reminds us that Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney were DETERMINED to attack, invade, and occupy Iraq, even as they loudly proclaimed that they would go to war only as a very last option, after all other options had been exhausted.
Seven years later, the "victory" in Afghanistan is morphing into an ever larger, ever more murderous, expanding war after President Bush _ALLOWED_ bin Laden to escape, and allowed al Qaeda to rebuild, regroup and recruit on the Afghan-Pakistan border.
Speaker Pelosi's attitude is basically,
Already, Speaker Pelosi and other Democrat "leaders" are BEING PASSIVE in the face of this terrible energy crisis hitting America, ALLOWING the Right-Wing press to start trumpeting, "Democrats won't let us drill in ANWAR or on the Florida coast!" even though the bottom line of this energy crisis is that President Bush and Vice President Cheney, in doing the dirty work of the insatiably greedy oil companies, have KICKED AMERICA BACKWARDS by THREE FULL DECADES - to the ENERGY CRISIS of 1974, when the American economy almost collapsed during the Arab oil embargo!
Tossing bills up Pennsylvania Ave. and watching President Bush VETO them IS NOT "leadership", Speaker Pelosi! You have to GRAB the AMERICAN press-media BY THE THROAT, and FORCE them to ask, "How is this energy crisis not predictable, given that we went through the 1974 energy crisis 34 years ago?"!
It is amazing how the Democrat "leadership," in their greedy desire to win the White House without CONFRONTING the abuses of the Bush White House, are so easily deluded into accepting the "Inside Beltway" "Conventional Wisdom" corporate media talking points that got us in this economic and foreign wars mess in the first place.\
Articles of Impeachment against Bush
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/bush
Bush BUDGET DEFICITS: http://www.uuforum.org/deficit.htm
NOTE: this chart has been SCRUBBED from it's website (link immediately above), so we post it here - the blue upward line is the Clinton econmic recovery; to the left of it is the Bush1 Recession, and to the right, almost vertically straight down, is the Bush2 (George W. Bush) Recession, with a momentary upward swing as money flowing out of Wall Street into real estate stimulated home production and related consumer purchasing for a year or two... until that boom, too, led to the housing bubble bust, under the tremendous impact of Bush's government deficits and runaway inflation in oil, gas, health care, and other core consumer prices.
=============================
Thanks to the courage of Congressional Representative Dennis Kucinich, the House Democratic 'leadership', Congress, and US press-media can no longer pretend ignorance ("hear no evil, see no evil, and for God's sake, speak no evil!") about the abuses of power and obstructions of justice warranting impeachment by President Bush and Vice President Cheney.
Article 5 of the 35 Articles of Impeachment brought up by Congressman Kucinich, while far from the "heaviest" of charges, reminds this Congress and the pubic that President Bush and Vice President Cheney _DIVERTED_ funds approved by Congress for the wrap up of the AFGHANISTAN war, and instead used those funds to pre-position US forces for the Iraq war which the Bush White House so desperately wanted. This article, alone, reminds us that Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney were DETERMINED to attack, invade, and occupy Iraq, even as they loudly proclaimed that they would go to war only as a very last option, after all other options had been exhausted.
Seven years later, the "victory" in Afghanistan is morphing into an ever larger, ever more murderous, expanding war after President Bush _ALLOWED_ bin Laden to escape, and allowed al Qaeda to rebuild, regroup and recruit on the Afghan-Pakistan border.
Speaker Pelosi's attitude is basically,
"Yes, slavery is abhorrent and a stain on America... but it would not be wise to do anything about it at this time, and this Congress will not do anything about it now or in the future."
Already, Speaker Pelosi and other Democrat "leaders" are BEING PASSIVE in the face of this terrible energy crisis hitting America, ALLOWING the Right-Wing press to start trumpeting, "Democrats won't let us drill in ANWAR or on the Florida coast!" even though the bottom line of this energy crisis is that President Bush and Vice President Cheney, in doing the dirty work of the insatiably greedy oil companies, have KICKED AMERICA BACKWARDS by THREE FULL DECADES - to the ENERGY CRISIS of 1974, when the American economy almost collapsed during the Arab oil embargo!
Tossing bills up Pennsylvania Ave. and watching President Bush VETO them IS NOT "leadership", Speaker Pelosi! You have to GRAB the AMERICAN press-media BY THE THROAT, and FORCE them to ask, "How is this energy crisis not predictable, given that we went through the 1974 energy crisis 34 years ago?"!
It is amazing how the Democrat "leadership," in their greedy desire to win the White House without CONFRONTING the abuses of the Bush White House, are so easily deluded into accepting the "Inside Beltway" "Conventional Wisdom" corporate media talking points that got us in this economic and foreign wars mess in the first place.\
Articles of Impeachment against Bush
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/bush
Bush BUDGET DEFICITS: http://www.uuforum.org/deficit.htm
NOTE: this chart has been SCRUBBED from it's website (link immediately above), so we post it here - the blue upward line is the Clinton econmic recovery; to the left of it is the Bush1 Recession, and to the right, almost vertically straight down, is the Bush2 (George W. Bush) Recession, with a momentary upward swing as money flowing out of Wall Street into real estate stimulated home production and related consumer purchasing for a year or two... until that boom, too, led to the housing bubble bust, under the tremendous impact of Bush's government deficits and runaway inflation in oil, gas, health care, and other core consumer prices.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Congressman Kucinich read 35 Charges of IMPEACHMENT vs President Bush....
Congressman Kucinich read 35 extensively researched and compiled Charges of IMPEACHMENT vs President Bush....
The final three bring up the the irony of the Alpha and Omega of the Bush-Cheney administration's claims to powers: THEY presided over the WORST TERRORIST ATTACK in US history, having demonstratably done NOTHING to make the hijacker's task even minutely more difficult - yet they claim their GROSS INCOMPETENCE and DERELICTION OF DUTY leading up to 9-11 as the basis of their "leadership" and near dictatorial wartime powers!!
Impeachment - Blaming Bush for His Greatest Achievement
By David Swanson
Tue, 2008-06-10
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/33996
For those who stayed riveted through the end of Congressman Dennis Kucinich's five-hour reading of his 35 articles of impeachment against President Bush on Monday night, the three articles at the very end of the list must have come as something of a jarring surprise. As everyone knows, managing to get the World Trade Center blown up, or at least just BEING president when it happened, is George W. Bush's greatest all-time achievement, the only action (or nonaction) that has ever made him truly popular with the American public, the one thing he will brag about until the day he dies. How, then, could Kucinich propose to impeach Bush for such stupendous success? Here's how:
Article XXXIII
REPEATEDLY IGNORED AND FAILED TO RESPOND TO HIGH LEVEL INTELLIGENCE WARNINGS OF PLANNED TERRORIST ATTACKS IN THE US, PRIOR TO 911
In his conduct while President of the United States, George W. Bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty under Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution "to take care that the laws be faithfully executed", has both personally and acting through his agents and subordinates, together with the Vice President, failed in his Constitutional duties to take proper steps to protect the nation prior to September 11, 2001.
The White House's top counter-terrorism adviser, Richard A. Clarke, has testified that from the beginning of George W. Bush's presidency until September 11, 2001, Clarke attempted unsuccessfully to persuade President Bush to take steps to protect the nation against terrorism. Clarke sent a memorandum to then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice on January 24, 2001, "urgently" but unsuccessfully requesting "a Cabinet-level meeting to deal with the impending al Qaeda attack."
In April 2001, Clarke was finally granted a meeting, but only with second-in-command department representatives, including Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, who made light of Clarke's concerns.
Clarke confirms that in June, July, and August, 2001, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) warned the president in daily briefings of unprecedented indications that a major al Qaeda attack was going to happen against the United States somewhere in the world in the weeks and months ahead. Yet, Clarke was still unable to convene a cabinet-level meeting to address the issue.
Condoleezza Rice has testified that George Tenet met with the president 40 times to warn him that a major al-Qaeda attack was going to take place, and that in response the president did not convene any meetings of top officials. At such meetings, the FBI could have shared information on possible terrorists enrolled at flight schools. Among the many preventive steps that could have been taken, the Federal Aviation Administration, airlines, and airports might have been put on full alert.
According to Condoleezza Rice, the first and only cabinet-level meeting prior to 9/11 to discuss the threat of terrorist attacks took place on September 4, 2001, one week before the attacks in New York and Washington.
On August 6, 2001, President Bush was presented a President's Daily Brief (PDB) article titled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." The lead sentence of that PDB article indicated that Bin Laden and his followers wanted to "follow the example of World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef and 'bring the fighting to America.'" The article warned: "Al-Qa'ida members—including some who are US citizens— have resided in or traveled to the US for years, and the group apparently maintains a support structure that could aid attacks."
The article cited a "more sensational threat reporting that Bin Laden wanted to hijack a US aircraft," but indicated that the CIA had not been able to corroborate such reporting. The PDB item included information from the FBI indicating "patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York." The article also noted that the CIA and FBI were investigating "a call to our embassy in the UAE in May saying that a group of Bin Laden supporters was in the US planning attacks with explosives."
The president spent the rest of August 6, and almost all the rest of August 2001 on vacation. There is no evidence that he called any meetings of his advisers to discuss this alarming report. When the title and substance of this PDB article were later reported in the press, then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice began a sustained campaign to play down its significance, until the actual text was eventually released by the White House.
New York Times writer Douglas Jehl, put it this way: "In a single 17-sentence document, the intelligence briefing delivered to President Bush in August 2001 spells out the who, hints at the what and points towards the where of the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington that followed 36 days later."
Eleanor Hill, Executive Director of the joint congressional committee investigating the performance of the US intelligence community before September 11, 2001, reported in mid-September 2002 that intelligence reports a year earlier "reiterated a consistent and constant theme: Osama bin Laden's intent to launch terrorist attacks inside the United States."
That joint inquiry revealed that just two months before September 11, an intelligence briefing for "senior government officials" predicted a terrorist attack with these words: "The attack will be spectacular and designed to inflict mass casualties against U.S. facilities or interests. Attack preparations have been made. Attack will occur with little or no warning."
Given the White House's insistence on secrecy with regard to what intelligence was given to President Bush, the joint-inquiry report does not divulge whether he took part in that briefing. Even if he did not, it strains credulity to suppose that those "senior government officials" would have kept its alarming substance from the president.
Again, there is no evidence that the president held any meetings or took any action to deal with the threats of such attacks.
In all of these actions and decisions, President George W. Bush has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President, and subversive of constitutional government, to the prejudice of the cause of law and justice and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States. Wherefore, President George W. Bush, by such conduct, is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office.
Article XXXIV
OBSTRUCTION OF INVESTIGATION INTO THE ATTACKS OF SEPTEMBER 11, 2001
In his conduct while President of the United States, George W. Bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty under Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution "to take care that the laws be faithfully executed", has both personally and acting through his agents and subordinates, together with the Vice President, obstructed investigations into the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon on September 11, 2001.
Following September 11, 2001, President Bush and Vice President Cheney took strong steps to thwart any and all proposals that the circumstances of the attack be addressed. Then-Secretary of State Colin Powell was forced to renege on his public promise on September 23 that a "White Paper" would be issued to explain the circumstances. Less than two weeks after that promise, Powell apologized for his "unfortunate choice of words," and explained that Americans would have to rely on "information coming out in the press and in other ways."
On Sept. 26, 2001, President Bush drove to Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) headquarters in Langley, Virginia, stood with Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet and said: "My report to the nation is, we've got the best intelligence we can possibly have thanks to the men and women of the C.I.A." George Tenet subsequently and falsely claimed not to have visited the president personally between the start of Bush's long Crawford vacation and September 11, 2001.
Testifying before the 9/11 Commission on April 14, 2004, Tenet answered a question from Commission member Timothy Roemer by referring to the president's vacation (July 29-August 30) in Crawford and insisting that he did not see the president at all in August 2001. "You never talked with him?" Roemer asked. "No," Tenet replied, explaining that for much of August he too was "on leave." An Agency spokesman called reporters that same evening to say Tenet had misspoken, and that Tenet had briefed Bush on August 17 and 31. The spokesman explained that the second briefing took place after the president had returned to Washington, and played down the first one, in Crawford, as uneventful.
In his book, At the Center of the Storm, (2007) Tenet, refers to what is almost certainly his August 17 visit to Crawford as a follow-up to the "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in the US" article in the CIA-prepared President's Daily Brief of August 6. That briefing was immortalized in a Time Magazine photo capturing Harriet Myers holding the PDB open for the president, as two CIA officers sit by. It is the same briefing to which the president reportedly reacted by telling the CIA briefer, "All right, you've covered your ass now." (Ron Suskind, The One-Percent Doctrine, p. 2, 2006). In At the Center of the Storm, Tenet writes: "A few weeks after the August 6 PDB was delivered, I followed it to Crawford to make sure that the president stayed current on events."
A White House press release suggests Tenet was also there a week later, on August 24. According to the August 25, 2001, release, President Bush, addressing a group of visitors to Crawford on August 25, told them: "George Tenet and I, yesterday, we piled in the new nominees for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the Vice Chairman and their wives and went right up the canyon."
In early February, 2002, Vice President Dick Cheney warned then-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle that if Congress went ahead with an investigation, administration officials might not show up to testify. As pressure grew for an investigation, the president and vice president agreed to the establishment of a congressional joint committee to conduct a "Joint Inquiry." Eleanor Hill, Executive Director of the Inquiry, opened the Joint Inquiry's final public hearing in mid-September 2002 with the following disclaimer: "I need to report that, according to the White House and the Director of Central Intelligence, the president's knowledge of intelligence information relevant to this inquiry remains classified, even when the substance of the intelligence information has been declassified."
The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks, also known as the 9/11 Commission, was created on November 27, 2002, following the passage of congressional legislation signed into law by President Bush. The President was asked to testify before the Commission. He refused to testify except for one hour in private with only two Commission members, with no oath administered, with no recording or note taking, and with the Vice President at his side. Commission Co-Chair Lee Hamilton has written that he believes the commission was set up to fail, was underfunded, was rushed, and did not receive proper cooperation and access to information.
A December 2007 review of classified documents by former members of the Commission found that the commission had made repeated and detailed requests to the CIA in 2003 and 2004 for documents and other information about the interrogation of operatives of Al Qaeda, and had been told falsely by a top C.I.A. official that the agency had "produced or made available for review" everything that had been requested.
In all of these actions and decisions, President George W. Bush has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President, and subversive of constitutional government, to the prejudice of the cause of law and justice and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States. Wherefore, President George W. Bush, by such conduct, is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office.
Article XXXV
ENDANGERING THE HEALTH OF 911 FIRST RESPONDERS
In his conduct while President of the United States, George W. Bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty under Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution "to take care that the laws be faithfully executed", has both personally and acting through his agents and subordinates, together with the Vice President, recklessly endangered the health of first responders, residents, and workers at and near the former location of the World Trade Center in New York City.
The Inspector General of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) August 21, 2003, report numbered 2003-P-00012 and entitled "EPA's Response to the World Trade Center Collapse: Challenges, Successes, and Areas for Improvement," includes the following findings:
"[W]hen EPA made a September 18 announcement that the air was 'safe' to breathe, it did not have sufficient data and analyses to make such a blanket statement. At that time, air monitoring data was lacking for several pollutants of concern, including particulate matter and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). Furthermore, The White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) influenced, through the collaboration process, the information that EPA communicated to the public through its early press releases when it convinced EPA to add reassuring statements and delete cautionary ones."
"As a result of the White House CEQ's influence, guidance for cleaning indoor spaces and information about the potential health effects from WTC debris were not included in EPA- issued press releases. In addition, based on CEQ's influence, reassuring information was added to at least one press release and cautionary information was deleted from EPA's draft version of that press release. . . . The White House's role in EPA's public communications about WTC environmental conditions was described in a September 12, 2001, e-mail from the EPA Deputy Administrator's Chief of Staff to senior EPA officials:
"'All statements to the media should be cleared through the NSC [National Security Council] before they are released.'
"According to the EPA Chief of Staff, one particular CEQ official was designated to work with EPA to ensure that clearance was obtained through NSC. The Associate Administrator for the EPA Office of Communications, Education, and Media Relations (OCEMR) said that no press release could be issued for a 3- to 4-week period after September 11 without approval from the CEQ contact."
Acting EPA Administrator Marianne Horinko, who sat in on EPA meetings with the White House has said in an interview that the White House played a coordinating role. The National Security Council played the key role, filtering incoming data on ground zero air and water, Horinko said: "I think that the thinking was, these are experts in WMD (weapons of mass destruction), so they should have the coordinating role."
In the cleanup of the Pentagon following September 11, 2001, Occupational Safety and Health Administration laws were enforced, and no workers became ill. At the World Trade Center site, the same laws were not enforced.
In the years since the release of the EPA Inspector General's above-cited report, the Bush Administration has still not effected a clean-up of the indoor air in apartments and workspaces near the site.
Screenings conducted at the Mount Sinai Medical Center and released in the September 10, 2004, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) of the federal Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), produced the following results:
"Both upper and lower respiratory problems and mental health difficulties are widespread among rescue and recovery workers who dug through the ruins of the World Trade Center in the days following its destruction in the attack of September 11, 2001.
"An analysis of the screenings of 1,138 workers and volunteers who responded to the World Trade Center disaster found that nearly three-quarters of them experienced new or worsened upper respiratory problems at some point while working at Ground Zero. And half of those examined had upper and/or lower respiratory symptoms that persisted up to the time of their examinations, an average of eight months after their WTC efforts ended."
A larger study released in 2006 found that roughly 70 percent of nearly 10,000 workers tested at Mount Sinai from 2002 to 2004 reported that they had new or substantially worsened respiratory problems while or after working at ground zero. This study showed that many of the respiratory ailments, including sinusitis and asthma, and gastrointestinal problems related to them, initially reported by ground zero workers persisted or grew worse over time. Most of the ground zero workers in the study who reported trouble breathing while working there were still having those problems two and a half years later, an indication of chronic illness unlikely to improve over time.
In all of these actions and decisions, President George W. Bush has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President, and subversive of constitutional government, to the prejudice of the cause of law and justice and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States. Wherefore, President George W. Bush, by such conduct, is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office.
The final three bring up the the irony of the Alpha and Omega of the Bush-Cheney administration's claims to powers: THEY presided over the WORST TERRORIST ATTACK in US history, having demonstratably done NOTHING to make the hijacker's task even minutely more difficult - yet they claim their GROSS INCOMPETENCE and DERELICTION OF DUTY leading up to 9-11 as the basis of their "leadership" and near dictatorial wartime powers!!
Impeachment - Blaming Bush for His Greatest Achievement
By David Swanson
Tue, 2008-06-10
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/33996
For those who stayed riveted through the end of Congressman Dennis Kucinich's five-hour reading of his 35 articles of impeachment against President Bush on Monday night, the three articles at the very end of the list must have come as something of a jarring surprise. As everyone knows, managing to get the World Trade Center blown up, or at least just BEING president when it happened, is George W. Bush's greatest all-time achievement, the only action (or nonaction) that has ever made him truly popular with the American public, the one thing he will brag about until the day he dies. How, then, could Kucinich propose to impeach Bush for such stupendous success? Here's how:
Article XXXIII
REPEATEDLY IGNORED AND FAILED TO RESPOND TO HIGH LEVEL INTELLIGENCE WARNINGS OF PLANNED TERRORIST ATTACKS IN THE US, PRIOR TO 911
In his conduct while President of the United States, George W. Bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty under Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution "to take care that the laws be faithfully executed", has both personally and acting through his agents and subordinates, together with the Vice President, failed in his Constitutional duties to take proper steps to protect the nation prior to September 11, 2001.
The White House's top counter-terrorism adviser, Richard A. Clarke, has testified that from the beginning of George W. Bush's presidency until September 11, 2001, Clarke attempted unsuccessfully to persuade President Bush to take steps to protect the nation against terrorism. Clarke sent a memorandum to then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice on January 24, 2001, "urgently" but unsuccessfully requesting "a Cabinet-level meeting to deal with the impending al Qaeda attack."
In April 2001, Clarke was finally granted a meeting, but only with second-in-command department representatives, including Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, who made light of Clarke's concerns.
Clarke confirms that in June, July, and August, 2001, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) warned the president in daily briefings of unprecedented indications that a major al Qaeda attack was going to happen against the United States somewhere in the world in the weeks and months ahead. Yet, Clarke was still unable to convene a cabinet-level meeting to address the issue.
Condoleezza Rice has testified that George Tenet met with the president 40 times to warn him that a major al-Qaeda attack was going to take place, and that in response the president did not convene any meetings of top officials. At such meetings, the FBI could have shared information on possible terrorists enrolled at flight schools. Among the many preventive steps that could have been taken, the Federal Aviation Administration, airlines, and airports might have been put on full alert.
According to Condoleezza Rice, the first and only cabinet-level meeting prior to 9/11 to discuss the threat of terrorist attacks took place on September 4, 2001, one week before the attacks in New York and Washington.
On August 6, 2001, President Bush was presented a President's Daily Brief (PDB) article titled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." The lead sentence of that PDB article indicated that Bin Laden and his followers wanted to "follow the example of World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef and 'bring the fighting to America.'" The article warned: "Al-Qa'ida members—including some who are US citizens— have resided in or traveled to the US for years, and the group apparently maintains a support structure that could aid attacks."
The article cited a "more sensational threat reporting that Bin Laden wanted to hijack a US aircraft," but indicated that the CIA had not been able to corroborate such reporting. The PDB item included information from the FBI indicating "patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York." The article also noted that the CIA and FBI were investigating "a call to our embassy in the UAE in May saying that a group of Bin Laden supporters was in the US planning attacks with explosives."
The president spent the rest of August 6, and almost all the rest of August 2001 on vacation. There is no evidence that he called any meetings of his advisers to discuss this alarming report. When the title and substance of this PDB article were later reported in the press, then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice began a sustained campaign to play down its significance, until the actual text was eventually released by the White House.
New York Times writer Douglas Jehl, put it this way: "In a single 17-sentence document, the intelligence briefing delivered to President Bush in August 2001 spells out the who, hints at the what and points towards the where of the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington that followed 36 days later."
Eleanor Hill, Executive Director of the joint congressional committee investigating the performance of the US intelligence community before September 11, 2001, reported in mid-September 2002 that intelligence reports a year earlier "reiterated a consistent and constant theme: Osama bin Laden's intent to launch terrorist attacks inside the United States."
That joint inquiry revealed that just two months before September 11, an intelligence briefing for "senior government officials" predicted a terrorist attack with these words: "The attack will be spectacular and designed to inflict mass casualties against U.S. facilities or interests. Attack preparations have been made. Attack will occur with little or no warning."
Given the White House's insistence on secrecy with regard to what intelligence was given to President Bush, the joint-inquiry report does not divulge whether he took part in that briefing. Even if he did not, it strains credulity to suppose that those "senior government officials" would have kept its alarming substance from the president.
Again, there is no evidence that the president held any meetings or took any action to deal with the threats of such attacks.
In all of these actions and decisions, President George W. Bush has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President, and subversive of constitutional government, to the prejudice of the cause of law and justice and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States. Wherefore, President George W. Bush, by such conduct, is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office.
Article XXXIV
OBSTRUCTION OF INVESTIGATION INTO THE ATTACKS OF SEPTEMBER 11, 2001
In his conduct while President of the United States, George W. Bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty under Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution "to take care that the laws be faithfully executed", has both personally and acting through his agents and subordinates, together with the Vice President, obstructed investigations into the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon on September 11, 2001.
Following September 11, 2001, President Bush and Vice President Cheney took strong steps to thwart any and all proposals that the circumstances of the attack be addressed. Then-Secretary of State Colin Powell was forced to renege on his public promise on September 23 that a "White Paper" would be issued to explain the circumstances. Less than two weeks after that promise, Powell apologized for his "unfortunate choice of words," and explained that Americans would have to rely on "information coming out in the press and in other ways."
On Sept. 26, 2001, President Bush drove to Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) headquarters in Langley, Virginia, stood with Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet and said: "My report to the nation is, we've got the best intelligence we can possibly have thanks to the men and women of the C.I.A." George Tenet subsequently and falsely claimed not to have visited the president personally between the start of Bush's long Crawford vacation and September 11, 2001.
Testifying before the 9/11 Commission on April 14, 2004, Tenet answered a question from Commission member Timothy Roemer by referring to the president's vacation (July 29-August 30) in Crawford and insisting that he did not see the president at all in August 2001. "You never talked with him?" Roemer asked. "No," Tenet replied, explaining that for much of August he too was "on leave." An Agency spokesman called reporters that same evening to say Tenet had misspoken, and that Tenet had briefed Bush on August 17 and 31. The spokesman explained that the second briefing took place after the president had returned to Washington, and played down the first one, in Crawford, as uneventful.
In his book, At the Center of the Storm, (2007) Tenet, refers to what is almost certainly his August 17 visit to Crawford as a follow-up to the "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in the US" article in the CIA-prepared President's Daily Brief of August 6. That briefing was immortalized in a Time Magazine photo capturing Harriet Myers holding the PDB open for the president, as two CIA officers sit by. It is the same briefing to which the president reportedly reacted by telling the CIA briefer, "All right, you've covered your ass now." (Ron Suskind, The One-Percent Doctrine, p. 2, 2006). In At the Center of the Storm, Tenet writes: "A few weeks after the August 6 PDB was delivered, I followed it to Crawford to make sure that the president stayed current on events."
A White House press release suggests Tenet was also there a week later, on August 24. According to the August 25, 2001, release, President Bush, addressing a group of visitors to Crawford on August 25, told them: "George Tenet and I, yesterday, we piled in the new nominees for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the Vice Chairman and their wives and went right up the canyon."
In early February, 2002, Vice President Dick Cheney warned then-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle that if Congress went ahead with an investigation, administration officials might not show up to testify. As pressure grew for an investigation, the president and vice president agreed to the establishment of a congressional joint committee to conduct a "Joint Inquiry." Eleanor Hill, Executive Director of the Inquiry, opened the Joint Inquiry's final public hearing in mid-September 2002 with the following disclaimer: "I need to report that, according to the White House and the Director of Central Intelligence, the president's knowledge of intelligence information relevant to this inquiry remains classified, even when the substance of the intelligence information has been declassified."
The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks, also known as the 9/11 Commission, was created on November 27, 2002, following the passage of congressional legislation signed into law by President Bush. The President was asked to testify before the Commission. He refused to testify except for one hour in private with only two Commission members, with no oath administered, with no recording or note taking, and with the Vice President at his side. Commission Co-Chair Lee Hamilton has written that he believes the commission was set up to fail, was underfunded, was rushed, and did not receive proper cooperation and access to information.
A December 2007 review of classified documents by former members of the Commission found that the commission had made repeated and detailed requests to the CIA in 2003 and 2004 for documents and other information about the interrogation of operatives of Al Qaeda, and had been told falsely by a top C.I.A. official that the agency had "produced or made available for review" everything that had been requested.
In all of these actions and decisions, President George W. Bush has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President, and subversive of constitutional government, to the prejudice of the cause of law and justice and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States. Wherefore, President George W. Bush, by such conduct, is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office.
Article XXXV
ENDANGERING THE HEALTH OF 911 FIRST RESPONDERS
In his conduct while President of the United States, George W. Bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty under Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution "to take care that the laws be faithfully executed", has both personally and acting through his agents and subordinates, together with the Vice President, recklessly endangered the health of first responders, residents, and workers at and near the former location of the World Trade Center in New York City.
The Inspector General of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) August 21, 2003, report numbered 2003-P-00012 and entitled "EPA's Response to the World Trade Center Collapse: Challenges, Successes, and Areas for Improvement," includes the following findings:
"[W]hen EPA made a September 18 announcement that the air was 'safe' to breathe, it did not have sufficient data and analyses to make such a blanket statement. At that time, air monitoring data was lacking for several pollutants of concern, including particulate matter and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). Furthermore, The White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) influenced, through the collaboration process, the information that EPA communicated to the public through its early press releases when it convinced EPA to add reassuring statements and delete cautionary ones."
"As a result of the White House CEQ's influence, guidance for cleaning indoor spaces and information about the potential health effects from WTC debris were not included in EPA- issued press releases. In addition, based on CEQ's influence, reassuring information was added to at least one press release and cautionary information was deleted from EPA's draft version of that press release. . . . The White House's role in EPA's public communications about WTC environmental conditions was described in a September 12, 2001, e-mail from the EPA Deputy Administrator's Chief of Staff to senior EPA officials:
"'All statements to the media should be cleared through the NSC [National Security Council] before they are released.'
"According to the EPA Chief of Staff, one particular CEQ official was designated to work with EPA to ensure that clearance was obtained through NSC. The Associate Administrator for the EPA Office of Communications, Education, and Media Relations (OCEMR) said that no press release could be issued for a 3- to 4-week period after September 11 without approval from the CEQ contact."
Acting EPA Administrator Marianne Horinko, who sat in on EPA meetings with the White House has said in an interview that the White House played a coordinating role. The National Security Council played the key role, filtering incoming data on ground zero air and water, Horinko said: "I think that the thinking was, these are experts in WMD (weapons of mass destruction), so they should have the coordinating role."
In the cleanup of the Pentagon following September 11, 2001, Occupational Safety and Health Administration laws were enforced, and no workers became ill. At the World Trade Center site, the same laws were not enforced.
In the years since the release of the EPA Inspector General's above-cited report, the Bush Administration has still not effected a clean-up of the indoor air in apartments and workspaces near the site.
Screenings conducted at the Mount Sinai Medical Center and released in the September 10, 2004, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) of the federal Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), produced the following results:
"Both upper and lower respiratory problems and mental health difficulties are widespread among rescue and recovery workers who dug through the ruins of the World Trade Center in the days following its destruction in the attack of September 11, 2001.
"An analysis of the screenings of 1,138 workers and volunteers who responded to the World Trade Center disaster found that nearly three-quarters of them experienced new or worsened upper respiratory problems at some point while working at Ground Zero. And half of those examined had upper and/or lower respiratory symptoms that persisted up to the time of their examinations, an average of eight months after their WTC efforts ended."
A larger study released in 2006 found that roughly 70 percent of nearly 10,000 workers tested at Mount Sinai from 2002 to 2004 reported that they had new or substantially worsened respiratory problems while or after working at ground zero. This study showed that many of the respiratory ailments, including sinusitis and asthma, and gastrointestinal problems related to them, initially reported by ground zero workers persisted or grew worse over time. Most of the ground zero workers in the study who reported trouble breathing while working there were still having those problems two and a half years later, an indication of chronic illness unlikely to improve over time.
In all of these actions and decisions, President George W. Bush has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President, and subversive of constitutional government, to the prejudice of the cause of law and justice and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States. Wherefore, President George W. Bush, by such conduct, is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office.
Monday, June 9, 2008
The Death of American Democracy: Democratic "leadership" (Pelosi, Reid) OBLIVIOUS to Republican vote theft in 2000 and 2004, enable 2008 vote theft
It must be remembered that Republicans, and Bush and Cheney specifically, were SO EMPOWERED by the stolen election of 2000, that they effortlessly rammed the most partisan Republican nominees past the somnolent (not to say "cowering") Democratic Senate in early 2001, in concert with the entirely fabricated fake 'scandal', the "White House Trashing 'Scandal'" - with the horrific American corporate media trumpeting the Bush-Rove-Ari Fliescher allegations of departing Clinton-Gore staffers "TRASHING" federal property in the sacrosanct White House for weeks on end... WITHOUT ONE PHOTOGRAPH OF EVIDENCE! This text-book political smear campaign drove popular vote winner (by well over 500,000 votes) former Vice President Al Gore out of town, tarred and feathered with disgrace by the fake scandal.
The political double atrocity (stolen election and fake scandal smear-mongering of departing Clinton-Gore staffers) was followed not only by Vice President Cheney all but rolling out a red carpet for the 9-11 hijackers (here the New York Times documents that, over and above VP Cheney repeatedly refusing Counter Terror Czar Richard Clarke's concerted requests for a "Principles Meeting" to discuss Al Qaida's October 2000 attack on the USS Cole, which, having gone unpunished in 2001, encouraged Al Qaida to launch more spectacular attacks on American targets, Cheney IGNORED CIA Director George Tenet's visit to the White House...SPECIFICALLY TO DISCUSS the Al Qaida terror attack/hijacking threat! - a warning that was ignored by Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Bush, but was acted upon by Attorney General Ashcroft - who stopped flying public airliners just a week after Director Tenet gave his now infamous July 19, 2001 "Al Qaida planning to attack in America, probably by hijacking or attacking American airliners" warnings!
#1. Washington Post: July 10, 2001, CIA Director Tenet meeting to White House discussed with NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR Condoleeza Rice "warned of an imminent threat from al-Qaeda"
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/02/AR2006100200187.html
#2. New York Times parallel report on that July 10 CIA Director/White House National Security advisor meeting TO DISCUSS THE IMMINENT THREAT of AL QAIDA ATTACKS IN AMERICA, the Times report expanding the breadth and scope of those CIA warnings to the White House that July of 2001:
noting that she [the president's National Security Advisor, Condoleeza Rice] HAD MET REPEATEDLY WITH Mr. TENET THAT SUMMER ABOUT TERRORIST THREATS."
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/03/washington/03rivals.html
While President Bush and Vice President Cheney IGNORED those PERSISTENT "Al Qaida PLANNING TO ATTACK IN AMERICA, probably by HIJACKING US AIRLINERS" warnings, Attorney General Ashcroft took those CIA and FBI warnings to heart - and STOPPED FLYING PUBLIC AIRLILNERS!
NOTE the date on this CBS news article: July 26, just over two weeks after that CIA Director visit to the White House to discuss the "IMMINENT THREAT" of Al Qaida ATTACKING IN AMERICA, probably by hijacking or attacking US airliners!
All the above just a PRELUDE to the 9-11 attacks, to the PIGGY-BACK ANTHRAX ATTACKS ON DEMOCRATIC _ONLY_ SENATORS (Daschle and Leahy), the sustained, persistent, and repetitive LIES-to-WAR to push the Congress and American public to accept a US invasion of Iraq; and the criminally corrupt and incompetent administration of that US occupation of Iraq, including NINE BILLION DOLLARS in US disbursements under American "VICEROY" Bremer GONE MISSING, in FIRST WEEKS OF THE US OCCUPATION, ALONE!
American democracy has been under sustained assault by the Bush-Cheney-Scalia-Scaife-Murdoch radical, reactionary, right-wing agenda for almost an entire decade now, and as usual, the American corporate press would rather discuss "did she or did't she" and other personality driven political stories, than talk about the 900 pound gorilla in the room: WILL AMERICA EVEN HAVE AN ELECTION this November?
Buzzflash contributor Elliott Cohen does an excellent job of outlining THE STORY of this decade, whether government "of the people, by the people, for the people" will endure the sustained assualt of the war lobby and radical right-wing disenfranchisement machine.
=============================================================
The Bush/McCain Game Plan: What May Be in Store for Obama -- And the Rest of America. The Iran Attack.
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Mon, 06/09/2008 - 9:26am. Guest Contribution
A BUZZFLASH GUEST CONTRIBUTION
by Elliot D. Cohen
http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/contributors/1655
Now that Barack Obama has secured the Democratic nomination, many of his supporters are looking forward with guarded optimism to a victory in November. However, while they assume that the road ahead will be a challenging one, and that the outcome may rest with key battleground states such as Ohio, what they may fail to anticipate are the kinds of obstacles that the McCain campaign in tandem with the Bush Administration might, in the coming months, place between them and victory.
It is easy enough to take one's eyes off the ball when concentrating on campaign speeches and strategies for winning over the hearts and minds of Americans. So what things might change the landscape of the current contest and tilt it in favor of the McCain camp?
First, the guarded optimism of Obama supporters assumes that the voting process will be largely a fair one. However, attention to past irregularities suggests otherwise. There are several familiar ways in which the election could be stolen. Some of these ways would be to disenfranchise African American voters and other would-be Obama supporters by purging them from voting lists, losing or failing to send out their registrations, deceiving these citizens about their proper voting precincts, and misallocating voting machines in precincts likely to go for Obama.
These, among other illegal and unethical tactics, were employed in key battleground states such as Florida and Ohio in both the 2000 and 2004 elections. It is pie-in-the-sky optimism to think that these same tactics won't be used, perhaps even more systematically, again in 2008. Meanwhile, faulty, insecure, and hackable electronic voting machines attached to malfunctioning printers will be used to record ballots.
In addition to these more conventional manners of election fraud, there are also other possible ways to steal the election. All electronic voting machines transport their data over telephone lines to a central computer where tabulations of votes are made. These telephone lines are not secure, however, because, in putting into operation its unlawful warrantless surveillance program, the Bush Administration had installed computer technology at major telecom company hubs, such as those of AT&T, which intercepts and reads messages before they reach their final destination. It is therefore quite conceivable that the balloting data being transported from individual voting precincts could be intercepted and reconfigured before it reaches its main tabulation point.
Unless adequate legal protections are enacted to protect against such possibilities, we may never know whether votes were changed even before they were tabulated. Unfortunately, the Senate version of proposed legislation (S.2248) that is supposed to protect against abuses of privacy, gives telecom companies immunity against criminal and civil liability for participating in unlawful electronic searches and seizures, and does not offer adequate safeguards against the possibility of such illegal tampering with votes.
As if this wasn't unsettling enough, while the Senate and House debate the final disposition of S.2248, the possibility remains of government interception of all e-mails and phone calls sent through the phone lines, including the messages sent by the presidential candidates and their representatives. Thus, while the Nixon Administration had to break into Democratic National Headquarters in order to get the lowdown on its Democratic opponents, the McCain camp, with the assistance of the Bush Administration, may now have only to go online to read about Obama's latest strategy for winning the election; thereby giving it the potential to thwart this strategy before it succeeds. Again, it is pie-in-the-sky optimism to suppose that such tactics as this will not be used by what can arguably be regarded as the most corrupt administration in the history of America.
As recently learned, there is currently a secret deal being transacted between the Bush Administration and the Iraq government that would establish permanent military bases in Iraq, thereby nominalizing Obama's promise to withdraw troops from Iraq and giving greater credence to the stalwart position of McCain to keep American troops in Iraq.
The strategy of the McCain camp will undoubtedly include stressing McCain's military and foreign affairs experience and emphasizing Obama's lack thereof. With the establishing of permanent military bases in Iraq, this emphasis will be further vindicated.
Notwithstanding a National Intelligence Estimate according to which Iran discontinued its nuclear weapons program in 2003, Bush has stepped up his rhetoric against Iran. He recently proclaimed, "Iraq is the convergence point for two of the greatest threats to America in this new century: al-Qaida and Iran," and he threatened, "If Iran makes the right choice, America will encourage a peaceful relationship between Iran and Iraq. If Iran makes the wrong choice, America will act to protect our interests and our troops and our Iraqi partners."
The Obama camp, not to mention every U.S. citizen, should be prepared for the possibility that prior to the November election, Bush will attempt to use his "war powers" to sidestep Congressional authority and launch an attack on Iran. From a purely logistical perspective, with simultaneous wars going on in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Iran, including a permanent presence in Iraq, it would make sense to have a commander in chief who is experienced in warfare. Obviously, this would place McCain in the enviable position of being able to boast of his wartime experiences and would leave Obama grasping for a response.
For the Obama camp, trying to win a victory against McCain and his Bush Administration support system may be like trying to play cards against an opponent who is using a loaded deck. But all American citizens on either side of the political divide should be concerned about the prospects of the 2008 presidential race becoming a power grab where the lives and liberties of all of us are used and abused to amass power and dominance, both here and abroad.
Those who support Obama need to beware. But those who support McCain need equally to beware, for winning a contest that is fixed is not really winning; and when the contest in question involves the defiling of the U.S. Constitution and the destruction of democracy, there are values at stake that far transcend one's party affiliation.
A BUZZFLASH GUEST CONTRIBUTION
Elliot D. Cohen is a political analyst and media critic. His most recent book is The Last Days of Democracy: How Big Media and Power-Hungry Government are turning America into a Dictatorship. He is the first-prize winner of the 2007 Project Censored Award.
The political double atrocity (stolen election and fake scandal smear-mongering of departing Clinton-Gore staffers) was followed not only by Vice President Cheney all but rolling out a red carpet for the 9-11 hijackers (here the New York Times documents that, over and above VP Cheney repeatedly refusing Counter Terror Czar Richard Clarke's concerted requests for a "Principles Meeting" to discuss Al Qaida's October 2000 attack on the USS Cole, which, having gone unpunished in 2001, encouraged Al Qaida to launch more spectacular attacks on American targets, Cheney IGNORED CIA Director George Tenet's visit to the White House...SPECIFICALLY TO DISCUSS the Al Qaida terror attack/hijacking threat! - a warning that was ignored by Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Bush, but was acted upon by Attorney General Ashcroft - who stopped flying public airliners just a week after Director Tenet gave his now infamous July 19, 2001 "Al Qaida planning to attack in America, probably by hijacking or attacking American airliners" warnings!
#1. Washington Post: July 10, 2001, CIA Director Tenet meeting to White House discussed with NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR Condoleeza Rice "warned of an imminent threat from al-Qaeda"
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/02/AR2006100200187.html
#2. New York Times parallel report on that July 10 CIA Director/White House National Security advisor meeting TO DISCUSS THE IMMINENT THREAT of AL QAIDA ATTACKS IN AMERICA, the Times report expanding the breadth and scope of those CIA warnings to the White House that July of 2001:
noting that she [the president's National Security Advisor, Condoleeza Rice] HAD MET REPEATEDLY WITH Mr. TENET THAT SUMMER ABOUT TERRORIST THREATS."
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/03/washington/03rivals.html
While President Bush and Vice President Cheney IGNORED those PERSISTENT "Al Qaida PLANNING TO ATTACK IN AMERICA, probably by HIJACKING US AIRLINERS" warnings, Attorney General Ashcroft took those CIA and FBI warnings to heart - and STOPPED FLYING PUBLIC AIRLILNERS!
In response to inquiries from CBS News over why Ashcroft was traveling exclusively by leased jet aircraft instead of commercial airlines, the Justice Department cited what it called a "threat assessment" by the FBI, and said Ashcroft has been advised to travel only by private jet for the remainder of his term.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2001/07/26/national/main303601.shtml
NOTE the date on this CBS news article: July 26, just over two weeks after that CIA Director visit to the White House to discuss the "IMMINENT THREAT" of Al Qaida ATTACKING IN AMERICA, probably by hijacking or attacking US airliners!
All the above just a PRELUDE to the 9-11 attacks, to the PIGGY-BACK ANTHRAX ATTACKS ON DEMOCRATIC _ONLY_ SENATORS (Daschle and Leahy), the sustained, persistent, and repetitive LIES-to-WAR to push the Congress and American public to accept a US invasion of Iraq; and the criminally corrupt and incompetent administration of that US occupation of Iraq, including NINE BILLION DOLLARS in US disbursements under American "VICEROY" Bremer GONE MISSING, in FIRST WEEKS OF THE US OCCUPATION, ALONE!
American democracy has been under sustained assault by the Bush-Cheney-Scalia-Scaife-Murdoch radical, reactionary, right-wing agenda for almost an entire decade now, and as usual, the American corporate press would rather discuss "did she or did't she" and other personality driven political stories, than talk about the 900 pound gorilla in the room: WILL AMERICA EVEN HAVE AN ELECTION this November?
Buzzflash contributor Elliott Cohen does an excellent job of outlining THE STORY of this decade, whether government "of the people, by the people, for the people" will endure the sustained assualt of the war lobby and radical right-wing disenfranchisement machine.
=============================================================
The Bush/McCain Game Plan: What May Be in Store for Obama -- And the Rest of America. The Iran Attack.
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Mon, 06/09/2008 - 9:26am. Guest Contribution
A BUZZFLASH GUEST CONTRIBUTION
by Elliot D. Cohen
http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/contributors/1655
Now that Barack Obama has secured the Democratic nomination, many of his supporters are looking forward with guarded optimism to a victory in November. However, while they assume that the road ahead will be a challenging one, and that the outcome may rest with key battleground states such as Ohio, what they may fail to anticipate are the kinds of obstacles that the McCain campaign in tandem with the Bush Administration might, in the coming months, place between them and victory.
It is easy enough to take one's eyes off the ball when concentrating on campaign speeches and strategies for winning over the hearts and minds of Americans. So what things might change the landscape of the current contest and tilt it in favor of the McCain camp?
First, the guarded optimism of Obama supporters assumes that the voting process will be largely a fair one. However, attention to past irregularities suggests otherwise. There are several familiar ways in which the election could be stolen. Some of these ways would be to disenfranchise African American voters and other would-be Obama supporters by purging them from voting lists, losing or failing to send out their registrations, deceiving these citizens about their proper voting precincts, and misallocating voting machines in precincts likely to go for Obama.
These, among other illegal and unethical tactics, were employed in key battleground states such as Florida and Ohio in both the 2000 and 2004 elections. It is pie-in-the-sky optimism to think that these same tactics won't be used, perhaps even more systematically, again in 2008. Meanwhile, faulty, insecure, and hackable electronic voting machines attached to malfunctioning printers will be used to record ballots.
In addition to these more conventional manners of election fraud, there are also other possible ways to steal the election. All electronic voting machines transport their data over telephone lines to a central computer where tabulations of votes are made. These telephone lines are not secure, however, because, in putting into operation its unlawful warrantless surveillance program, the Bush Administration had installed computer technology at major telecom company hubs, such as those of AT&T, which intercepts and reads messages before they reach their final destination. It is therefore quite conceivable that the balloting data being transported from individual voting precincts could be intercepted and reconfigured before it reaches its main tabulation point.
Unless adequate legal protections are enacted to protect against such possibilities, we may never know whether votes were changed even before they were tabulated. Unfortunately, the Senate version of proposed legislation (S.2248) that is supposed to protect against abuses of privacy, gives telecom companies immunity against criminal and civil liability for participating in unlawful electronic searches and seizures, and does not offer adequate safeguards against the possibility of such illegal tampering with votes.
As if this wasn't unsettling enough, while the Senate and House debate the final disposition of S.2248, the possibility remains of government interception of all e-mails and phone calls sent through the phone lines, including the messages sent by the presidential candidates and their representatives. Thus, while the Nixon Administration had to break into Democratic National Headquarters in order to get the lowdown on its Democratic opponents, the McCain camp, with the assistance of the Bush Administration, may now have only to go online to read about Obama's latest strategy for winning the election; thereby giving it the potential to thwart this strategy before it succeeds. Again, it is pie-in-the-sky optimism to suppose that such tactics as this will not be used by what can arguably be regarded as the most corrupt administration in the history of America.
As recently learned, there is currently a secret deal being transacted between the Bush Administration and the Iraq government that would establish permanent military bases in Iraq, thereby nominalizing Obama's promise to withdraw troops from Iraq and giving greater credence to the stalwart position of McCain to keep American troops in Iraq.
The strategy of the McCain camp will undoubtedly include stressing McCain's military and foreign affairs experience and emphasizing Obama's lack thereof. With the establishing of permanent military bases in Iraq, this emphasis will be further vindicated.
Notwithstanding a National Intelligence Estimate according to which Iran discontinued its nuclear weapons program in 2003, Bush has stepped up his rhetoric against Iran. He recently proclaimed, "Iraq is the convergence point for two of the greatest threats to America in this new century: al-Qaida and Iran," and he threatened, "If Iran makes the right choice, America will encourage a peaceful relationship between Iran and Iraq. If Iran makes the wrong choice, America will act to protect our interests and our troops and our Iraqi partners."
The Obama camp, not to mention every U.S. citizen, should be prepared for the possibility that prior to the November election, Bush will attempt to use his "war powers" to sidestep Congressional authority and launch an attack on Iran. From a purely logistical perspective, with simultaneous wars going on in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Iran, including a permanent presence in Iraq, it would make sense to have a commander in chief who is experienced in warfare. Obviously, this would place McCain in the enviable position of being able to boast of his wartime experiences and would leave Obama grasping for a response.
For the Obama camp, trying to win a victory against McCain and his Bush Administration support system may be like trying to play cards against an opponent who is using a loaded deck. But all American citizens on either side of the political divide should be concerned about the prospects of the 2008 presidential race becoming a power grab where the lives and liberties of all of us are used and abused to amass power and dominance, both here and abroad.
Those who support Obama need to beware. But those who support McCain need equally to beware, for winning a contest that is fixed is not really winning; and when the contest in question involves the defiling of the U.S. Constitution and the destruction of democracy, there are values at stake that far transcend one's party affiliation.
A BUZZFLASH GUEST CONTRIBUTION
Elliot D. Cohen is a political analyst and media critic. His most recent book is The Last Days of Democracy: How Big Media and Power-Hungry Government are turning America into a Dictatorship. He is the first-prize winner of the 2007 Project Censored Award.
Saturday, June 7, 2008
Lynch-Mob Justice in Alabama, 2002 election STOLEN by all-Republican "vote counting party" in middle of night..
Larisa Alexandrovna Reports on the Karl Rove - Bush White House Politically Directed Indictment, Prosecution, Trial, and Conviction of Democratic former Gov. Don Siegelman of Alabama, after a midnight vote-count by Republican operatives robbed Siegelman and Democratic voters of Seigelman's gubernatorial re-election.
Interview by BuzzFlash editor Mark Karlin
Mon, 06/02/2008
http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/interviews/111
-- Larisa Alexandrovna
Larisa Alexandrovna is an investigative reporter for The Raw Story and maintains her own blog at At-largely. She is distinguished by a passion for justice that is as palpable as her exhaustive research is accurate.
Alexandrovna was born in the Soviet Union and knows a thing or two about people getting framed by the state. So, among her many investigative projects, she became drawn to the plight of one Don Siegelman, the former Democratic governor of Alabama, who became an apparent victim of the DOJ "Prosecutor-Gate." His sin was protesting an election that appears to have been stolen from him, literally, in the dead of night.
If you think that "Prosecutor-Gate" ended with the resignation of Alberto Gonzales, you are wrong. Siegelman is only out of jail after a lengthy campaign to get him released on bond while his case is on appeal. Karl Rove still is at large and free to bloviate for dollars on the corporate media, while Siegelman has to battle to prove that he is an innocent victim of a DOJ that became a tool of partisan prosecutions.
We talked with Larissa recently, since she is one of the lead investigative advocates who have helped put the Siegelman injustice on the map.
* * *
BuzzFlash: We've admired your work for some time. You really broke the story on the plight of Don Siegelman, former Governor of Alabama. What happened to him is related to what has been called prosecutor-gate, under Karl Rove and Alberto Gonzales, when there was an attempt to, in essence, make the Department of Justice a partisan wing of the Republican Party and use the judicial system to actually indict and convict people to achieve political ends.
Don Siegelman was one of those people, and yet the mainstream press, for the most part, hasn't really focused on the Siegelman story. You have. In fact you were able to explain the complex relationships around the Siegelman story relating to the Justice Department and to Republican politics in Alabama and to corporate ownership of newspapers in Alabama who have, for a large part, blacked out the story. What, in essence, is the Siegelman story? \
Larisa Alexandrovna: Well, I don't think it's just Siegelman. There's quite a few other people who are in the same predicament. The story is basically that the Karl Rove mechanism operating out of the White House targeted what they saw as a political obstacle or a political opponent, and used the Department of Justice to eliminate that political opponent. It's really that simple.
BuzzFlash: And how did they do this?
Larisa Alexandrovna: It varied. The best way to summarize it is that they put compromised or "correct" U.S. attorneys into positions in states where they needed to eliminate particular individuals as political opponents. These U.S. attorneys then acted in ways that were irresponsible, and likely criminal. It ranged from approaching if not entirely purchasing witnesses, to barring evidence that would have exonerated Siegelman -- or others, and basically bringing charges over and over and over, and running investigations very close to elections, and then, suddenly appearing in a very public way to use even just an investigation as a way to disgrace a political opponent. It's complex, but that's the best way I can summarize it.
BuzzFlash: Okay. The key thing here is Siegelman was convicted under the Bush Department of Justice and a U.S. attorney that had relationships with the Republican campaign for governor and other offices.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Right. The U.S. attorney that targeted Siegelman was Leura Canary, who is married to Bill Canary, who worked for Siegelman's opponent in the 2002 campaign, Bob Riley. Riley is now the governor. Bill Canary was an adviser on the campaign, and he also goes way back with Karl Rove. They're good friends. They have a long working relationship in the South going back to the early Nineties. So there's that element.
But what should be mentioned is the first time Leura Canary's office tried to bring indictments against Governor Siegelman, the judge threw out the case and held the prosecution in contempt. The second time was much more complex because the judge that got the case -- how should I put it? -- is believed to be very corrupt. It's alleged that he was awarded the judgeship to "hang Siegelman." This is from a Republican whistleblower who came forward named Dana Jill Simpson.
So you had an allegedly corrupt judge the second time around. And jury-tampering, which was brought to the attention of the court by one of the jurors. You had a witness by the name of Nick Bailey, who was put on the stand with the prosecution knowing that he was lying, and having coached him. All that together enabled them to secure a conviction.
BuzzFlash: We should mention Siegelman is out on bail now, after a long period in which a Republican federal judge made it impossible for him to be released through various efforts. But he is on bail now, pending appeal. \
Let's talk about when he became indicted and the sequence.
Larisa Alexandrovna: He was running for re-election as governor.
BuzzFlash: The Republican opponent was the husband of the U.S. attorney who eventually indicted him. And Siegelman won that election, but lo and beyond, in the wee hours of the morning, suddenly 5,000 votes are discovered that swing the election to the Republicans.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Right. There's a midnight counting party, or recount party, that has no representatives from the Democratic side, just a small band of Republicans, the local officials. This was in Baldwin County, Alabama. Siegelman went to bed thinking he had won. They had already given a celebratory speech and everything. And in the middle of the night, this happens. By the morning, there were enough votes to make Bob Riley the winner.
BuzzFlash: Well, enough alleged votes, because these 5,000 votes just suddenly sort of appeared. It's still not clear where they came from other than that they were from that county.
Larisa Alexandrovna: It's almost exactly what happened in Ohio in 2004. The thing is, though, that those ballots were then sealed by the state Attorney General, William Pryor, who is also a good friend of Karl Rove's. And then William Pryor is appointed on a recess appointment to the 11th Circuit as a judge. So you see that this is something that goes directly into Karl Rove's office. Once they brought in Pryor, and you look at Pryor and what he did with sealing the ballots so there couldn't be a recount after this, you start to see that this is something much more organized and possibly at the highest levels.
BuzzFlash: Siegelman says this is where his trouble began. He protested that sudden emergence of the mysterious 5,000 votes that took away his victory a la Florida in 2000 for Al Gore. He asked for a recount, and he feels that at that point, his fate was sealed -- that Rove sent word down to have him indicted. Find some federal law that they could cook up to indict him on.
Larisa Alexandrovna: They had started investigating him even before this, looking for something. But the first round of indictments basically shut him up about this recount. And as I said, the judge, dismissed the case and held the prosecutors in contempt.
But Siegelman made another mistake. He tried to run again. That's when they just went after him and they assigned the case to Judge Mark Fuller, who we know from a Republican whistleblower was essentially put in the place to hang Siegelman. Then the first judge -- the real judge -- throws it away, and then they create a judge and have the case fall into his lap, and that's it. Siegelman's out of circulation.
BuzzFlash: What did they charge him with?
Larisa Alexandrovna: They charged him with bribery, which is insanity. But in order to bring that charge, they basically used the mail fraud and wire fraud laws -- sort of garbage-pail laws that somehow compound a crime if there's a crime. But the strange thing is he was charged with a co-defendant by the name of Richard Scrushy, who's a Republican donor.
BuzzFlash: He was the infamous former HealthSouth CEO.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Yes. In 1999 he was accused of donating to a political fund that was lobbying for Siegelman's lottery plan in exchange for being appointed to a key medical licensing board. And he was very much hated. From my own investigation, it seemed that Richard Scrushy was giving the Republicans a bad rap in certain states, and they really wanted him out of circulation. So it looks like they were paired. It's was like killing two birds with one stone.
Essentially the charges were that this Richard Scrushy had bribed Siegelman to get onto a medical overseeing board. But the problem with that is there was no quid pro quo. Siegelman didn't get any money himself, or even for his election. And Scrushy had been on the board under three previous governors. So there was no quid pro quo. This is what I'm saying. When you bring in a judge who allows certain evidence, and then they bring in witnesses who are compromised and coached, and there's jury-tampering -- it was kind of a ridiculous case to seek a conviction.
BuzzFlash: We encourage people to read your wonderful investigative pieces on this, which really broke the story open. The increased media scrutiny finally forced his release on bond, even though now his travel is restricted.
Larisa Alexandrovna: The 11th Circuit let him out.
BuzzFlash: What does the case signify? From what you just said, there's the intersection of what was known as prosecutor-gate, of the US attorneys scandal, plus the loading up of the federal bench with GOP lackeys. They intersect here, and you needed both of them for the case to work.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Rove's dream was to recreate the landscape of the judicial system, and to install judges that were either pliable, malleable, and/or very, very pro-corporation. Essentially that is what he did in Alabama in the early Nineties. That is what this is all about. If you control the governor in the states where the justices are not elected, you control who gets on the supreme court. And that's essentially what this is all about for Rove ultimately. But to get those kinds of things done, you have to eliminate the governor you don't want and install the governor you do want. There are a lot of corporate interests funding this. So it intersects in that sense. It's buying the law and restructuring the state judiciary.
BuzzFlash: If you put into place a Republican governor, and you have a Republican federal judiciary, you have the Chamber of Commerces buying the state supreme court, and you have U.S. prosecutors installed who will do what the party asks them to do, or the White House, when they need to achieve political objectives, you've controlled the entire process. It's a rigged judicial system.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Right. And you no longer need to worry about elections, honestly, because everything else is fixed. It doesn't matter who tries to do what when you know the outcome is fixed. So it basically takes away the rights of the people in any particular state. A party is under the control of a small group of people. It's a very dangerous, dangerous situation. And that was ultimately Rove's intention, to basically create the dream utopia of an extreme right-wing judiciary.
BuzzFlash: There also was pressure brought to bear on David Iglesas, the former U.S. attorney of New Mexico.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Right.
BuzzFlash: Siegelman was the highest-level official to whom this occurred, but he was not the only person.
Larisa Alexandrovna: In Mississippi, you had state supreme court justices this happened to. In Mississippi, you have a supreme court justice, Justice Oliver Diaz, Jr., who this was done to twice.
He was acquitted twice.
BuzzFlash: And the reason they went after him?
Larisa Alexandrovna: He was a political obstacle. You had a U.S. attorney tied to the White House umbilical cord, and they wanted to bring political prosecutions. There are so many conflicts of interest in that case.
But the most tragic part of that Mississippi Supreme Court case is that there were four co-defendants. One of those co-defendants is the really well-known attorney by the name of Paul Minor, the guy who took on big tobacco. He's a plaintiffs' attorney, and he was the largest Democratic campaign contributor in the South. So he was a target, and these judges were a target. They paired them into one conspiracy kind of thing to eliminate them all. And I know it sounds incredibly sort of paranoid or a most sort of extreme conspiracy theory, but these are facts. This happened. It is what it is.
But the tragic thing is that Paul Minor is in jail, and like Don Siegelman, he was shackled and manacled. He was not allowed out on appeal like Don Siegelman. But in the meantime, his wife is dying of brain cancer and she's gravely, gravely ill. He's not allowed out on appeal, so she won't see her husband before she dies. That's, to me, unacceptable. And I can't get anyone to pay attention.
BuzzFlash: Chairman John Conyers of the House Judiciary Committee has subpoenaed Karl Rove to discuss the Siegelman issue. Rove's attorney has said that he will not appear. He will only respond in writing.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Unfortunately he doesn't have that choice.
BuzzFlash: How will the House Judiciary Committee compel him to appear? Is he going to say that Bush will not allow him to appear?
Larisa Alexandrovna: No, because executive privilege doesn't apply. Karl Rove and the White House have said, we were not involved in these situations. So if they're not involved, then executive privilege does not apply.
BuzzFlash: Second, Don Siegelman, who has spoken very openly and frankly about his plight, his travel is restricted -- is that right?
Larisa Alexandrovna: It was. It's been lifted.
BuzzFlash: It's been lifted.
Larisa Alexandrovna: And there's an outcry. His case is under appeal, and it'll likely be overturned completely. I don't think he's going back to jail. But Paul Minor's still in jail and his wife's dying of cancer. I'm hoping people will help.
BuzzFlash: Another factor is the failure of the corporate media to cover this, particularly a chain of newspapers in Alabama which simply ignored it, which really bespeaks to corporate interests and their interest in maintaining the status quo.
Larisa Alexandrova: Right.
BuzzFlash: What amazed us is again how the story of prosecutor-gate was a big deal last year. And then it just sort of got forgotten because the Congress couldn't carry out its subpoenas. Then Alberto Gonzales left, so it sort of died down. But then you see a governor who is running for re-election, and he's denied re-election. Then he runs again. And the Department of Justice that is politically trying to bring him down through the judicial system, eventually succeeds in jailing him. This is the essence of prosecutorgate.
Larisa Alexandrova: That's right.
BuzzFlash: This came to our attention in large part because of your work and some others like Scott Horton of Harper's, who continue to cover it. We've, of course, emphasized it on BuzzFlash through your work and Horton's and others. It became, you know, on the Internet, at least, as a big issue.
BuzzFlash: The Washington Post didn't dig this up. You dug this up. And yet it was right there for anyone to dig up if they put their hands in the dirt and their nose to the grindstone and did their investigative reporting right.
Larisa Alexandrova: And Rawstory was reporting on the story. There was nobody else. Everyone focused on the U.S. attorneys who were fired. And I kept saying: what of the ones who stayed? Why did they get to stay? Were they the "loyal" Bushies? And if so, how?
Siegelman, as you pointed out, is high profile. But, you do not only have a governor [being prosecuted]. You have a supreme court justice in Mississippi. You have judges in Mississippi. You have a famed lawyer in Florida. You have the coroner in Pennsylvania.
At every level, you've got people who are high profile, and who do not have access to media shining a light on them, who cannot get their attention. Now what about people who are not high profile, who are not governors or judges, for example, somebody who, let's say, did not play ball on a local level, somebody who maybe wouldn't go along with something? We will likely never hear about them, whomever they are."
BuzzFlash: A woman in Wisconsin was prosecuted by the Milwaukee attorney there, and served time for something that really wasn't a crime. That was only because they wanted to try to dirty up the Democratic governor.
Larisa Alexandrova: Now in Alabama they're doing the same thing with state legislators who are Democrats.
This is what frightens me - how prevalent is this? How far spread is this? Is this localized to a couple of states? Or just a couple of high-profile cases? Or is this much deeper and more insidious?
We know that the Pentagon is spying on anti-war protesters. We know that the FBI and the New York Police Department were surveilling American citizens before the National Republican Convention in 2004. So, just how deep does this go when your political affiliation makes you public enemy number one? That is really frightening to me. That reminds me of the Soviet Union.
BuzzFlash: Which you've had some experience with.
Larisa Alexandrova: That's right.
BuzzFlash: Bringing it back to the Justice Department, the mainstream press finally did pick it up after Josh Marshal had hammered away on this for awhile, saying there's a strange coincidence here of U.S. attorneys who have been dismissed even though they've had very favorable job ratings.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Right.
BuzzFlash: And it was pretty clear that e-mails that have been destroyed at the White House related to prosecutorgate. This was at the height of Gonzales' rather infamous high profile. But then again, as we said earlier in this interview, it was kind of forgotten by the mainstream press. The mainstream press hasn't gone after the fact that we still have sitting there the people that the Bush department signed off on as okay for partisan prosecution.
Larisa Alexandrovna: The Josh Marshall reports were really, really responsible for just getting the U.S. attorney firings the attention that they required in Congress and in general. Then you had Harper's story, working on the ones that stayed behind. I thought that "60 Minutes" came in late in the game. The only person on TV who's even following this thinks that he did all the investigative work, you know? Which is fine. Just get the story out.
But ultimately, you know there's something very wrong here because Congress has not done anything to remove these people. Leura Canary, Alice Martin and Dunnica Lampton -- these are three names right off the bat I'll give you that must be removed from their posts as U.S. attorneys. They have blatantly violated their oath, their duties. They have abused their power. And there's enough evidence that at the very least they should be suspended until Congress can do whatever Congress needs to do. But let's remove these people so no more damage happens. Still, they remain in office.
BuzzFlash: Why was the Alabama press not covering this for the most part?
Larisa Alexandrovna: Because they're owned by the same family -- the major newspapers. Essentially it's a private operation that is party-aligned and party-subsidized. That's basically it. For the same reason, a right-wing TV outlet seems to have lost the signal of the "60 Minutes" coverage of the Siegelman case and blacked out the screens in Alabama. When you privatize the truth, that is the media; when you privatize justice, I mean, this is what you get.
BuzzFlash: In general they have allegiances to the status quo. People in power favor the corporate bottom line.
Larisa Alexandrovna: That's basically it. If you control the media, you control the truth.
BuzzFlash: We shouldn't forget that Mark Crispin Miller, on the Internet, through his e-mail and his blog, certainly was behind the cause of getting Siegelman freed. The mainstream media in Alabama took no notice of this injustice.
Larisa Alexandrovna: No. They actually reported nonsense and garbage and put out press releases from the U.S. attorney's office, which they used as facts. There were few reporters when I was down there. The few reporters - I was going through the archives and I was looking at the bylines. There were a few reporters' articles that were very good, very factual and they look like they had done their work and investigative reporting. When I tried to look them up, they no longer worked at these various publications. I don't know if this is a coincidence, but they no longer have jobs at those papers.
BuzzFlash: You've got the skills of an investigative journalist. Why does this particular case make you so impassioned?
Larisa Alexandrovna: Probably because it reminds me of the Soviet Union and a country that my family and I escaped from. It's no longer a country now, but technically I'm from the Ukraine, but at the time, the Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union. And it was single-party rule. And you have allegiance to the party. And the party controlled everything. And this is what I see happening here.
This disturbs me on a very personal level. And the fact that the public does not see this, or at least is starting to see this, is really frightening me. Because at some point, this will become irreversible. It will become so institutionalized that no amount of protesting or putting pressure on your member of Congress will change the structure that has been set up. And so, you know, that's basically why this makes me so, you know, crazy, so impassioned, is because it frightens me. It reminds me of a country I escaped from, so -
BuzzFlash: Larisa, thank you so much.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Thank you.
BuzzFlash Interview conducted by Mark Karlin.
Interview by BuzzFlash editor Mark Karlin
Mon, 06/02/2008
http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/interviews/111
Rove's dream was to recreate the landscape of the judicial system, and to install judges that were either pliable, malleable, and/or very, very pro-corporation. Essentially that is what he did in Alabama in the early Nineties. That is what this is all about. If you control the governor in the states where the justices are not elected, you control who gets on the supreme court. And that's essentially what this is all about for Rove ultimately. But to get those kinds of things done, you have to eliminate the governor you don't want and install the governor you do want. There are a lot of corporate interests funding this. So it intersects in that sense. It's buying the law and restructuring the state judiciary.
-- Larisa Alexandrovna
Larisa Alexandrovna is an investigative reporter for The Raw Story and maintains her own blog at At-largely. She is distinguished by a passion for justice that is as palpable as her exhaustive research is accurate.
Alexandrovna was born in the Soviet Union and knows a thing or two about people getting framed by the state. So, among her many investigative projects, she became drawn to the plight of one Don Siegelman, the former Democratic governor of Alabama, who became an apparent victim of the DOJ "Prosecutor-Gate." His sin was protesting an election that appears to have been stolen from him, literally, in the dead of night.
If you think that "Prosecutor-Gate" ended with the resignation of Alberto Gonzales, you are wrong. Siegelman is only out of jail after a lengthy campaign to get him released on bond while his case is on appeal. Karl Rove still is at large and free to bloviate for dollars on the corporate media, while Siegelman has to battle to prove that he is an innocent victim of a DOJ that became a tool of partisan prosecutions.
We talked with Larissa recently, since she is one of the lead investigative advocates who have helped put the Siegelman injustice on the map.
* * *
BuzzFlash: We've admired your work for some time. You really broke the story on the plight of Don Siegelman, former Governor of Alabama. What happened to him is related to what has been called prosecutor-gate, under Karl Rove and Alberto Gonzales, when there was an attempt to, in essence, make the Department of Justice a partisan wing of the Republican Party and use the judicial system to actually indict and convict people to achieve political ends.
Don Siegelman was one of those people, and yet the mainstream press, for the most part, hasn't really focused on the Siegelman story. You have. In fact you were able to explain the complex relationships around the Siegelman story relating to the Justice Department and to Republican politics in Alabama and to corporate ownership of newspapers in Alabama who have, for a large part, blacked out the story. What, in essence, is the Siegelman story? \
Larisa Alexandrovna: Well, I don't think it's just Siegelman. There's quite a few other people who are in the same predicament. The story is basically that the Karl Rove mechanism operating out of the White House targeted what they saw as a political obstacle or a political opponent, and used the Department of Justice to eliminate that political opponent. It's really that simple.
BuzzFlash: And how did they do this?
Larisa Alexandrovna: It varied. The best way to summarize it is that they put compromised or "correct" U.S. attorneys into positions in states where they needed to eliminate particular individuals as political opponents. These U.S. attorneys then acted in ways that were irresponsible, and likely criminal. It ranged from approaching if not entirely purchasing witnesses, to barring evidence that would have exonerated Siegelman -- or others, and basically bringing charges over and over and over, and running investigations very close to elections, and then, suddenly appearing in a very public way to use even just an investigation as a way to disgrace a political opponent. It's complex, but that's the best way I can summarize it.
BuzzFlash: Okay. The key thing here is Siegelman was convicted under the Bush Department of Justice and a U.S. attorney that had relationships with the Republican campaign for governor and other offices.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Right. The U.S. attorney that targeted Siegelman was Leura Canary, who is married to Bill Canary, who worked for Siegelman's opponent in the 2002 campaign, Bob Riley. Riley is now the governor. Bill Canary was an adviser on the campaign, and he also goes way back with Karl Rove. They're good friends. They have a long working relationship in the South going back to the early Nineties. So there's that element.
But what should be mentioned is the first time Leura Canary's office tried to bring indictments against Governor Siegelman, the judge threw out the case and held the prosecution in contempt. The second time was much more complex because the judge that got the case -- how should I put it? -- is believed to be very corrupt. It's alleged that he was awarded the judgeship to "hang Siegelman." This is from a Republican whistleblower who came forward named Dana Jill Simpson.
So you had an allegedly corrupt judge the second time around. And jury-tampering, which was brought to the attention of the court by one of the jurors. You had a witness by the name of Nick Bailey, who was put on the stand with the prosecution knowing that he was lying, and having coached him. All that together enabled them to secure a conviction.
BuzzFlash: We should mention Siegelman is out on bail now, after a long period in which a Republican federal judge made it impossible for him to be released through various efforts. But he is on bail now, pending appeal. \
Let's talk about when he became indicted and the sequence.
Larisa Alexandrovna: He was running for re-election as governor.
BuzzFlash: The Republican opponent was the husband of the U.S. attorney who eventually indicted him. And Siegelman won that election, but lo and beyond, in the wee hours of the morning, suddenly 5,000 votes are discovered that swing the election to the Republicans.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Right. There's a midnight counting party, or recount party, that has no representatives from the Democratic side, just a small band of Republicans, the local officials. This was in Baldwin County, Alabama. Siegelman went to bed thinking he had won. They had already given a celebratory speech and everything. And in the middle of the night, this happens. By the morning, there were enough votes to make Bob Riley the winner.
BuzzFlash: Well, enough alleged votes, because these 5,000 votes just suddenly sort of appeared. It's still not clear where they came from other than that they were from that county.
Larisa Alexandrovna: It's almost exactly what happened in Ohio in 2004. The thing is, though, that those ballots were then sealed by the state Attorney General, William Pryor, who is also a good friend of Karl Rove's. And then William Pryor is appointed on a recess appointment to the 11th Circuit as a judge. So you see that this is something that goes directly into Karl Rove's office. Once they brought in Pryor, and you look at Pryor and what he did with sealing the ballots so there couldn't be a recount after this, you start to see that this is something much more organized and possibly at the highest levels.
BuzzFlash: Siegelman says this is where his trouble began. He protested that sudden emergence of the mysterious 5,000 votes that took away his victory a la Florida in 2000 for Al Gore. He asked for a recount, and he feels that at that point, his fate was sealed -- that Rove sent word down to have him indicted. Find some federal law that they could cook up to indict him on.
Larisa Alexandrovna: They had started investigating him even before this, looking for something. But the first round of indictments basically shut him up about this recount. And as I said, the judge, dismissed the case and held the prosecutors in contempt.
But Siegelman made another mistake. He tried to run again. That's when they just went after him and they assigned the case to Judge Mark Fuller, who we know from a Republican whistleblower was essentially put in the place to hang Siegelman. Then the first judge -- the real judge -- throws it away, and then they create a judge and have the case fall into his lap, and that's it. Siegelman's out of circulation.
BuzzFlash: What did they charge him with?
Larisa Alexandrovna: They charged him with bribery, which is insanity. But in order to bring that charge, they basically used the mail fraud and wire fraud laws -- sort of garbage-pail laws that somehow compound a crime if there's a crime. But the strange thing is he was charged with a co-defendant by the name of Richard Scrushy, who's a Republican donor.
BuzzFlash: He was the infamous former HealthSouth CEO.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Yes. In 1999 he was accused of donating to a political fund that was lobbying for Siegelman's lottery plan in exchange for being appointed to a key medical licensing board. And he was very much hated. From my own investigation, it seemed that Richard Scrushy was giving the Republicans a bad rap in certain states, and they really wanted him out of circulation. So it looks like they were paired. It's was like killing two birds with one stone.
Essentially the charges were that this Richard Scrushy had bribed Siegelman to get onto a medical overseeing board. But the problem with that is there was no quid pro quo. Siegelman didn't get any money himself, or even for his election. And Scrushy had been on the board under three previous governors. So there was no quid pro quo. This is what I'm saying. When you bring in a judge who allows certain evidence, and then they bring in witnesses who are compromised and coached, and there's jury-tampering -- it was kind of a ridiculous case to seek a conviction.
BuzzFlash: We encourage people to read your wonderful investigative pieces on this, which really broke the story open. The increased media scrutiny finally forced his release on bond, even though now his travel is restricted.
Larisa Alexandrovna: The 11th Circuit let him out.
BuzzFlash: What does the case signify? From what you just said, there's the intersection of what was known as prosecutor-gate, of the US attorneys scandal, plus the loading up of the federal bench with GOP lackeys. They intersect here, and you needed both of them for the case to work.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Rove's dream was to recreate the landscape of the judicial system, and to install judges that were either pliable, malleable, and/or very, very pro-corporation. Essentially that is what he did in Alabama in the early Nineties. That is what this is all about. If you control the governor in the states where the justices are not elected, you control who gets on the supreme court. And that's essentially what this is all about for Rove ultimately. But to get those kinds of things done, you have to eliminate the governor you don't want and install the governor you do want. There are a lot of corporate interests funding this. So it intersects in that sense. It's buying the law and restructuring the state judiciary.
BuzzFlash: If you put into place a Republican governor, and you have a Republican federal judiciary, you have the Chamber of Commerces buying the state supreme court, and you have U.S. prosecutors installed who will do what the party asks them to do, or the White House, when they need to achieve political objectives, you've controlled the entire process. It's a rigged judicial system.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Right. And you no longer need to worry about elections, honestly, because everything else is fixed. It doesn't matter who tries to do what when you know the outcome is fixed. So it basically takes away the rights of the people in any particular state. A party is under the control of a small group of people. It's a very dangerous, dangerous situation. And that was ultimately Rove's intention, to basically create the dream utopia of an extreme right-wing judiciary.
BuzzFlash: There also was pressure brought to bear on David Iglesas, the former U.S. attorney of New Mexico.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Right.
BuzzFlash: Siegelman was the highest-level official to whom this occurred, but he was not the only person.
Larisa Alexandrovna: In Mississippi, you had state supreme court justices this happened to. In Mississippi, you have a supreme court justice, Justice Oliver Diaz, Jr., who this was done to twice.
He was acquitted twice.
BuzzFlash: And the reason they went after him?
Larisa Alexandrovna: He was a political obstacle. You had a U.S. attorney tied to the White House umbilical cord, and they wanted to bring political prosecutions. There are so many conflicts of interest in that case.
But the most tragic part of that Mississippi Supreme Court case is that there were four co-defendants. One of those co-defendants is the really well-known attorney by the name of Paul Minor, the guy who took on big tobacco. He's a plaintiffs' attorney, and he was the largest Democratic campaign contributor in the South. So he was a target, and these judges were a target. They paired them into one conspiracy kind of thing to eliminate them all. And I know it sounds incredibly sort of paranoid or a most sort of extreme conspiracy theory, but these are facts. This happened. It is what it is.
But the tragic thing is that Paul Minor is in jail, and like Don Siegelman, he was shackled and manacled. He was not allowed out on appeal like Don Siegelman. But in the meantime, his wife is dying of brain cancer and she's gravely, gravely ill. He's not allowed out on appeal, so she won't see her husband before she dies. That's, to me, unacceptable. And I can't get anyone to pay attention.
BuzzFlash: Chairman John Conyers of the House Judiciary Committee has subpoenaed Karl Rove to discuss the Siegelman issue. Rove's attorney has said that he will not appear. He will only respond in writing.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Unfortunately he doesn't have that choice.
BuzzFlash: How will the House Judiciary Committee compel him to appear? Is he going to say that Bush will not allow him to appear?
Larisa Alexandrovna: No, because executive privilege doesn't apply. Karl Rove and the White House have said, we were not involved in these situations. So if they're not involved, then executive privilege does not apply.
BuzzFlash: Second, Don Siegelman, who has spoken very openly and frankly about his plight, his travel is restricted -- is that right?
Larisa Alexandrovna: It was. It's been lifted.
BuzzFlash: It's been lifted.
Larisa Alexandrovna: And there's an outcry. His case is under appeal, and it'll likely be overturned completely. I don't think he's going back to jail. But Paul Minor's still in jail and his wife's dying of cancer. I'm hoping people will help.
BuzzFlash: Another factor is the failure of the corporate media to cover this, particularly a chain of newspapers in Alabama which simply ignored it, which really bespeaks to corporate interests and their interest in maintaining the status quo.
Larisa Alexandrova: Right.
BuzzFlash: What amazed us is again how the story of prosecutor-gate was a big deal last year. And then it just sort of got forgotten because the Congress couldn't carry out its subpoenas. Then Alberto Gonzales left, so it sort of died down. But then you see a governor who is running for re-election, and he's denied re-election. Then he runs again. And the Department of Justice that is politically trying to bring him down through the judicial system, eventually succeeds in jailing him. This is the essence of prosecutorgate.
Larisa Alexandrova: That's right.
BuzzFlash: This came to our attention in large part because of your work and some others like Scott Horton of Harper's, who continue to cover it. We've, of course, emphasized it on BuzzFlash through your work and Horton's and others. It became, you know, on the Internet, at least, as a big issue.
BuzzFlash: The Washington Post didn't dig this up. You dug this up. And yet it was right there for anyone to dig up if they put their hands in the dirt and their nose to the grindstone and did their investigative reporting right.
Larisa Alexandrova: And Rawstory was reporting on the story. There was nobody else. Everyone focused on the U.S. attorneys who were fired. And I kept saying: what of the ones who stayed? Why did they get to stay? Were they the "loyal" Bushies? And if so, how?
Siegelman, as you pointed out, is high profile. But, you do not only have a governor [being prosecuted]. You have a supreme court justice in Mississippi. You have judges in Mississippi. You have a famed lawyer in Florida. You have the coroner in Pennsylvania.
At every level, you've got people who are high profile, and who do not have access to media shining a light on them, who cannot get their attention. Now what about people who are not high profile, who are not governors or judges, for example, somebody who, let's say, did not play ball on a local level, somebody who maybe wouldn't go along with something? We will likely never hear about them, whomever they are."
BuzzFlash: A woman in Wisconsin was prosecuted by the Milwaukee attorney there, and served time for something that really wasn't a crime. That was only because they wanted to try to dirty up the Democratic governor.
Larisa Alexandrova: Now in Alabama they're doing the same thing with state legislators who are Democrats.
This is what frightens me - how prevalent is this? How far spread is this? Is this localized to a couple of states? Or just a couple of high-profile cases? Or is this much deeper and more insidious?
We know that the Pentagon is spying on anti-war protesters. We know that the FBI and the New York Police Department were surveilling American citizens before the National Republican Convention in 2004. So, just how deep does this go when your political affiliation makes you public enemy number one? That is really frightening to me. That reminds me of the Soviet Union.
BuzzFlash: Which you've had some experience with.
Larisa Alexandrova: That's right.
BuzzFlash: Bringing it back to the Justice Department, the mainstream press finally did pick it up after Josh Marshal had hammered away on this for awhile, saying there's a strange coincidence here of U.S. attorneys who have been dismissed even though they've had very favorable job ratings.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Right.
BuzzFlash: And it was pretty clear that e-mails that have been destroyed at the White House related to prosecutorgate. This was at the height of Gonzales' rather infamous high profile. But then again, as we said earlier in this interview, it was kind of forgotten by the mainstream press. The mainstream press hasn't gone after the fact that we still have sitting there the people that the Bush department signed off on as okay for partisan prosecution.
Larisa Alexandrovna: The Josh Marshall reports were really, really responsible for just getting the U.S. attorney firings the attention that they required in Congress and in general. Then you had Harper's story, working on the ones that stayed behind. I thought that "60 Minutes" came in late in the game. The only person on TV who's even following this thinks that he did all the investigative work, you know? Which is fine. Just get the story out.
But ultimately, you know there's something very wrong here because Congress has not done anything to remove these people. Leura Canary, Alice Martin and Dunnica Lampton -- these are three names right off the bat I'll give you that must be removed from their posts as U.S. attorneys. They have blatantly violated their oath, their duties. They have abused their power. And there's enough evidence that at the very least they should be suspended until Congress can do whatever Congress needs to do. But let's remove these people so no more damage happens. Still, they remain in office.
BuzzFlash: Why was the Alabama press not covering this for the most part?
Larisa Alexandrovna: Because they're owned by the same family -- the major newspapers. Essentially it's a private operation that is party-aligned and party-subsidized. That's basically it. For the same reason, a right-wing TV outlet seems to have lost the signal of the "60 Minutes" coverage of the Siegelman case and blacked out the screens in Alabama. When you privatize the truth, that is the media; when you privatize justice, I mean, this is what you get.
BuzzFlash: In general they have allegiances to the status quo. People in power favor the corporate bottom line.
Larisa Alexandrovna: That's basically it. If you control the media, you control the truth.
BuzzFlash: We shouldn't forget that Mark Crispin Miller, on the Internet, through his e-mail and his blog, certainly was behind the cause of getting Siegelman freed. The mainstream media in Alabama took no notice of this injustice.
Larisa Alexandrovna: No. They actually reported nonsense and garbage and put out press releases from the U.S. attorney's office, which they used as facts. There were few reporters when I was down there. The few reporters - I was going through the archives and I was looking at the bylines. There were a few reporters' articles that were very good, very factual and they look like they had done their work and investigative reporting. When I tried to look them up, they no longer worked at these various publications. I don't know if this is a coincidence, but they no longer have jobs at those papers.
BuzzFlash: You've got the skills of an investigative journalist. Why does this particular case make you so impassioned?
Larisa Alexandrovna: Probably because it reminds me of the Soviet Union and a country that my family and I escaped from. It's no longer a country now, but technically I'm from the Ukraine, but at the time, the Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union. And it was single-party rule. And you have allegiance to the party. And the party controlled everything. And this is what I see happening here.
This disturbs me on a very personal level. And the fact that the public does not see this, or at least is starting to see this, is really frightening me. Because at some point, this will become irreversible. It will become so institutionalized that no amount of protesting or putting pressure on your member of Congress will change the structure that has been set up. And so, you know, that's basically why this makes me so, you know, crazy, so impassioned, is because it frightens me. It reminds me of a country I escaped from, so -
BuzzFlash: Larisa, thank you so much.
Larisa Alexandrovna: Thank you.
BuzzFlash Interview conducted by Mark Karlin.
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