Six Big Lies by Alberto Gonzalez

I quote www.tpmmuckracker.com in its entirety.

1) “The disagreement that occurred, and the reason for the visit to the hospital, Senator, was about other intelligence activities. It was not about the terrorist surveillance program that the president announced to the American people.”
-- 7/24/07 testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee

The parsing in this testimony was so awkward, so evidently legalistic, that Gonzales has stood by the testimony, apparently confident that the inherent dishonesty in the distinction did not rise to the level of perjury. He’s since explained that his language “may have created confusion,” but that the “terrorist surveillance program” only referred to a narrow and uncontroversial surveillance activity, and that the dispute which led to his infamous trip to John Ashcroft’s hospital bed was about other activities -- albeit activities that others, like FBI Director Robert Mueller, have consistently viewed as part of a single program. To Mueller apparently, Gonzales' parsing is needlessly misleading.

2) “The consensus in the room from the congressional leadership [the gang of eight] was that we should continue the activities, at least for now, despite the objections of Mr. Comey. There was also consensus that it would be very, very difficult to obtain legislation without compromising this program, but that we should look for a way ahead. It is for this reason that within a matter of hours Andy Card and I went to the hospital."

"I just wanted to put in context for this committee and the American people why Mr. Card and I went. It's because we had an emergency meeting in the White House Situation Room, where the congressional leadership had told us, "Continue going forward with this very important intelligence activity.”
-- 7/24/07 testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee

There were a couple questionable (and contested) assertions in this one. Remember the situation: Deputy Attorney General James Comey was serving as attorney general, since Ashcroft had fallen ill. After Comey refused to reauthorize the administration's warrantless surveillance program, Gonzales and Andrew Card went to the hospital to try and convince Ashcroft to overrule him. FBI Director Robert Mueller's notes on the hospital showdown have since shown that he found Ashcroft to be "feeble, barely articulate, clearly stressed" after the encounter.

First and foremost is Gonzales’ bizarre cover story that admits all of the facts but insists on another interpretation of them. Gonzales claims that he did not go to the hospital room to “take advantage of a very sick man,” as Comey put it in his testimony – no, he went to inform Ashcroft of the congressional leadership’s decision. Of course, he admitted in his testimony that he came to Ashcroft’s hospital room with the reauthorization form in his hand (as Comey had testified). There's no other interpretation than that the reason he went to the hospital room was to have Ashcroft reauthorize the program. So what’s the difference? It’s a matter of emphasis, you might say. According to Gonzales, he was just acting on the will of Congress.

Except he wasn’t. Three people present at the meeting told The Washington Post that the briefing was solely on operational details and not on the legal basis for the program. So when Gonzales says that they wanted to continue the program "despite the objections of Mr. Comey," he's being dishonest. The lawmakers didn't know about Comey's objections. Ex-Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D-ND) and Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) have both said unequivocally that the meeting as Gonzales describes it never happened.

3) "I was not involved in seeing any memos, was not involved in any discussions about what was going on."
-- A March 13th press conference on the U.S. attorney firings.

After internal Justice Department emails and memos demonstrated that this was false, Gonzales explained in a March 27th interview: “What I meant was that I have not been involved, was not involved in the deliberations over whether or not United States attorneys should resign.” Kyle Sampson testified two days later to Congress that Gonzales had been periodically updated on the firing process over the course of two years.

4) "I haven't done -- I haven't talked to witnesses because of the fact that I haven't wanted to interfere with this investigation and department investigations."”
-- 4/19/07 testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee
“….as I've indicated, I have not gone back and spoken directly with Mr. Sampson and others who are involved in this process, in order to protect the integrity of this investigation and the investigation of the Office of Professional Responsibility and the Office of Inspector General.”
-- 5/11/07 testimony before the House Judiciary Committee

As Monica Goodling testified, in a private conversation approximately a week after Congress requested to interview her about the firings, Gonzales recounted to her his memory of how the U.S. attorney firings had occurred. He then wanted to know if she had “any reaction” to his recollection. Gonzales later testified that the conversation was “not to shape her testimony” -- it was “in the context of trying to console and reassure an emotionally distraught woman that she had done something wrong.”

5) “The track record established over the past three years has demonstrated the effectiveness of the safeguards of civil liberties put in place when the act was passed. There has not been one verified case of civil liberties abuse.”
-- 4/27/05 testimony before the House intelligence committee

In fact, as reported by The Washington Post (http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/003635.php), FBI reports to the attorney general had shown a number of instances of improper surveillance or searches. Gonzales later testified that his testimony had been truthful because these were not “intentional” abuses of the Patriot Act.

6) “…[L]et me publicly sort of preempt, perhaps, a question you're going to ask me, and that is, I am fully committed, as the administration's fully committed, to ensure that, with respect to every United States attorney position in this country, we will have a presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed United States attorney.”
-- 1/18/07 testimony before the Senate Judiciary CommitteeWhat Gonzales didn’t tell Congress is that his chief of staff Kyle Sampson had been scheming for months to circumvent the Senate, via an obscure provision of the Patriot Act that allowed Gonzales to appoint interim U.S. attorneys indefinitely. Sampson wanted to use the authority to keep Karl Rove’s former aide Timothy Griffin in place as Little Rock’s U.S. attorneys, despite opposition from Arkansas’ Democratic senators. He continued to tout the idea until as late as December, even communicating the strategy to lawyers in the White House counsel’s office.

In subsequent testimony, Gonzales admitted to being aware of Sampson’s scheming, but said he’d “never liked” the idea and had never considered it. Sampson, however, testified that Gonzales had considered it, and had only rejected the idea as late as January, shortly before he made the remarks above, and after senators had started asking questions about the U.S. attorney firings. So Gonzales' statement may have been literally true at the time he said it, but his chief of staff had certainly been unaware of such a commitment earlier that same month.

Gonzales appears to have used the same line about being committed to having a Senate-confirmed U.S. attorney a month earlier in a private conversation with Sen. Mark Pryor (D-AR). Of course, back then, Sampson was still avidly pushing his scheme since Gonzales had not rejected it -- a revelation that led Pryor (one of the few Democrats to have supported Gonzales' confirmation as attorney general) to announce on the Senate floor that Gonzales had "lied" to him.

Well At Least They Admit It

"Being obstructionist can either succeed or fail. So far it has worked for us." Minority Whip, Trent Lott (R Miss) in Roll Call)

This Week in the News

This week, President Bush travelled to Canada for a summit the with Canadian Prime Minister and Mexican President Calderon. At the summit, the President privately discussed a new package of aid, rumored to be in excess of $25 billion, to help Mexico fight its drug cartels. Mexican President Calderon has launched a crack down on the cartels which have grown wealthy due to US demand for the product. The aid package ads to the $19 billion the Administration plans to spend this year on the War on Drugs. (State governments will kick in an equal amount.) Since 1974 the cost of street drugs has remained steady, overall drug use has remained steady (with some peaks and valleys), and the amount of illicit drugs smuggled into the US has grown as has the strength and purity of street drugs. The War on Drugs -- Digging the Same Hole Deeper.

This week, the Bush Administration continued one of its most important ideological battles: keeping health insurance out of the hands of America children. New regulations announced by the Administration will make it more difficult for states to offer families health insurance through the federal SCHIP program. The administration contends that further expanding the program would drive families away from private insurance and deal a blow to the insurance industry. Said Tommy LaMotta, the author the new guidelines and Director of the Insurance Institute, "Private insurers are struggling for every dollar they get. While profits have doubled since 2000, they have not kept pace with the price of a summer home in the Hamptons or membership at a decent country club. We should not have to compete for with the government for the hard won dollars of the lower middle class. Somebody has to stick up for the big guy here."

This week, more insurance news. Despite the catastrophe's of Hurricane Katrina and other storms, property insurers in the US saw their profits rise some 18% in 2006. Insurance analysts attribute the $44 billion rise in profits to increased use of "re insurance" policies purchased from foreign firms that pay domestic insurance firms on their losses, as well as a shifting of the costs for natural disasters to private individuals and the government. Noted, Tommy LaMotta, "After Andrew and Northridge in the early 1990s, we said to ourselves 'we want to insure, but not on really bad stuff, cuz that costs us money.' So we lobbied and sobbed and got into a few think tanks and the next thing you know there is all sorts of state and federal insurance funds out there for people who have real troubles and the courts started reading our policies more narrowly. So now, hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, sorry, the public picks up the tab. See the deal is, you want to keep your profits to yourself, but get other people to cover your losses."

This week, the ACLU obtained a copy of the "Presidential Advance Manual" a document created by the White House that explains how to deter protesters at the President's public appearances. Among the Manual's advice: make sure only the most ardent supporters of the Administration are allowed to sit between the dias and the first bank of cameras; when possible close the event to anyone who does not support the President; organize a "Rally Corp" of College Republicans to cordone off protesters and/or shout them down; and encourage local police to restrict protesters to areas out of sight of cameras and the President. Reacting to the disclosure of the White House's sophisticated policy for quelling dissent, White House Spinster Tony Snow said, "It is not that the President is thin skinned or anything like that. No. When images of the President are beamed out all over the nation and world, the last thing we want is for anyone to get the idea that he is not unanimously loved and adored. Once people see that there are people willing to express their dissatisfaction, well... then they think they can express their dissatisfaction. We like to stop that snowball at the top of the hill knowwhatImean?*

This week, the Bush Administration issued a National Intelligence Estimate critical of Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al- Maliki and rumor has it that some in Washington support a return to power of Ayed Allawi, who served as Iraq's Interim Prime Minister. In fact, the Beltway lobbying firm of Barbour Griffith & Rogers has been retained to push the idea of Allawi's return. While some have been critical of the fact that Iraq's current Prime Minsister has been unable to make any progress (his Parliament is on vacation and half his ministers have resigned in protest), one anonymous supporter of Allawi was actually optimistic: "This is actually a great step forward for Iraq. You know you have joined the community of nations when you must lobby the US government in order to change leaders."

* A heavily redacted copy of the Manual is available at www.aclu.org

Deja Vu All Over Again

Yesterday, in a speech to the VFW, the President stated that leaving Iraq now would lead to the same type of disaster that leaving Vietnam did. He said that Vietnam was a "war worth fighting" (although not by him or VP Cheney) and by implication so is Iraq. Wow.

During Vietnam, supporters of the war told us that if we left Vietnam the dominoes of Malaysia and Indochina would fall. They did not. In fact, those countries thrived. Vietnam is now a stable country that our own President visited. So the doomsday scenario was wrong then and there is reason to be skeptical of the doomsday scenario we are presented with now.

Bush also made mention of the "killing fields" of Cambodia. After Vietnam, the brutal Khumer Rouge took control of Cambodia and killed millions. That massacre was not a consequence of our leaving Vietnam. Rather, it was a consequence of our massive carpet bombing of Cambodia, which destabilized that country and allowed Pol Pot to gain popularity. The same could be said for Iraq. Our invasion produced a power vacuum we did not replace, as a result we have strengthened the hands of Iran perhaps Syria, and Al Queda in Mesopotamia.

There is also a critical difference in why and when we entered both conflicts. We entered Vietnam in an attempt to shore up the French colonial government. By the time we escalated the war, Vietnam was already divided between North and South. The North was determined to annex the South and the South was fighting a Viet Cong insurgency. The country was already in chaos. By contrast, Iraq had a government that we toppled. Bottom line -- in Vietnam there was already a civil war raging and we effectively picked the losing side. The North would have likely succeeded regardless of our participation. In Iraq, we created the conditions for the civil war. No invasion, no civil war.

What are the possibilities if we leave Iraq? Continued bloodshed among sunnis and shia under the watchful eye of Iran and Syria. (Exactly waht is happening now.) Or, maybe with no more Americans left to shoot at, Iraqis will stop shooting at each other and try to create an independent state. Perhaps they will realize that unless they stabilize their country, they will become a wholly owned subsidiary of their neighbors. In other words, maybe if we stop adding gasoline, the fire may calm down.

What are the consequences of staying in Iraq? We would be an occupying Army in an Arab land for the next generation. Occupying armies are targets and expensive targets at that. More over, occupying armies tend to undercut your stature as the leader of the free world. Remember that we had over 500,000 soldiers in Vietnam. We dropped napalm on Vietnam and unloaded a greater tonnage of bombs than we did in WWII. If we follow a similar course in Iraq -- increased air strikes, biger prison camps, more Willy Pete -- every jihadist, islamist, and nogoodnik in the Middle East would have an excuse to sound the battle cry and our image as a rapacious foreign power would be reinforced. Even so called moderate Arab states would have to act againsts us. Further shockwaves would run through Lebanon and the ocuupied territories. (Would you like an amped up replay of last summers Isreal/Hezbollah conflict?) And, of course, the body count on both sides would continue to climb.

But that does not seem to bother anyone.

(By the way, although I usually disagree with him, kudos to the National Review's Jonah Goldberg for just admitting that this whole thing is about national pride.)

Well.... Duh

This morning's online version of the NYT has a headline that says "Many Sexually Active in 70s Study Says." well duhhh. It was the era of disco, bell bottoms and the frisky Ford presidency. Turns out the article was about people in their 70s. (They have since changed "in" to "into.")

Enough to Make a Grown Man Cry

I can understand why people who do politics for a living become cynical and crazy. This morning the Washington Post interviewed one likely Iowa voter, Wendy, who teaches seventh grade. She is torn between -- get this -- Obama and Giuliani -- Which is a little like saying you cannot decide if you are a Mets fan or a Yankees fan. She said she cannot vote for Edwards because he "has too much on his plate" with his wife's cancer. She cannot vote for Clinton because, "I don't like her 'stand-by-your-man kind of girl who rides on her husband's coattails just to become president' thing. Maybe if she would have gotten a divorce and done everything for herself I would have thought about it."

I think it would drive a sane man crazy to try to talk sense into people like Wendy. Its like she is deciding who she wants in her 7th Grade "Best Friends 4 Life, " club not who should be leader of the United States.

I suppose it is worse for the candidates. Whether Democrat or Republican these are all highly accomplished, sophisticated people, who-- whether you agree with them or not -- have shown their ability to get from point A to point B without tripping on their feet. Yet every mouthbreather with a high school education and an address in their mom's basement gets to pass judgement on how they look, act, and live their life, whether they are married or divorced, whether their wife or husband seems nice, whether they seem to have a nice family, and every other little inconsequential detail. You spend years trying to win the approval of people you probably would not hire if you were starting a business, people who could not find Iran on a map, and people who think the problems with social security could be solved by taking one of those pills they advertise on TV, the ones with the happy faces. These are people who vote for the candidate who seems the most like them or makes them "feel" good, or safe or secure.

I suppose you could say that is the marvel of democracy, and to a certain extent it is, but man .... is it ugly. Isn't there something we can do to make Wendy think a little bit harder? To convince the electorate that there is a difference between electing a leader and selecting the "Who is Hot/Who is Not" list in Vanity Fair.

Vacation, All I Ever Wanted

According to the news last week the President is back in Crawford for a little R&R and fake cowboy shenanigans. I guess there is really nothing going on in Washington that needs his attention. (He will travel to Canada for two days this week to meet with Canadian PM Harper and Mexican President Calderon at a luxury resort outside Quebec. It is made from the biggest log cab on earth so our guy should feel right at home.)

I know. I know. The President can handle anything he needs to in Crawford and his psuedo-ranch is fixed up to act as command central should he so desire. You know there are a multitude of reasons to dislike this President. But he makes it so easy by acting like an over entitled lazy f--k. I could maybe hold my ire in check if I felt the guy was on top of things, out there doing the best he can, taking meetings, finding facts, pulling the ol' half moons down his nose as he examines the particulars of troop movements or budget proposals. Instead, all we get is vacations and his strangely breezy demeanor. Its like he has some bent hostility for the American people. He won't even give us the courtesy of maintaining an appearance of concern.

We have a mini financial panic in the offing, the Iraq "government" is ever so closer to falling apart, two Iraqi governors have been assisinated, Putin is reassembling his country's Cold War apparatus and Iran is ... well... Iran. At this moment, jetting off the Crawford is a lot like giving me the finger.

This Week In The News

This week Newt Gingrich announced that "There is a war here at home that is just as important as the war against terrorism overseas. . . . There is a war here at home, and it is even more deadly than the war in Iraq and Afghanistan." (real quote) This new war is the one against illegal immigrants, which now supplants our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that Gingrich had previoulsy termed "World War III." Asked precisely how many wars the US could fight at one time, Gingrich noted, "Not too many more. I mean you add the War on Terror, to the War on Illegal Immigrants to the War on Drugs to the Constant Battle Against Secular Humanism to the Border Skirmish with the Homosexual Agenda to the Constant Disagreement Over Taxes and Fistfight for Free Enterprise and you start to realize just how many enemies Native Born Law and Order Heterosexual Religious Conservatives have. I mean we are under constant attack. Fortunately, its full employment for guys like me."

This week, General David Petraeus, commander of US troops in Iraq, lost a speaking gig. The White House announced that the "Progress Report" that Petraeus planned to give Congress on Iraq in September will instead be written by the White House and presented by the Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense. Petraeus will only discuss the report in private. The White House denied that they are trying to muzzle Petraeus, who recently said there was "no military solution" in Iraq. Speaking for the White House, Head Flak Tony Snow noted, "Our research indicates that having a mixed race multi gender couple deliver the news will be ultimately more palatable to the American people. I mean David is great, but he can be a little ... candid ... and stiff, also the cameras do not treat him well. He looks puffy in the face. We are hoping Condy [Rice] and Bob [Gates] can bring a little Sonny and Cher to this thing."

This week, the suit hoping to be President known as Mitt Romney castigated Barak Obama for suggesting that US air raids in Afghanistan are killing civilians. According to Romney, the statement was "disrepectful to our troops." (real quote). That same day the AP reported that US forces are, in fact, killing Afghan civilians at a higher rate than the Taliban is killing civilians. Asked if he meant to say that the truth was disrespectful of our troops, Romney replied, "Our boys and girls are over there risking their lives. The least we can do is pretend that everything is ok and that the slaughter of innocents goes unnoticed. I mean is that really too much to ask? A little cognitive sacrifice? I think not." Romney then announced that he would undergo a partial lobotomy out of respect for our troops.

This week, Presidential Advisor Karl Rove announced he will be stepping down from his post. The pioneer of "whispering campaigns" (Ann Richards is a lesbian/John McCain is crazy), and "wedge issues" (gay marriage, stem cell research) stands in a long line of Republican dirty tricksters including Lee Atwater and Roger Ailes. Rove, who made his name after being investigated for stealing the stationary of a Democratic rival as part of Richard Nixon's Committee to Re Elect the President, gave birth to George W. Bush's political career when he introduced the governor-to-be to members of the religious right in Texas. While Rove will undoubtedly find all sorts of lucre in the private sector, he will always be Turdblossom to us. We are all a bit less for his efforts.

Tone Deaf

Yesterday the President held a new conference with business reporters. He shrugged off any threat of a credit crunch, any fears of Wall Street volatility and any concerns about the economy generally.

The President also announced he was considering a new round of corporate tax cuts and reitereated that he would veto any expansion of the SCHIP program, which provides medical insurance to children.

Even if you tried, I do not think you could provide a more stark representation of the Republican Party's values in a single press conference. More money for corporate America. No money to kids.

The President also said the tax cuts were needed to make American business "competitive in the global marketplace." I cannot think of a country that has a lower corporate tax burden than the US, except the Cayman Islands and Bermuda. Exactly what "competition" are we facing on the tax front? (The only competition we face is from countries who invest in their infrastructure and workforces at a far greater rate than we do.)

The Mine Disaster

Six miners are now trapped below ground in Utah after an underground cave in. The United Mineworkers Union claims the accident was the result of "retreat minining" a practice whereby the last remaining pillars of coal are destroyed in an effort to gain higher yields. The Mine's president, Charles Murray, claims that the cave in was the result of an earthquake.(According to seismologists, any "quake" was likely a result, not the cause, of the mine's collapse.) Some intersting facts about mine owner Charles Murray:

Murray has testified before Congress that global warming is a myth and the coal industry should not be regulated in an effort to control greenhouse gasses.

The Mine Safety and Health Administration has cited Murray's mine in central Utah with more than 300 violations since January 2004, including 118 "significant and substantial" violations that are considered serious enough to cause injury or death

In 2002, Murray threatened officials of the MSA with the fact that he is friends with Sen. Mitch McConnell (R KY) who "last I checked is sleeping with your boss." (DOL Sec. Elaine Choa). Notably, Choa has been criticized for taking a lax attitude toward mine safety by refusing to do anything to repeat offenders. Mining deaths have risen 40% since 2005.

Katrina, I-35, Utah. Who is minding the store?

In Memoriam

On this date in 1945 we dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima. 100,000 people died instantaneously. By the end of 1945, the death toll was 145,000. Within five years it climbed to 200,000. The civilian to military death ratio was 6-1. Days later we dropped another bomb on the city of Nagasaki. Similar results followed.

To date, these are he only occasions that nuclear or atomic weapons have been used against civilian populations. A month before either bomb was dropped, 150 scientists from the Los Alamos test site sent a petition to President Truman urging him not to utilize the bombs. They used words like "inhumane."

In the United States, anywhere from 60 -80% of the population identifies themselves as practicing Christians of some sort.

Politicize This...

Credit to Dailykos.com for telling the political backstory of the I-35 collapse in Minnesota. Seems the Republican Governor made a big show of vetoing a bipartisan bill that would have allocated $300 million to bridge and road repair in 2005. He even had one of those big "VETO" stamps on stage with him. He was very proud of his tax cutting credentials and said the Minnesota legislature must have been "stupid" to send him the bill. The Governor's veto left the Minnesota Department of Transportation pretty much bankrupt until 2007, too late to fix any bridges.

Substitute "levees" for "bridges" and this story sounds very familiar. I suspect a lot of people will say that you should not "politicize a tragedy." But that is BS. This was not an unpredictable act of god, it was a failure of oversight. The people in charge of our infrastructure failed to do their job because they cared more about money than people. Talking about this failure is not "politicizing" it, it is simply holding people accountable for it.