Why isn't he in jail already?

 

Censorship in Alabama

From Harper's Magazine:

CBS aired its long-awaited feature on the prosecution and imprisonment of former Alabama Governor Don E. Siegelman this evening at 7:00. In a stunning move of censorship, the transmission was blocked across the northern third of Alabama by CBS affiliate WHNT, which is owned by interests of the Bass Family. Those who were in the zone of censorship or who missed it, can catch the whole segment here.

They're not even trying to hide it anymore.

Update 2/26:
People are asking why the Siegelman article was dropped and want specifics. WHNT re-aired the missing segment but it won't stop the questions.

Maybe they'll bring back the rack, too!

I can hardly wait!



(Via billw of Crooks and Liars who has a brilliant pic) Scott Horton of Harper's Magazine:

The Bush Administration is slowly introducing the Court of Star Chamber to the process of American justice. We see its elements everywhere. In the farcical Combat Status Review Tribunals created in Guantánamo, now repeatedly denounced even by judges serving on them as a travesty. In the Military Commissions, crafted in conscious avoidance of the standards both of American military and civilian justice. And in the steady press to lower the standards of our federal courts to introduce practices that continually tip the scales of justice in favor of prosecutors. Reports have begun to circulate that the Administration has put together a group of scholars headed by a right-wing activist judge to craft legislation to introduce a new court of Star Chamber, perhaps to be floated in the coming year. As we see in the public pronouncements of the Bush Administration, accusations leveled at detainees in the war on terror are leveled for political effect, and often to parallel partisan political campaigns. If those accusations are rejected by a court, it therefore undermines confidence in the Administration and the Party. Which is why, in the Bush view of justice, a failure to convict is unacceptable. And which is why the Bush view of justice is no justice at all.

Bernie Kerik Rudy Giuliani Bernie Kerik Rudy Giuliani

Just helping out...

For all of Rudy Giuliani’s many controversial associates, I suspect he’d be most pleased if the name “Bernie Kerik” is never uttered in public again. Kerik, of course, was Giuliani’s police commissioner and the man Giuliani recommended to head Bush’s Department of Homeland Security.

And while Kerik’s name quickly became an embarrassment for the former mayor, it keeps getting worse.

Bernard Kerik’s legal nightmare is about to get worse, with federal prosecutors expected to file charges against the former police commissioner that will likely include allegations of bribery, tax fraud and obstruction of justice, the Daily News has learned.

The indictment, expected next month, could prove to be an embarrassing obstacle for Kerik’s former mentor Rudy Giuliani, who is cruising at the top of the polls heading into the presidential primary gauntlet.

The bribery allegations against Kerik stem from a secret meeting at a bar in Tribeca, according to two sources familiar with the federal probe.

For several years, Kerik had no greater champion than Rudy Giuliani, who promoted him to New York correction commissioner, then to police commissioner. Giuliani then gave Kerik a job at Giuliani Partners, before urging the Bush White House to make Kerik the top man at the Department of Homeland Security.

The New York Daily News noted that Kerik’s latest charges “will have direct implications for Giuliani.” I think that’s a safe assumption.

Tell me lies, tell me six little lies....

Abu Gonzales at his best.

Re-edited for the pics:


Or this one:


Or this one:

Oh Brave Sir Georgie

Attempts to tell us he is moving on:

At a news conference Thursday, Bush acknowledged publicly for the first time that someone in his administration perhaps leaked the name of former CIA officer Valerie Plame to the news media — an act that launched the criminal investigation that resulted in Libby's conviction.

"And, you know, I've often thought about what would have happened had that person come forth and said, 'I did it.' Would we have had this, you know, endless hours of investigation and a lot of money being spent on this matter?" Bush said.

"It has been a tough issue for a lot of people in the White House, and it's run its course, and now we're going to move on."

Interesting that what you just confessed to, Georgie, is illegal as hell. You can thank your dad for that.



But even the judge who passed sentence on Libby is stunned at Bush's action:

WASHINGTON — In an unusual expression of frustration, the judge who sentenced former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby to 30 months in jail, only to see the sentence commuted by President Bush, said he was "perplexed" by the act of clemency.

In his first public comments on the matter, U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton took issue with Bush's statement that the prison sentence ordered for Libby last month was "excessive." Walton defended the sentence, saying that he followed established legal precedents as well as a strict interpretation of federal sentencing guidelines that has been supported by Bush's own administration.

Brave Sir Georgie ran away, he ran away, oh, he ran away..... but we are staying and checking for clues.

You know.... Georgie wasn't lying

When he said:

If there's a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. If the person has violated law, that person will be taken care of. -- George W. Bush

And he really did take care of Scooter, didn't he? Kept him out of jail so he won't talk. Because Scooter talking would put Karl, Dick and Georgie in the slammer....

No top ten this week

But just one subject. The commutation of the Obstructor of Justice Scooter Libby.

What makes you so special and above the law, Scooter?

Paul Krugman

Notes the sacrifices of the Bushies:

On this Fourth of July, President Bush compared the Iraq war to the Revolutionary War, and called for “more patience, more courage and more sacrifice.” Unfortunately, it seems that nobody asked the obvious question: “What sacrifices have you and your friends made, Mr. President?”

On second thought, there would be no point in asking that question. In Mr. Bush’s world, only the little people make sacrifices.

[snip]

This time around, Mr. Bush celebrated Mission Accomplished by cutting tax rates on dividends and capital gains, while handing out huge no-bid contracts to politically connected corporations. And in the four years since, as the insurgency Mr. Bush initially taunted with the cry of “Bring them on” has claimed the lives of thousands of Americans and left thousands more grievously wounded, the children of the elite — especially the Republican elite — have been conspicuously absent from the battlefield.

The Bushies, it seems, like starting fights, but they don’t believe in paying any of the cost of those fights or bearing any of the risks. Above all, they don’t believe that they or their friends should face any personal or professional penalties for trivial sins like distorting intelligence to get America into an unnecessary war, or totally botching that war’s execution.

Krugman goes on to discuss the panicked behavior of the Bushies over the possibility of Scooter Libby actually having to go to jail. He finishes:

Mr. Bush says that Mr. Libby’s punishment remains “harsh” because his reputation is “forever damaged.” Meanwhile, Mr. Bush employs, as a deputy national security adviser, none other than Elliott Abrams, who pleaded guilty to unlawfully withholding information from Congress in the Iran-contra affair. Mr. Abrams was one of six Iran-contra defendants pardoned by Mr. Bush’s father, who was himself a subject of the special prosecutor’s investigation of the scandal.

In other words, obstruction of justice when it gets too close to home is a family tradition. And being a loyal Bushie means never having to say you’re sorry.

Georgie has been physically unable to acknowledge mistakes. I don't think his mouth will ever be able to form the short sentence: I made a mistake. Or: I was wrong. Or even: I'm sorry.



This is a man who assumed he'd never have to accept responsibility for any of his actions.





And his enablers believed it too.



Guess what. This is Bush's and Cheney's war. They started it. They can't finish it. They can't fix it. The mess is all theirs.

They are responsible.

Terrible things, facts.

A smackdown on David Brooks by David Corn via Larry Johnson:
July 3, 2007

Mr. Brooks, our apologies. There was a snafu yesterday, and we neglected to send you the edited version of your latest column, which contained several queries from us. What appeared in today's Times was the copy you initially filed--with all those queries obviously unaddressed. Again, we apologize for the error and hope this did not cause you any trouble or embarrassment. For the record, below is the marked-up version of your column.

By DAVID BROOKS

In retrospect, Plamegate was a farce in five acts. The first four were scabrous, disgraceful and absurd. Justice only reared its head at the end. [Powerful opening. Setting the bar high. Must be proved.]

The drama opened, as these dark comedies are wont to do, with a strutting little peacock who went by the unimaginative name of Joe Wilson. [Pot calling kettle back, Mr. Brooks? Besides, do most "dark comedies" open with plain-named birds. Query Mr. Rich?]

Mr. Wilson claimed that his wife had nothing to do with his trip to investigate Iraqi purchases in Niger, though that seems not to have been the case. [Chronology problem? Mr. Wilson did not "open" this "comedy" with such a claim. He began the episode by publishing an op-ed--on the very same page your column appears--that accused the administration of having "twisted" the prewar intelligence. The issue of his wife's involvement in his mission to Iraq came later.]

He claimed his trip proved Iraq had made no such attempts, though his own report said nothing of the kind. [He did not claim his trip had "proved"--your word--the matter. He wrote that after speaking with past and present officials of Niger and "people associated with the country's uranium business," he had concluded that "it was highly doubtful that any such transaction had ever taken place." (We can forward you a copy of his op-ed.) And, as you know, columnists of the Times are not fact-checked. But we would point out that in his Times op-ed, Mr. Wilson did not claim, as you state, that "his trip proved Iraq had made no such attempts" to purchase uranium. He maintained that "there's simply too much oversight over too small an industry for a sale to have transpired." And--not to belabor what might be a fact-checking issue--according to a Senate intelligence committee investigation, the report written by the CIA on Mr. Wilson's trip "described how the structure of Niger's uranium mines would make it difficult, if not impossible, for Niger to sell uranium to any rogue states."]

Corn's response continues in its wonderfulness, pomposity pricked at every turn by needle sharp facts. I will now post a pic in honor of David Corn's brillance.



Thank you, sir. That was delicious!

J'accuse!

Update 7/4: finally found a YouTube that isn't oddly cut off at the end:



Olbermann on fire:

This President decides that he, and not the law, must prevail.

I accuse you, Mr. Bush, of lying this country into war.

I accuse you of fabricating in the minds of your own people, a false implied link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11.

I accuse you of firing the generals who told you that the plans for Iraq were disastrously insufficient.

I accuse you of causing in Iraq the needless deaths of 3,586 of our brothers and sons, and sisters and daughters, and friends and neighbors.

I accuse you of subverting the Constitution, not in some misguided but sincerely-motivated struggle to combat terrorists, but instead to stifle dissent.

I accuse you of fomenting fear among your own people, of creating the very terror you claim to have fought.

I accuse you of exploiting that unreasoning fear, the natural fear of your own people who just want to live their lives in peace, as a political tool to slander your critics and libel your opponents.

I accuse you of handing part of this republic over to a Vice President who is without conscience, and letting him run roughshod over it.

And I accuse you now, Mr. Bush, of giving, through that Vice President, carte blanche to Mr. Libby, to help defame Ambassador Joseph Wilson by any means necessary, to lie to Grand Juries and Special Counsel and before a court, in order to protect the mechanisms and particulars of that defamation, with your guarantee that Libby would never see prison, and, in so doing, as Ambassador Wilson himself phrased it here last night, of you becoming an accessory to the obstruction of justice.

Update 7/4: Via Firedoglake, windspike of Educational Whisper has a wonder breakdown of the grilling of Tony Snow over the Deciderer's decision.

Scooter's sentence commuted

The New York Times prints blog and political reactions:

John Hindraker at the Powerline blog calls Mr. Bush’s decision an “excellent resolution” to the episode: “I also think the President’s commutation of Libby’s sentence will go over well with the party’s conservative base and will contribute, to some degree, to a restoration of Bush’s standing with conservatives.”

Dan McLaughin at RedState notes that the issue is likely to resurface in the presidential campaign: “Now, we get to hear what Hillary Clinton thinks about the proper uses of the pardon power.”

At Talking Points Memo, Josh Marshall is skeptical of the president’s reasoning for sparing Mr. Libby from jail. He writes that there is no conceivable argument for “micromanaging” the sentence: “The only basis for this decision is that Libby is the vice president’s friend, the vice president rules the president and this was the minimum necessary to keep the man silent.”

Christy Hardin Smith at Firedoglake, which deployed an army to live-blog the Libby trial, says Mr. Bush’s decision amounts to “throwing the rule of law out in the trash to cater to his rabid base”: “This is a shameful, self-dealing action which will have long-term political ramifications for the Bush Administration. And it should.”

Andrew Sullivan writing at The Atlantic Online concedes that he once “retained some minimal respect” for the president: “No longer. We now know full well what his beliefs are: the law is for other people, not himself, his friends or his apparatchiks.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid issued this: “The president’s decision to commute Mr. Libby’s sentence is disgraceful. Libby’s conviction was the one faint glimmer of accountability for White House efforts to manipulate intelligence and silence critics of the Iraq War. Now, even that small bit of justice has been undone. Judge Walton correctly determined that Libby deserved to be imprisoned for lying about a matter of national security.

The Constitution gives President Bush the power to commute sentences, but history will judge him harshly for using that power to benefit his own Vice President’s Chief of Staff who was convicted of such a serious violation of law.”

Less than a pardon but no prison. Guess the aspens do share roots.....

Update: Tengrain has the best pic.

And Atrios of Eschaton says this:

I'm going to be mad tomorrow. I'm going to be mad tomorrow that the elite media (except Keith) won't point out that Bush's commutation of Scooter's sentence is essentially obstruction of justice. I'll be mad because that concept was regularly inserted into the narrative during the Clinton days.


Mostly I'll be mad because I have yet to see a prominent Democrat put the phrase "obstruction of justice" out there in relation to this. So perhaps my anger at the media is misplaced.