Quote of the Day: The Distinction Between "Illegal" and "Criminal"

On his decision not to prosecute Monica Goodling and other Justice Department officials who illegally restricted career positions to Republican cronies (via NYTimes):

“Where there is enough evidence to charge someone with a crime, we vigorously prosecute,” he said. “But not every wrong, or even every violation of the law, is a crime,” he said. As the inspector general’s report acknowledged, the hiring violations were such a case, because the wrongdoing violated federal civil service law, but not criminal law, he said.

Let's reduce this to syllogism form.

P1: Major Premise.The politically-motivated violation of civil service law constitutes a violation of everything we hold dear, as well as the basic anti-corruption and anti-fraud laws I would be seriously astounded if we did not have right now.

P2: Minor Premise. It is inconsistent with federal civil service law to apply a political litmus test when filling career positions in the civil service, i.e. the Justice Department.

P3: Fact. Attorney General Michael Mukasey will not prosecute the people who committed these "non-crime violations."

C3: Michael Mukasey is also a partisan tool and is committing an offense to ethics, if not to law (this syllogism is leading me to lose my faith in law).

Correct me if I'm wrong on P1; I really do hope I am, because I'd rather think the code of the law itself is incomplete (despite its obvious suggestion of the question, "WTF were the Civil Service reforms good for, then?"), rather than become depressed over the apparent lack of importance it has for our government.

What Happened to Bush?

I'm still at work, but I just wanted to ask a question to all of you: While we're paying attention to McCain, what are our President-for-another-seven-months and his cronies up to?

And why the hell hasn't he been impeached already?

Reid fails to oppose telecom immunity; Dodd to filibuster

Here's a wonderful example of leadership from Senator Reid:

I have determined that in this situation, it would be wrong of me to simply choose one committee’s bill over the other. I personally favor many of the additional protections included in the Judiciary Committee bill, and I oppose the concept of retroactive immunity in the Intelligence bill. But I cannot ignore the fact that the Intelligence bill was reported favorably by a vote of 13-2, with most Democrats on the committee supporting that approach. I explored the possibility of putting before the Senate a bill that included elements of both two committee bills. Earlier this week, I used Senate Rule 14 to place two bills on the calendar.

The first – S. 2440 – consists of Titles I and III of the Intelligence bill, but did not include Title II on retroactive immunity. The second bill – S. 2441 – consists of Title I of the Intelligence bill and Titles II and III of the Judiciary bill. But after consulting further with Chairman Rockefeller and Chairman Leahy, a consensus emerged among the three of us that the best way to proceed would be by regular order. Both Chairmen agreed with this approach.

Under regular order, and the rules of the Senate governing sequential referral, I will move to proceed to S. 2248 – the bill reported by each committee. When that motion to proceed is adopted, the work of both committees will be before the Senate. Because of the order in which they considered the bill, the Intelligence Committee version will be the base text, and the Judiciary Committee version will be automatically pending as a substitute amendment.

What this means, in effect, is that getting rid of the telecom immunity in the Intelligence Committee bill will require sixty votes, "rendering," as Glenn Greenwald explains, "such efforts virtually impossible. In doing so, Reid is brazenly ignoring the demands of 14 Senators -- including all of the Democratic presidential candidates -- to have the Judiciary Committee bill be the base bill."

That's bad enough, but the explanation Reid is giving makes me angry. "The Intelligence Committee submitted their bill first, so we will consider theirs first."--pretty transparent BS, I have to say. I'm sure there are very good reasons for Reid's failure to oppose telecom immunity, such as, say, keeping in the good graces of powerful people like the telecoms and his old chum Senator Rockefeller, but the Majority Leader has power that is meant to be exercised in just such instances as this, where it is obvious that some Senators are working against the interests of their constituency, and where those Senators are clearly wrong.

Apparently Senator Leahy has also decided not to exercise his full clout; Reid says that Leahy agreed to have his bill (the one without immunity, and with better safeguards on domestic spying) plowed under.

Not only has Reid taken this action, but he also, in defiance of Senate custom, refused to recognize the hold Senator Dodd (a member of his own party) placed on the bill. When Tom Coburn placed a hold on a civil rights bill, Reid honored it.

As a result of all this, Chris Dodd is going to have to stand up and filibuster in support of the Constitution and in defiance of his own supposed allies. What in the world is the matter with our party?

Here's Chris Dodd's page on the filibuster.

Update: I'm watching C-Span on my computer, and Ted Kennedy just gave a corker of a speech. I'll try and find a clip of it and put it up.

Update II: Kit Bond says that the President does have the "inherent authority" under Article II of the Constitution to "conduct warrantless surveillance." Let me just take a look at Article II.. okay, yeah, I don't see it anywhere. How can Bond make an argument like that with a straight face?

Update III: Here's part of the Kennedy speech. (Embed fixed. --markus)

The Man Who Lies, Cheats, Steals, and Runs for President

Rudy Giuliani has been having a bad month.

First, his longtime buddy and protege Bernard Kerik, who he made police commissioner of New York, gave a job in his firm, and nominated for the top job in the Department of Homeland Security, was indicted on 16 counts of "bribery, tax fraud, and obstruction of justice."

Kerik's sleaziness is old news, but now Giuliani is being forced to ask other cronies to keep him from calling up the "old crowd" in his defense, which might be tough considering this photographic gem:

Have you ever seen a two men kiss a baby less convincingly? I think they could give Lord Voldemort and Wormtail a run for their money.

Read more »

Maybe Pat Tillman actually was killed by enemy fire.

Except maybe the enemies were other US soldiers.

It makes sense, doesn't it? Why else would the Administration go to such lengths to cover it up? The speculation previously was that it was because a Pat Tillman, NFL star, dying with valor in the Great Cause, was a valuable propaganda object, but this makes just as much sense-- really more sense.

_ In his last words moments before he was killed, Tillman snapped at a panicky comrade under fire to shut up and stop "sniveling."

_ Army attorneys sent each other congratulatory e-mails for keeping criminal investigators at bay as the Army conducted an internal friendly-fire investigation that resulted in administrative, or non-criminal, punishments.

_ The three-star general who kept the truth about Tillman's death from his family and the public told investigators some 70 times that he had a bad memory and couldn't recall details of his actions.

_ No evidence at all of enemy fire was found at the scene - no one was hit by enemy fire, nor was any government equipment struck.

C & L and FDL have more commentary. I wish I was more shocked by this.

Frank Rich tears the GOP a new one

Frank Rich's latest column in the times is great. I haven't been a huge fan in the past, but this is making me a believer. This caught my eye, but read the whole thing.

"By my rough, conservative calculation — feel free to add — there have been corruption, incompetence, and contracting or cronyism scandals in these cabinet departments: Defense, Education, Justice, Interior, Homeland Security, Veterans Affairs, Health and Human Services, and Housing and Urban Development. I am not counting State, whose deputy secretary, a champion of abstinence-based international AIDS funding, resigned last month in a prostitution scandal, or the General Services Administration, now being investigated for possibly steering federal favors to Republican Congressional candidates in 2006. Or the Office of Management and Budget, whose chief procurement officer was sentenced to prison in the Abramoff fallout. I will, however, toss in a figure that reveals the sheer depth of the overall malfeasance: no fewer than four inspectors general, the official watchdogs charged with investigating improprieties in each department, are themselves under investigation simultaneously — an all-time record."

(http://select.nytimes.com/2007/05/13/opinion/13rich.html)

Romney Under Fed. Investigation: Lied about Big Dig?

So much for Kerry Healey's bounce.

Federal officials are probing scathing allegations that the Romney administration falsely claimed to conduct safety inspections in the Big Dig tunnel that collapsed and killed a woman in July.

The Securities and Exchange Commission is zeroing in on state financial documents from 2005 - cited in a new report by state Inspector General Gregory Sullivan - indicating that Gov. Mitt Romney was reviewing the safety of the Big Dig, when in fact the administration was only checking leaks in the Interstate 93 tunnel.

“Despite repeated assurances to bondholders, (MassHighway and Romney’s Executive Office of Transportation) . . . did not inspect the I-90 connector tunnel section where the July 10, 2006, collapse occurred,” Sullivan’s report states. “It is clear that casual disregard for the truth was grossly inappropriate.”

[...] While the inspector general’s report also cites “an alarming lack of stewardship” by the Turnpike, it singles out the Romney administration for abdicating its responsibility to verify the safety of the project.

Emphasis mine. If we tie Lt. Gov Healey to this, it's over. And God only knows what this could do to Romney's presidential bid.

For reference: Recent MA-Gov polls. Story found via DKos.

Karma?

A few days ago I wrote about the Senate passing the terrible, awful torture and denial of habeas corpus bill, for which Republicans overwhelmingly voted, joined by a not-insignificant number of Democrats. But I'm not blaming Democrats for this one, or at least, not primarily: a Democratic Senate would almost certainly have passed most or all of the amendments that got shot down. So, the Republicans pass a terrible, awful bill, and what happens? MyDD has a round-up of all the terrible, awful revelations coming out about the Republicans: 

• The National Intelligence Estimate declare that the war in Iraq in increasing terrorism worldwide
• Colin Powell say he was fired
• Rice is on the verge of having to resign.
• Bill Frist say that the Taliban should rule Afghanistan
• The White House met with Jack Abramoff 485 times, and had a huge amount of influence.
• Bob Woodward comes out with a book saying the Bush administration is lying about Iraq.
• Droves of Republicans are under investigation for something.

• For five years, most of the Republican leadership covered up for and protected a Republican congressman / sexual predator who was targeting young pages who worked on Capitol Hill. And the establishment media is saying jus that.
• The Republican House Leadership has been figuratively decapitated as a result, and now can't speak effectively on anything.
• The Republican response has been to blame the pages, blame each other, block investigations, call the incident unimportant, blatant lying, and show once again just how homophobic and ignorant they really are. Because defenses like that really work.
• And they did it all because they were worried it might cost them power.

Kind of makes me believe in karma. Or at least, the Days of Awe.