Channeling Nixon?

Can anyone point out to me any qualitative difference between these two statements?

Former President Richard Nixon, about Watergate:

"When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal.”


Former Secretary of State within the George W. Bush administration Condoleezza Rice, regarding waterboarding:

"By definition, if it was authorized by the president, it did not violate our obligations under the Conventions Against Torture."

Kill the Lawyers, redux

The Arizona Daily Star ran an Associated Press update today quoting White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel as saying the administration was not intending to prosecute any Bush administration officials for the acts of torture they officially sanctioned.

Not surprisingly, this position was happily accepted by Republicans. Quoting the article:

GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said the idea of “criminalizing legal advice after one administration is out of the office is a very bad precedent. ... I think it would be disaster to go back and try to prosecute a lawyer for giving legal advice that you disagreed with to a former president.”

The problem with this is it creates a backdoor by which the administrative branch can claim unlimited power. Want to spy on any US citizen without a warrant? Simply have a friendly OLC lawyer devise some half-assed argument supporting it. Want to drop a nuke on Canada because you can't stand the way they keeping adding 'eh?' to the end of every sentence? Call in the OLC! Nothing is so far out there we can't find some flimsy justification for it.

So what if, after the fact, the legal reasoning is found to be childish, amateurish, completely lacking of any professional standard - you got done what you wanted to get done. It's time to focus on the future, not look backwards to the past.

Supposedly, lawyers have professional standards, and if those standards are not met, or it is, at best, questionable those standards are met, then it is entrely appropriate to prosecute the lawyers who give such poor advice. The fact we are talking about lawyers making legal decisions which impact policy decisions for our entire nation makes this more imperative, not less.

If no other Bush administration official is prosecuted for these atrocities, at an absolute minimum the lawyers who provided the flimsy cover of legality which Bush, Cheney et. al. used as justification for their heinous acts must be. Otherwise, we are can no longer claim to be a nation of laws, only a nation of legal justifications.

Perhaps now it will all become clear

When the Bush administration and numerous supporters found time to focus on things other than pursuing needless wars, placing political hacks into positions they were not vaguely qualified for and various ways to expand presidential fiat at the expense of civil liberties, they often complained about how Bush was not getting enough credit for the supposedly burgeoning economy.

For all the economic growth which took place during the Bush year's according to various economic measures, people consistently reported that, on the whole, they were dissatisfied with their lot. The Bushies never seemed to figure out why, even though economists such as Paul Krugman repeatedly explained to them all that extra money was either going to corporations or being amassed in the hands of a very limited few, and not, in fact, "trickling down" the the citizenry as a whole.

Today, the Associated Press had an article laying out the numbers about as clearly as they can be presented, comparing data from 3 million households a year in the years 2005-2007 to data collected during the 2000 census. The key findings in the article:

* Median household income dropped in 79 percent of the cities and towns. Incomes dropped in the wealthiest communities as well as the poorest. Charleston, Ill., home to Eastern Illinois University, saw the biggest drop - 31 percent - to a median household income of just under $21,000.

* Nationally, incomes dropped by 4.3 percent during the period, to $50,007.

*The poverty rate increased in 70 percent of the cities and towns. Athens, Ohio, home to Ohio University, had the highest poverty rate, at 52.3 percent, in the 2005-2007 period.

Nationally, the poverty rate increased from 12.4 percent to 13.3 percent since the start of the decade.

* The unemployment rate increased in 71 percent of the cities and towns. Muskegon, Mich., a city of about 40,000 near Lake Michigan, had the highest unemployment rate, at 22.1 percent.

Nationally, the unemployment rate increased from about 4 percent in 2000 to 6.6 percent in the 2005-2007 period.

* Median home values increased in 92 percent of the cities and towns studied - doubling and tripling in many cities, mainly in California. Nationally, the median home value increased 26 percent, to $181,800.

Let's see ... lower incomes, higher unmployment, greater poverty ... no, I can't possibly see why people would think the great Bush economy wasn't helping them. Of course, all those negatives were offset by large gains in home values.

How's that working out?

Bailout Follies

To no one's surprise, after voting down the first bill and seeing the Senate put pressure on them by passing a bailout proposal, the House went along last Friday and passed a similar bill itself. Arizona's delegation, which had unanimously voted against the original bill split 4-4 the second time around (Giffords, Mitchell, Pastor, Shedagg were the yes votes).

I am not opposed to some form of throwing taxpayer money into the system. The situation is clearly dire, and by all accounts Federal reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, one of the chief originators of the bailout proposal, is an expert on the Great Depression ... so I accept the thesis something needed to be done, as galling as that is on many levels.

What I don't accept is that this was the only approach to be tried. While there has certainly been a great number of modifications added, the original framework - give $700 billion to the Treasury department to spend as it deems best - remains. As far as I can tell from what I have read, no other approach was ever considered at all, much less considered seriously.

Why not? Numerous other bright, well-respected economists have, since the original proposal came out, giving variations of the line "Well, it's better than nothing, but X would be a better approach". I am no economist, so take anything I say below with a large heaping spoonful of salt, but two other proposals which seemed reasonable to me included:

* Give money directly to the commercial banks. The idea was to encourage the commercial banks to lend money to each other again, thus unlocking the "credit crunch" which is supposedly breaking down the commercial gears.

* Use the money to purchase actual foreclosed homes. The idea was that by purchasing these assets outright it turns the bad investments into good ones. The money eventually would make it's way back to the companies holding the mortgage notes. Hey, if trickle-down economics is supposed to be so great, what's wrong with a trickle-up approach? As an added bonus, families would get out from under mortgages they can't sustain.

Either of these approaches (and others I have seen as well) would be more palatable to me than throwing money directly at the Wall Street companies that got themselves in trouble in the first place.

I'd be more understanding if the entire affair had been proposed and voted on in a 48-hour period. As things went, however, there was time (maybe not plenty of time, but time) to consider alternatives ... but apparently this never occurred.

What does it say about the Bush administration that it's first response to a crisis is a proposal that basically says "Give the Secretary of the Treasury $700 billion no strings attached" and the response of the Democratic Congress is to attach a few strings and then go along? Nothing good about either.

Much, much too late

As everyone knows by now, the Supreme Court finally got around this past week to telling the administration "hey, you can't just torture prisoners indefinitely ... at some point you have to, you know, actually provide a reason for imprisoning them."

Dear leader declared from Italy that while he might disagree with the decision he would abide by it. I am not sure why he should all of a sudden feel bound to abide by our Constitution, a flimsy piece of paper has not stopped him before. Of course, in the same set of comments where he graciously agreed he might be bound by the ruling he also suggested his administration would immediately start looking for ways to legislate around it.

I'd admire his stick-to-it attitude much more if it was dedicated to something like a reasonable national health care policy, a responsible approach to resolving issues along our border with Mexico, lowering the national debt or developing a coherent energy policy rather than finding excuses to detain people indefinitely so we can torture them whenever it suits our whim.

Even if dear leader goes against form and does actually obey the Court's decision, it's too late, the damage has been done.

Without question some number of the prisoners are bad, evil individuals who deserve to be locked away for life. However, it's also indisputable some number are guilty of nothing other than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Most fall somewhere in between. One question would be should we resort to torture even with the "worst of the worst" (answer: no, we should be better than that), and another has been how many even merit that appellation. The administration has in the past claimed all of them do, that it has infallibly managed to send only those guilty of the worst crimes, or, at least, planning to commit the worst forms of misdeeds, to Guantanamo.

Of course, this has been provably wrong for some time, as some number of detainees have already been determined to not be guilty of what they were accused of and released ... generally after spending months or years in a prison where they were regularly abused.

McClatchy Newspapers published the first part of what will be a five-part series today detailing the findings of its eight-month investigation into the prisoners at Guantanamo. McClatchy has been, throughout, the best source of truly investigative reporting regarding the war and its motives, and this piece is yet another must-read. As it makes clear, administration officials have known for years that many, perhaps most, of the prisoners kept in Guantanamo had no reason to be there and were not sources of operational intelligence. However, in an administration which could not bring itself to admitting it was anything less than infallible, releasing these prisoners, or even moving them to another location where they might be treated humanely, was never an option to consider.

Instead, we set up a system where individuals have been held for reasons they were not told based on evidence they could not see provided by individuals they could not know about. Kafka would be so proud.

Darth Scalia has already predicted this ruling will lead to more deaths. Of course, this claim will never be able to be proven either way. What is provable is our nation has resorted to torturing innocent individuals. We have violated nearly every human right imaginable, all purportedly for the "best" of reasons.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Hopefully this latest ruling will help take their first steps down the road out of the abyss.

Eager ears are listening

Remember back in January and February, when there was a great deal of huffing and puffing and general hoo-hah over the desperate need to renew the Protect America Act or President Bush would not be able to protect our country. The Act was allowed to expire on Feb. 17, and from all the overblown rhetoric, one can only presume it's a miracle of God we all are still alive despite such folly.

Of course, when the house passed a bill which (unlike the Senate version) did not include immunity for past indiscretions which Telecom companies may have committed, it became apparent that protecting the business issues was even more important than protecting the country, as Bush immediately threatened a veto for any bill without the immunity clause. Not that we didn't all know where his priorites lay, but it was nice of him to spell it all out so clearly for us.

Back to the PAA and eavesdropping ... as it turns out, the Act was never necessary ... the required tool has always been in place, in the form of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which (among other provisions) allows for requesting wiretap permission in front of a secret court, and also makes allowance for immediate wiretapping when time is critical, and retroactively applying for a warrant within 48 hours.

Our government made steady use of this law last year, gaining a record 2,370 eavesdropping warrants last year. That's 9% more than 2006, and more than double from 2001. Meanwhile, a grand total of four requests were denied (even one of those was only partially denied). That's a 99.83% success rate. How, exactly, is this an overwhelming burden on our government? Given those figures, consider how ridiculously unfounded those four requests must have been in order for the court to have denied them.

On the other hand, for a President who is used to getting his way 100% of the time, having someone say "No" to you even once, much less four times within a year, is tantamount to letting the terrorists win.

The Blind Pig Finds an Acorn

Not even President Bush, no matter how desperately he strives, can manage to be wrong all the time ... and he made the right decision this week when he quickly responded to an emergency call from the World Bank for $500 million more in food aid by pledging $200 million more from the U.S.

There has been a fair bit of discussion recently about the rising cost of food here at home, but matters are far worse elsewhere, and there have been outbreaks of food riots in Egypt and Mozambique. As the cost of fuel helps drive prices higher, things will only degenerate.

The most important part of the President's statement, however, wasn't the pledge of more money, but rather the push to loosen current U.S. law, which requires all food purchased for aid purposes to be bought here and shipped to its foreign destination.

That requirement limits the effectiveness of the aid in a multitude of ways. Not only does the greater shipping distance mean less money spend on actual food (particularly given the increased cost of shipping is a major cause of the current crises) and more time for food to arrive where it is needed, but it also prevents the ancillary benefits which might come from providing some monetary influx to farmers in African nations, for the companies there which would handle the shipping, etc.

It all makes sense ... unless you are, say, a member of the US shipping industry, in which case the suffering of people of a different nationality means little compared to the extra money in your wallet ... as group representative Gloria Tosi told the NY Times last fall, expecting shippers to give up some of their little pot of gold, even if it might save some hundreds or thousands of lives, is "politically naive".

She's right of course ... but it's also the right thing to do. Let's hope this is an issue the President and Congress can manage to find some actual bi-partisan agreement on.

VP of Torture

It came out this past week Vice President Vader was ultimately responsible for signing off on and even "micromanaging" the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques" against suspected terrorist agents during a series of meetings in 2002 and 2003 which included, among others, such noted figures as Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, and then CIA Director George Tenet.

What's remarkable is the sheer lack of newsworthiness about the revelation. It's been something everyone has "known" for years, it's just a question of the details being confirmed.

The torture inflicted involved more than dressing Condi up in kinky latex and whips, and even more than tying the terrorists to chairs, propping their eyes open with toothpicks and forcing them to watch around-the-clock reality television (which would either have forced confessions, true or not, or reduced the participant to the blithering state many of our fellow citizens sadly reside in). No, we're talking about all forms of physical abuse, up to and including sleep deprivation and water boarding.

For those who brush off the effects of water-boarding, or like to hide it behind euphemisms such as "enhanced interrogation techniques" or "simulated drowning", I encourage you to read this thread, written by someone who decided to find out for himself what the process was like last December. It's worth noting that, prior to conducting the experiment, the author favored the use of the technique. His thoughts after the experiment I leave for you to discover.

Don't just read the initial post ... there are a number of interesting questions and responses by the author throughout.

As has been noted, here and elsewhere, many, many times, these are techniques applied to individuals who have been found guilty of absolutely nothing. They have not been tried. They have not had a chance to confront their accusers in an open court. Many of them have been arrested under rather flimsy circumstances. A number which have been found to be innocent have been released.

This week a number of protests were organized around the world to highlight China's human rights' abuses, timed to coincide with the running of the Olympic torch prior to the Beijing Olympics this summer. Some of those protests were planned for San Francisco and the Golden Gate bridge ... something I am sure the Chinese government found quite hypocritical. Why should they be asked to adhere to standards we clearly refuse to hold ourselves to?

Eight years ago we were a beacon for the world, not perfect, but at least striving to be better, and encouraging other nations to join us in that search. Today, we are a bully who threatens and bullies smaller nations and takes away their lunch money if they don't mold their foreign policy to fit our self-interest.

I am not a pacifist ... there are just wars, and our presence in Afghanistan is, in my mind, fully justified. The leaders of that nation knowingly provided safe haven to a coterie of people who viciously attacked and killed our citizens. By doing so, it provided a legitimate cassus belli.

However, there are unjust wars as well, and Iraq unquestionably falls in that category (as will our future war with Iran, should McCain win election this fall ... but that's another issue). Our presence there, our continuing unjust occupation, and our continuing violation of basic privacy and civil liberties, both abroad and at home, have destroyed our nation's credibility for a generation, at least ... if we can ever regain it at all.

When trust is violated, it's rare to ever get it all back, no matter how contrite and sincere the subsequent remorse ... and this administration hasn't just violated trust, it's thrown it on the ground, ground it's heels on it, spat and shat upon it ...

Ultimately, it's not just the prisoners of Guantanamo, or those individuals who have suffered rendition, who have been wrongfully abused by this administration, it's all of us, the nation in it's entirety. When this leadership team came into the White House there was a great deal of talk and blather about the new "CEO" administration. I wish they had stuck with that ... at least then they might have limited their torture to our economy.

An overdue fight

The US House of Representatives has finally decided to assert itself and push back on the ever-increasing reputed powers this administration has claimed it possesses. A couple days ago, the Judiciary committee filed a lawsuit in federal court to force former White House aides Harriet Miers and Joshua Bolton to testify before Congress on what they knew (or didn't know) concerning the Attorney General firing scandal.

The Bush administration has been blocking their testimony, claiming Executive privilege allowed him to do so, despite the fact neither is any longer a part of the administration, nor are the matters in question ones where such privilege has traditionally been considered to apply. The House originally asked for their testimony last summer, but it wasn't until last month they finally got around to pressing contempt charges - charges which U.S. Attorney Michael Mukasey promptly declared would not be pressed by his office, which would be responsible for prosecuting the case.

So Congress has taken the only option short of impeachment, and taken the case to court.

The response from the White House was predictable, with spokeswoman Dana Perino referring to it as "partisan theater" ... and maybe she's right, insofar as the matter Miers and Bolton have been asked to testify about is concerned. On the larger issue, however, she's not just wrong, she's so far off base she's not even wrong.

The real, important issue here is the ruthless expansion of spying and secrecy powers Bush, Cheney et. al. have promoted for seven years now, nearly unchallenged up to this point ... and there is nothing partisan about that agenda. Should a Democrat win election this year, or some time in the future, Republicans in the House will have (and should have) the same right to expect co-operation in it's investigative and oversight role that this Congress is finally trying to enforce.

It's worth noting that a little over a decade ago, Bill Clinton became the first President to assert Executive privilege and have that claim overturned in court, over l'affaire Lewinsky. Hopefully Bush will become the second.

End the strike now!

President Bush was quoted this morning, in response to a question about Hillary Clinton's notion of sending Bush pere and Bill on a world-traveling goodwill trip (hat tip Tim Grieve at War Room):

"It's what I do during my presidency," Bush said. "I go around spreading goodwill and talking about the importance of spreading freedom and peace."

You just know ... know ... there are some striking writers on their knees sobbing with grief at missing out on such a comedy-ready line.

Credit where credit isn't due

The NY Times has a follow-up article on the recent announcement of a stem cell research breakthrough which may allow the creation of pluripotent stem cells without the need to destroy human embryos. The article provides some historical background, and some context as to what the breakthrough potentially means for future research and development in this country.

Midway through the article comes this:

On Tuesday, senior aides to Mr. Bush said he drove the experiments by holding his moral ground.

“This is very much in accord with the president’s vision from the get-go,” said Karl Zinsmeister, a domestic policy adviser to Mr. Bush who kept the president apprised of the work. “I don’t think there’s any doubt that the president’s drawing of lines on cloning and embryo use was a positive factor in making this come to fruition.”

Of course, this completely overlooks two points:

1. While the recent announcement was a joint one between teams from Japan and Wisconsin, it is in fact the Japanese team which has been the primary moving force in this line of research. It was their seminal announcement last year of a method which worked in mice that both teams built on to apply to human cells.

Bush's views and policies had nothing whatsoever to do with the Japanese research.

2. These developments would have been entirely impossible without initial research with actual embryonic stem cells. You can't create a method for developing cells with the same properties as embryonic stem cells unless you actually know what those properties are.


Bush's policies have done nothing whatsoever to promote research of pluripotent stem cells in this country, much to hinder it. There is a reason the leading research in this field comes primarily from Japan and South Korea.

Sadly, there is nothing unusual in this President taking credit for accomplishments he had nothing to do with, or weren't complete. "Mission Accomplished" anyone?

Historical figures

From USA Today:

Meanwhile, Bush reached an unwelcome record. By 64%-31%, Americans disapprove of the job he is doing. For the first time in the history of the Gallup Poll, 50% say they "strongly disapprove" of the president. Richard Nixon had reached the previous high, 48%, just before an impeachment inquiry was launched in 1974.

Fits of whimsy

Apparently frustrated by no longer having his every childish whim treated as imperial demand by the House and Senate, The Worst President In History is now planning to increase his use of Executive Orders to implement his ludicrously unpopular policies.

So ... what does this mean?

First of all, the Supreme Court has ruled (in this case) the President can't use orders to create new law. Since that time, Presidents have typically noted some law they were abiding by when issuing an order, to give it at least a veneer of legality. Most orders aren't controversial, and it's worth noting only two have ever been overturned in court (the above case and one issued by Clinton in 1996).

That limitation, however, still leaves plenty of room for misuse and abuse. Perhaps the most infamous Executive Order in our history was #9066, which resulted in tens of thousands of Japanese-Americans (and German- and Italian-Americans as well) being rounded up after the US entry into WWII and spending years in internment camps.

Given this administration's history of ignoring constraints on its power, it's quite easy to envision scenarios where it issues Executive Orders privatizing social security, drilling in the ANWR, or whatever - pushing policies Bush knows he no longer has any chance at all of getting through Congress. As a practical matter, any order would be virtually impossible to overturn - lawsuits would be appealed past the end of his term of office, and any attempt to counter his order by passing a bill in Congress would be vetoed, said veto upheld by the Republican minority.

Something we won't see, however, is an Executive Order to attack Iran. The administration thinks it already has sufficient authority to do that, regardless of what the Constitution might actually say.

Sucky math skills

Way back in the dawn of time, last May, the President signed a military spending supplemental bill while at the same time proclaiming a list of 18 bench marks it was hoped the surge (supported by the new funding appropriations) would help the military and Iraqi government meet.

In July the administration provided an update on progress toward meeting those benchmarks, but even that most optimistically spun view found "satisfactory" progress had been achieved on only 8 of the 18. For the record, thats 44.4 percent.

The Washington Post got its hands on a copy of the soon-to-be-released GAO report, and it paints a completely starker picture, including:

* Finding the number of Iraqi units capable of independent operation declined from ten in March to six in July, contradicting the administration's findings.

* Finding the number of attacks on Iraqi civilians has remained effectively unchanged, going from 25 per day in February to 26 per day last month, directly contradicting the administration's claims.

In total, the GAO determined satisfactory progress has occurred on two of ten security benchmarks, and one of eight political ones. That's 20% and 12.5% respectively. Overall, it's a 16.67% success rate.

Meanwhile, our President is putting out word he will ask for as much as $50 billion more next month to further support the surge. That's in addition to the $147 billion request already on the table. Doing the math once again, we get $197 billion, a fair chunk of change.

Apparently our President thinks progress in Iraq has been soooooooo outstanding, that not only should we not re-evaluate as to whether we should be there at all, we should instead be pumping even more money, and more blood, into the struggle.

Frankly, I don't understand how a Yale degree can be as prestigious as it is when 16.67% isn't just considered a passing score, but is considered such a magnificent grade it's worth substantial reward ... like, say, an additional $50 billion attached to a no-restrictions spending bill.

Or perhaps our President simply needs to take one of x4mr's math courses.

Success? This is Success?

Last month, "only" 80 US soldiers were killed in Iraq, down from 101 in June and a high of 126 in May. The administration and various war-supporters are already touting this as near irrefutable proof the surge is working, and if we just wait yet another six more months the true genius of Our Glorious Leader (and Dubya too!) will finally be revealed for all to see, even liberals.

Being the spoil-sport I am, however, I wanted to look at a few more of the numbers, which are available here. In looking at them, two things stand out:

1. The 80 deaths last month are essentially identical to the 83, 81 and 81 in January, February and March of this year respectively. That's when the surge was initiated. Put another way, there has been effectively no drop in US casualties per month since the start of the surge.

2. For whatever reason, possibly the onset of the stifling summer heat, both 2005 and 2006 saw low casualty figures for US troops in July when compared to adjacent months.

June 2005: 78
July 2005: 54
August 2005: 85

June 2006: 61
July 2006: 43
August 2006: 65

With 20 casualties so far in August, we are on pace for 88 or 89 more dead soldiers this month. I am sure the same set of people will find some way to explain to the heathen unbelievers such as myself why an uptick in the death count (if the pace continues) would also be evidence the surge is working.

The surge can't fail, only the rationale can fail. If the rationale fails, simply change the rationale. Long live the surge! ¡Desea vivo la oleada! Long live the Emperor! Er ... uhm ... we mean the Vice President of course.

Even if one looks at the numbers, though, and somehow manages to talk himself into believing the surge is succeeding militarily, what Lord Cheney, Prime Minion Bush and others induced to spread the gospel of Success In Iraq hope your forget - really, they need you to forget - is that the military aspect was always the least important part of the surge.

The whole point of placing additional troops in Iraq was to help create "breathing space" for the Iraqi government, which in turn was supposed to achieve certain political "benchmarks". The military aspects have always been secondary to the political ones.

Needless to say, however mediocre (at best) progress might be on the military front, it gets an A+ grade compared to the political situation.

Despite no progress whatsoever on meeting the desired benchmarks, the entire Iraqi parliament has opted to take a month break. In the interim, the largest Sunni block resigned at the start of the month, five more cabinet members announced yesterday they would boycott government meetings (an action one described as "first step toward withdrawal" from the government), and six ministers from Moqtada al-Sadr's faction, who walked out in April, show no sign of coming back.

Meanwhile, as the British prepare to pull out of Basra, Shiites there are pushing for more independence.

As we approach the mid-September date for the much-awaited report on the effects of the surge the Iraqi government, on whose behalf the surge was allegedly initiated in the first place, the government which is supposed to be making progress toward a new Constitution, agreeable power-sharing and financial arrangements, the government we have sent 30,000 more young Americans over to fight and possibly die for ... that government is on the verge of collapse.

Apparently I am overdue for my administration-sponsored brainwashing. No matter how hard I squint, no matter how rosy I tint my glasses, no matter how often I chant happy mantras to myself ("Mission accomplished!" "Greeted with flowers!"), no matter how much effort I expend in positive thinking ... I just can't make this look like progress.

Permanent Filibuster

The Senate had a sleepover last night, as Senate majority leader Harry Reid kept debate open on whether or not a bill to set a timeline to begin withdrawing troops from Iraq would get a voe. Although there were 52 votes in favor of bringing the matter to a formal vote, 60 were needed since Republicans were effectively filibustering the bill.

The Washington Post reports that, as part of the negotiations surrounding the matter minority leader Mitch McConnell suggested any Iraq-related amendment automatically require 60 votes to pass. Apparently this had been agreed to in a similar situation some months ago as a means of short-cutting certain procedural steps.

Think about that for a moment. McConnell is essentially stating outright that on any matter related to Iraq, if it might involve any restrictions on the President's handling of affairs then it will be filibustered. Senate Republicans are in a state of permanent filibuster, against the repeatedly expressed will of the citizens they purportedly represent.

Of course, McConnell and company could allow straight votes on the matters, knowing the President would veto the bill anyhow. However, they knowsthat would only make the President look bad (well, worse than he already does), and we can't be having that, now can we? So instead, they throw every possible parliamentary obstacle in the way as a means to protect the clown occupying the Oval Office for another 17 months.

Then they'll blame Democrats for "not passing legislation" or some such tripe.

Obstinance or Criminality?

All the way back in April, three long months ago, the House judiciary committee requested (but did not issue subpoenas for) copies of emails from administration officials that had been sent from (or to) email accounts maintained by the Republican National Committee.

A couple days ago, administration counsel Emmet Flood informed the RNC and Congress it was the position of the White House those emails were covered under the President's recently invoked "Executive Privilege" order. The RNC followed shortly after by indicating it would abide with the administrations desires, and not make the emails available.

Now, subpoenas have not yet been issued but they have been approved, meaning they could be issued at anytime, including today. If so, it will be an additional log on the fire which is beginning to flame between Congress and the White House over how far Executive Privilege actually reaches.

I can't see any reasonable interpretation in which the RNC emails can be protected. One of two scenarios must apply:

1. The emails in question do not involve official administration business. If so, then they can't possibly be protected under executive privilege guidelines.

2. The emails in question do involve official administration business, in which case the administration is in clear violation of the Presidential Records Act of 1978. If this is the case, the investigation becomes a criminal investigation, and precedent has established Executive Privilege does not apply in the face of criminal investigations (here and here). As an extra-special added bonus, the Act explicitly states it applies to the office of the Vice President too, no matter what branch of government it resides in for any given day of the week.

So the White House is either admitting to criminal behavior on its part or willfully obstructing a legal request (and one it knows is legal) for documents. There is no third option. Personally, I'm going with the latter choice -- even this administration, with it's noted propensity for grandiose claims leavened with a large dollop of stupidity isn't going to freely admit it's been violating the law.

Issue the subpoenas and ask for an expedited decision. Lets get the farce over with.

Update: Speaking of Republican obstructionism, Anonymous Liberal has an excellent post about a different (but related) form of it. ALs post references another excellent post on the matter, this one by Hilzoy.

Update: Earlier today (July 13), subpoenas were issued to the RNC for the requested information.

Attorney Firing Catch-22

The President yesterday claimed executive privilege in suggesting former staffers Harriet Miers and Sara Taylor should not testify before Congress regarding the basis for deciding which attorneys were let go from the Attorney General's office last fall.

Bush places himself in an interesting position with the claim. While the privilege certainly exists, it's not an expressed right of the Executive branch, and thus may be denied under certain circumstances. Generally, court cases have found that the "closer" one is to the President, the stronger the privilege is. Cases have also determined that direct communication with the President merits stronger protection than communications with other staffers. Attempts to apply executive privilege claims to such communications have lost in court several times in the past -- something which this administration surely knows.

Sooo ... either Bush is simply throwing roadblocks in the way, knowing he has a losing case but intentionally trying to slow things down (and hey, maybe a court will rule his way against precedent), or he plans to assert the "stronger" form of executive privilege, in which case he will have to confess he was, to some degree, involved in the entire sordid affair to a degree he has so far denied.

In other words, he's either a liar or intentionally obstructing a legal investigation. If I had to guess it's the latter, done in an attempt to keep Alberto Gonzales from even more embarrassing disclosures. Neither is good, though.

Various blogs are reporting Taylor will appear before Congress tomorrow anyway, despite the President's assertion. As she is now a private citizen, it doesn't look like there is anyway for the administration to prevent her testimony, should she choose to give it. It remains to be seen if she does much more than assert her 5th Amendment rights on any of the more interesting questions.

One of these things ...

... is not like the other.

The Bush administration is attempting to divert attention from it's egregious commutation of Scooter's sentence by screaming as loudly as it can "hey, Clinton did it too", a claim which, of course, has at least two problems with it:

1. Even if the Clinton administration had done the exact same thing, two wrongs don't make a right as the saying go. One is tempted to ask Tony Snow, or whatever administration mouthpiece is available, "Well, if Clinton had jumped off a roof would President Bush do the same?".

2. Clinton did not actually "do it too".

Now, it's indisputable Clinton issued a number of pardons, including a large set as he was leaving office. There really isn't anything unusual about this, as prior out-going Presidents have done the same thing. The vast majority of these pardons are largely symbolic, being issued for deceased individuals. For those not yet deceased, the vast majority have served their time and the primary practical effect of the pardon is to restore the individuals' voting rights.

I am not aware of any Clinton pardon which rewarded a Clinton administration official for stonewalling an investigation into the Clinton administration. Not to put it too bluntly, that's almost a textbook description of "corruption", and it's what the Bush administration just engaged in.

Among Clinton's pardons, perhaps the case which most closely parallels Scooter's (closest I could find anyway) was that of Susan McDougal, who was convicted of contempt of court for refusing to answer questions concerning Whitewater in front of Kenneth Starr's grand jury panel, and who Clinton pardoned on his last day in office. However, prior to being pardoned McDougal had served her entire 18-month sentence. The pardon did not save her a single day of incarceration.

Scooter, needless to say, won't spend a single day inside a jail cell. He is not out a penny of the $250,000 fine he just paid, that will come from the same donors who contributed over $5 million to his defense fund. He won't suffer for being unable to practice law, as he will easily command $25,000 or more per appearance on the speaking circuit for some time, and after can find a safe home in some right-wing think tank, waiting out time until President Bush can pardon him on Bush's last day in office.

No, Scooter won't suffer. Scooter knows that, the President knows that and, most importantly, every other member (and former member) of the current administration also knows that.

Why would any current or former member of the administration hesitate to perjure themselves or, at least, refuse to answer questions, even in the face of contempt charges, after it has just been clearly demonstrated that, ultimately, they will suffer no serious consequences for their actions? The clear implication is "good soldiers" will "be taken care of", and far better than our actual soldiers are once they return home.

In providing amnesty for Scooter, El Jefe said he did it because the sentence was "excessive". as has been well documented, there was nothing at all excessive about Scooter's sentence. Even some conservatives admit the only thing extraordinary about the case was not the degree of punishment but, rather, who was involved.

Only the course of events will let us know if the message Bush sent to future witnesses will turn out to be the most "extraordinary" part of the entire affair.

A bite to choke on

The immigration bill failed in a senate vote today, 53-46. The result is not a huge surprise, although Framer, despite predicting it's ultimate failure for weeks, found the final margin to be wider than he anticipated. Kudos for him for being on top of this from the get go. In particular, he noted early on the level of Democratic unhappiness with the bill (which did not get wide media coverage), and in the end 15 Democrats voted against it.

While the bill tried to provide something for everyone to like, it ended up providing something for everyone to hate instead. The border-wall bunch hated the entire route to citizenship proposal, and were concerned the enforcement provisions in the bill would never actually be ... well ... enforced. Given our history of (not) enforcing existing provisions, you can't really say their fears were unfounded.

Liberals, meanwhile, ended up seeing the provisions for guest-workers as a means to create an underclass within the labor force. Also, I suspect (as I noted before, and Framer did as well) there was a lack of enthusiasm for Democratic lawmakers to vote for a bill the President was so openly hoping to see come up for his signature. For anyone "on the fence", throwing the President such a lifeline when his popularity is at near-historic lows would have been a strong disincentive for voting in favor of the bill.

The vote outcome itself just reinforces how weak the President's position has become -- does anyone really think if this bill had come up for a vote three years ago, it would not have passed? I would say this really hurts the Bush administration, except it's hurting so much already how much more does yest another setback, even one of this magnitude, really mean?

So the status quo remains, which everyone seems to agree is not working, but which most everyone seems to prefer to the recently scuttled alternative. Apparently everyone felt things really could get worse after all. So what's next?

X4mr suggests trying to break the bill up into smaller chucks, focusing on pieces that might be passed. I am not sure I see this as being any better though. Both sides of the debate aren't going to give something to the other side without getting something back in return, of course ... so pieces have to be tied together. "I'll trade you more border security agents for a route to citizenship" for example. The problem is, certain pieces become very intertwined -- border agents, increased capacity to hold aliens, etc., and it may not make sense to pass some parts without others ... but then if a bigger chunk for one side gets proposed, the other side demands more in return, and the whole thing becomes too big to swallow again.

So the whole thing gets tabled, for this year at least, and it's hard to see either side agreeing to anything next year, when what looks to be a very heated Presidential race moves front-and-center. I expect it will be 2009 before we see the matter seriously addressed again.

Meanwhile, maybe we can all focus on something less divisive, such as impeaching Darth Cheney.