Not All the DOJ Missing Emails Are Missing 656
Hylas sends us to Democracy Now for a newscast on the missing emails, an interview with investigative journalist Greg Palast. Here's Palast talking about the fired US attorney from New Mexico, David Iglesias: "Iglesias believes the real reasons for the firings are in what are called the missing emails, emails sent by the [White House political advisor Karl] Rove team using Republican Party campaign computers, which Rove claims can't be retrieved. But not all the missing emails are missing. We have 500 of them. Apparently the Rove team misaddressed their emails, and late one night they all ended up in our inboxes in our offices in New York City." This story has had zero play in the US media; it's been being carried on the BBC.
Fortune (Score:4, Funny)
Greg Palast's history (Score:5, Informative)
Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:5, Informative)
He investigated the contract Jeb Bush gave to a company to filter out from the voter rolls the people who had no right to vote. He got their listings printed, and found out that they had prevented tens of thousands of african-americans from voting for no legal reason! As everyone knows african-americans almost always (95%) vote for the democrats. That is how the 2000 election really was stolen, and all US corporate media boycotted what he found, which only aired on the BBC.
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=greg+
For more great videos by Palast about the 2004 election and more:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=greg+
Also do a serch on emule for other exclusive materials.
Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:4, Funny)
Seems about right to me.
Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:5, Insightful)
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Of course, the connections won't be disclosed as it would damage the ongoing investigation on his crimes.
Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:4, Informative)
If you don't think the U.S. doesn't have any real journalists you should check out Countdown with Keith Olbermann [msn.com] on MSNBC. He's interesting, energetic, and covers stories that are rarely mentioned in the major news cycle. His special comments are also some of the best moments in modern TV news history:
Wikipedia entry [wikipedia.org]
Special Comments [youtube.com]
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For all the of the fun Olbermann has on his topics, and the opinion he has of O'Reilly, Olbermann is NOT a Liberal. It's just that Truth is often mistaken for Liberalism.
Olbermann is just reporting the facts. And O'Reilly is blowing chunks out of his ass.
This is kind of like saying; Between Nazis and Democracy -- somewhere there is truth. Yeah, like right next to Democracy. Anyone sane and rational right now is labeled a Liberal Extremist. If you happened
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Before we heap too much praise upon him (Score:3, Insightful)
Being a critical thinker means approaching what others say with a skeptical eye, ev
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Then, of course, people started digging even more and found out that Jeb Bush didn't give any contracts out - the ChoicePointe contract was awarded by Ethel Baxtor (D)), the director of Elections in the Florida State Department. They also foun
Nice try. (Score:5, Informative)
You can't have it both ways. So which is it?
I'll tell you. You're pulling a "Choicepoint" by omitting things from the story. Yes, Ethel Baxter (D) created the felon list (and since you claim felons vote overwhelmingly for Democrats, she must have been thinking about her sworn election office duty instead of her party), but a very important change was made by the Republicans: the decision to allow false positives. Under Baxter's rules, doubt over the status of a voter removed them from the list. With the new Republican guidance, you could now stack the list. (Wikipedia has more. [wikipedia.org])
This isn't a partisan issue: either you're for fair elections, or you're not. We should attack every instance of fraud, regardless of who is skewing the system.
And when you're "debunking" the BBC of all sources, you should provide some of your own of similar stature.
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The concept of "paying one's debt to society" no longer applies in the USA. That's why felons are stripped of numerous rights and privileges. The consequence of this is an underclass that cannot obtain good jobs, cannot affect the political direction of the country, and which can only defend itself if it breaks more laws.
This is wrong in every sense of the word
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"... and all US corporate media boycotted what he found, which only aired on the BBC."
Maybe that's because it's all ... uh ... hmm ... what could it be ... I dunno ... could it be ... BULLSHIT?!!
Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:5, Insightful)
Would you believe that we want fair elections, and that we don't give a shit whether its the Democrats or the Republicans fucking it up, we want it to stop?
Tit for tat is for 4 year olds.
Waaah.
Grow up.
Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:5, Interesting)
If that isn't the most crass, scummy tactic to keep Dems from voting, I've never seen worse. The Dems have certainly had their corruptions (hello, Mayor Daley), but I've never seen them resort to ANYTHING as underhanded as what Republicans do on a regular basis.
Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:5, Informative)
In 1979, the Supreme Court declared that students could vote in either their "home" (i.e., parents') district or the school district, whichever they declared as their "residence".
This decision had significant effect in a lot of college towns, where the town governments changed from conservative, anti-student to much more representative of the population in the 1980 elections. I remember this pretty well, because I was a student in Madison, Wisconsin at the time. Before this, the city had a government run by student-baiting right-wing conservatives. They were replaced by a "left-wing, hippy, communist" gang that really improved things in general, and who got re-elected overwhelmingly in subsequent elections because of the good job they did (while assiduously baiting the right-wingers at every opportunity
Of course, politicos still try to persuade students that they have to vote "at home", but this has no basis in law. It's purely an attempt to discourage students from voting where they live most of the year.
You can find a good number of descriptions of this Supreme Court decision by googling for the obvious keywords.
Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:5, Informative)
DOJ found very few cases of voter fraud in 5 years (Score:4, Interesting)
"In 5-Year Effort, Scant Evidence of Voter Fraud"
By ERIC LIPTON and IAN URBINA
Published: April 12, 2007
excerpt:
"Federal prosecutors in Kansas and Missouri successfully prosecuted four people
for multiple voting. Several claimed residency in each state and voted twice.
United States attorney's offices in four other states did turn up instances of
fraudulent voting in mostly rural areas. They were in the hard-to-extinguish
tradition of vote buying, where local politicians offered $5 to $100 for
individuals' support.
Aside from those cases, nearly all the remaining 26 convictions from 2002 to and
2005 -- the Justice Department will not release details about 2006 cases except
to say they had 30 more convictions-- were won against individuals acting
independently, voter records and court documents show."
In other words, Democrats did not have an organized campaign to skew the elections like certain other parties....
Re:DOJ found very few cases of voter fraud in 5 ye (Score:3, Insightful)
So the criteria for Democratic party wrongdoing is Justice Department convictions? That doesn't seem to be your criteria for Republican party wrongdoing. Or were you talking about some other party when you said "an organized campaign to skew the elections like certain other parties" (emphasis mine)? I'm not saying that there is or isn't some sort of larger conspiracy in either party's voting
DOJ investigates 9 Democrats per 2 Republicans (Score:5, Informative)
Consider this from a Paul Krugman column dated, 3/9/2007:
"Donald Shields and John Cragan, two professors of communication, have compiled a database of investigations and/or indictments of candidates and elected officials by U.S. attorneys since the Bush administration came to power. Of the 375 cases they identified, 10 involved independents, 67 involved Republicans, and 298 involved Democrats. The main source of this partisan tilt was a huge disparity in investigations of local politicians, in which Democrats were seven times as likely as Republicans to face Justice Department scrutiny."
Then consider that with such intense scrutiny by Attoney Generals who "played ball" and didn't get fired, there was found only a handful of 'vote fraud' cases.
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Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:4, Insightful)
If you're going to steal an election, it's best to cover all your bases.
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Re:Greg Palast's history is even better (Score:4, Insightful)
I think that ultimately we're at fault. We complain that politicians aren't honest, but when they are honest, we won't vote for them.
Politician A tells it like it is: we've got a deficit, so you need to cut spending, raise taxes, or both. Politician B gives us a fairy tale: sure we've got a deficit, but I'll spend more AND lower your taxes, and it will all work out! So who do we vote for? Politician B. We buy into his fantasy because he promises what we want: a free lunch. Then it turns out that we're faced with exactly the situation Politician A, the realist, said we faced: we have to make sacrifices, and we can't get something for nothing. There are no free lunches. And then we get all surly and say what a bunch of liars politicians are. Politicians tell the people what the people want to hear- not what the people need to hear- because that's who we elect.
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How do you figure? Won't most people who would be voting for a "now-independent but formerly-Republican" be Republicans themselves, thus weakening the actual Republican candidate?
My first thought (Score:4, Insightful)
from the article:
We went through the 500, and what we found were this massive plan to deny the right to vote -- I mean, extraordinarily targeting African American soldiers sent overseas. They'd send them a letter to their home address. The letter would come back. They say, "Gee, they don't live there. They shouldn't be allowed to vote."
This rings false to me -- the military supports the republicans in a MUCH higher percentage than the average citizen. I doubt very much that there was a master plan to stop soldiers from voting by the party who would benefit from them the most. Two words: Colin Powell. Also, I doubt very much that soldiers are incapable of answering snail mail or fulfilling their duties by taking care of business, and doing what they need to do to legally vote while stationed overseas.
Secondly, I have no problems with anyone challenging the residency of voter -- honestly, I'd like a little MORE confirmation of who is voting (but not how). We've heard the "voting from the grave" stories, and other crazy things -- and there is no doubt in my mind that both parties would do ANYTHING to win -- and I really mean anything. If one of the thing that reduces voter fraud is the checks and balance of one side making sure the other is honest -- fine. Did the republicans only challenge likely democrats? Well DUH! They're not going to challenge people who are likely to vote for them. Same thing for EITHER party. I don't see this as indications of fraud either.
Third -- I also disagree with the analysis of Mr. Iglesias. The fact that Tom Cruise played him in a movie is so incredibly irrelevant that I can't believe it was mentioned. He was the US Attorney!!! He should have set up a sting operation the MINUTE he suspected there was a conspiracy to commit voter fraud! Edmund Burke said all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. Here was a man, whose job was to uphold the Constitution, and he sat on his ASS when presented with a major conspiracy against the public? Assuming his words are true, his inactions show him to unqualified to hold his office, and although IANAL I believe his inaction as a member of the bar when presented with impending crime is actually criminal himself. Lawyers are sworn to uphold the law (please don't snicker). A lawyer is an officer of the court. Perhaps a lawyer could comment on that? Here is a man who we were COUNTING on to uphold the rule of LAW. If what he was said was true he was essentially called up and told "we are planning evil against your constituents." Inexcusable
Finally -- I DO believe that these firings were improper. I know I've criticized the article, but thats because I believe CRITICAL REVIEW MAKES THINGS BETTER. I actually want to see justice here BUT NOT FOR PARTISAN REASONS!!! I just happen to love Justice. And what we need is for more people who love Justice to fight against the people on both sides of the aisle who don't.
I also believe that it's complete bullshit that the emails do not exist ANYWHERE. But enough chit-chat about it -- let's get some search warrants and go find them! Make the people who committed this sabotage of our government pay, because they are more of a threat to us than any terrorist. Government should WELCOME this kind of scrutiny, not try to prevent auditing! I know it doesn't, and I know I'm living a pipe dream. I just keep thinking that someday we'll start voting for people who will actually serve with honor.
Or maybe we have been?
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Re:What's wrong about the firings, exactly? (Score:5, Insightful)
The illegality (if there was any) was in the claim that US Attorneys were asked to break the law, and then fired for not doing so. If there is a WHIFF of illegality, especially in the election process, government should welcome the scrutiny. I'd rather hear Rove and others say "I cannot find the emails, but I will do all in my power to help others recover them."
If there was, as Mr. Iglesias claims, an attempt to coerce him into breaking the law, and it's now coming to light because of his firing, it's worthy of investigation. I do wish he had stood up and counted when it was more relevant and easier to prove, and the fact that he didn't makes me REALLY doubt his story. And in the absence of proof, I believe Gonzales should be completely exonerated. But rather than stonewalling, welcome the investigation. If a (former) US Attorney says that he was approached to be part of a conspiracy to commit a crime, that should be enough to get a search warrant (because conspiracy to commit a felony is also a felony). I take it all with a grain of salt -- this is a disgruntled ex-employee who was fired -- to me the allegation is still serious enough to warrant (pun intended) further investigation
Off topic, the flower thongs you sell cracked me up! I hope they're moving well.
Re:I'm a little skeptical (Score:4, Informative)
FTFA
I must be new here... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I must be new here... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not weird at all. It's actually quite obvious why it's happening. Let me explain it to you:
1) The Republicans are the party of Big Business. They serve the interests of a wide variety of American corporations.
2) The mass media in the US is owned and controlled by a small number of large corporations. Take NBC, for instance. It's owned by General Electric, which is well-known for its "defense" work. Of course NBC won't put up any real opposition to the Republicans, who through their warmaking have no doubt made GE much in the way of profit.
3) The pathetic American education system has rendered most Americans unable to comprehend even their most essential civic duties. The mass media helps with this, by glorifying morons like Britney Spears, essentially all hip hop "artists", and so forth. They encourage most Americans to be as stupid as is possible.
When those three factors come together, shit like this can (and will) happen.
Re:I must be new here... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:I must be new here... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:I must be new here... (Score:5, Insightful)
For fuck's sake, people. Don't bash one party and then automatically revert to the other. You are basically saying "Well, this jackoff didn't work...but I can assure you that this jackoff will!"
The problem isn't the Republicans. The problem isn't the Democrats. It's what BOTH parties have done to rape this country.
You should wear sunglasses next time you come out of that hole in the ground, bud. Wouldn't want you to be any more blind than you already are....
Re:I must be new here... (Score:4, Insightful)
This is the line Nader was running on in the 2000 election.
Republicans suck, Democrats suck, they're both puppets of big business, etc.
Then we got 4 + 3 years of Bush and co.
I'd agree with you that both parties suck, but I think the past 7 years have shown
that one party sucks a whole lot worse than the other, and until we can manage a
massive overhaul of the electoral system (HA!) I think our best bet is to keep
Republicans out of any office higher than local dogcatcher.
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Heay! Some of us own and love dogs you know!
-
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Hey, I hate both parties too. But they're not "equally evil", if that's your point.
That dog won't hunt no more. (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sick of this "there's no difference between the Democrats and Republicans" business. Maybe there should be more difference, but there is one undeniable difference: the Republicans have brought us the most incompetent and corrupt administration in American history, aided by a congress almost to match it. The only modern parallel for incompetence, criminality, cronyism and rashness would be the Palestinian authority under Arafat, and I'm not sure that counts because it wasn't officially a nation.
I'm not saying the Democrats are angels, or that they have the best policies for America. But they've never delivered a government that was so poorly, criminally, or tyrannically run as that of the modern "Republicans". I put "Republicans" in quotes because I don't think they deserve the name of the party of Goldwater.
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They've been in the past, under Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, and for two years under Clinton. While that position did not exactly improve their character, they've never went on such an orgy of spending, power grabbing, and favor granting we saw from 2001-2006.
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Justice Brennan was an extreme liberal, and he was appointed by Eisenhower. In any case, Republican appointees or not, they have to pass the consent of the Senate. Sandra Day OConnor was a careful, case by case jurist who can't be readily pigeonholed, but she was nominated by Reagan, a strong conservative and approved by a Democratic senate. David Souter, appointed by Bush I, generally votes with the liberal wing of the court; Thomas, also appointed
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No, the problem is legislation, legislative agendas, and use of government powers, that violate the Constitution.
The very purpose of the court system is to uphold the law of the land, and the highest law of the land is the Constitution. Congress does not have the power to pass a bill into valid law if that bill is contrary to the Constitution. They can vote
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The result: we will be paying much, if not most of our taxes in the future to pay creditors. Mainly China. How does that make you feel?
We may as well talk actual numbers. (Score:5, Informative)
By comparison the top tax brack for most of the years of the "Reagan Boom" was 50% at around $170K or so, dropping to 28% at $32K under Bush.
These figures are not adjusted for inflation by the way.
The MEDIAN household taxation rates during
the Reagan budgets (1982-1989): 17.9,17.5,18.0,18.1,18.0,17.6,17.9,17.9
Bush HW (1990 - 1994): 17.9, 17.6, 17.4, 17.3,17.3
Clinton (1994-2001): 17.3, 17.3, 17.3, 17.4, 16.8, 16.9 16.6,15.3
Bush (2002-2003): 14.8, 13.8, 13.9
Note that each president's first year in office is under the prior president's budget.
Overall taxation rates dropped slightly during the Clinton years while the median taxation rate went down consistently and the top quintile rose significantly. Under the Bush administratio, there has been a substantial drop in effective taxation at the median income, but curiously only a slight drop is seen in the top quintile. The big tax breaks go to a tiny, tiny sliver of the top quintile.
This basically paints Clinton as overall a slight tax cutter who shifted the burden to the top quintile. Bush is a dramatic tax cutter who cut median and ultra-high income tax rates.
Ideal America vs. Real America (Score:3, Interesting)
Does no one else find it not only weird...
If we had accountability, the terrorists would win. You don't want the terrorists to win, do you?
I believe Benjamin Franklin said it best when he wrote,
Those who would sacrifice their freedom for temporary security are on to a damn good thing and should never be questioned.
Things are improving somewhat since the clusterf*** that is Iraq got so bad as to be undeniable. Compared to around 2002 when just about anything could be passed in the name of security and even the opposition party was scared to speak out lest they be accused of helping the terrorists win, things have got a lot better.
Even so, a lot of people are living w
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Regarding the firings, the Democrats are behaving true to political form (which is to say, behaving exactly like the Republicans would behave if the roles were reversed) and objecting to President Bush's administration doing something that the law and political convent
You and your grandpappy are wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
The Attorney General (Alberto Gonzalez) serves as an appointee of the President. You've got that much right. However, the Attorneys General that were replaced are appointed by the US Attorney General whose office is charged with serving the interests of the Judicial branch of the US government, not the Executive branch. While the US AG may serve at the pleasure of the President, he is not expected be beholden to the partisan interests of the President. The US AG is supposed to facilitate the enforcement of that the Legislative branch's checks (i.e. laws), not to place attorneys who kowtow to the will of one party or the other.
I am an American.
Another non-story about presidential lawbreaking (Score:5, Informative)
While they are political appointees they do not occupy political positions. Supreme Court judges are political appointees too. They can't simply be yanked off the court by the president if he or one of his friends loses a court decision.
To get on the Supreme Court, a nominee has to be approved by Congress. Ordinarily that applies to U.S. Attorney nominees as well. (Even though they serve "at the pleasure of the president".) Specter's little Patriot Act amendment put an end to that. So now the president can simply fire a prosecutor if he or one of his friends get prosecuted, replace him with whomever he likes, and nobody can say a thing.
Now we have people in the president's own party demanding that his prosecutors bring bogus charges against their political opponents, rushed in time for elections. (Historically prosecutors have usually waited until after elections to avoid tainting them.) We have people in the president's own party having the prosecutors investigating them fired. We have prosecutors being replaced by guys who compile lists of registered voters in minority districts for mass voter challenges. We have prosecutors being replaced for investigating real crimes instead of wasting their time harassing voters with imaginary "voter fraud" cases. We have a Department of Justice that launches more than six corruption investigations of local Democratic politicians for every single investigation of a Republican. If you think this is a "non-story" you're out of your mind.
Separation of Powers? Anyone? (Score:4, Informative)
The reason this _should_ be an issue is the principal of separation of powers has been sodomized by the current administration.
During the Clinton administration, there were just four people in the White House -- the President, the Vice President, the White House Counsel, and the Deputy White House Counsel -- who could participate in discussions with the Justice Department "regarding pending criminal investigations and criminal cases." There were just three Justice Department officials authorized to talk with the White House. This arrangement was intended restrict political interference in the administration of justice.
Yesterday in his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said that it was important that the Justice Department "be independent from" the White House. But as Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) pointed out, the firewalls that had existed during the Clinton administration have been ripped down. In the Bush administration, the rules have been rewritten so that 417 White House officials and 30 Justice Department officials are eligible to have discussions about criminal cases.
I copied this whole-cloth from http://thinkprogress.org/2007/04/20/whitehouse-go
Re:I must be new here... (Score:5, Insightful)
Iglesias fired for active Navy duty (Score:3, Interesting)
But apparently in TA those days off were spent serving active duty in the Navy, something workers are legally protected from being fired for. Supposedly.
I suppose GWB should have picked a better reason.
Re:I must be new here... (Score:5, Informative)
Nice troll. Too bad it's not correct.
You are correct when you say the US Attorneys serve at the will of the President. Bill Clinton, when he came into office, fired all 83 US Attorneys and replaced them. So did Reagan and Bush, Sr.
Bush, however, not only did not do that, he waited until two years into his second term to fire eight attorneys which he had previously appointed!
Further, as is now becoming clear, the firings were not for performance reasons, but political reasons. In one case, the attorney was told he was being fired to make way for a former aide to Karl Rove. In another case, Iglesias, he was specificaly told his firing was not for performance reasons but political [thinkprogress.org] yet the White House and Gonzales kept saying, and still say to this day, that the firing was for performance issues.
As Iglesias said on Fox Noise, and as the transcript above shows, he asked for and was given permission to use the DOJ as a reference. If he was fired for performance reasons, why bother to give him a recommendation?
So what we have is an Attorney General who has been lying under oath about an incident which he apparently knew nothing about even though he heads the department. Let's see, lying under oath, can't recall information, doesn't know what's going on. Why does that sound familiar?
Keep up the trolling. We need the laughs.
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Apples and oranges. Bill Clinton, like his predecessors, cleared out everyone from the previous administration regardless of the political leanings of the people. There were both Republican and Democratic attorneys who were fired. This is standard procedure, as of late, for any incoming president.
What Bush and Gonzales, and apparently a few senators, have done was to fire people becaus
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Political firings are NOT ok (Score:3, Insightful)
Here's the problem: firing US Attorneys because they don't toe the line of the party in power will damage the idea that the judiciary is independent of the executive and legislative branch.
Nobody had an issue with 8 US Attorneys being fired. The shit only hit the fan once it came to light that the firings might have been motivated by political considerations - what's worse, that they might have be
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Simple.
Re:I must be new here... (Score:5, Informative)
If you don't care about this now, you better not be bitching when a Democrat is President and the tides turn...
Re:I must be new here... (Score:4, Insightful)
If the attorneys were fired because they didn't help Republicans win elections, that's a problem, and a story, whether legal or not. Plenty of people get fired for doing things that are legal but incompetent or wrong. Plenty of people are held accountable even if they aren't fired. This goes near to the top of the Executive Department, and you say it's a non-story simply because it's not strictly illegal on the bare face of it?
Also, there is a good chance that there was illegal activity involved. If they were fired in order to obstruct prosecutions, intimidate prosecutors, or to cover up corruption, then guess what? They were likely illegal. Don't always believe what the mouthpieces of the administration are telling you.
So administrations in their second term are not to be held accountable for anything they do? That's what you're saying, and it's a crock. First, all the information about it needs to be brought to light. Did you forget that others besides the president are involved, and some of them plan to stay in politics? If anything untoward happened, it's our right to know, and it's our duty to use that information as we see fit.
In summary, you're repeating the propaganda of the administration mouthpieces who want us to believe it's a non-story. At its heart, the attorney firing issue is not about firing a few attorneys -- it is about corruption and twisting the purpose of the attorney general's office to electoral politics.
Re: I must be new here... (Score:5, Interesting)
(Actually, it might be worse than that. Iglesias was fired because he wouldn't obey a senator's demand to prosecute innocent people for political gain. Of course, the Rove House didn't want to admit that, so they fired him for missing too much work - a violation of Federal law, since he missed the work due to being on active duty with the US Navy.)
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Let's say it was legal and above board. Fine. Even if they were fired for political reasons. OK. The president is a political entity, he can do politics.
Know what's also legal? Congress investigating actions of the executive branch, holding hearings, questioning interested parties. If you thi
Purge is a gateway to Voter Fraud cases. (Score:4, Informative)
That case and many more like it, are the real issues. The things that will send people to jail. The hearings over the 8 that were fired have two goals: 1) a Perjury trap for Gonzo (who has done a remarkable job of avoiding them at the cost of all of his credibility) and 2) grounds to pull up more internal documentation (the missing emails). The theory being that the hearings over the purge is the crack in the Cadberry egg that will let us get to the gooey caramel middle.
-Rick
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Actually, RTFA. The reason cited was "too many days absent from office". But those days off were for active duty in the Navy. Supposedly you guys have a law that says you can't be fired for being away from work for active duty in the military.
GWB could have fired Iglesias for some other reason - he picked the wrong one.
Hmmm (Score:4, Insightful)
Excuse my naiveté, but wouldn't leaking one or two of these supposed e-mails do more to boost Mr. Palast's credibility than just claiming he has them?
Re:Hmmm (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Hmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/05/10/br
Mr. Palast's credibility is top-notch as far as I'm concerned. He always dares to cover stories that everyone else is too scared to do. Look at the wonderful work he's done cornering Goldfinger and vulture funds. Poor kids in Africa are likely to have an education, healthcare and food thanks to his courageous work. Kudos to him!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/6
Re:Hmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Why are they talking to Karl Rove? (Score:4, Insightful)
OK, so if all the emails were lost it stands to reason that they were all stored in one place either the same storage system, or in the same facility. So where are those backups, on-site and off-site.
And what about archives? Wouldn't they run an archive at least once a year for safekeeping?
Where are the sysadmins and what are they saying about the incident?
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Re:Why are they talking to Karl Rove? (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't envy anyone in that role. In a given day I wear lots of different hats... checking/sending e-mails to/from the very same people using different mailboxes based on the context of the communication, and whether it's being paid for. I might have a thread going with someone because of a contract we're both working on, and want to leave a trail in a corporate box to help track that project. But we might also have reason to talk more off-line over the prospects of another gig, or to strategize a bit on how we want to talk to/about someone who overlaps with our other (directly for pay) communications. Very easy to have some messages go through the wrong channel sometimes. Same reason Gore picked up his White House office line to raise cash, and same reason some staffer might be having at least some of the e-mail exchanges that help a boss shape a political posture on the retention of a politically appointed employee (say, a US attorney) through more than one e-mail system.
Karl Rove doesn't, and shouldn't have to know squat about how the plumbing works. No more than Al Gore would know how the PBX that handles his oops-I-used-the-wrong-phone-line fund raising calls works. If the first thing Rove heard was, "sorry, we don't save mail from those other accounts," then that's what he's going to repeat. You'll notice he's not chiming in on the details of it, or expressing an expert opinion on it... not to be confused with politically opposed congressional reps who make thundering speeches about how it's the 21st century and there's no such thing as un-retrievable e-mail. But... I host mail for some of my own tasks, and once the backups have cascaded through the fairly short retention time on a separate volume, they're GONE, baby. Even if a sound-bite-generating congressman says otherwise.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe I'm missing something here, but isn't the entire point of the Gonz
Must be the "liberal" media at work. (Score:5, Insightful)
This can only be the work of the so-called "liberal media" in the US that we hear so much about. Look at those leftist, socialist Commie bastards protecting the interests of their right-wing Republican friends. Oh, wait...
Re:Must be the "liberal" media at work. (Score:4, Insightful)
It aims to make a buck, and it aims to protect the current system it lives in. If it can make a buck by dissing the right, it will do so, if it can make a buck by dissing the "left", it will do so. In this case, they obviously don't see any money to be made from the story, so they aren't following it.
(And, the media in the US might be "left-wing" compared to the US, but it is right-wing compared to, for example Europe. And in Australia, two of the five TV channels tend to be neutral (can you guess which two? I'll give you a hint, they are funded by the government (at least to a certain extent)).)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:So Why Is This On Slashdot??!!! (Score:4, Insightful)
Why "so interesting"? As nerds we do our own research and we don't fear on command, this Bush admin is crap, total crap and those of us who are living in the real world have paid a price for HIS mistakes while he has profited from them (like Haliburton stock). Have you flown anywhere or been to another country lately? Airports look like jails and the world uniformly hates Americans. Have you checked the value of the US dollar? Has poverty been reduced? Do you have any friends in the military who have died in the last four years? Have you had your research dollars reduced or eliminated? Have you needed the National Guard? Add that to all the favors done for the Saudis and now back at home it looks like the most qualified US attorneys, some who happen to have worked on felonies perpetuated by elected officials (remember The Dukester?) are fired mid-term (which is unusual since Bush appointed them in the first place) and it looks like the next election will be overseen by people who have graduated from the worst college in America and a few of the key attorneys come right from Karl Rove's office. Important enough for you?
AC? Grow a backbone.
Re: So Why Is This On Slashdot??!!! (Score:3, Informative)
Why is slashdot so interesting in this one political story, instead of all the more important ones going on?
Technology Bites Politicians Again seems apropos for a nerdnews site.
Seems slashdot likes to get political only when it involves those evil, nasty Republicans.
It's hardly Slashdot's fault that Those Evil Nasty Republicans have been the only party with enough power to do much of anything for the past six years.
Do you think the Democrats will fare better on Slashdot when (if) they recover power?
Have you been submitting stories about IT biting Democrats in the ass, and getting your stories rejected?
Not quite accurate editorializing... (Score:5, Interesting)
Democracy Now [democracynow.org] airs in the US on quite a few small local stations (I listen to it on my ride home from work every day) as well as a few satellite channels.
Of course, everyone seems to completely ignore it, even though so far they have a pretty much spot-on record regarding the evils of the current administration... They broke the "secret prisons" story about two years before the mainstream media caught on; Regularly discussed Abu Ghraib and detainee torture at least six months before we all started "Doing the Lyndie"; Private jet chartering for illegal renditions to have prisoners tortured by third-party countries, 18 months before anyone cared (and still, even now that everyone stopped caring despite the practice continuing).
But then, ya just can't trust them tinfoil hat types, right?
Palast has more interesting things to say (Score:5, Interesting)
It Has Had Some Play In the USA - But Not Much (Score:3, Insightful)
The blogger had this to say: Put simply, this stinks. Earlier this months, Sen. Pat Leahy (D-Vermont) subpoenaed (http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/05/leahy_s
The Bush administration continues to openly flaunt their complete contempt for the laws of this country. Bring respect back to the White House my ass.
Is there any proof at all? (Score:3, Insightful)
Did anyone read the article? (Score:3, Informative)
This article was written as a joke, and it appears that someone pulled out a choice quote and submitted it as news. What's next, The Onion?
Cruise/Bacon dialogue because it's a TV transcript (Score:3, Informative)
The Cruise/Bacon dialogue was there because it's a TV transcript. Obviously the BBC thought the viewer would be more "captivated" if they included shots of Tom Cruise playing one of the US attorneys who was fired.
So the movie dialogue is there because of sensational TV editing.
If you read the article right through you'd find the official stats on 2004 election showed 3 million
I expect better of slashdot (Score:3, Funny)
Secondly: I expect much better from my "geek news site". This article is flat out crap. Are the editors paying attention or did they just let their personal biases get the better of them to the detriment of the website?
The technical question (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm a biologist who does mathematical methods stuff - so this is not my area. But what we (you) *should* be discussing is: how can we prove that the e-mails are (or are not) genuine?
Presumably, whitehouse.org has saved all of the routing information for the e-mails they kept. Can we use that information - along with whatever still lives in the logs of the intermediary routers, to at least verify that the e-mail was sent from the addresses claimed in the headers? That doesn't absolutely prove that whitehouse.org didn't mess with the content - but it'd be enough to satisfy me, at least.
Not All the [DOJ] Missing Emails Are Missing (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm from a [former] Newspaper family and have a "dog in this hunt".
If our information systems are compromised/co-opted we'll become instruments of mis/dis-information and a tool of our New Overlord, which, of course, we would then welcome.
Hard evidence of this is slowly revealing itself, and in turn being suppressed by the very power intrusted to serve the people.
It's the definition of "news" that has been jeopardized, along with the right to know.
It's a transcript (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Considering the source I'll wait (Score:5, Insightful)
For example?
This story strains credibility
In what way? That it suggests that Karl Rove would lie? How is that straining anything?
The entire scenario is more than a little far fetched
Politicians do this sort of thing all the time.
unless you're automatically predisposed to hate Karl Rove.
You don't have to be predisposed to hating Karl Rove, he's such a cunt that it's impossible not to; but that's not really anything to do with the believability of this story of everyday political shenanigans.
I'll wait for a better, more credible source.
Like what? One that agrees with your strangely innocent view of politics?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Phhht. I stopped listening to you right there, since you're either trolling or deluded. That's an extraordinary claim. Where's the proof?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Why Does This Matter (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Some mail will be failed to be delivered because the person doesn't live there anymore, they refuse to sign for the mail, they weren't home during delivered, etc, etc.
On election day you wait for those who have their registered mail returned to cast a ba
just perjury and obstruction of justice (Score:3, Informative)
1. pete domenici (r-nm) tried to force attorney generals to indict democrats for voter-fraud
2. alberto gonzales (ag) almost certainly lied under oath
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/19/opinion/19mon4.h tml?ex=1331956800&en=dfab854c91a51b4b&ei=5088&part ner=rssnyt&emc=rss [nytimes.com]
http://www.gregpalast.com/investigative-journalist -greg-palast-reports-on-the-firing-of-new-mexico-a ttorney-david-iglesias/ [gregpalast.com]
http: [tpmmuckraker.com]