U.S. Attorney General Resigns

willie3204 is one of many to mention that U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has resigned. One of Gonzales' main opponents praised his decision stating that: "'For the previous six months, the Justice Department has been virtually nonfunctional and desperately needs new leadership,' said the Schumer statement. 'Democrats will not obstruct or impede a nominee who we are confident will put the rule of law above political considerations. We beseech the Administration to work with us to nominate someone whom Democrats can support and America can be proud of.'"

Comments

i didn't think much of ag ag

[circletimessquare]

until i heard that story of him rushing to the side of the previous ag, john ashcroft, who was ailing in hospital, himself no friend of the rights and freedoms americans hold dear, and the bastard was seeking an extension of the secret wiretapping program from a sick man:

In a December 2005 article[31][32] in The New York Times, it was revealed that the NSA was eavesdropping on U.S. citizens without proper warrants. This led to an investigation by the Office of Professional Responsibility in the Justice Department. This investigation was shut down after the President[33] denied investigators the security clearances necessary for their work. Some critics have alleged that the President did so in order to protect Gonzales from the internal probe.[34]

According to May 15, 2007, testimony by the former deputy attorney general, James B. Comey to the Senate Judiciary Committee (as reported in the New York Times[35]) on the evening of March 10, 2004, Mr. Gonzales and Andrew H. Card Jr. (then Mr. Bush's chief of staff) tried to bypass him by secretly visiting Mr. Ashcroft. The purpose of this dramatic middle-of-the-night visit was to reauthorize the secret wiretapping program, which Comey (as acting AG) had refused to reauthorize. (Mr. Ashcroft was extremely ill and disoriented, Mr. Comey said, and his wife had forbidden any visitors.)

" In walked Mr. Gonzales, carrying an envelope, and Mr. Card. They came over and stood by the bed. They greeted the attorney general very briefly, and then Mr. Gonzales began to discuss why they were there, to seek his approval for a matter. I was very upset. I was angry. I thought I had just witnessed an effort to take advantage of a very sick man who did not have the powers of the attorney general because they had been transferred to me.[36] "

Comey's testimony laid out that "contrary to Gonzales' assertion, there was significant dissent among top law enforcement officers over a program Comey would not specifically identify."[36] He added that some "top Justice Department officials were prepared to resign over it."[36]

it takes some effort to make john ashcroft look like a brave defender of american's freedoms. and ag ag did that, by acting like some sort of blitzkrieg operative for the extension of capricious and dubious powers. all very shady, all very slick, all very despicable, and forever afterward in my mind ag ag was worthy of not just resignation, but prosecution and punishment

now it looks like, like a previous white house operative (ag was the general counsel of gw bush in texas), that he's just the fall guy for his higher ups. resigning and taking the heat that rightfully should lead to dick cheney, karl rove, and gw bush

i'm not one for impeachment, it's a radical act, but i'm wondering where all the self-righteous a-holes who were ready to pillory clinton for whitewater and getting a blowjob from an intern are on the subject of gw bush, (or iran-contra, for that matter). or is it just a partisan game to get the other team at all costs, regardless of any actual judgment of the scale of wrongdoing?

personally, clinton could have had roman orgies on the scale of caligula in the white house. compared to what bush has done to this country's image in the world, orgies in the white house ranks as an impeachable offense a couple of orders of magnitude below what the shocktroops of chicanery the gw bush team has given us

gw bush: the usa's worst president, ever. he's just a moronic drunk rich kid. he wasn't even rightfully elected by the will of the american people. can you imagine how different things would be on the world stage today if al gore was in the white house?

the 2008 elections cannot come fast enough

Re:Tough Position

[cybermage]

Lets assume for one moment, before he took this position that he was a good lawyer. But to be led by a man who has destroyed so many other reputations is no easy task.

Gonzales has been with Bush since Texas. That's how long his poor judge of character has been in place.

As for him being a good lawyer, that's hard to say. I'm more concerned about whether he's an ethical and moral lawyer, which he is not; and, that didn't start when he took the AG job. Remember that it was Alberto Gonzales that convinced the president that the Geneva Conventions prohibiting torture were "quaint" and don't apply to the U.S. We have the detentions at Guantanamo of "foreign combantants" and the suspension of Habeas Corpus for Americans suspected of ties to terrorism because of him.

Gonzales was amongst the crew strongarming former Attorney General John Ashcroft in the ICU to approve the warrantless wiretapping program. The polital firings of U.S. attorney's is just the last straw on a big pile of straws.

Re:Thank Talking Points Memo.

[alfredo]

It is normal to replace all the USA's when a new president takes office. What made this different was they went after Attorneys that were not partisan enough in the cases they took. Inglesis refused to speed up an investigation to indict a Dem before the election. He refused to be influenced. If you saw the movie "A Few Good Men" Tom Cruise played the part of Inglesis. Yes, that story was about him.

Carol Lam was the one who put Cunningham in prison. She was working her way up the chain of command and was getting too close to the Whitehouse and Pentagon.

One of the new USA's replacing Cummins was the man who crafted the caging lists that denied black soldiers their right to vote in 2004 and 2006. He went to the Pentagon and found what black soldiers were deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. They then sent a "do not forward" letter to their stateside post. When the letter was returned, they used that letter as evidence to challenge their votes. vote caging is illegal.

The USA's that remain are to a man, people who enforced caging lists, voter roll purges, and brought politically motivated cases timed for greatest effect at the polls. The calls of voter fraud was just a cover for their own illegal acts.

No matter what side of the political spectrum you my land you should be concerned when the Attorney General's office becomes a political arm of any party.

I want an AG that is loyal to the law, not the president. Even the much maligned Janet Reno was a far sight better than Gonzales. She went after Clinton with the same gusto as a Republican.

Re:slashdotliberalwinning

[Pojut]

How about slashdotliberalwinning , to signify that we finally are?

Shit like this really REALLY pisses me off.

Right, Left, Rebulican, Democrat...we are all AMERICANS. When will you people get that through your thick skulls?

There are no "teams" here, people. We are all in this boat together. The more of you that put a letter after your name, the more this country falls apart.

The "team" nature that this country has become obsessed with is the marking of our downfall. People like the person quoted in this post are the EXACT reason why this country is fucked. It's not because he is for the liberals or because he is for the conservatives...it's because he is declaring a "side" as "winning".

The instant you do that, we all lose.