Prosecutors Ranked on Loyalty to Bush before Firings

Fristies!
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"Who does the President think he's F'n kidding?" --Keith Olbermann

http://www.self-gov.org/quiz.html http://tinyurl.com/dw846
http://www.geocities.com/tthor.geo/debasedmoney.html

I believe that our Heavenly Father created the monkey because he was disappointed in man." -- Mark Twain

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&fo...

WHY CAROL LAM WAS THE "REAL PROBLEM": CORRUPT GOP FUNDED PHONY DEFENSE COMPANIES! $700 MIL!!

Just so you know, Josh Marshall, Joe Cannon, the San Diego paper and I have investigated this scandal and it really leaves all the others behind in significant ways, although lying to take us to war takes the cake.

Because this was nothing less than a quiet coup our democratic system. The Republicans criminally conspired to take over this country illegally. And they did it -- in style, with hookers.

Because the US Attorneys firing scandal has now become intertwined with the Phony Defense Company Scandal of Jerry Lewis, Duke Cunningham, Porter Goss and the entire GOP membership of the Defense Appropriations Committee. In all, about 15 to 20 more Republican Congressmen would have been indicted for being involved with Lewis and Cunningham on all those criminal earmarks.

INCISIVE reporting on this NEW development at the link above.

"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable. " -John F. Kennedy

http://www.gregpalast.com/bush-hit-woman-behind-prosecutor-firings-has-l...

Bush Hit-Woman Behind Prosecutor Firings Has LONG History of Purges to Protect Bush

by Greg Palast
from the original reports for BBC Television and the Guardian (UK)

The Mister Big behind the scandal of George Bush’s firing of US Attorneys is not a ‘mister’ at all. The House Judiciary Committee has released White House emails indicating that the political operative who ordered the hit on prosecutors too honest for their own good was Harriet Miers, one-time legal counsel to the President.

But this is not the first time that Miers has fired investigators to protect Mr. Bush.

In 1999, while investigating Governor George Bush of Texas for the Guardian papers of Britain, I obtained an extraordinary, and extraordinarily confidential, memo to the US Attorney’s office in Austin. It disclosed that, in 1997, Governor Bush secretly suggested to the chairwoman of the Texas Lottery Commission that she grant a contract to the client of a Bush ally.

The Governor’s back-door demand to the Lottery chairwowan was not so easy. Bush wanted the Lottery to grant a multi-billion dollar contract to GTech Corporation. But GTech hadn’t even bid on the contract - and a winner was already announced.

There was only way for the Chairwoman to carry out the fix: fire the director of the Lottery who had discouraged GTech from bidding because of its history of corruption.

The Chairwoman, Harriet Miers, did the deed: fired the Lottery director; Miers then ignored the winning bid — and gave Bush’s favored company the contract, no bidding, in perpetuity.

Miers and the Draft

Neither Miers nor President Bush have ever denied the contents of the memo [I’ve posted it here] despite repeated requests from the Guardian and BBC Television.

Bush’s attempt to appoint Hitwoman Harriet to the US Supreme Court in 2005 surprised many. Not me. Miers, personal and governmental lawyer for George Bush, had quite a file on her boss, and he must have been grateful for her discretion.

Most crucially, she knew why Bush so desperately needed to give GTech the lottery contract. The heart of the matter was the then-successful cover-up of the Bush family’s using its influence to get young George Bush into the Texas Air National Guard and out of the Vietnam war draft.

The memo to the US Attorney reads:

“Governor Bush thru [name withheld] made a deal with Ben Barnes not to rebid because Barnes could confirm that Bush had lied during the ‘94 campaign [for governor of Texas]. Bush was asked if his father … had helped him get in the National Guard. Bush said no he had not, but the fact is his dad call then-Lt. Gov. [Ben] Barnes ….

Is a good thing, more so when the precedent was set by Clinton/Reno so that they could have their attorneys in place. Plus, what is so wrong with firing someone?

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/3/13/13636/5650

Tue Mar 13, 2007 at 10:08:47 AM PDT

Documents that were turned over to Congress today prove that top Bush Administration staffers were intimately involved in the firings of eight former U.S. attorneys including David Iglesias of New Mexico, disproving the Justice Department’s prior assertion that the White House played almost no role.

The White House has also revealed that President George W. Bush personally relayed concerns that had been shared with him about a number of U.S. attorneys to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales weeks before the firings. Among those who complained to Bush was U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M.

Statements made Monday evening by the White House in conjunction with the release of records are the latest in a series of admissions the Bush Administration has made only after the media or others alleged that prior statements weren’t accurate. That failure to be up-front about information has increased suspicion that the firings were political and has caused the scandal to explode.

Read the article by clicking here.

MORE at the link above --

"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable. " -John F. Kennedy

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/0314usattorneys03...

E-mails cloud reasons for ouster of Arizona's U.S. attorney

Mike Madden
Republic Washington Bureau
Mar. 14, 2007 12:00 AM
WASHINGTON - Arizona's former top federal prosecutor was not on the original list of U.S. attorneys the Bush administration wanted to force out, according to e-mails from the White House released Tuesday by Democrats in Congress.

The messages also show that top aides to President Bush were closely involved in the decision to oust eight U.S. attorneys last year, including Arizona's Paul Charlton. White House aides approved detailed plans for the purge, according to the e-mails, which were turned over to the House Judiciary Committee by the Justice Department and the White House.

Congress is investigating how and why Charlton and his colleagues were pushed out in December. The lawmakers are looking into allegations that some were forced out for political reasons or made to step aside to get rising Republican stars into the prestigious jobs.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said Tuesday that his chief of staff, Kyle Sampson, who orchestrated the purge, had resigned. But Gonzales will keep his Cabinet post despite calls from Democrats for his own resignation.

"I acknowledge that mistakes were made here," Gonzales said. "I accept that responsibility. And my pledge to the American people is to find out what went wrong here, to assess accountability and to make improvements so that the mistakes that occurred in this instance do not occur again in the future."

At first, Justice Department officials said all eight federal prosecutors were replaced because of concerns about their performance, but they have since changed their explanations, saying some were issues of policy.

Some of the e-mails released Tuesday appear to contradict the administration's public statements: The messages detail reasons for Charlton's dismissal that do not match those outlined by a top Justice Department official, who told a House subcommittee last week that Charlton was targeted over his stand on death-penalty cases and his views on whether to tape interviews with suspects. The e-mails suggest he was removed over marijuana and obscenity cases.

Charlton declined to comment on the e-mails Tuesday.

Democrats said they will seek to interview former and current White House and Justice officials, including President Bush's top political adviser, Karl Rove, over allegations that some of the prosecutors were forced out because they were investigating Republican lawmakers or because they were not pursuing similar cases against Democrats.

Charlton's office had opened a preliminary investigation into land dealings by Rep. Rick Renzi, R-Ariz., last fall. No charges have been filed, and Renzi denies any wrongdoing.

"U.S. attorneys have always been above politics," said Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., the Senate's third-highest ranking Democrat. "And this administration has blatantly manipulated the U.S. attorney system to serve its political needs."

White House officials said Tuesday that they had only signed off on the list of U.S. attorneys to be fired, not decided whom to include on it.

The records released Tuesday show White House officials had inquired about replacing all 93 U.S. attorneys when Bush began his second term in early 2005.

But aides at the Justice Department said that would be impractical, and officials instead started looking into firing a handful of U.S. attorneys in February 2005.

On a list created late that month, Charlton was listed with no recommendation to be fired or retained but rather as one of a group of prosecutors who "have not distinguished themselves either positively or negatively."

By mid-September 2006, Charlton's name appeared on a list of U.S. attorneys "we should now consider pushing out," said an e-mail from Sampson, Gonzales' aide, to Harriet Miers, then the White House counsel. The messages don't provide much of an explanation.

The only issues raised in the dozens of e-mails between top Justice officials and White House lawyers focus on his unwillingness to prosecute an obscenity case and his decision not to prosecute most marijuana-smuggling cases near the border unless loads of more than 500 pounds were involved.

A Justice Department aide defended Charlton's marijuana policy in a message to White House officials, acknowledging the limited resources available to border-state prosecutors.

Then-House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., had questioned the prosecution strategy in a meeting with Bush, White House aides said in the messages.

The e-mail complaining about Charlton's approach to obscenity charges was sent to Sampson after he had decided to replace Charlton.

Prosecutors in Arizona did pursue an obscenity case after the Justice Department encouraged them to do so, said Ann Harwood, the first assistant U.S. attorney for Arizona.

"I'm not sure if this is the one they wanted us to take or if there was another one," she said.

Nowhere in the hundreds of pages of e-mails does anyone in the administration raise concerns over Charlton's policies on the death penalty or taping of FBI interviews, the only reason officials have given publicly for pushing him out.

The messages also show how quickly fortunes can change in high-stakes political jobs.

Two of Charlton's colleagues who were later pushed out, Kevin Ryan in San Francisco and David Iglesias in New Mexico, were recommended for retention in early 2005 as "strong U.S. attorneys who have produced, manage well and exhibited loyalty to the president and attorney general."

Yet by December, Iglesias was forced out, just months after Republican Sen. Pete Domenici and Republican Rep. Heather Wilson called him to complain that an investigation into corruption charges against state Democrats was moving too slowly.

"Domenici's (chief of staff) is happy as a clam," deputy White House counsel William Kelley said in an e-mail to Sampson in December.

"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable. " -John F. Kennedy

Firing your OWN PEOPLE when they question your ethics or the legality of your actions. Just how is that going to spread freedom? Please, all you Hitler Youth. Enlighten us poor, godless libs.

The scary bit is, you could still get the fascist society you seem to want.

(Formerly Liberal Traitor--Liberal isn't treason anymore!)