Fox News Sunday: "Where's the smoking gun?"
Download | play 
Download | play (Thanks to Dan and David for the videos)
Sen. Russ Feingold appeared on Fox News Sunday and as a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, was asked by Chris Wallace whether this whole drawn out mess of 8 months and 8500 pages isn't just some political theater...
WALLACE: But you know, I think the question is, is this really going anywhere? Is this substantive oversight or is this political theater?
I mean, the point is on the U.S. attorneys which we're talking about, six-month, seven-month investigation, 8,500 pages of documents, 14 witnesses, and you say yourself as a member of Senate Judiciary you haven't found any hard evidence that the White House has broken the law.
FEINGOLD: Well, I happen to think they probably did break the law here, but I don't think the investigation is over, and...
WALLACE: But do you have any evidence of that?
FEINGOLD: ... until we -- well, that's why we're asking for people like Karl Rove and others to come down and testify so we can actually examine the evidence.
We haven't had access to the evidence. How are you supposed to examine it when you can't look at it?
THIS is political theater? What was the Whitewater investigation? You know, the one that FOXNews cheerleaded through that took six YEARS (not months, Chris), cost $64 million dollars, expanded from one discrete issue to an overarching "truth commission" that could still only nail President Clinton for lying about an extra-marital affair?
Ah, the bliss of rabid partisanship....it means your memory never need be longer than what suits your cause.
Damn- they edited the hell out of that interview. Notice the cuts?
no surprises there, scum asks smarmy lip biter questions intelligent man gives honest answer!
Why does Chris Wallace look like the off-spring of PeeWee Herman and Gumby?
Wallace isn't the worst of them. Although quite obviously a willing and ideologically sound cog in the Republican Faux news machine, he at least asks some searching questions of the repugs from time to time. He'll also make comments such as that he made about asking someone on to defend Gonzo this morning - saying that "there were no takers".
Damn- they edited the hell out of that interview. Notice the cuts?
What's new? Faux Noise and CNN have been cropping the clips to make their argument look better ever since they have been covering politics.
Chris Wallace will never be half the man his dad was and he knows it. This must gall him.
Blogger wanted. Watching Fox News Sunday required.
Now thats hell.
As much as I dislike Faux News, R. Murdoch, O'Liely, et.al,(even C.Wallace), he
did ask a pertinent question. WHY haven't charges(Impeachement or otherwise)
been initiated by this Congress???? Can we survive another 17 months of this
admin. w/all their lies/deception. Get a move on and either shit or get off the pot.
If you call lying to Congress "political theater." Jeesh!
Mike Wallace should have pulled out...
Where's the smoking gun Chris? Up your ass you f*ucking idiot. But you're too full of shit for anyone to want to venture a look. (Mike Wallace has to be embarrassed to have turned out a TURD like that as his child).
Where's this going Chris? Not where Whitewater, travelgate and dozens of other Rethug fishing expeditions went.
This is going to INVESTIGATION, INPEACHMENT, TRIAL, CONVICTION, REMOVAL FROM OFFICE and then TRANSFER to the International War Criminal Court in the Hague, Netherlands.
If the Dems have the balls; so far they don't.
They don't even have the smarts to boycott FAUX RETHUGLICAN NEWS as they should. No Balls.
every day Faux uses junta talking points from "Western White House" to "war on terror" chyron during Iraq coverage. Wallace is a whore's whore
Watching the Democrats create a "reality" over the last 6 years has been amazing. Even more amazing is the Republicans who buy in to it.
amerikkka jumped the shark
Only saw this clip and not the interview as taped or as broadcast, but a bit disappointed at Russ (as we call him here in his home state) leaving the impression that there is no hard evidence of wrongdoing.
He's right that a lot of evidence is missing because the investigation has been impeded, but: a) withholding the evidence is potential wrongdoing in itself: while there are privileges that may arguably apply, the evidence shows that release of documents were delayed, documents were ordered deleted, and communications traffic was diverted outside of the normal system which maintains and regulates the condict of public officials; b) this is itself potential evidence of wrongdoing of which there is an attempted coverup, since there is a presumption in law that when a party could provide evidence and does not, the evidence would hurt their position (this does not apply when the non-producing party is criminally accused, but it applies in civil court, in the court of common sense, and would apply in an impeachment trial); c) there is evidence of several crimes here -- for example, there are roughly six devises used in employment discrimination law to prove illicit motive (which a Hatch Act or Iglesias' potential claim based on his military service closely resembles), and the record so far shows almost every kind of such evidence (ordinary procedures ignored, comparables treated differently, references in the record to the protected characteristic, defending explanation only appears after the fact, is contradicted, is unworthy of credence, etc.; d) the weakest link in proving some other crimes is proof of illicit motive and, and as a lawyer who works on similar issues, I know, as Russ certainly must, that motive is inherently hard to prove by direct evidence, and hence the law includes various indirect mechanisms of proof, including, in the civil context, the shifting of the burden onto the accused.
If this were a case in the private sector, I'd tell my plaintiff clients their chances of prevailing were red hot.
Doggiebobo @ 9:
It's all about money. And everyone on TV knows clearly who ultimately signs their checks.
VT Independent @ 12:
JJ @ 14:
Haven't you got that backward?
It's a shunder the ss missed wolf blitzer.
Chris Wallace: 'You haven't got the smoking gun! Why are you complaining about the Bush Administration hiding the smoking gun?!'
Only a Fox News host could make an argument like that and safely assume that his audience will buy it.
to me, the smoking gun is the ag repeatedly lying at every turn
if nothing illegal occured....why lie?
The dems need to Abort pelosi & reid .
lol, lol, lol
So, FoxNews is effectively saying:
"We know that Gonzalez is lying, so what's your point?"
U can thank rupert murdock (fucking piece of shit) for bringing the kangaroos to the scotus
and for all the death . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . ..
DickCheneyShotMeInTheFace @ 11:
He used one of those concoms that the repugs say aren't safe. One out of a billion might break. You should see the Bill Maher special.
n.s.a. close my fucking doors after your sneak & peeks . . .
Chris Wallace is currently banging his head against a blunt object after that segment.
Why did Russ Feingold appear on a propaganda network? I don't get that part. Wallace is known to be an amateur, on top of it.
Democrats need to stop appearing on the network of the republican voice. It lends legitimacy to a political entity.
Just Me @ 30:
I agree!
the smoking gun is all around you. chris, you dingbat.
it's wiretapping, it's executive orders and signing statements gone bezerk, it's gonzo, it's the attorneys, it's the war, it's the lies about the war, it's pat tillman, it's torture, it's habeous corpus, it's voter caging, it's the plame affair/treason, it's the manipulation of news, it's the politicization of gov't departments, it's tom delay, duke cunnigham, jack abramoff, its PHONY NEWS, it's tax cut for the rich, it's no bid contracts, it's welfare for the rich, tax cuts for the rich, it's secret energy meetings that divided up iraq before 911,
it's bringing in mexian truckers on american roads to lower the wages, ect ect ect ect ect..............................
Even without a hard crime (although I agree there is probably at least one to be discovered), this is about the deliberate politicization of the justice department, which in my mind qualifies as corruption and violates the Hatch act. It's fine to point out the hypocrisy and gall of Fox News and the right regarding the political theater they brought to Clinton's sex scandal, but there are few Bush admin scandals (plenty to choose from) more worthy of the resources currently being dedicated by Congress. Gonzales and Bush would have men of character like Patrick Fitzgerald replaced with weaselly apparatchiks to advance their political agendas, and that absolutely must be exposed.
When a human dipstick like Chris "I-embarass-my-old-man-every-day-I'm-on-television" Wallace, working for the obstructionista cheerleading network does the "nya, nya you don' have no smokin' gun, ya lousy copper," routine to a classy, serious guy like Russ Feingold it is cringe-chuckliscious. Yo, Chris! There is a huge difference beteween evidence which does not now or has never existed, and evidence which is being consciously, jealously guarded. Ignoring and disregarding subpoenas, blathering on nonresponsively to pointed questions, trying to change the subject back to FEAR! FEAR! FEAR! all the F**king time, these are the reasons and the ONLY reasons why the good guys haven't found the evidence . . . yet. The day is coming like a freight train, Chris.
[Deleted. Take your bigotry to a site that supports same-Sitemonitor]
...
terri Schaivo is political theatre.
This is hardly terri schaivo
..
[Well I can't, because you're banned now-Sitemonitor]
what about the smoking gun in the Ken Starr investigations.It took them over 6 years to find dirt on BC....how soon they forget..
mudshark @ 38:
Republicans have only themselves to blame for this stuff. They created this new wave of inquiries and recrimination when they decided to spend 6 years trying to remove Clinton from office by any means necessary.
I love when the Rethugs. screw themselves over and over.
Fox would claim Capone's only crime was tax evasion. ...and then Hume wouldn't be so certain of that.
Yeah, hearings on the Bush Crime Families criminal activites is political theatre but asking the kind of biased questions Wallace or anyone on Faux would ask are not theatrical in the least, is that what you're asking us to believe Chris? I guess that's why Fuax News viewers are the least informed about real facts and most prone to say O'Saddam Bin Hussein was responsible for 9/11 and all the other misinformation they can come up with!!!
Arroyo @ 38:
agreed..that was my point.But this is just the tip of the iceberg..and if the Dems have any balls at all they will persue this to it's complete conclusion..to include everything from the Tillman coverup to the lies to get us into Iraq...and everything in between.
.
Haven't the Dems learned yet? DO NOT, REPEAT NOT, GO ON FOX.
Dahgrostab'ph-r-i @ 41:
good point...We all know that Hussien hated everyone around him,Syria,Saudia Arabia,Iran,the Kurds,Turkey,that was the way he kept them out of Iraq.To say the he was a co conspirator for 911 is preposterous.
THIS is political theater? What was the Whitewater investigation? You know, the one that FOXNews cheerleaded through that took six YEARS
Cheerleaded? You don't say. The genesis of the Fox "News" show "Special Report" was simply to focus on Whitewater.
A bit hard to gather evidence I would think when people refuse to testify, or thousands of e-mails go missing.
There was no smoking gun in the Nixon admin. until the
tapes got turned over. The same is most likely the case with this bunch.
When the shoe was on the other foot, and Bushco was
listening to our phone conversations, their response to
people who objected was, if you are not doing anything
wrong why worry about it. Our response now should be,
if there is no "smoking gun" what are you worried about?
Come testify and bring the evidence requested, if there was no wrong doing we should be able to clear this up in a matter
of days. Fat Chance!
As for Wallace he has much in common with George Bush,
if he was not the son of someone famous he would be a nobody. He wouldn't make a pimple on a real journalist's
ass.
wellstoner @ 35:
Excellent point. And Faux News has their own political theater. How about Sean Hannity's latest "investigative" reporting on the "murder" of Vince Foster by the Clintons?
Otay @ 47:
Sean Hannity is such a f***ing brickhead.
Is he sleeping with Rupert Murdoch?
How else would a non-talent like Hannity get his own television show?
Wallace's defense "you can't prove a thing without the missing evidence".
Nixon lost a job in '74 over a 15 minute tape gap. That was when one+one still equalled= two.
Political theatre? Chris Wallace grew up in the shadow of his father Mike who was a master inquisitor and report and yet learned nothing.
If this is political threatre, it is a republican neocon production, staged as comic farce.
There is a cast of GOP clowns who do not know truth from a pigs butt and who create unbelievable stories that no one believes and then, they cry how they are soooo put upon. And when you look at the history of politics in this country for the last 30 or so odd years, you find the GOP doing the same thing now as they did in times.
Chris, might I say.......you are comic theatre.
I think Chris Wallace's greatest performance in political theater was when he tried to own Bill Clinton during a Faux News interview - and got his ass handed back to him.
Otay@47...are you kidding me...the Foster suicide?Their not really going to try and drag that back out are they?...I don't watch Fixed News so I'm up to speed with Shammity
ooppss....not up to speed with Shammity
Someone ought to remind smarty pants that FNC is all political theater all the time. The executive branch does not have the right to privacy. In fact, we should probably presume them guilty until they can prove themselves innocent. That is what TRANSPARENCY and OVERSIGHT is all about. Obstructing this investigation by itself is an impeachable offense.
mudshark @ 52:
Yes. That's how impoverished they are. Sad.
I look forward to seeing the news whores and pundits of the U.S. Corporate "News" Media 'brought to justice for war crimes against humanity, for propagandizing a lost war of conquest, for censoring and under reporting the violence wraught by smart bombs and dumb bullets. Pumpkinhead, Tweety, Shit Fumes, regards
How could any empowered and informed member of society still be a Republican or a Democrat? weird!
.
WHY,
I don't know what you mean.
IT'S NOT PARTISANSHIP WHEN THE REPUBLICANS DO IT, RIGHT?
.
mudshark @ 52:
http://mediamatters.org/items/200707260004
Hannity
I used to think that, like the Beatles, each doofus on Fox News had their own distinct personalities. Hannity was the one most likely to fail a test, O'Reilly was the one most likely to become a conspiracy theorist and axe murderer, etc. Now it's hard to say they don't share attributes. O'Reilly is rubbing off on Hannity, for instance. ;)
In any event, the Faux News handlers are really trying to rile up their charges to promote political theater.
Wallace knows good and well that there are far too many "coincidences" to simply dismiss any appearance of improprieties. He's just playing the Faux Noise game because those are the people that pay him. An investigation is not simply an action to bring down a person or persons; it is also there to clear the name of people who may, in fact, be innocent but have a taint of criminality by simple insinuation, association or hearsay. An investigation is supposed to be an effort to get all the facts and what prompts it is a sufficient amount of information that leads a reasonable person to conclude that something just isn't right. For instance, if I hear a strange sound in my home in the middle of the night, I'm going to investigate. Is the sound actual evidence? It might be part of the bigger case for proving the source of the sound and thereby the presence of an intruder. Or it could just be the house settling or a baseball tossed on the roof by the mischievous kid of a neighbor. Either way, I'd be a fool to ignore it and go back to sleep.
His "logic" simply holds no water.
Otay@59..................You would think that 60 to 70 million dollars worth of Ken Starr's investigation would of found something....not to mention all this time since.....hacks, fucking hacks
If you think Hannity doing a story on Vince Fosters death is pathetic, wait and see what happens if Hillary win's the democratic primary. It will be all dirt all day and night by Faux news and the rest of the reichwing controlled media.
mudshark @ 61:
Yeah, more than was spent on the 9-11 investigation.
But just give them 60 million dollars more and they'll prove a conspiracy by Hillary to seduce us with her breasts. You know, it's important in the war on terror, and all.
"Political theatre." Does Chris Wallace have to parrot Bush verbatum? What a maroon.
Chris Wallace is a sniveling whiny bitch.
By the way it now appears that Bush is gearing up for Armageddon as he is giving 20 milion dollars in weaponry and aid to Saudi Arabia and 30 million dollars of aid and weaponry to Israel. This we are being told is to contain Iran of course.
Now the $64,000.00 question is will the Saudi's turn around and arm the Sunni's who will then use these weapons on our soldiers in Iraq? Will they sell them to rogue terrorist groups to attack Israel?
All I know is that when ever our government has armed, trained or given aid to another country it has usely come back to bite us right in the ass. Past examples would be the fighter pilot training of Chinese teenagers at Pensacola, Florida before we entered WWII. These same Chinese pilots were found to be flying the Russian MiGs against us in the Korean War.
Under the Reagan administration we sold chemical weapons to our Iraqi puppet Saddam Hussein who of course would then use them on his own people and in his countries war with Iran. Which would lead to us invading Iraq twice within a decade.
During Afghanistan's 10 year war with the old Soviet Union, once again under the Reagan administration our CIA armed and trained Osama Bin Laden and other "freedom fighters" to help assist the Afghan's. Of course we all know what 20 something years later.
I'd like to know what the rethuglicans and the reichwing media called the Whitewater investigation back then? I imagine to them these were necessary investigations to save our country and civilization.
Fast forward today and with congressional over sight once again being used after a 7 year lapse, investigations are suddenly political theater or political stunts. Sorry you pack of hypocritical assclown's it's called doing one's duty. The rethuglican party are the biggest buch of hypocritical whiners that I have ever seen.
IMPEACH BUSH, CHENEY AND GONZALES!
Mr Mike Wallace, how did you raise such a totally stupid kid? You certainly had enough money to send your kid to good schools and/or hire tutors. You could have hired a nanny or someone if you didn't have the time to instill some morals and values into your idiotic son.
Man, its stuff like this that really pisses me off. They control the debate and steer it toward lies. This is clear bullshit and Wallace, as a responsible journalist, knows that. Or at least he should.
Jo @ 7:
Like George junior vs George senior.
Neocons are unbeleivable. They chide the Dems for pusuing the case and say the Dems have not evidence of wrongdoing. Yet its Bush who is keeping any evidence from them and, therefore, is blocking the investigation.
Shame on Feingold for appearing on Fox.
Just Me @ 29:
Russ, Russ, hon. Unless you were severely edited, which you probably were, why didnt you clean crissy's clock for him?
Where's Clinton when you need him???
Mike C @ 69:
chrissy, a responsible journalist??? you must be thinking of his father, Mike Wallce. chrissy isnt half the man his father is. Hell, he isnt even half the man his mother is. lol
I wonder what Faux Noise's response is going to be if Uncle Rupert's desire to acquire the Wall Street Journal falls through? Will he send down a memo to bash the Bancrofts and the Journal's staff? Would be an interesting conservative cannibal feast.
Where is the smoking gun?
Ahh, they don't show up. Idiot.
Chris, no one stepped forward to defend A G Gonzolez, because he didn't do anything that needs defending! So what do you have Feingold? A smoking gun, anything? Feingold: "ah, ah, we're trying to find something! Anything we can make-up.
Ruthless People @ 70:
Does that mean George Jr. won't be half a shit-stick?
a guy @ 78:
I was wondering if Jo was implying that Bush Sr. was a wit. ;)
Does anybody else on the left think that lying under oath (perjury), even about something that shouldn't have been brought up, is a problem?
Yes, he lied about a blowjob. The issue is that he lied about a blowjob under oath!
The same process applies here. The attorney general has been unable to answer questions about politicizing a department that essentially functions as an arm of the executive. But, now, he's lying under oath about something that, if he just came out and admitted it, would not be impeachable, even if it's deplorable.
I'm a fan of consistency.
That first part was about Clinton.
Russ Feingold ROCKS my freaking world!
I love that man, and I love to love that man.
Jack Jett-Feingold
www.jackejett.com
Democrats should flood the fox networks and counterattack.
I simply cannot argue with a republican; leave alone can't open my mouth about any issues. They are sissy and lack the intellect to make a case.
Grow some brains, repubs!
I think Clinton is a good debater. He should go on Fox one of these days. Ignore Monica Lewinsky's scandal but concentrate on the war on terror and the current policies.
Fox would love it!
How many months was it on the PHONY Clinton scandal, oh I forgot the right only gets excited about boners, sorry. Where in the hell do these pieces of garbage come from.
I'm proud to be able to vote for Feingold.
I would not be at all surprised if he ends up playing a major role in bringing some justice to this administration.
Wallace...FuxNooz hackery at it's best.
With Fucks' News' penchant for the boner-scandals, perhaps AttorneyGate should have a few penises thrown in, to get EVERYONE's attention. Let's start now. Shit, we can even throw in a "Democrat" for the sake of fairness and balance...
LIEBERMAN SUCKED BUSH OFF IN THE OVAL OFFICE.
So says my unnamed senior White House official...Can Chris Wallace DISPROVE it? I think not...
just like in the libby case, the administration stonewalls and prevents the truth from coming out, the repube talking heads on fox and wingnut radio claim there is no evidence so what is all the "theater" about and then claim that we have a non productive congress that is obsessed with invstigations and unable to "do the work of the people" even though the repubes are the reason for the work of the people not geting anywhere. and why, so that rove and his shit spinners can claim in the next election that nothing was accomplished by this "democrat" led congress and they can ride into the sunset having prevented their crimes from seeing the light of day. one thing that can change this of course is MSM doing it's job and calling the repubes out. but unless there are ratings in it, it will not happen.
Fixed News and the GOP's memory is only as long as their dicks.
Note to Russ: This is substantive oversight, not political theater. Also, when someone asks you to list the crimes that Bush has committed, the only thing you need to worrry about is whether there's enough time in the interview to list the crimes. Go for it, Russ.
Comments are closed on this entry