Is There A Special Prosecutor In Our Future?
By Nicole Belle Thursday Aug 07, 2008 8:45amOh please, oh please, oh please, oh please...
Our very own Murray Waas has been looking into the possibility:
I have two new stories on the Huffington Post- one this evening and one from yesterday- about the various investigations being conducted within the Department of Justice of the firings of nine U.S. attorneys and the politicization of the Department.
What is clear from both, as well as whatever scant other information we have been able to glean about what investigators are focusing on, is that they apparently are not shying away from examining the role and conduct of the White House- in either the initial White House role in firing the U.S. attorneys- or as my story tonight shows- also the role of White House officials in working with senior political Bush administration appointees to provide misleading information and testimony about the firings to Congress.
I have no inside information about whether a criminal investigation or a special prosecutor's probe will derive out of the current probes by Justice's Inspector General and its Office of Professional Responsibility. (I either don't have sources that good, or that ones that might talk to me aren't telling.)
But based on what investigators have been looking into, the possibility that a special prosecutor might be named to investigate the U.S. attorney mess might not be as remote as one might have thought.
It still appears much more unlikely than not that one would be named, but with the conduct of so many White House officials being scrutinized, the possibility for one being named for the first time appears to be a threat to the Bush administration. Read on...
Of course, it could just be another sternly worded letter too. However, it is becoming increasingly clear that those aspen roots are deeply, deeply tangled throughout the Bush administration and there is definitely a movement afoot to look at this much deeper than they have before.
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Funny, when I started reading the post I was wondering which scandal a special prosecutor might be appointed to look into. There's just so many. Actually that's not funny, it's sad.
Hmm... Why am I not optimistic...
Ah, yes, the old aspen roots. May I suggest Hemlock?
the truely sad thing is many americans have extreme doubts that the bush co. criminals will ever face justice. after so many crimes, so many lame attempts at accountability and nancy and Harry still running the show with impeachment "off the table" i have a difficult time getting the least bit excited that any of this will change.
One special prosecutor probably won't do it, we need a Jeffersonian revolution.
This will never happen. The Bush WH has a lockdown on the DOJ, the FBI and the CIA (and Congress, it could be argued). With only 5 months of their term left they will do everything they can to derail any serious investigations into their criminality. If McSurge is elected certainly nothing will happen and if Obama is elected he will consider it all "politics of the past". I do predict that Obama, if elected, will be impeached before the end of his term.
Apparently Monica Goodling can get off scot-free because she no longer works in that department. Something is just so wrong about that. Of course something is just so wrong about everything that happened in that case.
theWalrus @ 6:
Impeached? Huh? Is this coming merely from a sense of irony?
theWalrus @ 6:
Impeached on what grounds?
Miss Larissa thinks that Mukasey already has brought in their professional cover-up guy for all of this:
Brian A. Benczkowski
Nikola @ 8:
No. I seriously believe that Republicans will find *something* to impeach Obama on. They will be hyperactive and hypersensitive to anything he does and working with the Media will find, if not create, some sort of "scandal" upon whcih to begin impeachment hearings. *That* will be the final irony to the Bush legacy.
theWalrus @ 11:
So it is irony. Sadly, it often works that way:P
Forasmuch as I'd like to see a Special Prosecutor be appointed, it's not going to happen.
Obama will avoid it, at all costs.
theWalrus @ 6:
An interesting conclusion, and not one I can argue with. It's become the Republican way.
No, there isn't.
No newly fledged Preznint will EVER presume to prosecute her/his predecessor, no mqatter the evils done, because by doing so s/he would establish the precedent which would CERTAINLY await them at the end of their tenure...
woody, tokin librul @ 15:
Oh poo, if Clinton was a precedent of any sort Bush would've been more careful wrecking things.
Mary @ 13:
Well, Obama had better realize which side of the bread his butter is on. He's losing ground as we speak by not going on the offensive enough. Shit. More right wing judges.
For a lot of this..... wait until 2009..... what is the point of accusing someone to have it overturned or forgiven.....
WIN FIRST.... SPOLIS AFTER
Nikola @ 16:
You're not paying attention...Please read my comment again. Clinton was impeached to take impeachment off the table, and as payback for Nixon. He was NOT prosecuted retro-actively, after leaving office, but the Busheviks.
There's a donation campaign going on to further the cause of accountability: holding Congressional incumbents accountable for not holding the executive branch accountable and/or making it more difficult for even the people to hold them accountable. Take a look.
woody, tokin librul @ 19:
He was impeached to take impeachment off the table? How is that? I understand that you meant retroactive prosecution, but Bush was supposed to be wary of Congress then, no? Though, I suppose, "everything changed after 9/11".
Nikola @ 12:
They will attempt to impeach Obama and there will irony galore.
The neo-cons purpose is to destroy government but they have no sense of irony.
They have many enablers in the Democrats.
GOP has balls
People loved Clinton and did not wanted to impeach him but they did any ways.
Every one hates Bush and we want to impeach him but the won't
Irony anyone?
Some parts of the DOJ have had the grit to take on Ted Stevens the iconic GOP Senator, though perhaps there is some realpolitik involved where the people who could have derailed the investigation did not want to waste their support on someone so long in the tooth and already extremely vulnerable*mdash;I expect that to the GOP "loyalty" is much like the rest of their Potemkin "principles".
*GOP has balls
People loved Clinton and did not want to impeach him but they did any ways.
Every one hates Bush and we want to impeach him but the won't
Irony anyone?
Nothing will be done to this white house in anyway, shape, or form. They have covered the tracks of illegal activities in a cover of mismangement so thick that it would take a staff of 1000's to even scratch the surface. We all KNOW that they are crooks and liars, now try and prove it. Until a high ranking person in the admin talks, we will only have bits and pieces of proof to go after them with. Loyality is #1 with this admin so I don't see any of them talking anytime soon, then there is the whole not wanting to go to jail thing that will keep them quiet. I really hope that I am wrong on this, but I doubt it.
my tinfoil offer:
if any investigation gets underway and proves any kind of threat at possible legal accountability to the bushies, there is no way in hell barack obama will be able to assume the presidency.
and i suspect a little false flag operation to ensure it.
After what the country has been through for the past almost eight years, I doubt anyone would have the stomach for an impeachment of a new president. There are too many skeletons in the republicans closet for them to take a chance on any exposure. They don't want to stir up anything, especially if they are in the minority.
pissed off patricia @ 28:
What does minority mean anyway?
They own the media, they own everything. They'll just choose issues that''ll get them back to power in 2-4 years. That's assuming Obama doesn't get swift-boated right now.
So, remind me, which departments of the government *weren't* improperly politicized over the past eight years?
The departments that have Rove taint all over them include DOJ, DOD, EPA, FDA, DHS, GSA, NASA etc. Some group needs to start a website just to keep track.
How about this one for special prosecutor?
http://inspirationinc.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/church_lady.jpg
BIG DEAL.
There's only 3 months to go before the election. By the time a special prosecutor is appointed and the investigation is under way, Bush could be gone.
The letter from the White House Waas speaks of, denying Rove's involvement in the US attorney filings, was sent to the DOJ a year and a half ago. Why on earth has it taken the Democratic congress so long to investigate it?
Why was impeachment taken "off the table" to begin with? How f*cking noble and wrongheaded of them. How can you take part of the US constitution "off the table"? The Repubs sure as hell will go for impeachment whenever and however it suits them.
john j @ 23:
No, perma-press.
Remember these?
http://www.shaunsayre.com/70s/fads/leisuresuit.jpg
as nice as it all sounds, i'm not holding my breath.
pelosi has made her position more than clear.
the cretinous bastards will walk.
i can only hope they all get reamed before they leave this mortal coil
ok @ 30:
Dept of the Interior - See Guns in Parks
Dept of Labor - See lowering of pollution control standards in workplace
I'm sure if you search though all the cabinet-level deptartments you will see Roves taint all over, my only question is if the taxpayers will get a refund from the salary that WE paid him for 6 years
One of the many pieces of post-Shrub cleanup legislation needs to be a new and improved independent prosecutor statute. This incarnation needs to have some safeguards to make it more difficult—but nothing is perfect—to abuse as it was during the Clinton administration. The new legislation should also make it possible to trigger it from outside the Federal government; for example, if some significant percentage of the state legislatures request an investigation. The whole problem with our current system of checks and balances is that if the Congress is not doing its job the executive will almost certainly run amok. Big money and strong national parties can become so powerful that they effectively wash out local input into the election process; these two firces have hijacked the state initiative process's creating initiatives to serve both out-of-state interests and nationally partisan purposes.
karen marie @ 34:
Why you naughty girl you.
I love it when women talk dirty.
The pattern of lies is consistent throughout the scandals indicated by the deeds of this mis-administration. Plamegate, U.S attorneygate, abuse-of-authoritygate, et al, all lead to Rove and Cheney. Imagine growing up to have a career as a lier. And as taxpayer paid liers, paid to lie against your own government. Amazing! Follow the lies.
When the mid-level small fry start facing prosecution, they'll turn on their "masters" in a flash. There'll be a few who'll go the Liddy route (e.g., the Scooter) but come January when they know no pardon is likely to be forthcoming, most will make like canaries—some might even find that they do have a troubled conscience after all: look at McClellan.
It's gotten so bad in the Bush regime that it's too much to believe and therefore we can't/won't believe it. Therefore it's passed over because we can't absorb it, or get excited anymore.
Therefore, the Repubs new strategy is to promote an exposure-a-day to wear us down and get major crimes hidden in the forest of crimes.
Cynical enough?
Dream on. Not on this planet.
Start with waterboarding the executives that attended Cheney's energy task force!
Obviously, impeachment proceedings should have begun right after the November 2006 elections, followed by War Crimes trials. The level of apathy in the country amazes me. Ron Suskind's new book is remakable and we now know that documents were actually forged to get us into war. What is the general response? Yawn.....
As Jack CAfferty said on CNN yesterday:
If any Republican can overcome the wretched stain of eight years of George Bush and win the White House, we deserve whatever bad things will happen to us.
Ron @ 42:
Err, I mean putting them under oath.
What would Zeus do? @ 39:
The problem is that the "smoking gun" has been destroyed a long time ago, so it will come down to a he said/she said argument and that wont wash in court, at least in a case of this importence. Now if one of the small fry has kept some of the evidence that was to be destroyed, we might, MIGHT, have something to prosicute on. The main problem is that almoet all of what they did was by word of mouth with no paper trail to follow. These people are dumb in exicution, but very, very smart in the cover-up. IMHO the best way to get them is to do the old watergate theme "FOLLOW THE MONEY", but when you have the banking est in cahoots with the admin, it becomes a near impossible task.
karen marie @ 34:
They can use this:
http://mscdirect.com/CGI/NNSRIT?PMPXNO=1994105&PMT4NO=0
ysbaddaden @ 37:
The right tool for the job:
http://mscdirect.com/CGI/NNSRIT?PMPXNO=1994105&PMT4NO=0
Sorry about the double post. C&L acting funny today.
Are they doing site work dear Site Monitors?
At this point in the game a special prosecutor is about as useless as the popes balls...one can only hope that the guilty parties in the BushCo administration will have justice done upon them one way or another once they've retired to Paraguay...
If something actually comes of this, I'll eat my words, but this will mean all of two things, jack and shit, and jack left town with a large crowd years ago.
Ron @ 44:
Today in Bizarro they had authorities Ouija boarding a prisoner.
Michael "Gonzo II" Mukasey will never go after any of the White House officials for anything. This story sounds nice, but Hell hasn't frozen over yet and I haven't seen any pigs flying yet, so I doubt that there will be any special prosecutors until January 21, 2009.
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