So it's Spring and the who what?
And it’s said this is the time when a young man’s fancy turns to, well okay I’m not young anymore and it’s still cold and I’m the kind of mood that views a budding romance in my life with the same enthusiasm I’d have for a toothache so the less said in this direction the better.
And so it begins - this from AP:
“WASHINGTON - A House panel on Wednesday defied the White House and authorized subpoenas for President Bush’s political adviser, Karl Rove and other top aides, setting up a constitutional showdown over the firings of eight federal prosecutors.”
I would object to use of the word ‘defied’. What this House panel has done is simply use the powers invested in it by the constitution of the United States. It is only W’s I am the decider lord god king of all I see mind set that made this into a crisis.
The House (and we will see about the Senate) has decided not to agree to the absurd conditions that * and his cronies had set for talking to Karl Al and dear old Harriet – i.e. not in congress, not under oath and no transcript can be made. As the New York Times pointed out – why set these conditions if you weren’t trying to hide something. And these people lie, a lot, like all the time, every damn day so not having them under oath and without a transcript to review makes no sense. Fortunately this is not the same congress that when it (slowly and unwillingly) investigated the run up to 9-11 allowed W and Cheney to testify together (onlookers were thrilled that W continued to speak while Cheney drank a glass of water) and so the Subpoenas.
Anyway this will mark the first time W and his gang of clowns has been confronted by something with legal consequences – you don’t answer a congressional subpoena you go to jail. And it could get even nastier – Nixon got in deep for refusing to answer a subpoena from the House and we all remember what happened to him.
So we are going to have yet another fight about executive privilege – however it looks like, and this is not surprising, W and his boys have expanded this idea to where his aides don’t ever have to testify under oath if they don’t wish to – whereas the existing definition of executive privilege is that there are things you can’t ask X about Y not that you can’t ask X any questions at all. And furthermore, Y needs to be linked to affairs of National Security, real national security like war plans and stuff like that not where the vice president is eating today.
This is going to be tough and it is going to take a while – we’re right up to the Supreme Court on this and the stakes are pretty damn high – checks and balances that sort of thing so stay tuned. After all we are dealing with a group of people who think W can have people tossed into jail, their genitals smashed with a hammer and then be held without charge for as long as they want (In Soviet Union called this the Gulag by the way) if that is the desire of the President.
Some other notes on this – WH Press hack Tony Snow was read an editorial he wrote in ’98 trashing Clinton’s claim of executive privilege in re Monica – which was stupid by the way – he of course claims this is different and in some ways it is – for one this is about things important to the future of the Republic like preventing the Attorney General’s office and the department of Justice from being some kind of half assed NKDV and the law being used against the president’s enemies not blow jobs (nothing against blow jobs).
A bizarre note about all this is that at the press conference W expressed sympathy for the dismissed Attorney Generals. Like he didn’t have anything to do with it.
And for those with memories the magic number 18 showed up – this time it’s the number of days gap in the e-mails the Justice Department dumped yesterday – no e-mails between 11/15 and 12/4 of last year (when all the dealing went down) like we weren’t going to notice and ask questions? Yeesh.
Netflix is pretending the films I sent back haven’t gotten there yet – however I do have a film in reserve “voyage to the planet of prehistoric women” which was pretty much bolted together like some Frankenstein monster
The Enemy Below can’t make the open mike tonight while I’m temped to go and do a few covers just to see if I still can I might just make myself a nice dinner tonight and watch a good movie for a change or listen to music even. (While I like the coffee shop – you do need a break from time to time, it’s been like we’ve been living there for a while now)
I had been listening to a lot of classical music over the winter – not sure why but there you are but as spring gets here I find myself putting on the Who of all people – starting with their first album (and whoever told Roger he could sing a James Brown song, you were wrong) let you know what I think as I get to the end.
Peace, Love, People try to put you down
And so it begins - this from AP:
“WASHINGTON - A House panel on Wednesday defied the White House and authorized subpoenas for President Bush’s political adviser, Karl Rove and other top aides, setting up a constitutional showdown over the firings of eight federal prosecutors.”
I would object to use of the word ‘defied’. What this House panel has done is simply use the powers invested in it by the constitution of the United States. It is only W’s I am the decider lord god king of all I see mind set that made this into a crisis.
The House (and we will see about the Senate) has decided not to agree to the absurd conditions that * and his cronies had set for talking to Karl Al and dear old Harriet – i.e. not in congress, not under oath and no transcript can be made. As the New York Times pointed out – why set these conditions if you weren’t trying to hide something. And these people lie, a lot, like all the time, every damn day so not having them under oath and without a transcript to review makes no sense. Fortunately this is not the same congress that when it (slowly and unwillingly) investigated the run up to 9-11 allowed W and Cheney to testify together (onlookers were thrilled that W continued to speak while Cheney drank a glass of water) and so the Subpoenas.
Anyway this will mark the first time W and his gang of clowns has been confronted by something with legal consequences – you don’t answer a congressional subpoena you go to jail. And it could get even nastier – Nixon got in deep for refusing to answer a subpoena from the House and we all remember what happened to him.
So we are going to have yet another fight about executive privilege – however it looks like, and this is not surprising, W and his boys have expanded this idea to where his aides don’t ever have to testify under oath if they don’t wish to – whereas the existing definition of executive privilege is that there are things you can’t ask X about Y not that you can’t ask X any questions at all. And furthermore, Y needs to be linked to affairs of National Security, real national security like war plans and stuff like that not where the vice president is eating today.
This is going to be tough and it is going to take a while – we’re right up to the Supreme Court on this and the stakes are pretty damn high – checks and balances that sort of thing so stay tuned. After all we are dealing with a group of people who think W can have people tossed into jail, their genitals smashed with a hammer and then be held without charge for as long as they want (In Soviet Union called this the Gulag by the way) if that is the desire of the President.
Some other notes on this – WH Press hack Tony Snow was read an editorial he wrote in ’98 trashing Clinton’s claim of executive privilege in re Monica – which was stupid by the way – he of course claims this is different and in some ways it is – for one this is about things important to the future of the Republic like preventing the Attorney General’s office and the department of Justice from being some kind of half assed NKDV and the law being used against the president’s enemies not blow jobs (nothing against blow jobs).
A bizarre note about all this is that at the press conference W expressed sympathy for the dismissed Attorney Generals. Like he didn’t have anything to do with it.
And for those with memories the magic number 18 showed up – this time it’s the number of days gap in the e-mails the Justice Department dumped yesterday – no e-mails between 11/15 and 12/4 of last year (when all the dealing went down) like we weren’t going to notice and ask questions? Yeesh.
Netflix is pretending the films I sent back haven’t gotten there yet – however I do have a film in reserve “voyage to the planet of prehistoric women” which was pretty much bolted together like some Frankenstein monster
The Enemy Below can’t make the open mike tonight while I’m temped to go and do a few covers just to see if I still can I might just make myself a nice dinner tonight and watch a good movie for a change or listen to music even. (While I like the coffee shop – you do need a break from time to time, it’s been like we’ve been living there for a while now)
I had been listening to a lot of classical music over the winter – not sure why but there you are but as spring gets here I find myself putting on the Who of all people – starting with their first album (and whoever told Roger he could sing a James Brown song, you were wrong) let you know what I think as I get to the end.
Peace, Love, People try to put you down
posted by Unknown at 9:52 AM
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