Impeach Gonzales Now

   By way of the Daily Kos comes this little post on the remaining options for dealing with Bush Crime Family and their refusal to speak under oath and on the record about the prosecutor purge.

Kuttner: Impeach Gonzales

by Kagro X Sat Mar 24, 2007

Me: OK.

Instead of responding to lawful subpoenas, President Bush has invited congressional leaders to meet informally with Karl Rove and other officials involved in the prosecutor firings, with no sworn testimony and no transcript. Rove narrowly escaped a perjury indictment in the Cheney/Libby/Wilson affair. You might think these people had something to hide.

After the administration refused to cooperate, Republican Senator Arlen Specter inadvertently gave the best rationale for impeachment. Referring to the White House invocation of executive privilege, Specter warned, "If there is to be a confrontation, it's going to take two years or more to get it resolved in court."

Exactly so. By contrast, an impeachment inquiry could be completed in a matter of months. The White House, knowing the stakes, would find it much harder to stonewall. And Gonzales might well be asked to resign rather than exposing the administration to more possible evidence of illegality.

In refusing to cooperate, Bush puffed himself up to the swaggering truculence that has worn so thin, declaring, "We will not cooperate with a partisan fishing expedition." But this investigation is hardly partisan, since several Republican senators and congressmen have called for Gonzales to resign. And if there were ever a legitimate subject of full congressional investigation, tampering with criminal investigations on political grounds is surely one.

Warm up the machinery with the low-hanging fruit.

There aren't many more options available for dealing with an "administration" that claims there's no Constitutional authority for Congressional oversight. This one has the added benefit of live demonstration of the point.

 

Technorati tags: Alberto Gonzales, impeachment, US Attorneys, purge, subpoena

News On Saturday Night

"He has always been straightforward and honest with me. So, unless there is clear evidence that the attorney general deliberately lied or misled Congress, I see no reason to call for his resignation."   Sen. Orrin Hatch ( R-Utah ) said  in a statement which he issued in support of Alberto Gonzales. Remember him? He's the United States Attorney General who seems to have a penchant for lying at times.

   If Hatch doesn't see any reason for Gonzales to step aside, I would like to suggest that he make an appointment for an eye exam as soon as possible and he may want to learn how to read emails which show that Mr. Gonzales did okay a plan to move ahead with prosecutor's termination at a meeting that he attended on November 27. 

Rep. John Conyers ( D-Mich. ) : "How much scrutiny do we have to put behind everything the attorney general says? I know he's busy, and he could have done things that he didn't remember, but we're going to give him as much rope as he needs."     AP

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CIA Still Waits For New Interrogation Rules

New York Times ( Subscription Required )   |  Posted March 24, 2007

A sharp debate within the Bush administration over the future of the Central Intelligence Agency's detention and interrogation program has left the agency without the authority to use harsh interrogation techniques that the White House said last fall were necessary in questioning terrorism suspects, according to administration and Congressional officials.

The agency for months has been awaiting approval for rules that would give intelligence operatives greater latitude than military interrogators in questioning terrorism suspects but would not include some of the most controversial interrogation procedures the spy agency has used in the past.

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Al Jazeera    Saturday, March 24, 2007

Iraq hit by more suicide bombings

   Suicide attacks across Iraq have left at least 50 people dead, as armed groups appeared to be stepping up a campaign against those seen as collaborating with the US and the Iraqi government.

In the worst attack a suicide bomber killed at least twenty people and wounded twenty six at a police station in Dura, a mainly Sunni district in Baghdad.

Officers said the dead included 14 policemen and three detainees as well as three others working in the building, while another 26 were wounded.

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Al Jazeera   Saturday, March 24, 2007

Christian church rises in Arabia

By
John Terrett, in Doha, Qatar

Work has begun on the construction of Qatar's first purpose-built church in the desert outside Doha, the country's capital.

Although the country's native inhabitants are entirely Muslim - and are prohibited by law from converting to another faith - the new Catholic church will cater to the large number of Christian migrants who have come to the Arabia Gulf state in search of work.

Costing about $15m, the new church is being constructed outside Doha, Qatar

Roman Catholics from all over the Arabian Peninsula - many of them migrant workers - are helping to pay for the $15m building, which is scheduled to open at the end of the year.

Overseeing the church is Paul Hinder, the Catholic Church's Bishop of Arabia. A Christian in the heart of the Muslim world, his diocese is the entire Arabian peninsular, encompassing six countries.

 

Technorati tags: Orrin Hatch, Alberto Gonzales, DoJ, John Conyers, CIA, Iraq, Sunni, Arabia, news