Justin's Thursday Political News 07.26.07

Posted by Justin Baragona on 07.26.2007

Alberto Gonzales pisses off the Judiciary Committee yet again, Bush gives more rationale for the Iraq War and I discuss Michael Savage and his obsession with Nazis one more time.

Welcome to yet another edition of Justin's Thursday Political News. Some of you may have noticed already, but I unfortunately did not participate in the latest round table discussion regarding the Democratic hopefuls for President. The main reason behind this faux pas is that last weekend I had softball playoffs on both Saturday and Sunday. While we dominated the St. Gerard Church league (how about that, an atheist playing in a church league….who woulda thought?), I did feel a slight twinge of guilt in not joining my fellow 411 writers in grading the candidates. However, I was able to drown that guilt in the free beer that the parish provided for winning the championship. Well, now that you know how my weekend went, I think I should provide you with some news.



Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) said the following to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday:


"How can you say you should stay on as attorney general when we go through exercises like this? You want to be attorney general, you should be able to clarify it yourself."


Once again, Gonzales appeared before the Senate, and once again, he completely infuriated the panel members his statements and his lack of accountability. While the above comment shows that a Democrat had some harsh things to say to the Attorney General, it was not entirely contained within party lines. Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) also had some stern words and pointed questions for the long-time Bush friend. "The constitutional authority and responsibility for congressional oversight is gone," said Specter. "If that is to happen, the president can run the government as he chooses, answer no questions." Then, after making that statement, Specter looked right at Gonzales and said: "The attorney general has the authority to appoint a special prosecutor."

Basically, the main thing that upset the committee this time around was the explanation they received from Gonzales about his visit to former Attorney General John Ashcroft back in 2004 when he was in the hospital and his powers were temporarily given to James Comey. Back in May, Comey testified that Gonzales and then White House Chief of Staff Andy Card visited Ashcroft after he was recovering from gall bladder surgery to pressure him to recertify the Bush wiretapping program before it expired. Comey had already told Gonzales and Card that he would not extend the program as there were questions that it was imposing on civil liberties. It was at that time that they decided to see if they could convince Ashcroft to write off on it, despite him being incapacitated.

Gonzales explained to the committee that he only went to Ashcroft because members of both parties in Congress asked him to. Also, he did not ask Ashcroft anything because he could see that he was not able to comprehend anything at the time, and he merely left after he realized that. He stated he was not trying to take advantage of Ashcroft in his condition. It seemed to many members of the panel, however, that Gonzales was being vague and unclear about his explanation on why he visited Ashcroft, as his reasoning seemed to shift. He seemed to place the blame on Congress on why he was even there and he stated that he just wanted to see if Ashcroft was aware of Comey's objections to the program and if he had made his own decision. Specter finally got fed up with Gonzales, which led to this exchange:

Specter: How can you get approval from Ashcroft for anything when he's under sedation and incapacitated? For anything?

Gonzales: We would not have sought nor did we intend to seek to get any approval from General Ashcroft if in fact he was not fully competent to make that decision.

Specter: I'm not making any progress here.

Of course, Specter wasn't the only one who had issues with Gonzales' statements, past or present. Schumer also had some heated words with the Attorney General. Schumer asked Gonzales questions about the surveillance program, as he was wondering if Gonzales gave misleading testimony back then when he stated that nobody in the administration disagreed with the operation or purpose of the program, especially when it operated without warrants originally. "How can you say you haven't deceived the committee?" Schumer asked. "The disagreement that occurred, and the reason for the visit to the hospital, senator, was about other intelligence activities," Gonzales said. Of course, he would not say what the other programs were. This then led to Schumer's comment used at the start of this column. Is it just me, or is talking to Gonzales like speaking to a child? You will never get the same answer twice and you have to constantly repeat yourself, yet in the end, you get nowhere.




After President Bush made a speech at Charleston Air Force Base justifying the Iraq War because of the presence of al Qaeda there, former CIA director and CNN adviser John McLaughlin had this to say:


"No question al Qaeda in Iraq is an important part of this conflict. But to describe it in just those terms is to describe really a game of checkers when what we're dealing with here is a game of chess. Because we have many other facets to this conflict, including a civil war, including tensions between tribes, nationalists and so forth."



Herein lies the problem; Bush doesn't know how to play chess. The game is just way too complicated for him. He cannot think three moves ahead and his thought process is completely linear and black and white. And that is all perfectly ok…as long as you are not the President of the United States! Actually, I'm not sure if Bush believes or even understands this latest line of bullshit he is trying to heap on us in regards to the Iraq War. As always, he is just trying to do his best to justify the unjustifiable and to make it look like he isn't a complete and total incompetent. From what he said on Tuesday in South Carolina and I'm sure he'll repeat it constantly over the next few weeks, is that the al Qaeda in Iraq is the same as Bin Laden's al Qaeda and that it is imperative that we stay in Iraq to fight them there so we don't have to fight them here.

Really, though, isn't this a complete oversimplification of the problem in Iraq and at worst, makes the President look like a moron because he is actually making a case that the war in Iraq has created more terrorists. Yes, if you look at the case Bush is making and strip it of all of its jingoistic superficiality, then you will see that he is saying that since we have gone to war in 2003, we have actually increased the number of al Qaeda members instead of reducing or eliminating their memberships. He made sure to mention al Qaeda enough times in his speech (93 times total) to drive home the point that al Qaeda was responsible for 9/11, al Qaeda is in Iraq, we are in Iraq, therefore we are in Iraq for all the right reasons. However, I don't think anyone in his administration thought far enough along this chain of thinking to see that the glaring hole is now Bush can be directly blamed, through his own statements, for increasing the terrorist threat against the United States. While trying to use simplistic logic to gain support for his folly of a war, he will most likely see his words be used against him and his idiocy pointed out in the media and in Washington, and his and the war's approval rating will plummet to unbelievable lows. The Democrats better attack his statements like piranha.



White House Spokesman Tony Snow made the following comment to reporters after the President underwent a procedure to see if polyps in his colon were cancerous:


"The president is in good health. There is no reason for alarm."


God dammit.



On the July 20th broadcast of 'The Savage Nation, Michael Savage made these comments about Al Sharpton and Don Imus:


"Well, they lynched him. They lynched Imus, as far as I'm concerned.

They didn't do so, so much for racial reasons, they did it for commercial reasons. They did it A, to shake down CBS, and number 2, they did it because Imus was a more successful talk-show host than they were. They have loser shows on the weekend that no one listens to. Now, how do you move up if you're a talentless demagogue? What you do is you attack talented white men, and you say that we need to have fairness in America, in the American media. So put us in their seats.

This is what was done in Nazi Germany to Jews."



I am only including another segment on Michael Savage because last week he attacked Keith Ellison for comparing Bush to Hitler and here he is this week comparing what happened to Don Imus with the Jews in Nazi Germany. Worse, he also tried to equate it to black men getting lynched in the South in the not so distant past. I just don't think you can have it both ways, Michael. Also, I hate listening to someone rail on about the 'plight' of the white man and how much he has to endure in today's society. Cry me a fucking river. Yes, Savage, the white man is persecuted around every corner in America and has to endure as much, if not more, than the Jews persecuted by Nazis. Or blacks who suffered through slavery and Jim Crow. Poor, poor whitey.



That is going to do it for me this week. A column I think you should check out is from the bossman himself, Jason Easley. He discusses the Democratic debate that showed on CNN/YouTube. I'll be back next week with more news in the realm of politics.