Gonzo's gone

Just heard the news this morning...

Washington Post:

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales announced his resignation today, ending a controversial cabinet tenure that included clashes with Congress over the firing of nine U.S. attorneys and over the use of warrantless wiretaps in the war on terror.

About time!

Gonzales will step down on Sept. 17. In a brief statement, he called his 13 years in public service a "remarkable journey," but he gave no explanation about why he chose to resign now after resisting months of pressure to quit.
...
"I do not find your testimony credible," Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) told him flatly in a July hearing on the surveillance program.

"Under this Attorney General and this President, the Department of Justice suffered a severe crisis of leadership that allowed our justice system to be corrupted by political influence," Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), said as news of Gonzales' resignation circulated. "I hope the Attorney General's decision will be a step toward getting to the truth about the level of political influence this White House wields over the Department of Justice and toward reconstituting its leadership."

(The Washington Post article also brings up the matter of Gonzales' Hispanic ethnicity several times. Honestly it shouldn't be such a big deal.)

Many Bush loyalists didn't even support Gonzales as his plight increased this year due to questions of competence and ethics by Democrats and Republicans alike. For the last few months, it seems as if only, and I mean only, the White House supported the attorney general, if that.

The Democratically-fueled congressional investigations into the practices of the White House — e.g. the politically-motivated firing of US attorneys, illegal anti-terror tactics, etc. — are getting into murkier political waters. Key Bush administration aide Karl Rove, who departed earlier this month, was also under pressure from long overdue probes into this secretive administration.

The trend of major administration figures leaving shows the dire — if not confusing — state the White House is in. When these figures leave, they also seem to be vague as to why they are leaving and who made the decision; additional details remain as secret, as is the standard with this non-transparent government.

We may never know the full details of the many devious plots both Rove and Gonzales have been charged with spearheading, but there is one question we can expect an answer to, albeit not immediately: Who is going to replace Gonzales? Since the White House is so politically weak, even with its own party (remember also presidential appointee confirmation voting has also been along party lines and the Democrats have a rough majority in Congress), it might be a struggle to get another poor, un-judicial, un-independent AG confirmed, at least not at the yes-man level Bush will want them at.

technorati tags: gonzales, alberto+gonzales, bush

Congress legalizes Bush's NSA wiretapping program

An inept Congress hands Bush his NSA wiretapping program legalized on a silver platter...
Quiz time! What is the one of the last things Congress did before taking a four-week August recess? Hand more power to the Bush administration and slash away at the US Constitution, of course! Another sting to civil liberties courtesy of the 'war on terrorism' and the American government. Enter the Protect America Act of 2007 (Senate vote info; House votes). All links in this post are, in my opinion, quite important to understanding this complex issue.

Secrecy, spying, and a false 'war'
Why did the United States Congress cave in to (NYT) President George Bush on the expanded wiretapping bill? If this were the Clinton years I might think secret deal or tradeoff (i.e. you pass my stuff and I don't veto yours). However, that system hasn't been as prolific in the relationship between Bush's White House and the majority-Democratic Congress.

One would think this new bill would finally resolve the legality of the Bush administration's controversial domestic surveillance program. How could any self-respecting legislator approve it — let alone a Democrat? The answer appears to be fear, on both sides, especially Democratic, of appearing soft on terrorism.

The Dems have already spent — for better or for worse — so much political energy on symbolic jabs at the Bush administration on the subject of Iraq. But when it comes to something real, impacting, non-symbolic, and relevant, but by no means routine, they give George W. Bush the kind of victory he hoped for. The NSA wiretapping program — revealed in 2005 by The New York Times — has been ruled illegal again and again. It sidesteps an already troubling statute: the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, or FISA, whose secret judges grant secret warrants for secret searches or wiretaps, secretly. The Bush administration was forced to but the NSA program under the domain of FISA in January, resulting in a still-secret ruling that the program was illegal and placed restrictions, or something of the sort.

But the word 'illegal' is not in Bush's dictionary...
This bill, signed into law by Bush this weekend, validates the illegal wiretapping program that he has even admitted exists (in his own special way, plus it gave him a chance to attack the so-called liberal news media). It has a decent reach too. One of the administration's excuses for its until-recently-illegal eavesdropping program was that the current FISA court only deals with old means of communication, not modern ones like email and calls over fiber optic cable. Naturally, instead of requesting the then Republican-controlled Congress update the legislation (especially for the post-9/11 world, for which which the administration claims the illegal secret programs are essential), the White House decided to launch its own secret programs — legal or otherwise.

Extension of power
So what's wrong with this law just updating FISA to keep up with the times? Well, keeping up with technology is not the only changes this law puts into place...

Just as before, the FISA court only issues the search warrant after the search/wiretap is carried out — troubling, I know. But this legislation goes a bit further by removing more power from the courts, albeit secret ones that almost never take issue with clandestine spying on a domestic level. Now the searches can be carried out at the discretion of the attorney general or intelligence director.

That is all the more troubling considering the political yes-men Bush keeps in his cabinet and staff, and the fact that Alberto Gonzales is known for politically-motivated (in)justice. The horror! And as if the fact that Gonzales can now order secret searches, legally this time, isn't enough to make you a bit queasy for the disregard of the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution, keep in mind that under this new law the AG and head of intelligence have plenty of discretionary leeway when it comes to ordering secret surveillance. Plus, it's all secret; I'd expect nothing less transparent from this administration.

The sorta good news
A positive is that the AG will indeed have his power checked to a certain extent by internal audits, which have proved their worth in the past. That aspect of oversight is one the White House doesn't like.

One sliver of good news is that because of lawsuit threats that only increase under this legislation, telecommunications companies and ISPs are less likely to be bullied into invading their customers' privacy under pressure by the Bush administration. In fact, as I understand it this law removes the shield the White House has desperately tried to use to protect the telcos, which is bad news for the industry. Still, Gonzales has less leeway to invade our phone and internet records, though more to wiretap if the conversation might (emphasis on might) be with someone outside of the United States. Nonetheless, the telcos are as scared as ever of being sued for disclosing private details of their customers, as the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, as did the NYT (linked above):

The law also gave the administration greater power to force telecommunications companies to cooperate with such spying operations. The companies can now be compelled to cooperate by orders from the attorney general and the director of national intelligence.
...
In fact, pressure from the telecommunications companies on the Bush administration has apparently played a major hidden role in the political battle over the surveillance issue over the past few months.

Worse than FISA
FISA was scary enough — but maybe understandable and, to an extent, justifiable — but putting the secret search rights into Bush's political cronies (yes, that's what Gonzales, among others, is) is going more than a tad overboard. Justifying it with national security is puzzling. The least Congress could do is get rid of Alberto Gonzales, which would take a bipartisan effort; many, many Republicans are on board with the idea and the Democrats have been jabbing at it for months. This new law will last six months or so, ending in early February 2008.

Just to make this more confusing, this all ties back to the legality of the 'war on terror':

With minor exceptions, FISA authorizes electronic surveillance only upon certain specified showings, and only if approved by a court. The statute specifically allows for warrantless wartime domestic electronic surveillance—but only for the first fifteen days of a war. 50 U.S.C. § 1811. It makes criminal any electronic surveillance not authorized by statute, id. § 1809; and it expressly establishes FISA and specified provisions of the federal criminal code (which govern wiretaps for criminal investigation) as the "exclusive means by which electronic surveillance...may be conducted," 18 U.S.C. § 2511(2)(f) (emphasis added).[2]

The Department of Justice concedes that the NSA program was not authorized by any of the above provisions. It maintains, however, that the program did not violate existing law because Congress implicitly authorized the NSA program when it enacted the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) against al-Qaeda, Pub. L. No. 107-40, 115 Stat. 224 (2001). But the AUMF cannot reasonably be construed to implicitly authorize warrantless electronic surveillance in the United States during wartime, where Congress has expressly and specifically addressed that precise question in FISA and limited any such warrantless surveillance to the first fifteen days of war.

So even under FISA the NSA program is questionable. No wait, the White House says it doesn't follow FISA rules because of the 'war on terror' powers given to the president by Congress. No worries: this new law legalizes all that existing wiretapping junk and then some.


There's balance, it's just all tilted towards the White House, (and the only checks are top secret)
In the war against terrorism there's no need to bother with those pesky courts of Constitutional practice anymore, says the White House. Congress seems to have fallen in line with that logic. And this isn't the first time. Remember the horrendous Military Commissions Act of 2006?

Isn't Congress supposed to oversee the operations of the executive? Has everyone forgotten the fundamental idea of checks and balances? With this law Congress has only given more power to the bloated, unpopular, unitary executive Bush administration that a majority of it claims to hate. It also cuts away further at the notion that Americans have rights guaranteed to them by their constitutional, and that civil liberties come with those rights. Freedom trumps security — or at least it should. But in a police state as well as in a certain way modern America (though nothing near a police state), fear rules all.

Soft on civil liberties
If the Democrats are so afraid of being painted as weak on national security, than actually being weak on civil liberties is not a very good fix. Are they more worried of what their opponents think of them and will paint them as than what they are actually doing? That's just sad.

When it comes to the reaction to national security — GWOT and its consequences — the Democrats have been disappointing. Does what your opponents think of you matter more than doing the right thing? Enjoy your recess, Congress. Hopefully you'll come back to Capitol Hill with more brains and balls.

Balkinization offers brilliant legal analysis and opinion on the 'proposed FISA "fix"', as they call it.

This post is over 1,500 words. Eventually I will probably cut it into shorter, more specific posts then expanding them. So don't be alarmed if you see a post with parts of this essay in the future.

Bush is bad at excuses...

Deja vu, anyone?

President Bush is still in denial about the reality, in scientific as well as political realms. In this case, the denial is of the validity of his decision to stay in Iraq, and the conditions there. Al Qaeda as always proves a perfect scapegoat for when things go wrong (although they are no doubt inflaming the insurgency, alarmism and exploitation of people's fears of terrorism is not the way to go to rebut anti-Iraq war critics).

President Bush sought Tuesday to rebut critics who argue against a link between al-Qaida in Iraq and the larger terror network led by Osama bin Laden, issuing fresh warnings of possible attacks at home.

By emphasizing al-Qaida's growing presence and influence in Iraq, Bush again tried to reframe the war in the public's mind as a matter of protecting the United States.

Essentially he's saying what he has been saying all along: 'If you don't follow me and stick by my administration, the boogyman will come and get you and your children. Who, why, and how this terrorist will do that is secret, so I cannot tell you the specifics. Trust me, even when all rational thought and evidence is piled up against me... or else you're helping the terrorists win.'

See this post for more on Bush's flawed excuse for occupying Iraq. In my mind the only valid excuse left is 'to repair the mess we've created by invading and instituting poor policies' — not 'to finish what we started and take out the terrorists who attacked on 9/11 by combating them'. Wrong country; wrong mentality. The terrorists are there because of the insurgency, the insurgency exists because of a mixture of the inevitability of occupation and bad policies, as well as good ol' sectarian tensions.

Another high-ranking United States government official, Attorney-General Alberto Gonzales, is in a different kind of denial. He denies that he pressured previous AG John Ashcroft, who was hospitalized at the time, to engage in illegal wiretapping of American civilians in 2004. Isn't it amazing how Gonzales is still in office, months after he was supposed to be gone?

The White House's 'state of denial' is alive and well — which is not a good thing.

Votes of no confidence

Paul Wolfowitz will leave his post as World Bank president by 30 June. This follows a ruling by the World Bank board about evidence of a breach of ethics by Wolfowitz after he gave his girlfriend a pay raise. Wolfowitz, formerly with the Defense Department, was one of the neocon architects of the Iraq war and similar Bush administration policy.

Similarly embattled US Attorney-General Alberto "I don't know" (60-some times in one hearing!) Gonzales might face a vote of no-confidence in Congress. About time. Already five Republican senators have called for his resignation — a very rare occurrence, especially since that is over 10% of GOP senators.

Support for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales sank further Thursday as Democrats proposed a no-confidence vote, a fifth GOP senator called for his resignation and yet another Republican predicted he won't survive a congressional investigation.

The White House shrugged off the no-confidence idea as merely symbolic, and President Bush continued to stand by his embattled friend.

By any measure, the news was not good for Gonzales. Democrats proposed two versions of a nonbinding resolution expressing what senators of both parties have said for weeks: that Gonzales has become too weakened to run the Justice Department.

Bush has stood by both officials, and will most likely see both fall soon — one already has.

technorati tags: bush, wolfowitz, gonzales, world+bank, united+states, politics, news, breaking-news, paul+wolfowitz, alberto+gonzales, democrats, congress, white+house

Apparantly Bush is starting to focus more on foreign policy...

I wasn't aware he ever had stopped putting a great deal of focus on foreign policy, but apparantly USA Today thought so. Much of George W. Bush's presidency — from the very beginning — has been dominated by foreign politics. He won the 2004 election on foreign, not domestic, policy. His one 'great' mark, a not-so-great change in the Social Security system, went badly enough, as did his abomination of an education plan, No Child Left Behind.

Even if one includes Iraq, his stronger political front — in his eyes and in the eyes of his supporters (some not so much — is that abroad. The 'war on terror' is the primary reason for this, and much of the so-called war's focus has not been that of homeland security. Thus, the 'war on terror' arguably is, and has been made out to be, a foreign policy operation. Bush courts neoconservatives (neocon hawks) for his policy abroad; social conservatives (Christian right) for his policy at home.

Since the new Democrat-led Congress took power, he has also been locking horns with the legislature over his bottomless war in Iraq. So far Bush keeps coming up on top.

Hurricane Katrina's devastation of the American Gulf Coast and the amazingly poor response from the government is another example of how domestic services have taken a turn for the worse under this president. An incompetent political appointee — and I don't mean Bush, I mean Brown — does not make a great FEMA head. Nor is a non-independent attorney-general acceptable (just ignore Gonzales, he has lied enough lately and is finally being questioned by a Senate panel), especially considering the prescient on the independence of the Department of Justice. Believe it or not, DoJ has maintained some measure of distance from the White House in the past, allowing it to do its job without petty political pressures.

Another aspect of his political identity is the moral, religious part. From pushing from stem cell bans, to fighting against abortion, to other moves nudging church closer to state, this president has plenty of street cred (per se) from the religious right.

Here is one good thing about Bush: he is showing some toughness on Darfur, threatening more UN sanctions. Unsurprisingly he is not looking at the real problem: other countries, especially China, including America, are only propping up the genocide-instigating regime in Sudan. He also needs to stand behind the United Nations if he wants anything to be done on the humanitarian side of things.

Oh, and if I were to give Bush a political grade — from both my standpoint and the popular standpoint — it'd be a 1.5/10 or 2/10. He got some positive limelight from his speech following the Virginia Tech shootings, though not in my eyes. While he has a 32% or so approval rating, remember if he were to be put head-to-head with most politicians that percentage would rise, so he still has a bit of popularity. Iraq still going horrible; 'war on terror' still a disgrace; American scientific power is down; government is overpowering of the people and don't give back (positively) in return; transparency is moot and fundamentalist ideology reigns in the Oval Office. But people still like the president more than Congress...

technorati tags: alberto+gonzales, bush, george+bush, white+house, usa, united+states, foreign+policy, domestic, sudan, darfur+genocide, in+the+news, news, USA+Today, religious+right, united+nations

Executive versus legislature

A subcommittee on judicial affairs in the US House of Representatives authorized subpoenas for a myriad of senior Bush aides yesterday, including Karl 'The Architect' Rove and Harriet ('Nominated for Supreme Court but failed to even get a hearing because she is basically Bush's personal lawyer') Myers, regarding the Congressional probe into the politically-motivated firings of several US Attorneys at the Justice Department.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has been connected to this brewing scandal and one of far more serious — yet less covered — extent involving the FBI breaking the law (specifically provisions in the Patriot Act, as if that didn't give them enough power).

Congress finally began flexing its muscle by issuing subpoenas for documents earlier this month. The evidence from the documents directly contradicted statements made by Gonzales and the White House, and linked Gonzales, Rove, and the attorney firings from a number of emails between Rove and Golzales.

Politicians from both sides of the aisle have called for the attorney general's resignation. However, President George W. Bush has given Gonzales his steadfast support.

This is a White House known for its secrets and opposition into investigation. It has stonewalled any questioning — by the press or Congress — on plenty of major issues, not least Iraq and the 'war on terror', and is continuing to do so with these latest events involving the Justice Department.

Congress, with its yet-to-dazzle Democratic majority, has, however, been sticking it to the man lately. The man being the Bush administration and sticking it meaning politically threatening but still not exercising full oversight powers. Progress is being made, albeit sluggishly, on the evening of powers over Iraq policies between the White House and Congress. There are also signs of actual debate (gasp) of American policy in Iraq.

What makes the attorney firings odd is that at least one was fired not because of his political views, but because of his failure to politicize his legal work, something lawyers are usually taught against.

One must wonder: if Libby was the supposed fall-guy for Plamegate and FBI Director Mueller was for the FBI law-breaking, who will fall in the US Attorney scandal? Will it be Gonzales for political reasons, much like Rumsfeld left after the election? Or will it be a lower-level crony who will lose their job to gain props from the Bush administration?

technorati tags: gonzales, alberto+gonzales, bush, karl+rove, white+house, congress, democrats, subpoena, fbi, attorney

Congressional action: the subpoenas cometh

Well it appears Congressional Democrats are finally starting to flex their political muscle on two big issues: Iraq war policy (see this post) and the flurry of troubles at the Justice Department, notably the politically-motivated firing of US attorneys.

First of all, the Justice Department investigation:
Washington Post:

The Senate Judiciary Committee today authorized the use of subpoenas to compel the testimony of five Justice Department officials as part of an investigation into the firing of eight U.S. attorneys, but the panel put off a vote on subpoenas for top White House aides, including senior political adviser Karl Rove.

Meeting in an executive session, the 19-member committee voted to authorize the issuing of 11 subpoenas -- five for Justice Department officials involved in the firings and six for U.S. attorneys who were dismissed last year in the controversial purge. The subpoena authority gives the panel a fall-back position in case any of the current and former officials refuse to testify voluntarily or Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales reconsiders his pledge to let his subordinates appear before the committee.

While Gonzales has ambiguously admitted some things, this administration always has a fall guy (Libby in Plamegate; Mueller in FBI lawbreaking). Plenty of politicians of all stripes have called for Gonzales to step down. One of the best arguments I've seen and blogged about is that of the New York Times.

Because of a Congressionally-stonewalling, non-balenced, and unchecked (in governmental power) White House, unresponsive for its actions, along with the Democrats' rather slim majority in the Senate, one of the few powers the Dems can exercise would be subpoena power over the Bush administration. However, they have yet to be tough like the GOP was in its 12-year majority because of reasons of political and public perception. The executive is still well-liked compared to the legislature, at least in the public's eyes.

Even if one sides with Bush, this is a good exercise of democratic political power seen in democracies and, like the fact there was a report that revealed the FBI's law-breaking, it shows not all transparency is lost, even in an administration as closed to the public as the current one.

FBI continually breaking the law

On Friday, it was revealed in a US Department of Justice (DoJ) report on the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the use of various elements in the so-called war on terrorism that the FBI was misusing the Patriot Act and other laws — already controversial when followed appropriately — that constituted breaking the law. Although it hardly constitutes 'breaking news', the report sparked outcry on Capitol Hill (which is good, because it should).

Soon after the report, FBI Director Robert Mueller III admitted the law-breaking and took all of the blame, “Who is to be held accountable? And the answer to that is, I am to be held accountable.” he said.

The United States government — not least the FBI and CIA — breaking its own laws is nothing new, but rarely is it exposed and admitted so publicly, and rarely is it revealed by the government itself. This shows the US federal government has not lost all transparency, and these internal audits — like the one that showed the Bush administration was skewing terror figures — and reports are important to a free and democratic government. Not all hope is lost. Note: Congress had required the DoJ to file this report.

However, the story does not end with Mueller, or even the FBI.

Salon's Glenn Greenwald wrote an exceptional and extensive piece tying the FBI's misuse of Patriot Act provisions directly up to President Bush via the myriad of legislation and policies empowered by the 'war on terrorism'.

Multiple media outlets are focusing on the unsurprising story that the FBI seems to have been abusing its powers under the Patriot Act to issue so-called "national security letters" (NSLs), whereby the FBI is empowered to obtain a whole array of privacy-infringing records without any sort of judicial oversight or subpoena process. In particular, the FBI has failed to comply with the legal obligations imposed by Congress, when it re-authorized the Patriot Act in early 2006, which required the FBI to report to Congress on the use of these letters.

That the FBI is abusing its NSL power is entirely unsurprising (more on that below), but the real story here -- and it is quite significant -- has not even been mentioned by any of these news reports. The only person (that I've seen) to have noted the most significant aspect of these revelations is Silent Patriot at Crooks & Liars, who very astutely recalls that the NSL reporting requirements imposed by Congress were precisely the provisions which President Bush expressly proclaimed he could ignore when he issued a "signing statement" as part of the enactment of the Patriot Act's renewal into law. Put another way, the law which the FBI has now been found to be violating is the very law which George Bush publicly declared he has the power to ignore.
...
And this report, as indicated, is from the Bush Justice Department. But this is the country we have created for ourselves by allowing the President to insist upon not only more and more invasive powers, but the ability to exercise those powers in virtual secrecy and with no limits. And the few limits which Congress has imposed are simply ignored because the administration knows that -- at least thus far -- there have been no consequences, and little public outcry, prompted by its law-breaking.

The information being gathered and stored on the private lives of American citizens by the federal government is vast and growing -- and that is the conclusion compelled by what we know about what this government has been doing. This is an administration that has operated behind an unprecedented veil of secrecy, and it is undoubtedly the case that there are whole surveillance programs about which we have not learned. Do Americans really want the federal government compiling electronic dossiers on them with virtually no safeguards and no oversight?

The day after the revelation of this latest government fumble, Bush proclaimed himself Mr. Fix-It and said things would be worked through so this kind of misuse will not happen again — or at least people wouldn't hear about it again. He defended most all of these questionable policies, such as the 'national security letters' Greenwald wrote about, which are basically a warrant-less ticket for the FBI to do whatever it pleases in the name of 'fighting terrorism'.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, already up to his knees in troubles and political liability, including one relating to the politically-related firing of decent attorneys, is also implicated in this mess. Whereas Mueller is the fall guy, and Bush occupies the title of Mr. Fix-It-But-Not-Really, Gonzales is somewhere in between. His number of friends in Congress — Democrat or Republican — is dwindling. The New York Times even called for his resignation, a harshly-worded but true editorial, on Sunday (their editorials are regarded as influential, especially politically).

...[Gonzales] has never stopped being consigliere to Mr. Bush’s imperial presidency. If anyone, outside Mr. Bush’s rapidly shrinking circle of enablers, still had doubts about that, the events of last week should have erased them.

First, there was Mr. Gonzales’s lame op-ed article in USA Today trying to defend the obviously politically motivated firing of eight United States attorneys, which he dismissed as an “overblown personnel matter.” Then his inspector general exposed the way the Federal Bureau of Investigation has been abusing yet another unnecessary new power that Mr. Gonzales helped wring out of the Republican-dominated Congress in the name of fighting terrorism.

The F.B.I. has been using powers it obtained under the Patriot Act to get financial, business and telephone records of Americans by issuing tens of thousands of “national security letters,” a euphemism for warrants that are issued without any judicial review or avenue of appeal. The administration said that, as with many powers it has arrogated since the 9/11 attacks, this radical change was essential to fast and nimble antiterrorism efforts, and it promised to police the use of the letters carefully.

But like so many of the administration’s promises, this one evaporated before the ink on those letters could dry. The F.B.I. director, Robert Mueller, admitted Friday that his agency had used the new powers improperly.

Mr. Gonzales does not directly run the F.B.I., but it is part of his department and has clearly gotten the message that promises (and civil rights) are meant to be broken.

It was Mr. Gonzales, after all, who repeatedly defended Mr. Bush’s decision to authorize warrantless eavesdropping on Americans’ international calls and e-mail. He was an eager public champion of the absurd notion that as commander in chief during a time of war, Mr. Bush can ignore laws that he thinks get in his way. Mr. Gonzales was disdainful of any attempt by Congress to examine the spying program, let alone control it.

The attorney general helped formulate and later defended the policies that repudiated the Geneva Conventions in the war against terror, and that sanctioned the use of kidnapping, secret detentions, abuse and torture. He has been central to the administration’s assault on the courts, which he recently said had no right to judge national security policies, and on the constitutional separation of powers.
...
The Justice Department has been shamefully indifferent to complaints of voter suppression aimed at minority voters. But it has managed to find the time to sue a group of black political leaders in Mississippi for discriminating against white voters.

We opposed Mr. Gonzales’s nomination as attorney general. His résumé was weak, centered around producing legal briefs for Mr. Bush that assured him that the law said what he wanted it to say. More than anyone in the administration, except perhaps Vice President Dick Cheney, Mr. Gonzales symbolizes Mr. Bush’s disdain for the separation of powers, civil liberties and the rule of law.

On Thursday, Senator Arlen Specter, the senior Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, hinted very obliquely that perhaps Mr. Gonzales’s time was up. We’re not going to be oblique. Mr. Bush should dismiss Mr. Gonzales and finally appoint an attorney general who will use the job to enforce the law and defend the Constitution.

technorati tags: united+states, justice+department, patriot+act, national+security, national+security+letters, legal, politics, alberto+gonzales, robert+mueller, bush, civil+liberties, war+on+terror, US+government

In the news: from China to Hillary

China launches satellite missile (Time, CFR, The Times)
Just remember the space defense program President Bush put into effect (BBC News) last year, the controversial reincarnation of Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative 'Star Wars' (BBC News) space weapons program. Who knows where this is going to lead; Iran still has the international security's attention (security wise), but will China steal the limelight? Iran's president is not doing so hot politically, FYI. On the China issue, I have a feeling an interesting yet short-lived international relations battle will ensue but nothing too serious.
US attorney general defies (Think Progress) existing laws and constitutional precedent. Alberto Gonzales: "There is no express grant of habeas in the Constitution." More analysis at Balkinization. See even more relating to the AG in this Slate article on this issue.
Democratic senator from New York announces her run for the US presidential elections in 2008. Hillary Clinton is so far ahead in polls for Democratic presidential candidates, but that is no guarantee (NYT) she will win.
Now that the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has gotten back $100 million of his country's tax dollars from Israel, more peace talks (BBC News) are under way between Syria, Israel, and Palestine — including between Hamas and Fatah, two leading Palestinian political groups (different talks, obviously). But don't get your hopes up, remember a while back? However, this is an interesting Haaretz story on Israel-Syria peace talks; will Syria get their Golan Heights land back? Let's hope.

technorati tags: hillary+clinton, 2008+election, politics, news, in+the+news, gonzales, alberto+gonzales, habeas+corpus, current, abbas, palestine, israel, syria, china, space+missile, china+missile, presidential, iran