What Judge Sullivan’s Opinion Means

As I reported, Judge Emmet Sullivan has issued his ruling in the Dick Cheney interview FOIA, ruling partly for and partly against CREW. Sullivan has ordered DOJ to turn over the documents in question by October 9. He has directed DOJ to redact the information exempted in two earlier filings. So, as I suggested, we’ll get some new information. But we won’t learn how Cheney answered when asked whether Bush authorized him to leak classified information (which ended up including Valerie Wilson’s identity).

Here’s some more detail on what the ruling means.

A Rebuke to Obama’s Executive Power Grab

While Judge Sullivan accepted all of Ralph DiMaio and David Barron’s specific exemptions based on national security or deliberative grounds, he rejected the laughable DOJ argument that releasing Cheney’s interview materials would dissuade other high level White House officials from cooperating in investigations. That’s important, because it rejects a theory that would shield a great deal of information on White House criminality. Here’s Sullivan’s description of everything that would be shielded under such a theory.

In this sense, the category of proceedings that DOJ asks this Court to conclude are “reasonably anticipated” could encompass any law enforcement investigation during which law enforcement might wish to interview senior White House officials. Such proceedings might include an investigation into alleged criminal activity that physically took place in the White House; financial wrongdoing by a White House official that took place before or during his or her tenure in the executive branch; misconduct relating to official responsibilities, such as the breach of national security protocol that formed the basis of the Plame investigation; or even an event occurring outside the White House with only tangential connection to one or more White House officials. Thus conceived, it becomes clear that the scope of the proceedings described by DOJ is breathtakingly broad.

I’m guessing, but unless the parts of Cheney’s interview Sullivan has ordered to be released are a lot more scandalous than I think they are, I don’t think Obama’s DOJ will appeal this because it’s unlikely the Appeals Court will agree with them, and as we’ve seen, Obama’s Administration tends to go to great lengths to avoid letting Appeals Courts issue rulings in relatively unimportant cases that reign in executive power. 

Continued Shielding of the Most Important Information in Cheney’s Interview

As I’ve said, Judge Sullivan did accept all the national security and deliberative exemptions that DOJ and CIA invoked. Here’s a list of what that includes, and here’s my more detailed description of how Cheney probably responded.

  • Vice President’s discussion of the substance of a conversation he had with the Director of the CIA concerning the decision to send Ambassador Wilson on a fact-finding mission to Niger in 2002.
  • Vice President’s discussion of his requests for information from the CIA relating to reported efforts by Iraqi officials to purchase uranium from Niger.
  • Vice President’s recollection of the substance of his discussions with the National Security Advisor while she was on a trip to Africa.
  • Vice President’s description of government deliberations, including discussions between the Vice President and the Deputy National Security Advisor, in preparation of a statement by the Director of CIA regarding the accuracy of a statement in the President’s 2003 State of the Union Address.
  • Vice President’s recollection of discussions with Lewis Libby, the White House Communications Director, and the White House Chief of Staff regarding the appropriate response to media inquiries about the source of the disclosure of Valerie Plame Wilson’s identity as a CIA employee.
  • Vice President’s description of his role in resolving disputes about whether to declassify certain information.
  • Vice President’s description of government deliberations involving senior officials regarding whether to declassify portions of the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate.
  • Description of a confidential conversation between the Vice President and the President, and description of an apparent communication between the Vice President and the President. 
  • Names of non-governmental third-parties and details of their extraneous interactions with the Vice President.
  • Name of a CIA briefer.
  • Names of FBI agents.
  • Names of foreign government and liaison services.
  • The name of a covert CIA employee.
  • The methods CIA uses to assess and evaluate intelligence and inform policy makers.

Assuming DOJ does responds to Sullivan’s order, I expect them to withhold significant parts of pages 2, 3, 6, 7, 9, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 23, 25, and 26. Which means we’ll get roughly 15 pages out of 28, plus fragments of the remaining 13 pages. Not bad, but as you can tell, the most interesting information will be withheld.

Interestingly, Sullivan sort of confirmed a claim DOJ had made earlier: in spite of the fact that we know a great deal about this information already, some of it does not identically match what we already know.

First, a review of CREW’s declaration and attachments in conjunction with DOJ’s in camera submission demonstrates that none of the withheld records has been publicly released; nor has information identical to the information contained in those documents been made public. More fundamentally, however, CREW’s argument ignores the purpose of the deliberative process privilege, which is designed to protect the decision making process itself. Regardless of whether certain factual information is publicly available, the information in the withheld documents is protected precisely because it might compromise what information was considered and what role it played in the deliberative process. [my emphasis]

Though Sullivan’s statement is weaker than the claim DOJ made, this does suggest that Cheney’s story didn’t entirely match the story released publicly at trial.

A Potential to Demand the Information O’Donnell Already Requested??

Now, Sullivan pretty much blew away CREW’s argument that Cheney had effectively waived any privilege when he acceded to the interview with Pat Fitzgerald.  But I’m curious whether Sullivan’s interpretation of the case that both CREW and DOJ relied on on this issue leaves room to argue that Cheney did waive privilege by having his lawyer leak information about his interview to Michael Isikoff. Here’s what Sullivan had to say about the waiver argument.

Contrary to CREW’s suggestion, the court in In re Sealed Case did not create a per se rule that a disclosure to any third party constitutes a waiver of any and all privilege claims. Rather, the court simply concluded based on the facts in that case that the deliberative process privilege could not be asserted as to documents that had already been revealed to the public and to a private, non-government attorney. The present case, by contrast, involves the disclosure of information gained by Vice President Cheney in his official capacity and disclosed to Fitzgerald the Special Counsel in his official capacity as a law enforcement officer. In re Sealed Case, quite simply, does not address the issue before the Court – whether the information given by Vice President Cheney to constituted a protected inter-agency communication or a public disclosure to a third party.

In other words, Sullivan argues that Fitzgerald does not count as a third party.

Now, as I’ve noted before, we know that Cheney’s lawyer, Terry O’Donnell, leaked a key part of the information over which Barron invoked the deliberative privilege–whether or not Bush declassified information for Cheney to leak. Here’s what O’Donnell leaked to Michael Isikoff.

… the "president declassified the information and authorized and directed the vice president to get it out." But Bush "didn’t get into how it would be done. He was not involved in selecting Scooter Libby or Judy Miller." Bush made the decision to put out the NIE material in late June,

Michael Isikoff is, by anyone’s definition, a third party. And so it seems as if Sullivan might buy the "waiver" argument with regards to this information.

And that’s some of the most critical information in Cheney’s interview.

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54 replies
  1. bmaz says:

    Yeah, but you see, you would need a lawyer on the case to actually freaking make the argument. I ain’t holding my breath…..

  2. Arbusto says:

    1. Off the top of my head, is this an instance where Cheney stated Bush authorized him to declassify any docs he wanted, even though that isn’t assignable?

    2. Is CREW likely to appeal the sections the Judge chose to hold as secret/executive privilege?

    • emptywheel says:

      Re: what O’Donnell leaked? Yeah, that was his effort to distract attention from the possibility that Cheney leaked Plame’s identity. It’s really the goldmine in this interview, though I don’t think Fitz asked Cheney if he ordered Libby to leak Plame’s ID.

      It’s just two lines out of the 28 page interview report.

      As to CREW appealing? I haven’t asked them. But it looks like Sullivan did a pretty close review of what’s in the documents, so I think it’d be hard for CREW to appeal this.

  3. Hmmm says:

    I suppose there is some faint possibility that investigating any differences between the unredacted transcript and what has come out before might turn up some fruitful stuff. Perjury, for example, or the exposure of expedient lies to players or to the public.

    Anybody seen BabyDick around today? Sweaty and on the attack?

  4. Cynthia Kouril says:

    Marcy, the privledge is Bush’s not Cheney’s, so Cheney’s leak would = waiver. It’s not Cheney’s waiver to give.

  5. readerOfTeaLeaves says:

    Where’s the Health Care thread…?
    Cantwell just hit a homer so far out of the ballpark the ball is still flying over several states.

    • JamesJoyce says:

      She Hit the ball over state lines? HA HA Finally some competition for state operating corporate tax exempt or for profit health insurers discriminating and usurping federal civil rights of Americans, under the color of state law and contractual law like segregationists, to insure their economic livelihood, at the expense of someone, or another person’s civil rights and or life?

      It took 100 years for slaves to have the protection of Constitutional Law, (Civil Rights Legislation,) denied by segregationist/racist states, after the ratification of the 14th Amendment. Do you really think insurers will stop discriminating against people at less profit without an effective penalty, to control corporate behavior?

  6. JamesJoyce says:

    “State Secrets” and “executive privilege,” again used to cover corporate/government collusion and criminality? Let the “Court” continue to protect criminals as they did slaveowners in “Dred Scott vs Sanford?”

    It seems the only non-legitimate facade of a government interest being protected here is the “business relationship” between the former administration and international corporate energy interests?

    Executive Oil, The Iraq Oil Plot and Corporate Treason?

  7. emptywheel says:

    But it was done with the participation of Bush’s press staff. It was done with the coordination of Dan Bartlett, in an at least somewhat official capacity.

    • tekel says:

      Question for bmaz: I’m guessing, given your 1st-post response, you think CREW’s going to miss this detail. So let’s say, arguendo, Sullivan buys the argument that the conversation with Isikoff functions as complete waiver to anything disclosed therein. Is the pending CREW litigation sufficient to reach those disclosures, or is it limited to the Cheney/Fitz interview?

      If it’s limited, what prevents someone (like me, heh) from filing a new FOIA request for the Isikoff interview materials?

      And oh hey I passed the Oregon bar exam. Which means I’ll probably be unemployed for the next few years, but hey, at least I’m done with school so I have more time for the interwebs

        • tekel says:

          sure. And I’ll just let the bank take my house so we can keep the kid in daycare while I’m giving my time away for free.

          Why didn’t I think of that?

          • JamesJoyce says:

            Corporate Servitude…. so much for your life and liberty! A procedural taking under the color of law undermining your rights Life and Liberty! This alleged health care reform is corporate protectionism for monopolies, plain and simple!

          • Hmmm says:

            I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to offend. I’m unemployed too and I sympathize. I understand how job searches take a huge amount of time and energy, and unemployment per se is a drag to the spirit and energy. I just meant that if you do have time available — and maybe you don’t, but it sounded that way from what you wrote — then with your JD you might be able to provide some really meaningful help where it’s needed.

            Again, I’m sorry if you felt antagonized, I meant to be encouraging and not negative. Text is ambiguous that way.

      • bmaz says:

        First off, big congratulations!! The first thing you learn after graduating law school and passing the bar is that law school doesn’t teach you squat about actually being a practicing lawyer. But it gives you the necessary framework for learning that part of the equation. Don’t know what you have in mind, but working for either prosecutors or public defenders offices for a couple of years provides fantastic heavy duty court and trial experience fast; it is literally unparalleled for that, and is kind of fun too, but it is not for everybody. My one piece of advice is, don’t think of your first job as your career, it is only the first step.

        As to your question, CREW already has missed that argument. They, um, were aware that some thought they should be making it though, so whatta ya gonna do? That was what was behind my comment @1. I think someone new could do a new case so long as they had new arguments distinct from CREW.

        • PJEvans says:

          My-niece-the-lawyer has been working for a disability-rights group since she passed the CA bar; that’s about four years now.

      • punaise says:

        And oh hey I passed the Oregon bar exam

        first off: congrats
        second: good luck with that job search

      • BayStateLibrul says:

        Great news and congrats, but please don’t argue that a corporation is a living, breathing human being with inalienable rights…

      • james says:

        Any public defender jobs out there?
        People losing their homes who might need representation during the process?

  8. runfastandwin says:

    DID YOU ORDER THE CODE RED!

    YOU’RE GOD DAMN RIGHT I DID!

    Where is Tom Cruise when we need him?

  9. tekel says:

    Bay State@23: I think you’ve got me confused with James Joyce After all those railroad cases we read in 1st year civpro, I’m pretty convinced that the legal fiction of corporate personhood is the root of all evil.

    ew@21: I’ll keep it just between you and we. I’d be happy to help with drafting.

    Hmmmm@20: That was out of line, sorry- meant to be funny and I came across like a sarcastic jerk. Which is also a shortcoming of text. No hard feelings I hope.

    bmaz: ok, right, you’re thinking what I’m thinking.

  10. Hugh says:

    OT I was just putting this into some threads:

    OT John Burns one of the Times stable of neocon correspondents reports on a speech McChrystal gave in London. When asked if he would support a scaled back strategy focusing on al Qaeda rather than the Taliban, McChrystal replied:

    “The short answer is: no,” he said. “You have to navigate from where you are, not where you wish to be. A strategy that does not leave Afghanistan in a stable position is probably a short-sighted strategy.”

    http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10…..lobal-home

    Afghanistan hasn’t been stable for the last 2,000 years and yet has survived. Who is being short-sighted? McChrystal looks to be hanging tough. He should be fired.

  11. readerOfTeaLeaves says:

    Bay State@23: I think you’ve got me confused with James Joyce After all those railroad cases we read in 1st year civpro, I’m pretty convinced that the legal fiction of corporate personhood is the root of all evil.

    It may not be the single root, but it’s definitely one of them.

    Looking forward to bmaz’s further thoughts on this mangrove mess of twisty roots.

  12. rmadelson says:

    I actually got my first job practicing law through volunteering with the Federal Defender’s office in Atlanta. I volunteered as sort of an assistant/shadow for a great lawyer in that office. I learned a whole lot from her and as we worked on a huge RICO gang case that was about to go to trial — what looked to be a six month trial — I figured that the attorneys representing co-defendants would be really busy and might need someone around the office to help out. I ended up with several interviews and eventually got a job with one of those lawyers. I also got to meet a lot of really good criminal defense lawyers that way. Of course, I wasn’t married and didn’t have a child or a mortgage at the time so it was a lot easier for me to volunteer.

    Anyway, congrats to tekel, on passing the Oregon bar. I will be in Cannon Beach next week. Nice place, Oregon.

    rOB

  13. bmaz says:

    Hey folks, on a topic of special interest here at EW, October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month and my friend Blue Girl has a fantastic new post on breast cancer, its effect on its victims, and its intersection with healthcare reform. Go give it a read and a recommend (if so inclined).

  14. Mary says:

    A lot of the issue of who is and is not a third party goes to what had me so upset way back when Schumer made his bargain with Comey to let DOJ inhouse the investigation. That was back before I came by FDL, but it’s why I have never had a great view of Comey – I always thought that was Comey and Schumer pulling the wool over everyone’s eyes. As time went by and nothing was done, I got resigned to that – then when Fitzgerald pulled off his initial press conference on the Libby indictment I really thought, “hey, maybe this isn’t going to be as bad as you thought it would be” but in the end, we saw things die with a whimper and Fitzgerald send Conyers those responses that said all the hullabaloo around his “special” appointment was really all only intended to create a “perception” of independence.

    But to poke and dig on some of this, on the third party front there seems to be a lot that Sullivan didn’t take into account (and maybe none of it was briefed), but, for example, we do have a public record of Cheney and Addington arguing that the OVP isn’t actually a part of the Exec branch, it’s “fourth branch.” Under Cheney’s own posit, then, there’s not Exec privilege that attaches. Ok – that’s not a good argument, I just kind of feel like now and then people who make insane statements ought to have them come back to haunt them in an admission against interest setting.

    More to the point, when Sullivan starts looking at Fitzgerald’s “unique” role and what that means as to whether or not he was a “third party” or someone just having a little “inter-agency” chit chat between OVP and DOJ …

    Nevertheless, and notwithstanding the unique role of the Special Counsel as both part of and independent from the executive branch, this Court agrees with DOJ that the discussion between Fitzgerald and Vice President Cheney is more appropriately considered a protected inter-agency disclosure

    Sullivan doesn’t seem to think that getting input from Fitzgerald on that issue is necessary to its resolution. Fitzgerald actually took a position in litigation on a very similar issue in the Libby trial. There was a whole exchange of briefings and an order entered by Walton with respect to alignment of the parities, where Fitzgerald argued, successfully, that the court could NOT align his office with the Exec branch agencies. That should probably have been touched on in the filings here if the court was going to get to that issue.

    I don’t think you can argue that the office of Special Counsel is before Sullivan’s court just bc Bradbury and Barron were/are before the court and have filed declarations. A special acting AG was appointed for the litigation. Already you have to wonder why the AG, Ashcroft, would have had to recuse from supervision if all that was happening was that DOJ was having non-adversarial inter-agency chit chats. Still, he did and you then had a delegation from Comey to Margolis on the supervisory front and Fitzgerald running the office and investigation. Seems to me that if someone is going to rule that OSC or OSP was only having an inter-agency chit chat, that office needs to be allowed to take a position on that assertion. Which means you have to figure out if the acting authority is still with Margolis and, if not, where it went – or you get Fitzgerald. I’d have to both find the motions and Walton’s order and read them again (which isn’t going to happen in the next day or so), but it seems to me that you might have had another court already make a ruling to the contrary based on the same nucleus of operative facts. OTOH, I think some of what Fitzgerald may have argued then (like maybe the fact that he was using subpoenas and judicial process to get info, IIRC), might load the scales differently vis a vis a “voluntary” statement from OVP. Still, I don’t see how you get a resolution of whether or not he was a third party without pulling his office before the court to say some yeahs or nays and without looking at the prior ruling by Walton.

    Then you have to take notice of the actual effect of Sullivan’s ruling. He’s basically saying that when you have a criminal investigation being conducted, the FBI should have a heckuva time ever coming after anyone for making a false statement, bc their statements to the FBI are always protected from being revealed to a court as inter-agency chit chats. That makes no sense. Granted – in this case the law enforcement issue is presumptively over and done with and so the law enforcement privilege was properly held to not apply, but the Libby case itself, based as it was on so many false statements, some of which were only in the context of the OSP FBI investigators chit chats with “inter-agency Libby” stands for the proposition that OSP was indeed viewing the provision of information by Exec branch representatives as provisions to which criminal consequences could (and did) attach. Inter-agency chit chats as part of the deliberative process couldn’t have those kind of criminal aspects that attach to them and that is just glossed over. It’s the “then a miracle occurs” part of the equation.

    So – if you’re not having an interagency chit chat, then you look to the content of the discussion (which DOJ is arguing was about privileged matters). To start with, they say there rare two sentences (that’s not much is it?) that involve direct communications between the President and Cheney and to which they are going to attach Presidential privilege. For much of the rest, they are saying that Cheney was describing stuff that was all a part of the “deliberative process.”

    So let’s poke that a bit. As the court notes and quotes, the deliberative process is supposed to involve policy decisions.

    “The purpose of the deliberative process privilege is to ensure open communication between subordinates and superiors, to prevent premature disclosure of policies before final adoption, and to avoid public confusion if grounds for policies that were not part of the final adopted agency policy happened to be exposed to the public.”

    So – in the context of the OSP’s interview with Cheney, what would have been the “policy” issue? Violating law isn’t a matter of policy – and while we’ve heard a lot about not criminalizing policy, I’d say it’s pretty clear that you also shouldn’t be able to do the opposite “policy-ize” crime. So discussion about things that Fitzgerald was investigating as a crime (the Plame leak) and also discussions about things that he might have thought he could fit into his mandate (like the leaks of the national security assessments handed off to Judy Miller in violation of the Nat Sec Act, whether or not they were “insta-declassified”) just flat don’t fit the “policy” constructs of the deliberative privilege. The only privilege to covering up discussions of the commissions of crimes that did then actually occur [I’ll give the benefit of the doubt on the deliberative front to discussions of crimes that folks decide NOT to commit] is the Fifth.

    So I think there should be some push on the issue that discussions of violations of the NSAct, the IIPA, or discussions of providing false statements are not, and cannot be, discussions of “policy.” If those discussions are of acts that did not then take place – maybe those would fit in, as the deliberative process should allow for someone to highlight to the decision makers that they are going to be breaking the law and let them respond accordingly. But with respect to acts that are taken, you can’t convert crime to policy just by discussing it within the Exec branch. So no deliberative privilege attaches.

    CK makes a point above about the privilege being Bush’s rather than Cheney’s if you were looking at policy matters rather than plotting criminal acts, but while I agree I think that Bush would have had to have acted a long time ago to raise the privilege and he never did. At least when Fitzgerald was making his filings to be dis-aligned with and from the Exec agencies. IMO, fwiw, which obviously isn’t much bc no one makes my arguments and the courts aren’t flocking to rule on them. As a matter of fact, I’m much more distracted by and bummed over Hellerstein’s ruling than interested in Sullivan’s. Which I guess is why I’m so bitchy. IMO the real privilege that attached should have been one that was Cheney’s – a privilege against self incrimination. If he decided to forego that privilege under the posit that, “the President can’t break the law and whatever you do, it isn’t a crime if the President oks it” then, well, he should just have to live with the consequence of making the wrong call on that. Except, of course, that he didn’t make the wrong call. Holder, Obama and their compatriots on the courts and in Congress have proven that Nixon was right.

    /incoherent ramble.

    • bmaz says:

      That should probably have been touched on in the filings here if the court was going to get to that issue.

      Um, yeah. And that statement goes for about everything you argue here. What they did brief on was decent work, but they missed a lot. And they did not do a good job of going back and turning Fitzgerald’s argument on numerous things against the opposition like they should have as you note.

      • Mary says:

        Yeah, and I’m guessing we won’t be seeing any filing from Fitzgerald (or Durham or other SPec Prosecutors) as Spec Pros asking to intervene and for the court to withdraw it’s order and hold in abeyance to the extent that it is an order determining that Special Prosecutor interviews with Exec branch members in connection with criminal investigations are “inter-agency chats” which will be subject to privilege (and for which Special Prosecutors could not, then, pursue false statements claims bc of the privilege that would attach) until the office of Spec Prosec has an opportunity to also brief that issue to the court.

        Not gonna happen, although it would if you actually did have such a thing as independent special prosecutors. THey’d never allow a court ruling to go out as precedent stating that their criminal interviews with Exec branch members are all privileged and they can’t release or use them without waivers of that privilege – even where someone is found to have lied (given a false statement) to them.

  15. MadDog says:

    What bothers me the most about Sullivan’s ruling is that he’s created a new ex post facto application of privilege for Cheney that should’ve been sought during the actual time of Cheney’s interview.

    It was the responsibility of Cheney (and Bush) to seek such a privilege at the time of the interview. That they did not do so is their failure, and in a just world, their loss of that privilege!

    Judge Sullivan, to our loss, has stepped far over the line of bias to act as Cheney’s (and Bush’s) personal advocate by giving them this mulligan.

    Imagine that a future resident of the Executive branch talks freely and unguardedly about a crime with law enforcement and prosecutors.

    Judge Sullivan’s ruling allows any such future resident to “after the fact” hide their commentary with this ex post facto application of privilege.

    No need to invoke the privilege beforehand. By Judge Sullivan’s way of thinking, the privilege is magically and silently invoked just by being a resident of the Executive Branch.

    Tis another sad day for America. We are all less because of this.

    • kindGSL says:

      When can we start calling out crooked or conspiratorial judges for being involved in massive criminal cover ups, fraud and the removal of, or failure to protect, the basic human rights of citizens?

      Don’t judges have some kind of responsibility to protect the rights of the citizenry, or do they think we are national serfs and slaves? To be dispensed with as they wish.

      Where’s the oversight?

  16. Mary says:

    Congrats Teke. I hope you find what you want on the work front and at least the bar is now behind you.

  17. doalive says:

    tell us of yer secret deepest/darkest fears,and are they/them comprimised commercially,unfounded,manufactured,rational or just a spy in the house of “war,and are they rational or based upon foreign,alein or queer states of strange and or just plain bizarre, aka wierd,an energy parrallax,paradia`d dichotomy designed to repeat,perpetuate,aka pre-cipatate a manifest dust aka fate,,,the nemisis a free state of affair/zsc`,tell us naught and the guess becomes increasingly wild,so tell the wind a lie and the intellagiences the real reason why,if ya trust a country that passivly gazes thair senses upon the natural,civil & wild wide world earthly,3rd stone from the sun aka home,,,OO,or plan B aka dOOr #3,to freedom’s state it seems,the doors are better open,than concealed and or locked down,regulated,stood-up,stand stilled,anti free,closed,ya know the feeling individual aka countryman`etc,etc,,,wolvedrive exercise” to tin-man, over & out,,,PS really this header really fits better when the decision emmanating from the the most un-democraticaly American wing reads i luv ya all and behalf of the image in my mind i do behold,free from fear,want,and the last recourse war,just tell us won’t ya please,to whOOm it may concern,1 more tyme OO^live^for the record,including the light of a free tomorrows day,one way or another bearing serving providing doesn’t nessacerrily equate with beleiving,empire,state,in-corperated entities within the political body entrusted to act on behalf a faith that is not based on an imitation that only mimics what it may have thought was heard or wished to seek and understand,the will of the people resembles the fyrelight of the local starlight more than an alternative purpose could slither or progress to a station that the final resting place may be found,power,civilazation,society,poitics,structure,history,come-on tell us,,,please,don’t make the baliff whip out the rubber chicken,the T-Birds’ feather’s would be insulted,OO,thats 2 mythical creatures that hopefully escaped aka ran away a long tyme ago,well that and the goat, a reset digatally remastered might let go,,,in a court,a court of truth,get the whole set,justice now with new and improved naturally occurring natural law (patent pending,-action figures sold seperatly)hint;2 whOOm it” “may-?concern is osIx and me,i,my.& of horse we,aka us,stated,declared,united,,worldly,federal,earthly,un-divided

  18. DWBartoo says:

    Well, my hopes that a member of the Judiciary would dare to rise, to stand where and when Congress, in the face of Executive “over-reach”, would not, have definitely been realized. The good and well-respected Judge Emmet Sullivan has lifted his ass off the bench sufficiently to fart in the general direction of the Constitution and “the people”.

    Secrecy reigns.

    And “the people” are not entitled to the truth.

    On another topic:

    Congratulations, tekel!

    (Another of my perhaps foolish “hopes” is that, one day, the good lawyers will outnumber those given to mere or utter “expediency”…)

    DW

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