It’s Called R-E-C-U-S-A-L

/in /by

Tom Maguire usually takes himself more seriously than this. After reading the WaPo’s series on Dick, he chose to ignore the widespread criticism on the part of hardcore conservatives of OVP’s dismantling of the Constitution and instead claim that the WaPo article was proof–proof at last!!!–that "Fitzgerald’s prosecution of Libby may have been politically motivated."

To prove that "Fitzgerald’s prosecution of Libby may have been politically motivated," Maguire ferrets out the abundant evidence that John Ashcroft didn’t get along with his Imperialness. He picks one event involving Ashcroft from 2001, another event involving the no-longer AG Ashcroft (and Gonzales) from 2005, then nods to the Comey hospital confrontation from March 2004.

All cited as evidence that "Fitzgerald’s prosecution of Libby may have been politically motivated"–that a guy who was not appointed or supervised by Ashcroft, who brought an indictment a year after Ashcroft’s resignation, was politically motivated.

Look. Using this evidence, you could (if you really wanted to) make the argument that Ashcroft’s decision to continue the investigation past Armitage’s confession and Libby’s first lies was political. You might argue that Ashcroft’s decision to–gasp!–recuse himself in December 2003 was political. (You’d of course have to ignore the centrality of Comey’s decision to appoint a real prosecutor, since that happened days after his own appointment; it–and his February clarification of the scope of Fitzgerald’s inevstigation–preceded the March 10 event Maguire cites.)

But then there’s the other problem. Maguire has found his evidence that this was a political prosecution–political for Ashcroft, mind you. Yet all the while, he’s making an argument that Fitzgerald operated with no effective oversight and therefore was unconstitutionally appointed. So apparently, Ashcroft simultaneously directed Fitzgerald to mount a political prosecution (even a year after he resigned), yet he had no legal authority over Fitzgerald in the least.

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  1. looseheadprop says:

    They are really hanging their hats on this unconstittutionally appointed thingy, aren’t they?

    Two things though:
    1) Unlike folks appointed under the Independant Counsel Act, PatFitz was, in fact, confirmed by the Senate (I think, unanimously–have to double check that)to be a federal prosecutor when he became US Attorney in Chicago. If they had any doubts about his fitness to prosecute, I’m sure it would have come up during his confirmation process.

    2) As an– already in the Department –DOJ employee, PatFitz was merely given a specific detail, a task to do within the Department.

    Delegations happen within federal agencies (and agencies at other levels of government) all the time. This is pretty plain vanilla. Recusals that result in delagation of a task, are everyday events in government.

    This is not an exotic concept. Not was the method selected by Comey unusual. Somebody in a previous thread made a comment to the effect that it was amazing that Comey could do a thorough and careful enough job of legally delegating in a one page letter.

    Well, not if delegating is no more exoctic than your weekly grocery shopping list!

    The ONLY reason this delegation was special (I’m not even sure I want to commit to the word â€special†it is much stronger than what I mean to say) is because the delagation and the possible targets happened so far up the food chain.
    Had exactly the same kind of conflict of interest happened because a unit chief in some US Attorney’s Office had prior relationship with a possible target of the investigation and chose to recuse himself and write a one page delagtion letter to some line AUSA, nobody would think twice about it.

    Moreover, the SCOTUS would NEVER consider issuing a writ of cert. for it. It’s just too plain vanilla.

  2. AZ Matt says:

    Mr. Maguire seems to have gotten himself hung up in a delusional circle of thinking. That just reinforces his beliefs concern poor ol’ Scooter. No evidence is required in his mind.

  3. freepatriot says:

    anybody remember Monty Python’s â€Quest For The Holy Grailâ€

    I get the idea that tom mcguire is reporting from the scene where the peasent being â€oppressedâ€

    mcguire seems determined to convince us that the poor peasent really is being oppressed

    in spite of what our own experience has told us, we should believe a hack like mcguire ???

    hey mcguire:

    your father was a hamster, and your mother was an edleberry
    now go away, or I shall taunt you again

  6. lolo says:

    EW, delurking to say Tom Mcguire is an idiot. Are you watching the hearing on CSpan3? WOW Nadler is on fire. It’s about the EPA and 911. Now off to read the rest of your posts.

    lolo

  7. Anonymous says:

    I would like to add to LHP’s fine dissertation above the lack of any claim of actual prejudice to Defendant Libby from this supposed lack of supervision. The problems that Libby’s defense seems to have encountered were all self made. They made tactical decisions, especially on the CIPA issues vis a vis Libby and/or Cheney testifying that affected their case. It is hard to see any viable argument of any kind that a â€prosecutor run amok†caused any harm or detriment whatsoever. I agree with LHP that the appointments issue is a tenuous stretch to start with, when you then couple in that there is no visible prejudice, nor even any really claimed, it really results in a non-compelling argument.

  8. freepatriot says:

    actually this indicates a fatal flaw in repuglican logic (it that an oxymoron ???)

    consider this paragraph:

    On a related front, some commentators on the left cannot fathom the notion that Fitzgerald’s prosecution of Libby may have been politically motivated – surely, they note, Ashcroft and Comey were good Republicans, as was Judge Walton?

    Hmm. That would be especially cogent if all politics was partisan politics. Folks able to embrace the concept of factional disputes within an Administration will find these tidbits from the WaPo series on the Cheney Vice-Presidency to be interesting.

    mcguire mistakes â€POLITICAL INFIGHTING†for politics, and then projects his own ignorance onto his audience

    it kinda reminds me of Sauron’s fatal flaw; his inability to measure anybody else’s motives without regard to his own malice

    Sauron couldn’t figure out that Frodo would attempt to destroy the ring because the idea that somebody would want to destroy the ring never occured to Sauron

    mcguire sees â€Politics†everywhere because everything IS political to this twit

    here’s some mcguire logic in action:

    those two children aren’t fighting over a cookie; they’re waging an economic battle over resourse allocation

    in mcguire’s world, there is no concept of â€justiceâ€. every criminal prosecution is a political act of revenge. every call to social justice by the Democrats is a â€Political Actâ€. And, apparently, anybody who tries to uphold the law in the face of bushco is guilty of a â€Political Actâ€

    in mcguire’s world, I’m sure there ARE people who’s actions are not purely political. those people are called loyal bushies

    kinda reminds me of a local skidmark …

  9. Ishmael says:

    LHP – thank you for expressing so clearly that recusals, Chinese walls, and delegation happen everyday in the legal world – it’s not even â€vanillaâ€, more like â€unflavoredâ€. Team Libby argues that Fitzgerald wasn’t under any supervision or control (other than, say the fact that he remained an employee of DOJ, subject to its standard ethical constraints and guidelines, could be fired or replaced for crossing any such lines), but, as bmaz points out, can’t point to any prejudice to Scooter from any such lack of supervision as a result. In fact, the areas of supervision they claim to be concerned about were actually approached by Fitz in ways that were advantageous to Scooter! Of course, if there had not been such a delegation and recusal, Team Libby would be arguing that the lack of Chinese walls would place the administration of justice into disrepute – although such an argument should have been made at the earliest practicable opportunity in the case, to avoid the waiver argument. As Atrios would say, â€OWWWWWWW, the STUPID, it burns!†I agree, the case law and practice here would NEVER attract the attention of the Supremes for any regular litigant – the VERY IMPORTANT PERSON argument didn’t work for the memory test, but the only basis of the cert application, given that Morrison and Edmonds can be read harmoniously with each other, both on the law and on the facts of this particular case, will have to be that Scooter is a very important person with very important friends.

  10. Ishmael says:

    Of course, there was never any jurisdictional argument for SCOTUS under Bush v. Gore either other than the Republicans wanted it to be there(remember the one-time magical Equal Protection argument) and look how that one turned out!

  11. Mimikatz says:

    Of course there was prejudice to Libby. If Fitz hadn’t been appointed, it would have stayed in-house, there’d be no presecution, and Libby wouldn’t now be going to jail! Isn’t that really what it’s about?

  13. Anonymous says:

    Except, Mimikatz, apparently if Ashcroft HAD run the investigation, he’d have indicted Libby. So apparently Libby would have undoubtedly been prosecuted–and it would have been undoubtedly political–in any case.

  14. Tom Maguire says:

    …he chose to ignore the widespread criticism on the part of hardcore conservatives of OVP’s dismantling of the Constitution

    Re the â€widespread criticism†– exactly so. Anyone who needs me to be the hundredth person to state the obvious is going to be frequently disappointed.

    Maguire has found his evidence that this was a political prosecution–political for Ashcroft, mind you. Yet all the while, he’s making an argument that Fitzgerald operated with no effective oversight and therefore was unconstitutionally appointed. So apparently, Ashcroft simultaneously directed Fitzgerald to mount a political prosecution (even a year after he resigned), yet he had no legal authority over Fitzgerald in the least.

    Boy, that sure is a tough logical hurdle to span… let’s see, Ashcroft listens to Comey explain that Libby looks like a liar and agrees to recuse himself so that Comey can loose the hounds of hell on Libby and maybe Cheney (but no one at State).

    Seeing as how two years later Fitzgerald didn’t get anyone except the guy he initially targeted, maybe we should just conclude that Ashcroft was lucky.

    Or maybe we can figure that Ashcroft, Comey and Fitzgerald all went into this with the same broad ’Get Dick’ agenda. Tough call.

    So, are you arguing that Ashcroft’s view of Cheney did not affect his willingness to see a special counsel appointed essentially to target the OVP? Fascinating.

    Just to anticipate a rebuttal, Ashcroft’s recusal is often associated with Rove, not Libby. (Here is an old ,a href=â€http://news.nationaljournal.com/articles/0608nj1.htmâ€>Waas aticle). However, the case against Rove was highly speculative; the â€Libby is lying†case held up through the trial.

    So Ashcroft had to figure he was siccing a special counsel on his buddy Cheney.

    mcguire mistakes â€POLITICAL INFIGHTING†for politics, and then projects his own ignorance onto his audience

    it kinda reminds me of Sauron’s fatal flaw; his inability to measure anybody else’s motives without regard to his own malice

    I come for the analysis but stay for the self-parody.

    Somebody in a previous thread made a comment to the effect that it was amazing that Comey could do a thorough and careful enough job of legally delegating in a one page letter.

    Well, not if delegating is no more exoctic than your weekly grocery shopping list!

    Hmm. How many shopping lists, excuse me, special counsels appointed as per the Comey method, have we seen since, let’s say, 1950? None. or at least, the amici said it is unprecedented and the prosecution certainly has not pointed to any precedents.

    Maybe no one makes shopping lists anymore.

    I come for the analysis…

  16. Anonymous says:

    Ashcroft listens to Comey explain that Libby looks like a liar and agrees to recuse himself so that Comey can loose the hounds of hell on Libby and maybe Cheney (but no one at State).

    So let me understand the chronology you’re suggesting. On December 30, at about 9AM, Ashcroft calls Comey and says, â€I’m recusing myself.†And Comey, who has only been on the job 13 days including the Christmas holiday and doesn’t have direct oversight on the case, calls Ashcroft back around 3PM, saying, â€Omigod!! It’s all Libby!!†Ashcroft says in response, â€YOu’re right, and Cheney’s mean!!!†And then Comey, on the same day that Ashcroft recused himself, not only manages to discover that Libby’s the guilty party, but also manages to find his buddy Fitz and get him to agree to take on the case. And he manages to pass on the deep knowledge he has gained in the 13 days of very indirect attention he has given the case. Voila!! I’m convinced!!!

    Is that the scenario?

  17. Anonymous says:

    ….another event involving the no-longer AG Ashcroft (and Gonzales) from 2005,

    That was a typo – it was an incident from 2004, as should have been obvious from the context, which included clues such as:

    Cheney’s lawyer passed word that Philbin was an unsatisfactory choice. The attorney general and White House counsel abandoned their candidate.

    My bad.

    Is that the scenario?

    Mormally, I defer to you in concocting outlandish scenarios. My more modest effort starts here:

    On October 3, 2003, President George W. Bush nominated Jim Comey to serve as Deputy Attorney General, he was unanimously confirmed by the Senate on December 9, 2003, and the President signed his commission on December 11, 2003. Prior to becoming Deputy Attorney General, Mr. Comey served as United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York from January 2002 to the time of his confirmation.

    Sometime between October and December 30, 2003 Comey manages to figure out that not all is sweetness and light between DoJ and OVP – maybe he has heard of the review of the torture memo beguan in fall 2003 (IIRC), maybe he has heard about the NSA program (or maybe he spends the fall prepping for Halloween and mailing X-mas cards).

    So Ashcroft has it in for Cheney; Comey is able to figure that out all by his little self, and maybe has it in for Cheney himself; and again, because his IQ is over 80, Comey is able to figure out that if Libby is lying, it may be to protect Cheney, but regardless, setting a special counsel loose on Libby will probablky embarrass Cheney.

    Your view is that this is all too much for Comey to have worked out? That no one at DoJ ever hinted to him that Ashcroft and Cheney were on the outs, and DoJ was preparing a major push-back? My goodness, how long will we all have the opportunity to enjoy the new, utterly trusting, no-hidden-agendas for anyone EW?

    mcguire mistakes â€POLITICAL INFIGHTING†for politics…

    From my post:

    Some commentators on the left cannot fathom the notion that Fitzgerald’s prosecution of Libby may have been politically motivated – surely, they note, Ashcroft and Comey were good Republicans, as was Judge Walton?

    Hmm. That would be especially cogent if all politics was partisan politics. Folks able to embrace the concept of factional disputes within an Administration will find these tidbits from the WaPo series on the Cheney Vice-Presidency to be interesting.

    Why are you saying to me what I am saying to you?

  19. Anonymous says:

    So um, in that time period between October and December, when, in response to questions about recusal, Ashcroft said, â€we don’t have a DAG, I can’t recuse until we doâ€â€“that whole time Ashcroft was filling Comey’s head with hate for Cheney? And Cheney, not normally a bureaucratic nitwit–as the WaPo piece points out–still allowed Comey’s appointment to go forward? Wow, what a remarkable twist of fate for the left!! And meanwhile, the whole time Comey was in NY justifying those same PATRIOT provisions that Cheney loved so much–that was just a front so he could sneak into DOJ and get REVENGE!!!! on Cheney for … um, those same PATRIOT provisions that he loved so much?

    I love it, Maguire!! Not only do you manage to invent temporal impossibilities worth of HG Wells, but you manage to flip all the actual events on their head!!

    That was tricky of Ashcroft, recusing himself so they guy he put in charge would oversee the prosecution he’d have been better able to run himself, wasn’t it?

  20. EH says:

    It’s all a part of the highly-organized DoJ pushback against OVP. Once you realize that everything else falls into place. Oh, and Scooter is innocent.

  21. MayBee says:

    That was tricky of Ashcroft, recusing himself so they guy he put in charge would oversee the prosecution he’d have been better able to run himself, wasn’t it?

    We could call that prosecution laundering. Or indictment in a box, if you prefer.

  22. radiofreewill says:

    Tom – I know you can hear me, even if Marcy’s got you in a figure-four, so please ponder this:

    Why would a guy who’s willing to sing â€When the Eagle Soars†in public, with tears in his eyes, no less – why would a guy like that recuse himself from oversight of an investigation into his best political friends in the White House?

    Do you think, maybe, as a Bush Cabinet member, he had no choice, in lieu of a Special Prosecutor, but to step-aside in a Possible Treason Investigation that points to the White House?

    Do you think Comey’s understanding – all of his career, and not just during his time as DAG – was that he was entrusted with prosecuting wrong-doing according to the Rule of Law, wherever that may lead?

    On the assumption that Bush would never serve a warrant on himself if he had something to hide, we are left with only the Rule of Law itself to open Any door behind which evil-doers are cowering in America – and that has to include the possiblity of the Long Arm of the Law reaching right through the closed doors of the White House to nab possible traitors.

    Your positions are weak because you are on the wrong side, Tom.

    Open your eyes, you’ve been pinned.

  23. Tug says:

    While we are at it, can we bring up how disgusting it is that Halliburton moved out of Houston to Dubai?

  24. CaseyL says:

    Actually, what I found most humorous about Maguire’s latest trip to LaLaLand was how he boiled down the entire story about Cheney’s power grab to Fitzgerald’s investigation.

    Here’s the Vice President usurping Presidential power while the actual figurehead President is still in office, here’s Cheney undermining official US foreign policy and pushing for more war, here’s Cheney claiming executive privilege simultaneously claiming he’s not part of the executive branch, here’s Cheney ordering torture and secret prisons; here’s Cheney classifying and de-classifying data like a bloody jack-in-the-box according to the political expediency of the moment… and what do Maguire (and his lunatic commenters) focus on? Patrick FItzgerald.

    Not only that, but they take Cheney’s across the board violation of Constitutional and statutory law, and say it was justified – not even, mind you, by evoking national security, but by saying he â€had†to, because Ashcroft and Comey and Mueller and Fitzgerald were being mean to him.

    The worst Constitutional crisis ever, and the JOMorons reduce it to a case of personal picque.

    It’s not bad enough they’re apologists for creeping totalitarianism; they’re silly, shallow-minded, trivializing, dumb-to-the-bone apologists for creeping totalitarianism.

  25. Martin says:

    Emptywheel vs. Maguire is like Arthur vs. the Black Knight in Monty Python’s Holy Grail:

    [Maguire loses an arm at the start of the debate]:

    â€Now stand aside worthy adversary.â€
    â€â€™tis but a scratchâ€
    â€A SCRATCH!? Your arm’s off!â€
    â€No it isn’tâ€
    â€Then what’s that, then?â€
    â€I’ve had worseâ€
    â€You liarâ€
    â€C’mon, you pansy!â€

    [Thorough dismemberment]:
    …
    â€I’m invincibleâ€
    â€You’re a loony!â€

    Now I’ll have nightmares of Clarice threatening to bite me.

  26. Sara says:

    Well I think it time to make up a nice juicy conspiracy theory to spice all this up a bit.

    Remember at Verdict time Mrs Scoots says out loud something to the effect that they are going to get it, you know meet their maker or whatever?

    Well maybe the 4 part on Cheney and all the rest is her promised revenge. If her little scoots has to go to the big house for protecting this lot — well she knows lots of stuff, and perhaps knows a thing or two about helping the press.

    Remember Mr & Mrs Scoots met each other when they were staffers on the Hill. Mrs Scoots worked for Joe Biden on Foreign Affairs, and she is at least on record as a democrat. Mr. Scoots worked on the other side of the aisle on the same committee staff. It twas love on the Hill, and the two became an item.

    Then we have Mary Matalin chatting in her letter to the judge about how she and James have the same sort of bi-partisian marriage as the Scoots, with the same young children.

    So it is a conspiracy on the part of a wife, (not The Wife), soon to be prison visiting, to take down the VP a peg or two as revenge for not fixing the trial or something like that.

    Conspiracy theory can come in handy at times, particularly when simplicity is needed to explain things.

  27. William Ockham says:

    You guys are missing the most delicious irony of Maguire’s post. Tom, who has been a dedicated warrior in the right wing’s assault on the press, suddenly takes everything in the Cheney series as gospel so he can pull out a few unrelated tidbits to concoct this utterly ridiculous scenario.

    I’m halfway expecting to hear from Tom next week that aliens from another galaxy are behind the Libby prosecution.

  28. Jon says:

    There’s a difference between being a right-wing partisan and being intellectually dishonest. With his logic-defying leaps of faith and whirling dervish clouds of smoke, Maguire is the clearly the latter. Scooter Libby and the â€neocon†gang should be tried for treason for selling out their country. Now what do they call the apologists and supporters of people who sell out their country?

  29. Liam says:

    See â€Operation Mockingbird†in Wikipedia and consider the fact that this cabal has payed journalists to lie for them already.Maybe this is how Tom Tom the pipers son and shitstain are motivated,its certainly not a desire for justice.Its fine mess we are in when so many feel no shame in defending thoese who reveal a covert agents name for such low motives.

  30. compelled_to_unlurk says:

    It is not all bad …. In Mr. Maguire, teachers all around the world now have the ultimate example of a sophist.

  31. Jodi says:

    Tom Maquire,

    this is really a tough room.

    I think you have shaken them up though. Comparing you to HG Wells!

    : )

  32. freepatriot says:

    Why are you saying to me what I am saying to you?

    well tom, you can’t seem to comprehend the fact that I don’t believe a fucking word you say

    understanding that, here’s our problem in a nut shell

    what I’ve been saying to you is that YOU’RE A FUCKING JOKE (scroll up and see for your self)

    what you THINK you are saying might be be something different that what everybody is hearing, but what you said to me is â€tom mcguire is a fucking joke†(you didn’t say it in those words, but you wrote a piss-weak sophist’s argument about a serious criminal trial and expected me to believe it, so you MUST be trying to communicate the â€I am a FUCKING JOKE†message to me)

    now that we can agree on the message we’re BOTH trying to pass on to the other (ie, tom mcguire is a fucking joke) what part of â€tom mcguire is a fucking joke†do you not understand ???

    in this thread alone, I’ve compared you to Monty Python’s falsely oppresed peasant, â€Martin†compared you to Python’s â€Black Knightâ€, and â€compeled_to_unlurk†flat out called you a fucking sophist (once again, scroll up and check it your self)

    do you begin to see a pattern here tom ???

    we’re NOT buying your bullshit

    and when a bullshitter can’t …

    well, we all know what happens to the bullshitters who can’t sling the bullshit anymore

    it’s back to fauz gnus for you, ya fucking hack

    does that clear things up for you, or are you still confused ???

    (btw, I’ll give you 10-to-1 odds right now that the Appeals Court doesn’t buy scooter’s version of this sophist’s argument you’re making either)

    now go away, or we shall taunt you again …

    thought I was kidding about that ???

    mess with the bull and ya get the horn …

  33. maguire hits the crack pipe again says:

    hey maguire – if High Schoolers can ’ get it ’, why can’t you and your fellow heads-up-ass mates like jodi, maybee and section 9 get it ?? it really is not that hard – just pick up the phone and dial R-E-A-L-I-T-Y.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..h-torture/

    President Bush was presented with a letter Monday signed by 50 high school seniors in the Presidential Scholars program urging a halt to â€violations of the human rights†of terror suspects held by the United States.

    â€We do not want America to represent torture. We urge you to do all in your power to stop violations of the human rights of detainees, to cease illegal renditions, and to apply the Geneva Convention to all detainees, including those designated enemy combatants,†the letter said.

  34. Neil says:

    Shorter Maguire: DOJ wielded it’s awesome power in an unjustified prosecution of Scooter Libby for personal not professional reasons.

    What a large pile of steaming shit.

    In this installment, Maguire returns to his best form, speculation. Comey had it in for OVP because Comey, a recent addition to DOJ, is a team player.

    Do you have one shred of evidence on which to base this wildarsed theory?

  35. freepatriot says:

    hello ???

    tom ???

    are you there ???

    or did you finally get a fucking clue ???

    and I thought you were too sold out to learn something new