Bush and Schumer
David Kurtz reports that the Mukasey nomination will come down to the Senate Judiciary Committee vote (and TPM is tracking votes so far). I believe this sets up some really interesting tension between Bush and Chuck Schumer.
You see, events thus far have made it very important for Bush to get Mukasey approved.
Whitehouse Sniffing around Bush's Executive Orders
Remarkably, Sheldon Whitehouse asked Mukasey very few written questions. But I am intrigued by this one.
2. Do you believe that the President may act contrary to a valid executive order? In the event he does, need he amend the executive order or provide any notice that he is acting contrary to the executive order?
ANSWER:
Who Vetted Mukasey?
Here's an interesting question from Dick Durbin to Mukasey. It addresses whom the Administration felt it needed to give buy-in before nominating Judge Mukasey:
11. According to the Washington Post, before you were confirmed you "spent part of the weekend meeting with leading figures in the conservative world, seeking to allay their concerns about [your] philosophy and suitability for running [the] Justice Department."
a.
Diplomatic Renditions?
Here's a response from Mukasey that frankly stumps me. It comes in response to a Joe Biden question on extraordinary renditions.
If the purpose [of renditions] is to gather intelligence, why would the United States trust interrogations carried out by Egyptian or Syrian intelligence agencies--agencies that the United States has long acknowledged and criticized for engaging in torture and abuse?
ANSWER:
Mukasey Will Not Commit to Restoring Election Law Manual
One of the sub-scandals that came out as part of the USA purge is that DOJ recently revised the manual on Election Offenses. Gonzales' DOJ basically removed the language restricting indictments just prior to elections--precisely the restriction that Hans Von Spakovsky violated when he brought indictments against former ACORN workers just before the 2006 elections.
Mukasey and Contempt
Even more than Mukasey's woozy answers on waterboarding, I'm disturbed by his opinions on executive privilege and contempt, partly because I suspect Mukasey would make sure no waterboarding happened going forward, and that his answers on waterboarding are designed primarily to avoid putting those who waterboarded--or signed off on it--in the past at legal risk.
Shorter 4 Top Lawyers: To Hell with the Courts
Here's the letter from Ashcroft, Comey, Goldsmith, and Philbin that came up so often in today's SJC hearing. The key graf is this one, in which four top lawyers say, "to hell with the Courts, we've got two branches plus Cheney, who needs a third?"
Finally, we note that we are familiar with the legal analysis conducted within the Executive Branch of intelligence activities allegedly connected to the lawsuits against telecommunications carriers
Jane Harman Responds
Jane Harman sent a response to this post via a staffer.What rubbish! For those like me whoinsist that the President’s domestic surveillance program must complyfully with the Constitution and the 4th Amendment, the only way forCongress to get there is with a veto-proof majority. That's why I'mworking with Republicans.
State Loses Its Army
I've imagined (and it's largely imagination) that Condi's little PR campaign of the last week was a desperate attempt to stave off DOD control over State's bodyguards--an attempt to retain an army for the exclusive use of the State Department. Condi went to (for her) unheard of lengths to try to play nice and pretend that State could manage a very large band of mercenaries.
Is it just coincidence that that effort
Oh Madame Secretary...?
In an email to Laura Rozen and Jeff Lomonaco this morning, I predicted Henry Waxman would be mightily interested in the news that the Blackwater guards involved in the September 16 shooting had been granted immunity.
In any case, I suspect Condi will regret that she didn't mention thiswhen visiting Congress last week.
Time for Another Primary Challenge for Jane Harman
Buried in this article on Democrats compromising with Republicans, I noticed this paragraph:
And as Democratic leaders push their own legislation to rein in the wiretapping program, Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) has been quietly exploring avenues of compromise with Rep. Peter Hoekstra (Mich.),the ranking Republican on the House intelligence committee. CentristDemocrats hope those talks can dovetail with the Senate intelligencecommittee's own bipartisan measure on surveillance of suspectedterrorists.
Jane Harman, of course, is a
The Lead Rubber Ducky in Grover's Bathtub
There's an interesting case study going on over at the Senate Commerce Committee. The Committee is trying to write legislation to return the Consumer Product Safety Commission to its former strength so it can prevent things like lead-filled toys from entering the toddler chew chain. Yet the Commission's acting head, Nancy Nord, is trying to preserve the Norquistian "ideal" of small government--she's objecting to Senate plans to give her Commission more
Blackwater Guards Given Immunity from Prosecution
I pointed out the other day that several of the Blackwater guards involved in the September 16 shooting have left Iraq. Now bmaz points to this AP story revealing that all the guards have been given immunity from prosecution.
The State Department promised Blackwater USA bodyguards immunityfrom prosecution in its investigation of last month's deadly shootingof 17 Iraqi civilians, The Associated Press has learned.
[snip]
Three senior law enforcement officials said all the Blackwaterbodyguards
Exxon Would Like to be Excused
Back when I taught, at the beginning of the school year each year the school would hand professors a description of the incoming freshman class so the professors could understand what world their students were coming from. It usually read something like:
2007: This year's incoming freshmen were born in 1989.
The top TV series for most of these students' teen years was American Idol.
These students matured after the first big judgments against
We've Seen This Before
Kagro X has a post focusing, again, on Michael Mukasey's evasions about the Constitution. Kagro focuses not on Mukasey's confusion about whether water-boarding is torture, but whether the President can ignore existing laws.
Any president -- and I mean any president -- ought to beable to depend on a certain amount of deference from his or herAttorney General, of course.
McConnell's Earmarks
I'm less interested in the local angle on Mitch McConnell's placement of earmarks to benefit BAE in this year's defense appropriations bill than what it says about our military industrial complex.
Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., is pushing $25 million in earmarkedfederal funds for a British defense contractor that is under criminalinvestigation by the U.S.
Patrick Philbin
SJC will meet on Wednesday to take up SSCI's FISA Amendment. We'll get to see whether the Administration has sufficiently satisfied Scottish Haggis and Patrick Leahy to get the bill through committee with the telecom immunity still attached.
But there may be other reason to tune in, something I noticed on Selise's weekly Congressional hearing schedule:
Panel I:
Kenneth L.
Funny Money
Atrios provides some crack former econ professor analysis on the dollar ...
WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
Dollar sinking.Thedollar fell as low as $1.4426 per euro, the weakest since theintroduction of the 13-nation common currency in 1999, before tradingat $1.4420 as of 6:29 a.m. in Tokyo from $1.4393 in late New York onOct. 26.
Update on Gaming Intelligence to Justify War
I wasn't so disturbed by the news that DNI Mike McConnell had decided to reverse the recent practice of producing unclassified Key Judgments from an NIE ... until I read Scott Horton's take on it.
Michael McConnell started his first two months on the job with asolid record for candor and accuracy.
The Dodge on Retroactive Immunity
Okay. This will serve as a summary of my analysis of the SSCI report on their FISA bill and to show how the SSCI managed to convince themselves to give retroactive immunity to the telecoms. Thus far, I have shown that:This report suggests that the Authorization to Use Military Force was central to the enactment of Bush's illegal warrantless wiretap program.The report claims they need to give telecoms immunity because, since