This "Shocking" Story Should Not End Until GONZALES IS GONE (NYT Editorial)

[kpete]

Editorial
Why This Scandal Matters

Published: May 21, 2007

As Monica Goodling, a key player in the United States attorney scandal, prepares to testify before Congress on Wednesday, the administration’s strategy is clear. It has offered up implausible excuses, hidden the most damaging evidence and feigned memory lapses, while hoping that the public’s attention moves on. But this scandal is too important for the public or Congress to move on. This story should not end until Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is gone, and the serious damage that has been done to the Justice Department is repaired.

..........

This understanding has badly broken down. It is now clear that United States attorneys were pressured to act in the interests of the Republican Party, and lost their job if they failed to do so. The firing offenses of the nine prosecutors who were purged last year were that they would not indict Democrats, they investigated important Republicans, or they would not try to suppress the votes of Democratic-leaning groups with baseless election fraud cases.

The degree of partisanship in the department is shocking. A study by two professors, Donald Shields of the University of Missouri at St. Louis and John Cragan of Illinois State University, found that the Bush Justice Department has investigated Democratic officeholders and office seekers about four times as often as Republican ones.

........

It is hard not to see the fingerprints of Karl Rove. A disproportionate number of the prosecutors pushed out, or considered for dismissal, were in swing states. The main reason for the purge — apart from hobbling a California investigation that has already put one Republican congressman in jail — appears to have been an attempt to tip states like Missouri and Washington to Republican candidates for House, Senate, governor and president.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/21/opinion/21mon1.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

[Kurovski]

1. K&R. (nt)

[L. Coyote]

10. DITTO: Gonzolies, the last man standing after a lying match. LINKS here

Gonzolies (verb. nov.) English, May 17, 2007
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x907626

[pberq]

2. Kick & Nominated

[tblue37]

3. He should not end after he is gone, either. (eom)

[NashVegas]

4. The Title Should Be

This "Shocking" Story Should Not End WHEN Gonzales is Gone ...

[Bassic]

5. There was a total Bushbot senator from Florida on CNN yesterday

that kept saying Gonzo's explanations were satisfactory and that the Dems don,t even have any power over him. Gotta love Florida's politicians...

[annabanana]

13. Doesn't it just tickle you that they've moved their primary up?

Isn't it just grand that the most corrupt state state with the most compromised election machinery is now in a position to REALLY screw America up, yet again?

[Bassic]

14. I know, it's really annoying.

I just hope they don't succeed a third time.

[lonestarnot]

6. Wonder what KKKarl will do when this is over?

Time?

[troubleinwinter]

7. A related story:

Posted on Sun, May. 20, 2007

U. S. ATTORNEYS

Efforts to stop `voter fraud' may have curbed legitimate voting

By Greg Gordon
McClatchy Newspapers


WASHINGTON - During four years as a Justice Department civil rights lawyer, Hans von Spakovsky went so far in a crusade against voter fraud as to warn of its dangers under a pseudonym in a law journal article.

Writing as "Publius," von Spakovsky contended that every voter should be required to produce a photo-identification card and that there was "no evidence" that such restrictions burden minority voters disproportionately.

Now, amid a scandal over politicization of the Justice Department, Congress is beginning to examine allegations that von Spakovsky was a key player in a Republican campaign to hang onto power in Washington by suppressing the votes of minority voters.

"Mr. von Spakovsky was central to the administration's pursuit of strategies that had the effect of suppressing the minority vote," charged Joseph Rich, a former Justice Department voting rights chief who worked under him.

He and other former career department lawyers say that von Spakovsky steered the agency toward voting rights policies not seen before, pushing to curb minor instances of election fraud by imposing sweeping restrictions that would make it harder, not easier, for Democratic-leaning poor and minority voters to cast ballots.

In interviews, current and former federal officials and civil rights leaders told McClatchy Newspapers that von Spakovsky:

-Sped approval of tougher voter ID laws in Georgia and Arizona in 2005, joining decisions to override career lawyers who believed that Georgia's law would restrict voting by poor blacks and who felt that more analysis was needed on the Arizona law's impact on Native Americans and Latinos.

-Tried to influence the federal Election Assistance Commission's research into the dimensions of voter fraud nationally and the impact of restrictive voter ID laws - research that could undermine a vote-suppression agenda.

<Snip>

Von Spakovsky... accepted a presidential recess appointment to a Republican slot on the Federal Election Commission in December 2005. He is scheduled to appear at a June 13 confirmation hearing before the Senate Rules and Administration Committee.

http://www.rawstory.com/showarticle.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.realcities.com%2Fmld%2Fkrwashington%2Fnews%2Fnation%2F17256012.htm%3Ftemplate%3DcontentModules%2Fprintstory.jsp

His comnfirmation must be rejected!!!

[gratuitous]

8. Why is the Times shocked?

Didn't they embed Judith Miller to help spread war hysteria? And now they're shocked -- shocked! I say -- to find out that the Bush administration would taint even the most serious considerations of governance with unbridled partisan politics? I don't think they're quite that stupid, which leads me to the conclusion that they think their readers are that stupid. It's really quite insulting.

[Robbien]

9. I don't like this. It implies the story is over if Gonzales is gone. Wrong.

Gonzales is a bad smelly fish in this story, but he is just a small bad smelly fish.

There is so much in this story which should not die for years and years until the very last Regent/Liberty fundie has been purged from the US Gov't. This story should not die until the push for a National ID card is dead. This story should not die until there is a safe verifiable voting system. This story should not die until the NSA backs off from their spying and the whole spying program has been exposed.

Then put habeas corpus back and maybe it would be time to possibly think about perhaps letting this story go to the back burner.

[wryter2000]

11. My feeling exactly

Assuming he's not able to committ any more offenses against humanity and our democracy because of the spotlight on him...

I'd rather he stay on like a huge millstone around *'s neck. I want to hear Muller, Card, and/or Ashcroft before the same Senate committee.

[NewJeffCT]

15. There is no way integrity at Justice can be restored

without replacing everybody at the top - President, VP, Rove, and the attorney general. Be it through impeachment, resignation, or having their terms expire in January of 2009

Is there anybody on the Republican side of the aisle that has the ability to restore the integrity to the Justice Department? Chuck Hagel? Nope... John McCain? Nope, and he wouldn't take it, either. Maybe John Dean? But, the likelihood of Bush nominating him is probably less than the proverbial snowball's chance in hell.

[donheld]

12. This "Shocking" Story Should Not End Until BUSH is gone

Sorry but I had to make a slight adjustment to the NYT. It is now correct