Letters to the Editor
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Results at Last
I'm so gladdened by this resignation, and I trust most Americans feel the same.
The investigations worked. Let's kill that talking point that "Americans don't like investigations" once and for all.
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On to the next
Next questions, please!
Is the recent rash of resignations by design, or a sign of crumbling and collapse?
And if by design, who is the designer and what is the design?
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Maybe Gonzo just wanted to spend more time ...
... firing and justifying the torture of political opponents within his own family.
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Stranger than Fiction
The Rovian machinations are too scary and disgusting for even a skilled novelist like Stephen King to handle plausibly, but they sound like they come right out of a horror novel. The horror is it is happening to and in our once great nation. I don't feel any safer with all these people resigning because Cheney still wants to bomb Iraq, and he's not going anywhere.
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What medication is Sidney Blumenthal on?
Just this month, on 8-2-07, to be exact, Salon was publishing Blumenthal's straight-faced pronouncement that Gonzalez would never resign because he knew too much about the nefarious Bushco crime family, right?
Now, 25 days later, the reason that Gonzalez must resign is that he knows too much about those evildoings in the Bush White House.
Can anybody tell me -- did Blumenthal just switch brands of aluminum foil for his headgear? Is that what the issue is?
This kind of thing used to be the domain of 3 a.m. call-in programs on AM radio. Now, it passes for what is supposedly a credible movement-wing of the Democrat party. Are the Sidney Blumenthals of the world going to pick the 2008 Democrat nominee for President? I suppose I can only hope so...
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Another reason why now
Jon Stewart? Stephen Colbert? Dan Froomkin?
All on break.
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prophylaxis
http://www.birthrightpetition.com/phpPETITION/index.php
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To Elephantman
While SB may have stated on 8/2/07 that Gonzalez would never resign, this was before Karl Rove left, which caught a lot of people by surprise. I think SB did an adequate job of explaining how the situation changed for Gonzalez changed once his puppetmaster left him dangling.
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Another [more cynical] reason for doing it NOW. Congress is in recess.
The next Attorney General - if he/she is to be confirmed by the Senate - will have to face an inquisition the likes of which we have not seen in a generation or two.
The goddam Democrats might even expect that anyone seeking confirmation as Attorney General might have to promise - under oath - to ENFORCE THE LAW. Which would result in Bush's impeachment and indictment for violations of Title 50 US Code, Chapter 36, Subchapter 1, Sections 1800 et seq., among other crimes to notable and numerous to elucidate herein.
Far better to settle for a recess appointment while Congress is ON FUCKING VACATION.
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Sidney
Great article. You have just given the reasons for a "presidential" pardon for this clown by the Clown in Chief.
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Elephantman
It is well known that both the Indian and African varieties of your animal are equipped with good brains and intelligence. Unfortunately, this can't be said for the American version and especially for you!
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Elephantman/woman
What, did the RNC pick up your contract? If that's the best you got you need to give them a refund. The issue here has nothing to do with Mr. Blumenthal and what he may or may not have wrote in Salon (in fact he never wrote anything about whether or not Gonzalez would or would not resign, what he actually wrote was that it was in Gonzalez' best interest not to resign, I suggest you actually read the article in question before you try and paraphrase it). The issue is, what is going on behind the scenes that forced Gonzalez' hand now? You can try and obfuscate the issue all you want, that is your craven right, but people are wise and getting wiser to the criminal enterprise that is the Bush administration. You would do well to distance yourself from it, yourself...but I guess you can't see that since you are blinded by your love for George Bush.
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21st century blogging: Q. How do you know when Sidney Blumenthal is blathering incoherently about some imagined Republican plot? A. When his fingers are touching his keyboard.
No, mhellman, I am NOT accepting any of this idiotic baloney.
Here was Blumenthal, earlier this month: (God forbid a guy like this ever being allowed to advise a future President on something important, like projecting the U.S. economy four years out...)
"Bush cannot afford to have Gonzales resign or be removed. Gonzales' leaving would ratchet up the administration's political crisis to an intense level. Bush could not nominate a replacement without responding to the Senate Judiciary Committee's inevitable request for information on every matter that he has attempted to keep secret. On every unresolved and electrified issue the Senate would demand documents -- the entire cache on the development of policy since 2001 on torture, the gutting of the Civil Rights Division, the U.S. attorneys and much more. Only Gonzales' perpetuation in office holds back the deluge."
~Sidney Blumenthal in Salon, 8/2/07
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This falls short of Sidney's usually excellent analysis
I think that the note by Elephantman described the problems with this article.
As far as I can tell, the Democrats are too spineless and the Republicans too interested in party power over their country to impeach Gonzales, despite his repeated lies under oath. Gonzales treated congress with the same open contempt that they treated him. Yet nothing happened and there was no evidence that Abu Gonzales was going anywhere. So why did he resign now? All Blumenthal can think of is that Rove is gone so Gonzales had to follow.
As Elephantman points out, this ignores the obvious advantages to the Bush administration of having a compromised Attorney General in place. Gonzales has proven that his Justice Department is not going to investigate the billions of dollars that have been stolen in Iraq or anything else.
Now the Bush administration has to deal with confirmation hearings. Some commentators are betting that the Bushies will once again play the terror card (appoint who we say or you're soft on terror). Perhaps this will work. Or perhaps now that Gonzales is gone the Washington establishment will taste political blood in the water. This really is the wheels coming off the whole tottering G.W. Bush enterprise. There's every reason to believe that confirmation hearings will be contentious. The Democrats might actually force Bush to appoint something other than a crony. A Justice Department that actually enforces the law could make the last year of the Bush administration hell. They've certainly never experienced such a Justice Department before.
The question remains: given all of the negatives, why didn't Gonzales "hang tough"? He was not going anywhere and he provided protection for the Bushies. Blumenthals analysis is shallow and contradicts his early writing.