Captain's Quarters -

I don't believe in giving in to the Democrats about Executive Branch personnel but I don't like incompetent Executive Branch personnel even less. Bye bye Mr. Gonzales.

And while you're at it, take Chuck Hagel with you.

Frankly, I think Bush would rather fire Rove than Gonzales--if he had some reason to. For the President, I don't think this has anything to do with "protecting" Rove. It's about standing by a good friend, a close friend, Gonzales, who hasn't committed a firing offense in Bush's estimation. On the contrary, I think Gonzales will have to fight the President if he wants to leave.

Gary, much agreement with having Hagel pack his bags promptly.

I won't even discuss Gonzales' incompetence but I do think the White House needs to take an offensive stance on how this "investigation" started as a Witch Hunt by Schumer and the Democrats of Revenge.

Might thought is....if you're Pres. Bush, you write the names of Schumer's "suggested" replacements on a 20" x 24" placard and set fire to it on the White House lawn.

Then Pres. Bush sends up HIS nominee to Schumer and the Democrats of Vindictiveness - a nominee whose past policies and stances would make Ashcroft look like Rahm Emanuel. Shove the hardest-a**ed nominees down their throat.

Point is - if Schumer and the Democrats of DickTracy find themselves tied up for weeks/months in approving a new AG, that will delay their moving on to #3, #4, etc on their Witch Hunt List. Bog 'em down.

It hard not to say that a pattern has emerged re: the Bush presidency....it is all about him and his pals, and screw what anyone else thinks. I thought Bush would have learned a lesson over the Miers nomination. Apparently not.

The fact that Bush is digging in his heels over this one...when his own party is railing his pal...is quite telling. And, IMO, when you couple this decision with the Miers decision and with the decision to can Rummy when he did, you start to wonder about Bush's decision making ability.

Gonzales should just do the right thing on his own and resign. I don't think he did anything illegal or unethical, but he has shown himself to be an incompetent manager.

John Bolton would make a nice replacement.

Captain,

I have to respectfully disagree with you here. Gonzalez should stay. In fact, if there really was any justice, President Bush would instruct Mr. Gonzalez to send Justic Officials to Congress and arrest the good leaders Reid and Pelosi and charge them with treason for interfering with the Executive branch (foreign policy) and for giving aid and comfort to the enemies of the United States.

I would do it live, on camera, with agents and handcuffs very visible, and a news conference laying out the charges on national TV. I'd also petition the judiciaru to remand both individuals as security threats.

But then that's just me. I'm certain other's mileage may very. However, I feel that Pelosi and Reid ought to be considered for the same treatment that Andrew Jackson once desired for Clay and Calhoun: Shoot the one and hang the other. Then get back to running the country.

Respects,

Sigh...

I've written it before, and I repeat it here:

Gonzales needs to go. He's either a liar or a total idiot. Either way, he doesn't need to be the AG.

Yes, I know: the dems haven't showed that he did anything illegal (and if THAT pack of crooks can't find evidence of a crime, it flat don't exist!). Nevertheless, the USAG is the country's top law enforcement officer, and as such should be a person worthy of respect. He also should reflect well on the president who appointed him and in whose cabinet he serves. Gonzales fails on both counts.

As for Trashcan Chuckie and his laundry list... The president should tell him to stick it up his ass. Trash is playing politics again, and the president shouldn't even look at the list. If he's determined that Gonzales remain at his post (and, no matter what else you think of Bush, he's not a man to vacilate), then he certainly doesn't need a "helpful" list from unindicted scum like Trashcan.

The only good thing to come out of this affair is proof that the president still does have a set of balls. Too bad he doesn't remember them when dealing with the filthy democrats who want to sell us out in Iraq or when he's talking about border security.

Bah.

LOL !

Sorry Captain...

Taking advise from Chuck Schumer is simply not sound policy.

This is a non issue.

No negligence of any kind found, some miscommunication and hyperbole.

Much like Mr. Libby.

And we are going to dump an AG?

Please...

Some are actually letting the Democrats decide who goes and stays?

Some are simply not seeing this in an objective light.

They slandered Bork, and 'Borking' has nearly destroyed
a number of Conservatives the unethical Democrats have targeted.

Beginning to wonder if there is a stubborn mentality in regard to some, who are driven by their own opinion, versus the larger picture.

No evidence of wrong doing, but we'll just dump someone cause they didn't answer questions to the Senate in the manner we wished?

Let's ignore Reid's land deal, Feinstein's peddling Military Contracts, Shumer's libel of Judge Pickering, Boxer trying to undermine a National Election of 2004, etc., etc...

Again, much to do about nothing, letting the dishonest Liberal Democrat Partisans dictate the issue.

Not wise, in my humble opinion.

So, the President should cave in to the Democrats and fire Gonzo over this non-scandal? Listen to the feckless, weak-kneed congressional Republicans?

And then, what? Allow Schumer to choose the next AG? Or spend a year - of the 21 months remaining in the term - trying to get a new AG confirmed?

WHO would even accept the job, knowing that it's temporary, low paying (for a good lawyer), involves a complete public cavity search, and is subject to firing at the Democrats' whim?

And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
But we’ve proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane.

Bush might as well chum the waters before swimming as give the Democrats a taste of blood.

Dump Gonzales to please the kangaroo court of the Judiciary Committee that has proven no illegality? Gonzales may be a lousy witness and an inept manager, but asking for his resignation implies that the DOJ under his leadership was engaging in corruption--a very damaging message.

Mark Levin posted at his blog link at NRO about this issue just the other day, summing up my own perspective on this nonsense:

Attacking Alberto Gonzales is like clubbing a baby seal. He's weak. He was always weak. He was weak when he served as White House counsel. He was weak when he was confirmed by the Senate for attorney general. And he was weak during testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday. Now, before there was Gonzales, there was John Ashcroft. He was always strong. He was strong when he served in the Senate. He was strong when he was confirmed by the Senate for attorney general. And he was strong when he testified before the 9/11 Commission. They said he had to go because he was strong.

Everyone knows what's going on here. The Democrats, who started this, want Gonzales's head on a stake as another supposed example of administration corruption. They want the public to believe that the firing of these eight U.S. attorneys is the equivalent of Watergate. These are the same Democrats who defended Janet Reno to the end despite real malfeasance, including the Elian Gonzales disaster, the WACO massacre, and the deadly expansion of the legal wall between the CIA and FBI. In comparison, Gonzales is Oliver Wendell Holmes. But Republicans have had enough of him. They see him as incapable of defending himself, let alone advancing a conservative agenda. And they hope to replace him with someone more to their liking, which will never happen given this Senate. In the big scheme, none of this matters, and the public could care less. The president’s ratings aren’t affected by this. This is an inside-the-beltway manufactured scandal.

(By the way, I say this as someone who has never been impressed with Gonzales, Harriet Miers, and so many of the people the president holds close.)

Far more relevant, consequential and disturbing is the behavior of the Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid, who by word and action is actively undermining our fighting men and women in Iraq. His legislative efforts to starve our armed forces in the middle of a war are as contemptible as anything I’ve witnessed in my 25 years in Washington. And yesterday he made a statement that was so disgraceful and brazen that it could have been uttered by Tokyo Rose during World War II or Jane Fonda during the Vietnam War. The difference, of course, is that Reid is the highest ranking Democrat in the United States Senate.

For those who are so pre-occupied with Gonzales that they may not have heard it, this is what Reid said yesterday: "I believe ... that this war is lost, and this surge is not accomplishing anything, as is shown by the extreme violence in Iraq this week."

So, Reid announces to our brave volunteers that their country is sending them to a lost war. And he announces to our enemy that victory is within their reach — just keep up the killing a little longer. During my radio show last night, I received a call from a Gold Star father. He was outraged by Reid’s comment. He has called before and has become a good friend. But I’ve never heard him as angry and frustrated as he was last night.

Rather than join the chorus demanding Gonzales's resignation, let me be the first to demand Reid's resignation. And let's see how many pundits, conservative and otherwise, will join me.

This non-issue, trumped up by Waxman's laundry list of investigations, needs to be put into proportion to other, much bigger areas of national concern that a responsible Congress should be tackling. Newsweek and media of their ilk are doing the heavy lifting to create a "scandal" that barely registers with the public, much as they did with the accusations against and trial of Libby.

I, too, am unhappy with Gonzales but not for this silliness. If Gonzales is forced to seek more time for his family, Fight4TheRight has the correct idea of bogging down this bunch of buffoons.

Heretofore, I have thought that Gonzo should resign, not because he broke any laws, but because he is an incompetent boob in a position where we need an aggressive tough guy. Then I read this:

"A big GOP concern: Gonzales's continued presence will make it hard to move measures important to the party's base, like immigration reform, through the judiciary committees, said the strategist."

If Gonzo is holding up "immigration reform," then I'm Gonzo's newest fan. Stay Gonzo, Stay!!

if THAT pack of crooks can't find evidence of a crime, it flat don't exist!

They're finding it, docjim. The firings themselves aren't the criminal act(s), but they were one small part of a criminal enterprise. The battle over information slows things down to be sure, but that's nothing new. I'd say we're in the fifth inning; a bit early to triumphantly call the game.

Do not be so naive. Schumer is in league with Comey, who despises Gonzales and hopes to get the AG role in a coup. He was assured by Schumer that he would get his support if he (Comey) agreed to let Patrick Fitzgerald have free reign in the Libby investigation, which he did. This is yet another example of the beaurocracies trying to do an end run around the administration in league with the Dems and a compliant press (see CIA and State also). These guys are far more dangerous than having Gonzeles there for the rest of the Bush term. Why do Republicans and conservatives continue to cooperate in their own destruction by these slimey Democrats? I will never understand it.

Frankly, I think Bush would rather fire Rove than Gonzales--if he had some reason to.

Perhaps RBMN, but I think Rove is the one that Bush has to protect at all costs, in part by letting Gonzales slowly twist in the wind. Why? Because Rove is deeply involved in the firing of those U.S. attorneys, and a whole lot more. There's a reason why so many emails were suddenly found to be missing, and why so many of them were ones sent by Karl Rove.

Lemme get this straight:

for THIS the GOP is gonna grow a pair?

Well said Gwedd, and onlineanalyst. We cluck our tongues as a conservative goes down, vowing to fight the lies and ridiculous charges, yet the next time they start flinging feces, we start noting how covered in brown streaks someone is becoming, and start blaming them for coming to work in a dirty suit. One after another, they fall, and you guys don't just help them do it, you do it for them. They whine, you grovel. They complain, you apolgize. They threaten to demand his resignation, you demand it firstbygod.
Pathetic.
You get what you deserve. You vote for mealy-mouthed appeasers and apologists, then you whine when they appease and apologize, then, when we condemn them for appeasing and apologizing, you defend their appeasements and apologies, demanding more, justifying them as being more moral than the other guys. Sure, their lying, but their making so much noise, we should appease and apologise to get them to quiet down.

biwah...criminal enterprise? BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Perhaps you mean the Dems...the Starkist Tuna Fiasco...Reid's shady land deals involving his son on the zoning board...cold cash Jefferson ring a bell, anyone?...and you think firing these attorneys was criminal because SOME of them were investigating REPUBLICANS, but not one word about Bill Clinton firing the attorneys who were investigating Dan Rostenkowski, and guilty man if ever there was one, just waiting on a cell, until his loyal buddy Bill (loyal for what reason, I wonder, maybe some help from old Dan's district, maybe?) let's him off the hook by firing the attorney prosecuting him, ready for trial. And, just to keep Dan from looking bad, he goes ahead and fires the attorney about to investigate hisself, Billy Boy Clinton, dropping years of investigation that led down a path of fraud, theft, and murder, along with 91 other attorneys just to make it seem fair and all.
I like Schmuckies words on Fox News Sunday best..."You can fire them for no reason but you can't fire them for a bad reason..." LOLOL.

Gonzo is holding up "immigration reform," then I'm Gonzo's newest fan. Stay Gonzo, Stay!!

We want Gonzo!

We want Gonzo!

We want Gonzo!

Can DC get any more deranged? (Don't answer that!)

Doc:

Thanks for the non-answer, in the absence of a defense, why not go on the offense. If you want to get all relative, though, I would point out that voting is a fundamental constitutional right.

Falls in with the admin standard line of defense: Deny until exposed; contest investigative authority until defeated; cop amnesia; when little or no doubt remains as to guilt, smear everyone else without regard to relevance to the matter at hand (actually that might be step 1, depending on the situation).

I'm no fan of garden-variety legislative votes-for-cash corrruption and the like, but manufacturing a vote-suppression system using DOJ and timing criminal prosecutions to game elections is indeed a cut above all that...not that the comparison is particularly relative to the rightness or wrongness of those acts.

Doc Neaves, where's there's smoke there's fire:

E-Mails Show Rove's Role in U.S. Attorney Firings

March 15, 2007 — - New unreleased e-mails from top administration officials show that the idea of firing all 93 U.S. attorneys was raised by White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove in early January 2005, indicating Rove was more involved in the plan than the White House previously acknowledged. The e-mails also show how Alberto Gonzales discussed the idea of firing the attorneys en masse while he was still White House counsel -- weeks before he was confirmed as attorney general.

The e-mails put Rove at the epicenter of the imbroglio and raise questions about Gonzales' explanations of the matter. ...

I'm looking forward to Karl Rove taking the oath before telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, because he's got a lot of it to tell.

FYI, to remind some of why this matters, remember that the idea to dismiss all 93 U.S. attorneys was to provide cover for getting rid of the few they really wanted to fire and replace with "loyal Bushies" who would prosecute cases to help the GOP at the polls in close races.

Paul Mirengoff

Senate Republicans have told President Bush that Gonzales must go if the administration wants to see any progress on its legislative agenda, including immigration. In fact, the only part of Bush's legislative agenda that offers the promise of progress is immigration reform. And considering how much damage the administration, the congressional Democrats, and (yes) the Senate Republicans can accomplish through such reform, the prospect of stalling it has me rooting for Gonzales to stay.

Might thought is....if you're Pres. Bush, you write the names of Schumer's "suggested" replacements on a 20" x 24" placard and set fire to it on the White House lawn.

Why that big a placard??? Let's be environmental friendly, dontcha know??? LOL

I think that Republicans are showing themselves to be disloyal and easily manipulated. In fact I am thinking that in the future I will show the same loyalty to people like Specter and Sessions etc as they have shown to members of the own party. Sonds fair to me.

Speaking of incompetent, did these Senators not read the passage in the Patriot Act that pertained to replacing Attorneys? The Patriot Act gave the administration authority to replace these Attorneys without conferring with the Senate. And then when they did just that, the Senate got pissy. Now they have changed the rules back so that Senate confirmation is required. So why did they go along with the initial change? If they had left it like it was this probably never would have happened because there would have been more oversight in the first place. No question of who said what to whom.

Personally I think it is nonsense and I think the willingness of Republicans to stab each other in the back is distressing and rather pathetic to watch.

As for immigration reform, most people want to see something done on this issue because they think it is too important to demagogue or ignore.

Bush has moved to the right and I think that refusing to come up with anything last summer and the unseemly fight conservatives had over the issue hurt them with most of the country in general and it really hurt them with Hispanic voters who felt there was some racism involved. People can blow that off all they want, but when the next election comes around it just might make a difference.

People want to see more border security and some kind of guest worker program and they also want a rational answer to what to do about the people who are here. Tancredo can not even win a majority among conservatives on this. As fas as the rest of the country is concerned, he is a fanatic. People are tired of fanatics. They want pragmatic problem solving not posturing and preening. That does not mean they are liberal or anything.

"Why that big a placard??? Let's be environmental friendly, dontcha know??? LOL"

HaHa Gary!

I'm sorry. I didn't explain that the paper for the placard would be Recycled paper board derived from saw dust created from 12,287,359 acres of Rain Forest cutting needed to create the new Federal Carbon Credit Requistion form #AG-114Z-2B388!

: )

Pardon my Brainstorming here but how about this as an alternative plan to Gonzales:

Pres. Bush has Gonzales resign. Then Pres. Bush submits Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) as Gonzales' replacement (Amy has the background and Schumer would love it).

Then, MN Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R) can fill Klobuchar's spot in the U.S. Senate with a Republican Senator for 3.5 years!!!

And then (it gets better)....President Bush can, two months later, declare that since he didn't do a wholesale gutting of the U.S. District Attorneys when he took over, he is doing it now - so he fires the entire staff along with his new AG !

New unreleased e-mails from top administration officials show that the idea of firing all 93 U.S. attorneys was raised by White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove in early January 2005, indicating Rove was more involved in the plan than the White House previously acknowledged. The e-mails also show how Alberto Gonzales discussed the idea of firing the attorneys en masse while he was still White House counsel -- weeks before he was confirmed as attorney general.

From ABC News, quoted by starfleet_dude (April 23, 2007 03:25 PM)

So, let me see if I've got this right. Bush wins his second term, and Rove proposes firing all 93 US attorneys... just like Slick Willie did shortly after he took office in '93. Only eight of the attorneys are actually fired over a year later. But this is somehow evidence of a vast "criminal enterprise" (to borrow from biwah)???

You people are pathetic. You're like caricatures of McCarthy-era red baiters, but instead of seeing commies under your beds, you see Rove. Rove arranged to fire the US attorneys! Rove put Scooter Libby up to it! Rove tricked Armitage into outing Valerie Plame! Rove stole the '04 election in Ohio! Rove stole the 2000 election in Florida! Rove was on the Grassy Knoll! Rove was the Black Dahlia murderer! Rove kidnapped the Lindbergh baby! Rove sank the Titanic! Rove was Jack the Ripper!

Despite the hand-waving on the part of the media, their masters in the democrat party, and loopy liberals who spend too much time listening to the voices in their heads, nobody has found evidence of any crime (and keep in mind that I'm NO friend of Gonzales).

These hysterical conspiracy theories are almost enough to make me side with those who think Gonzales ought to stay just to give a big ol' finger to the loopy lefties who see Rove lurking in every corner and insist that everybody in the White House including the president's dog should be locked up, shot, hung, drawn and quartered, and made to listen to John Kerry's speeches until they die.

Sheesh.

They could bring Ashcraft back. Oh yeah, that would go over.

I still think that giving Schumer and his pals want they want is a mistake. Besides, Gonzales does not deserve this. This crap of demanding that people be fired every time they make a mistake or don't jump when a bunch of Senatorial blowhards want them to needs to end. Every damn you turn around these guys want someone to lose their jobs. And yet year after year after year, they just keep on doing what they do no matter how much they screw up.

That should be Ashcroft. Oh well.

And that email proves nothing. No one in the White House or anywhere else has claimed that there was no discussion whatsoever about firing Attorneys, they claimed there was no big conspiracy on the part of the White House to get specific people and then cover it up. And there is no proof that there was.

Now on the other hand, we do know that Schumer was completely unconcerned when the guy in the White House had a big fat D behind his name and fired the Attorney looking into his and his wife's business. That is different, Democrats are special. Laws do not apply to them. No sireee.

Yes, this Rove under the bed thing is getting weirder all the time.

Are you have ever been an associate of Karl Rove?

Giving in to this lynch mob and firing Gonzales would simply pour gasoline on the fire. I'm not Gonzales fan, and never have been, but he has done nothing wrong but rendered mediocre performance.

Suddenly that means he has to go? After a month of Kangaroo Court? Can we apply that standard to Congress too?

Maybe Bush can take the position that Gonz will resign when half the Senate steps down. After all, if lax performance is justification....

Then there is the juicy incentive to keep him on if it fouls the New Amnesty Scam. Reason enough by itself to keep Gonzales in the office.

I wrote two months ago elsewhere that I thought Gonzales was a lousy AG. But I didn't support him resigning unless it was shown he had broken the law. Why? Because the Dems will have to confirm the new AG, and that means handing them a golden opportunity for fully televised grandstanding on "torture", surveilance, the Geneva Convention, the patriot act and the usual litany of liberal complaints about "fascist" America.

Conservatives that want to hand the Dems a media circus are not thinking this one through.

I guess I'm one of those "filthy" democrats. Guess what wingers, Schumer didn't start this scandal. If you people could actually read and comprehend you'd know the 8 fired attorneys are the ones who raised hell. What kind of kool-aid are wingers drinking when they start the "CIA, State Dept, MSM are all in cahoots to bring down Gonzalez? He's a incompetent boob, even you wingers admit that. Think of your own jobs, if you were an incompetent boob, how long would YOU have a job? Normally I wouldn't give sound advice to the opposition, but boys, Gonzalez is giving your party a black eye. So you'd keep him on just to spite the dems? I guess the good of the country doesn't matter. And wingers, try bringing Reid and Pelosi up for treason. Then you could be a bigger laughing stock than you already are. Elections have consequences, get over it.

conservative democrat:

I believe the Marines fighting in Fallujah and Ramadi are now fully aware of the "consequences" of the last elections.

My guess is the American people are slowly becoming all too aware of the consequences and won't let it happen again. :wink:

So, let me see if I've got this right. Bush wins his second term, and Rove proposes firing all 93 US attorneys... just like Slick Willie did shortly after he took office in '93. Only eight of the attorneys are actually fired over a year later. But this is somehow evidence of a vast "criminal enterprise" (to borrow from biwah)???

docjim505, when Karl Rove suggested firing all 93 attorneys it wasn't because he simply thought they should all be fired for no reason. No, the reason was because he wanted to do so just to replace the few he most wanted out. Why? Because it would cause less suspicion about the motive for firing only the few. Well, Rove's proposal was nixed in the end as being "impractical", due to the hassle of again hiring a completely new batch of U.S. attorneys. As Gonzales has consistently failed to explain precisely what the reasons were for firing those eight U.S. attorneys, it's time to ask Rove what the reasons were since Rove clearly had an interest in the matter and was certainly in the loop about it.

I say keep the AG around for the rest of Bush's term, he is a constant reminder of just how badly Bush filled some of these important Cabinet jobs and is a disgrace to moderate conservatives ... you know you are in trouble when the only reason you keep a (you pick which one) a liar or an idiot with a memory problem, is out of "not giving in" to the other side!

Bush, he is the best democrat the democrat's have!

I think Bush is smart to hang on to Gonzolas.
He knows that as soon as Gonzolas leaves, the Demolishcrats will find another target to pick on.

During the runnup to the '04 Pres. election, I remember all the comments from the MSM & left wing pundits about Bush's Cowboy arrogance in not admitting to mistakes he made while in office. Bush wasn't stupid then. He knew if he admitted just one mistake before the election, it would be the soundbite heard the world over, 24/7.

Same goes here. If he lets Gonzales go or if Gonzales resigns, that will be the beginning, not the end of this non-scandal. I agree wholehearted with DaMav who said:

"Because the Dems will have to confirm the new AG, and that means handing them a golden opportunity for fully televised grandstanding on "torture", surveilance, the Geneva Convention, the patriot act and the usual litany of liberal complaints about "fascist" America.

Conservatives that want to hand the Dems a media circus are not thinking this one through. "

Politics has a lot in coming with heavyweight boxing.

If you think all your side has is a bunch of darlings. And then the other side is all evil. You're setting up situations that are bounc to backfire.

I'm listening to Tom DeLay's new book on tape. Yes, at the end he's discussing his own legal troubles. And, he's pointing out how these are "manufactured."

HELLO. That's the nature of the business!

It's like discussing sex in a whore house. You want to discuss the sex that goes on in there. And, I only want to know what it costs.

Most Americans have cut to the chase long ago. DeLay was instrumental in going after Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton was NOT impeached! But if you're now surprised that with the "house divided 50/50" there aren't going to be monumental arguments over incrementally small stuff. THEN YOU ARE NOT PAYING ATTENTION.

In politics you win. When a man like Newt Gingrich accused Bill Clinton of "adultry" ... Well, he knew of what he spoke!

And, most people walked away shaking their heads. You're not going to win arguments doing that stuff. But if you can't help youself? Go ahead.

The prize is GREAT. To win, means you get the job. To lose, means the other side got the job.

And, most people want to be left alone.

Still. Progress happens. Roads get built. Even the early congresses, which took 40 years to build a workable navy; started out FEARING SHIPS! That's why the pirates had a field day.

And, the congress critters? They thought their oceanfront property would be worth less; if we had tall ships defending us at sea. Because they could turn their guns on the port of New York. Well? Then, if not, which state builds the ships? How to you divide the benefits among 13 states. If only one state provides the parking garages? I kid you not. Very early on, our wise Founding Fathers KNEW that government was a bitch.

For conservatives to have clout they need votes.

But we're living in a system that cuts people off. You either accept whatever religious principle is hot that day. Or, it's the highway. "A plague on both houses, is not an uncommon attitude."

And, of all things that did NOT work, it's been the name-calling. (In the old days? That was called "mud slinging.")

And, Richard Nixon, in his zeal for running for office, back in the 1940's; said Gahagan-Douglas (wife of the actor, Douglas. And, a senator, I think, in her own right.) To make a name for himself, Nixon said she wore pink panties.

Well, Nixon was very anti-communist. (And, I think, over all, the "communists" won. He lost the biggest prize he ever held in his hands! Let me tell ya!)

Among the things in DeLay's book, over which he complains a lot; are the way the donks used the RICO laws, challenging him for taking a golfing trip to Scotland. Where he could meet Margaret Thatcher. The clincher? The donks file papers, but don't go to court. HELLO! Only 3% of all civil cases EVER end up in front of a judge!

And, then? Ron Goldman's dad never got a cent from OJ. And, Al Sharpon never paid a dime of the $80,000 judgement against him. In the Tawana Brawley affair. That's just life.

Nope. Kids aren't born in cabbage patches.

And, for the sex you get in whore houses, the transactions costs you money.

Same with congress.

And, because it's close! That's one of the reasons the screaming is so loud! Today's malls don't give you the gist of what it was like to do business in teeming cities. But you just didn't wait in your stall for customers to come in.

Just like politicians, it takes plenty of noise.

And, some people get the added advantage of some pretty nifty ads, to boot.

Of all the things with the least amount of payoff; has been the dreck that's passed, oh, since Kennedy got shot. In terms of politics. And, yes. The costs are more. So the stakes, if you have the ambition to run, are higher.

There's never been a good system.

Before women got to vote (1919)? It was common to offer men booze. In other words? The voting booths were like traveling bars. You came in to put your X on a piece of paper. And, you were given a male beverage. TRADE.

The first election to really use the ugly name-calling stuff, goes back to 1840.

ANd, if there's anyone experienced at HARD BALL. It's either Joe DiMaggio. Or every single man that's gotten elected to office.

The whole idea is that your pitting people to compete.

Even among beautiful women, where the best looking woman should win "slam dunk." Because your eyes tells you so;

Still needs to get felt up, back stage, by Donald Trump.

Now, that's reality.

This "crying business" that life's not fair?

Are you going through those motions because you want to win?

In DeLay's book, he mentions that when Bush #41 got rejected in 1992, 9-million voters fell short.

No new taxes pledge, remember?

Seems the Bush's never accepted the dad's defeat. So they've put Dubya up to repeat this. (Not in losing an election.) But in leaving office NOT LIKED.

I'd bet dolalrs to doughnuts that the donks don't think Bush will pull the rug out from under Gonzales.

What they wanted to do is SHOW THE WORLD how creepy Dubya is! How he likes people who don't belong in a top job at Justice. Not after Libby got railroaded by Fitzmas. But was Fitzmas fired? Hell, no.

Just politics as usual.

And, you want to see this one.

Because "Bush can."

Uh huh.

Yup. He sure can.

But he's very weak. And, AG Gonzales is without talent.

By setting the stage for Bush to "play the loyalty card," you see another event where Bush should not have been entrusted with the Oval Office.

THAT'S. THE. POINT!

In a contest between rivals, you should expect that your oponent is going to look for your weak spots. And, then try to take advantage of them.

As a matter of fact, I grew up thinking that it was the democraps that were always in disarray. Except for that interlude with Camelot.

Bush's shortfall? People's confidence in him drops along with his numbers that tanked.

Again, his dad's numbers tanked, and he seemed so unaware. Point to something that either Bush did that strengthed anyone's positions in Congress?

Men serve. They go. Even B-1 Bob Dornan, hasn't been brought back for any comic relief. So think about it. Today's menu topic is AG Gonzales. Served al'la Dan Quayle. With the fear in the eyes that the GOP tends to fall in love with. Like falling in love with ladies who have crossed-eyes.

"Thanks for the non-answer, in the absence of a defense, why not go on the offense."
A, I didn't realize it was a QUESTION, and 2, the answer is what you call "criminal enterprise" you can't give examples of like I just gave examples of Democratic corruption JUST SINCE THE LAST ELECTION. So, in your own words, thanks for the non-answer, in the absence of a defense, you go on the offense. Just one small problem, NEITHER BUSH NOR GONZO COMMITTED A CRIME. But this small, salient fact seems to continually slip your weak mind.

"If you want to get all relative, though, I would point out that voting is a fundamental constitutional right."
Where did I say otherwise? Or is this the best strawman you can come up with these days? Whattsamatta, heart not in it?

"Falls in with the admin standard line of defense: Deny until exposed;"
"I did not have sex with that woman, Monica Lewinsky..."

"contest investigative authority until defeated;"
Like Bill challenged Ken Starr left, right, and center over every little tidbit?

"cop amnesia;"
How many " I can't recalls" did Hillary, Bill, and company give over the years again? And that's the few times we could actually get them to come answer questions at all.

"when little or no doubt remains as to guilt,"
You mean, when the proof is overwhelming? Like with the blue dress? Like with over a thousand witnesses?

"smear everyone else without regard to relevance to the matter at hand (actually that might be step 1, depending on the situation)."
Like Ken Starr, Linda Tripp, Monica Lewinsky, etc., etc., etc.?

"I'm no fan of garden-variety legislative votes-for-cash corrruption and the like,"
You mean like Cold Cash Jefferson? You mean like minimum wage for everyone in the country except those workers in YOUR tuna plant? You mean like sudden zoning changes that triple the value of your land overnight? You mean like free junkets to anydamnplace from people who have legislation pending before the committee heads they are taking on vacations?

"but manufacturing a vote-suppression system"
manufacturing? Exactly what are you calling a "vote suppression system"? And how did Bush manufacture it? You throw out these specious claims, but no evidence to back them up, you just sound like a conspiracy nut, or, worse yet, a BDS sufferer.

"using DOJ"
USING the DoJ? Again, how? Or is this more of your sematical crap, trying to make it sound ominous?

"and timing criminal prosecutions to game elections is indeed a cut above all that...not that the comparison is particularly relative to the rightness or wrongness of those acts."
Show me one prosecution he proceeded with where the timing was changed one wit in order to "gain" ( I assume you mean) in the election. If you're saying he was gaming it, then you are making the accusation of voter fraud with, again, no evidence, something you're rather good at.

Posted by: biwah at April 23, 2007 03:16 PM

Doc Neaves, where's there's smoke there's fire:
Then you quote some source saying that Rove knew about the firings. That they were discussed in an email. That he offered a suggestion, but his suggestion wasn't taken. To you, this is evidence that Rove the Mastermind is once again behind it all. To the rest of us, it looks like BUSH SIMPLY DIDN'T TAKE HIS ADVICE. Normally, this would let Rove off the hook, but in your sick world, Rove actually got Bush to not take his advice in a sinister twist of events, a reverse psychology move that will be talked about for hundreds of years. All so only CERTAIN attorneys would get fired.

"I'm looking forward to Karl Rove taking the oath"
And there we have it. Full-fledged BDS. There doesn't have to be a reason, you just want to grill Rove on the stand. So much for your credibility.

"before telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, because he's got a lot of it to tell."
He owes nobody in this world that I can think of an explanation about anything. Least of all BDS sufferers who seem to want to question him until he admits killing the Archduke Ferdinand, DeGaulle, Kennedy I and II, Martin Luther King Jr. and Christ himself. GET OVER YOURSELF.

"FYI, to remind some of why this matters, remember that the idea to dismiss all 93 U.S. attorneys was to provide cover for getting rid of the few they really wanted to fire and replace with "loyal Bushies" who would prosecute cases to help the GOP at the polls in close races."
We have admissions from people that that's exactly what Clinton did, fired one that was investigating his buddy Dan Rostenkowski and one that was investigating Bill and Hillary themselves. Yet you accuse Bush of exactly what Bill did like it's a bad thing, but Clinton is your hero and did no wrong, but....
Wow. It's amazing the way you try to rewrite history. It's amazing you aren't able to admit to yourself that you have to lie in order to be right, or to make your boy Clinton look good, or to make Bush look bad.

Posted by: starfleet_dude at April 23, 2007 03:25 PM

And this is how they treated him, btw. Shameful. Absolutely shameful.

http://www.theabsurdreport.com/2007/senate-shame/

Meanwhile, a marine has a message for Harry Reid and all you other whiners who think the war is lost:

http://64.13.251.37/2007/04/23/marine-corporal-from-a-bunker-in-ramadi-i-got-a-message-for-that-douche-harry-reid

Meanwhile, we continue to throw conservatives and cops under the damn bus...an agent shot a man while trying to apprehend him (all four illegals), he said the man was trying to throw a rock, but the US authorities don't believe him, since the OTHER THREE ILLEGALS ALL TELL A DIFFERENT STORY. Of course, we believe the illegals instead of the cop. What a joke this is becoming.

Gonzales is just one more in a long line that started with Brownie (unless, of course, like I asked years ago, someone has come up with any federal response to any disaster even close to the magnitude of Katrina that was faster? I thought not, considering they were, for the first time, responding BEFORE being asked) being given up over a storm, a hurricane that was BLAMED ON REPUBLICAN POLICY, for crying out loud. Then it was Libby. Then, it was four border agents, now it's Gonzales, and now another border agent.

When will it end?

Let's not forget Rumsfeld and Delay. While Delay has yet to be convicted (and it's looking pretty good for a prosecutorial misconduct charge against Ronnie Earle), Rumsfeld would not have been sacrificed had the Dems not made so much noise. People who didn't like him took the opportunity to show how open minded they were, how willing to work with Democrats they were, instead of asking the simple question, "Exactly how did Rumsfeld make this worse, when any other reasonable person would have done it different?" They won't ask it, because the answer is, none. He did nothing to make this war go badly. It went badly, and his policies were blamed. Yet, we've barely changed anything, and those changes haven't brought about immediate wins where before it was losses, essentially nothing has changed one way or the other. So, how about admitting that the insurgency, fueled by Iran (we now know for sure, admitted by them, that they are directing all the OTHER Shiite attacks, Hesbollah, etc.), is the real enemy, not Donald Rumsfeld? Maybe he's not fighting it quite as efficiently as he could, but adjustments take time, especially when the situation is constantly changing.
So, you guys go ahead, trash some more conservatives, throw them away. We have so many.
Or, better yet, learn that when Democrats whine about something, you come to the defense over baseless charges, or risk getting thrown to the wolves yourself, as when you can't get a decent conservative to run for office for fear of what his own party will do to him, so we are run by nothing but Democrats.
Think about it.

Wow. It's amazing the way you try to rewrite history.

Yep; blunt truth spoken by the Doc...

Here is another example of this Doc;

Wishing Doesn't Make It So
>
>"[Senator Barack] Obama told his audience [in an address March 4, 2007 at
>the Brown Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Selma, Alabama] that
>because some folks had the courage to 'march across a bridge' in Selma,
>Ala., his mother, a white woman from Kansas, and his father, a black Muslim
>from Africa, took heart. It gave them the courage to get married and have a
>child. The problem with that characterization is that Barack Obama, Jr. was
>born Aug. 4, 1961, while the first of three marches across that bridge in
>Selma didn't occur until March 7, 1965, almost four years after Obama was
>born.
>
>"Obama went on to tell his audience that the Kennedys -- Jack and Bobby --
>decided to do an airlift. They would bring some young Africans over so that
>they could be educated and learn all about America. His grandfather heard
>that call and sent his son, Barack Obama, Sr., to America.
>
>"The problem with that scenario is that, having been born in August 1961,
>the future senator was not conceived until sometime in November 1960. So,
>if his African grandfather heard words that 'sent a shout across oceans,'
>inspiring him to send his goat-herder son to America, it was not Democrat
>Jack Kennedy he heard, or his brother Bobby, it was Republican President
>Dwight D. Eisenhower.
>
>"Obama's speech is reminiscent of Al Gore's claim of having invented the
>Internet, Hillary Clinton's claim of having been named after the first man
>to climb Mt. Everest (even though she was born five years and seven months
>before Sir Edmund climbed the mountain), and John Kerry's imaginary trip to
>Cambodia."

Democrat voters don't hold these people accountable; hell, people like SF Dude & CD buy into these lies mindlessly. It boggles the mind to see how completely void of human integrity the entire Democratic Party truly is.

Of coarse I'm in the same camp with Doc and SoldiersMom. We've already had this discussion several times.

Doc Neaves:

I'm not going to blockquote your entire hissy fit just to point out that I did not raise the issue of history, nor did I defend corrupt Democrats. I am not naive about corrupt politicians. And yes, Delay falls into the garden-variety corruption category, although he's among the most brazen (that we've found out about).

But speaking of Dealy, how about those emails from Abramoff's folks to thew White House - the ones that were channeled through RNC because only then could the White house "do more for" Abramoff?

And, to reiterate my point for those who have their diatribes pre-scripted and so don't bother to read: the Bush administration used DOJ to trump up false corruption charges against Democrats (and nonpartisans) right in time for elections. Innocent people went to prison and the prosecutions are just now getting laughed out of the courts of appeal. Those that viewed the justice systems as anything better than a kangaroo court at the RNC's disposal were canned. That's your backstory, soon to be the front story.

Not that it's anything new. J. Edgar would be proud, although he probably wishes he had been this ambitious himself.

I'm with Onlineanalyst and Fight4TheRight: Keep Gonzales, stonewall the Senate, and force Harry Reid to resign.

/Mr Lynn

Mr. Lynn:

Keep Gonzales - I love it. Now that it's obvious that he's a political trojan horse, you guys are circling the wagons to keep him.

Stonewall the Senate - Yeah, keep them distracted on that White House corruption thing so that they don't pass any immigration legislation. bit of a gamble, no?

Force Harry Reid to resign - How? Do you have some pictures?

And, to reiterate my point for those who have their diatribes pre-scripted and so don't bother to read:"
actually, I didn't read this anywhere. Show me where you said it, please. Cut and paste will do, if it's from this thread. Otherwise, just another strawman argument. Or, as we call them here in Texas, a lie.

"the Bush administration used DOJ to trump up false corruption charges against Democrats (and nonpartisans) right in time for elections."
Timing aside, show me the false corruption charge. Show me where someone was charged, then found innocent. That's what trumped up means. Found to be demonstrably false, and was known to be false when filed. Trumped up, as in made up. Go ahead, show me.

"Innocent people went to prison"
Name one.

"and the prosecutions are just now getting laughed out of the courts of appeal. "

Again, name one. And if you have a charge for Tom Delay, bring it, because Ronnie Earle could sure use some help, he can't seem to find a single law that Tom Delay has broken.

Karl Rove's going to be investigated now:

Low-key office launches high-profile inquiry - The Office of Special Counsel will investigate U.S. attorney firings and other political activities led by Karl Rove.

WASHINGTON — Most of the time, an obscure federal investigative unit known as the Office of Special Counsel confines itself to monitoring the activities of relatively low-level government employees, stepping in with reprimands and other routine administrative actions for such offenses as discriminating against military personnel or engaging in prohibited political activities.

But the Office of Special Counsel is preparing to jump into one of the most sensitive and potentially explosive issues in Washington, launching a broad investigation into key elements of the White House political operations that for more than six years have been headed by chief strategist Karl Rove.

The new investigation, which will examine the firing of at least one U.S. attorney, missing White House e-mails, and White House efforts to keep presidential appointees attuned to Republican political priorities, could create a substantial new problem for the Bush White House.

First, the inquiry comes from inside the administration, not from Democrats in Congress. Second, unlike the splintered inquiries being pressed on Capitol Hill, it is expected to be a unified investigation covering many facets of the political operation in which Rove played a leading part.

"We will take the evidence where it leads us," Scott J. Bloch, head of the Office of Special Counsel and a presidential appointee, said in an interview Monday. "We will not leave any stone unturned."

Bloch declined to comment on who his investigators would interview, but he said the probe would be independent and uncoordinated with any other agency or government entity. ...

And they said Ken Starr was out of control, but at least he investigated known impropriety. You can fire them for no reason or any reason, yet for some reason, somebody's going to investigate the reason? Shouldn't they come up with, say, a reason that would be illegal first? I mean, shouldn't you have to prove it's POSSIBLE to commit a crime before you can just go investigate someone for it? I know, Democrats, they get to break known laws and not get investigated, but, at least up til now, they've had to actually accuse us of BREAKING SOME LAW before they investigated us. Now, they're investigating us to see if we...what? If there's no law to break, what could they possibly be investigating? Maybe while they're out there looking, they should enjoin the manhunt for their MANHOOD.

Maybe they should be investigating Johnny Sutton, and the problem with the Border Agents. Two stories, one that the Border Agents don't trust Bush and are afraid to do their jobs, because of story number two, here it is, agent number four being prosecuted, three illegals he tried to arrest as witnesses against him, all related to each other and the deceased.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070424/ap_on_re_us/border_patrol_shooting_2

Absolutely shameful. Bush should be impeached for this alone.

Doc Neaves:

manufacturing a vote-suppression system using DOJ and timing criminal prosecutions to game elections

That's what I posted earlier (3:16 - a post you took the time to ridicule despite apparently forgetting to read the whole thing. I hope that's just an individual quirk of yours and not a Texas thing.

Go ahead, show me.

Name one.

Here's what a political witchhunt really looks like. Georgia Thompson was a travel agent turned civil service employee who was performing her relatively mundane job. There was zero direct evidence that she did anything wrong. The prosecution theory was that "she lied".

It was the summer before the 06 election, and after the conviction Mark Green took off and almost upset the Democrat incumbent governor in a close race.

****

http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=587510
April 5, 2007

Federal judges Thursday ruled that former state purchasing supervisor Georgia L. Thompson was wrongly convicted of making sure a state travel contract went to a firm linked to Gov. Jim Doyle's re-election campaign and freed her from an Illinois prison.

Thompson had served four months of an 18-month sentence.

The three-judge panel in Chicago acted with unusual speed, ruling after oral arguments by Thompson's attorney and the U.S. attorney's [Steven Biskupic's] office.

During 26 minutes of oral arguments, all three judges assailed the government's case, with Judge Diane Wood saying at one point that "the evidence is beyond thin."

During a news conference later Thursday, Doyle, a former state attorney general, said the three judges did an "extraordinary thing" by entering an order finding Thompson innocent and ordering her immediate release.

****

Look deeper. Biskupic did not show up to defend his own case before the court of appeals, and sent one of the newest attornies in the office to do his stammering for him. One of judges commented "I'm not even sure what the theory of your case was."

Do you really want to defend DeLay? The guy was in deep and would NEVER have resigned if he hadn't acted corruptly. He's the one with the iron spine all you righties love so much. Much as I don't like him, I'll give him that. Speaking of Texas, Travis County chose Ronnie Earle for the job and though he bunged it up he will never get hit with prosecutorial misconduct, as there was plenty of probable cause. I won't have the gall to employ your logic and defend William Jefferson just because he was never convicted.

Now, do you have ANY other questions for me?

biwah:
this is the comment I hadn't seen before that I was asking where you'd said it...
"the Bush administration used DOJ to trump up false corruption charges against Democrats (and nonpartisans) right in time for elections."
you ridiculed me for not having seen that, and as evidence, you pasted the following:
"manufacturing a vote-suppression system using DOJ and timing criminal prosecutions to game elections"
which, to be honest, has only "right in time for elections (with no proof, mind you, that these prosecutions should have been brought earlier, as implied, or later, as is the RIGHT OF THE PROSECUTING ATTORNEY TO SCHEDULE, I'm thinking, unless I read it wrong the other day in an article discussing Gonzalez) in common with "and timing criminal prosecutions to game elections".
First of all, "game elections"? Is this some new code word I'm unaware of, or are you saying he did the prosecution in order to win an election? You mean, like Mike Nifong did? And, if he did, shame on him, just like Nifong, but what has this got to do with George Bush, unless you want to blame every single pecadillo committed by every single government employee, right down to the Parks Department, on George W. Bush? I mean, I know your BDS goes deep, biwah, but dayum, put down the pills, you're taking the wrong ones.
And I'm thinking it's just more BDS about timing. Prosecutions go on all the time, they take months and the investigations take years, so they are bound to fall across a couple of elections if it's a big enough case. Again, this trial you speak of has nothing to do with "manufacturing a vote-suppression system using DOJ" or "the Bush administration used DOJ to trump up false corruption charges against Democrats (and nonpartisans".
And to be honest with you, unless you know the intricasies of a case, using it to support some tangential view is dangerous business, at best. These all sound like state employees, and who's to say the three judge panel isn't just as partisan and acted in just as partisan a manner as you accuse others of doing. You see, biwah, it's your fatalistic view that Democrats are angels, and only the Republicans deserve scourging that makes your words not credible.
You then go on to ask me if I want to defend Delay, when no one has yet to bring a charge against him, though Ronnie Earle has tried six times at last count. And there is NO probably cause, idiot, nor could there be, for breaking a law that wasn't made yet. But little facts like that get in your way, so you conveniently forget them. And William Jefferson hasn't been charged because the Democrats are holding that up. Let's see you call for his investigation, since you want to Rove to take a turn on the Rack, let's let someone who's obviously guilty go first, make sure it works right. You won't defend him because he's indefensible.
No, biwah, no questions, you have problems admitting the truth of the answers you have now, I'd be wasting my time to ask you anything I didn't already know.

Doc Neaves:

You see, biwah, it's your fatalistic view that Democrats are angels, and only the Republicans deserve scourging that makes your words not credible.

Wow. I can only conclude that prior to this, I had no idea what a serious problem adult illiteracy truly is.

And is that really fatalism?

biwah,

I read through the article you posted. Pretty thin stuff to hang a charge of politically-motivated prosecutions on, I think. The article indicates that, even if no crime was committed, there was still something to cause a raised eyebrow or two:

Two executives at Adelman Travel, Craig Adelman and director Mitchell Fromstein, jointly donated $20,000 to Doyle's campaign about the time the firm was awarded a $750,000 contract. Doyle canceled the contract after Thompson was indicted.

...

Omega World Travel of Fairfax, Va., had initially scored higher than Adelman. Witnesses testified that Thompson said giving the contract to Omega would present political problems.

Witnesses could not remember exactly what she said, however. [emphasis mine - dj505](1)

Not exactly hard evidence of quid pro quo, but the timing is certainly... interesting, wouldn't you agree?

It also seems that the appellate court was most distressed because the US Attorney, Biskupic, went after the wrong person:

Judge William Bauer asked why others weren't prosecuted.

"Did you go after the governor or the Adelman people criminally?" Bauer said. "So the people you think were responsible for all this were Adelman and the governor, but she (Thompson) carries the sack?"

A salient point, I think. If Biscupik was trying to intimidate democrats, it seems to me that he would have gone after Adleman or Doyle himself, as Judge Bauer notes.

Could you also please explain to me why the White House would try to "get" Doyle? Why not Reid, or Pelosi, or Schumer, or the Hilldabeast, or a really high-profile democrat? Does Rove have nothing better to do with his time than try to railroad the governor of Wisconsin?

Incidentally, the game isn't over:

The travel case spawned an inquiry into other matters and recently resulted in the indictment of Dennis Troha, a large Doyle donor from Kenosha. Troha until recently was the prime developer of a proposed Menominee Indian casino in Kenosha.

Troha is accused of illegally funneling donations to Doyle by giving money to his relatives so he could avoid campaign contribution limits. He has pleaded not guilty.

And I think that you and your fellow libs would appreciate this statement from the state GOP:

"There's too many questions here for this to be a vindication of the administration."

Isn't this exactly the attitude taken by the dems in the Libby case and now the pillorying of Gonzales? "There just MUST be evidence that Rove is behind it all! We'll keep digging until we find it!!!"

At any rate, remember Occam's razor. Which seems more likely:

1. A US Attorney tries to intimidate a prominent democrat politician by prosecuting a civil service employee appointed by the democrat's Republican predecessor, or;

2. A US Attorney finds some evidence of corruption in the state bid process, successfully prosecutes a civil servant in charge of that process, but has the sentence overturned later on appeal because the appeals court thought that the evidence against the civil servant seemed very thin to them?

By the way, were Judge Randa and jury who convicted Thompson in the first place also part of the "criminal enterprise"? Did Rove get to them, too? Or has their been evidence brought forward, as there was in the Duke case, that the prosecutor hid and / or manipulated evidence?

For an example of a REAL political prosecution, do look at Ronny Earle vs. Tom DeLay. IIRC, Earle shopped his indictment all over Texas trying to find a grand jury that would actually find that DeLay might have actually committed a crime. Earle has a history of using his position to get even with political rivals, including Kay Bailey Hutchinson. And just how long has this been going on, by the way? And DeLay still hasn't been brought to trial?

You and starfleet_dude make it sound as if Rove has all the US attorneys out snooping through democrats' trash cans (a la Chuck Schumer and his staff), trying to dig up dirt so they intimidate the opposition at the behest of the White House. Yet, this case is the best you can offer as "evidence"???

Try again.

-------------

(1) http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=587510

biwah:
fa·tal·ism /ˈfeɪtlˌɪzəm/
–noun 1. the acceptance of all things and events as inevitable; submission to fate: Her fatalism helped her to face death with stoic calm.
2. Philosophy. the doctrine that all events are subject to fate or inevitable predetermination.

As in, it is inevitable that whatever Republicans do is bad, whatever Democrats do is good. And your conclusion, due to your illiteracy, is only in error in thinking you can have any grasp on the real problem of adult literacy (not illiteracy) until you are both adult and literate.

And yes, that is really fatalism, assuming a predetermined set of values for something long before the outcome.

docjim....cheers, dude, well said. My shout if we meet at the rail.

Sorry about the error with the blockquote.

starfleet_dude quoted this (April 24, 2007 08:55 AM):

But the Office of Special Counsel is preparing to jump into one of the most sensitive and potentially explosive issues in Washington, launching a broad investigation into key elements of the White House political operations that for more than six years have been headed by chief strategist Karl Rove.

The new investigation, which will examine the firing of at least one U.S. attorney, missing White House e-mails, and White House efforts to keep presidential appointees attuned to Republican political priorities, could create a substantial new problem for the Bush White House.

First, the inquiry comes from inside the administration, not from Democrats in Congress. Second, unlike the splintered inquiries being pressed on Capitol Hill, it is expected to be a unified investigation covering many facets of the political operation in which Rove played a leading part.

Wait a minute! I thought that Rove was the evil genius who, simply by reaching out with his hand, could have US Attorneys fired for no good reason! And could cause Richard Armitage to out Valerie Plame, and Scooter Libby to lie about it! I thought that the Bush administration did nothing but stonewall and cover for itself! That it's nothing but a vast criminal enterprise!

And you mean to tell me that these evil geniuses can't stop the Office of Special Counsel blithely going to investigate them??? Why doesn't Rove simply have Scott Bloch (a presidential appointee, no less) fired?

Make up your mind: is the Bush White House a vast criminal enterprise with international reach that can, will, and does engage in shady if not outright illegal activities with breathtaking nonchalance, or is it simply a group of quite normal politicians who ride the ragged edge of the law and whose only crime is that they have the unmitigated gall to beat democrats in elections from time to time?

docjim, I still like Senator Schmuckie's line: "You can fire them for no reason but you can't fire them for a bad reason".

Can you think of a single reason, any reason at all, that Bush could come up with (or Rove, even under hypnosis smoking some good ganja) that he couldn't turn into a BAD reason?

Doc Neaves:

Regarding fatalism: it is an acceptance as you point oput of all things that may happen, not a slavish devotion (i.e. an "acceptance of", to stretch the term) to a particular idea that one has. Fatalism would pretty much inhibit any presuppositions based on political views. You could indeed hold those views, but your fatalism would prevent you from actually applying them to reality, because fatalism dictates that whatever happens, happens.

So you may want to give your own definition a quick re-read and (re?-) thought.

biwah...what color is the sky in your world? Who decided we were talking about all things (like in, nothing can be left out), instead of all things (like in, all things Republican are bad and all things Democrat are good)? Did you hurt your back doing that mental gymnastic? And please explain the sentence, "You could indeed hold those views, but your fatalism would prevent you from actually applying them to reality, because fatalism dictates that whatever happens, happens"? It sounds as though you first say that fatalism prevents me from applying my views to reality (totally lost as to what the heck THAT means, reality is reality, my view has nothing to do with it) because whatever happens happens?

Dude, you so lost me. This is nothing but incoherent psychobabbly. Sorry, my apologies to all you psychobabblers out there. This is incoherent faux-psychobabble. It means absolutely nothing except whatever biwah says it does because it's too confusing to deny any explanation you give, while being to vague to actually say anything while sounding really important and snotty.
Now, want to try and speak English, or will we just see some smartass wave of your hand, and a hearty TaTa, as you smugly walk away thinking you've won something? Go ahead, I've been waiting for you to leave in a huff all day, and here comes one now, just your color.

And, speaking of giving a definition a quick re-read,how about this time, you read, but with COMPREHENSION.

if you are fatalistic, you (by definition) don't apply your particular beliefs to how you perceive reality. You wait for reality to take shape and accept that whatever happens happens. That is why if I am a rabid partisan who insists that the world is a certain way, I cannot also be a fatalist.

You are obviously pretty worked up, but I'd say, either try to see what I'm saying (and I will do the same) or just don't address these issues to begin with.

That said, this afternoon at work is kicking my ass and I may not get to say my piece in response to docjim for now. If you care to hear it let me know and I will get into it this evening. suffice to say it will NOT put all your suspicions to rest nor change your beliefs. But it's just more "forth" to your "back".

However if you're just going to continue the downward spiral in your manners I'll spare both of us the effort.

whatever.

It's getting deeper, folks:

Lawmaker leaves panels after FBI raid

WASHINGTON -- An Arizona congressman temporarily stepped down from two more House committees on Tuesday and got caught up in the probe of the firings of U.S. attorneys, less than a week after the FBI raided his wife's insurance business.

Rep. Rick Renzi said in a statement Tuesday that he was taking a leave of absence from the House Financial Services and Natural Resources committees. He stepped down from the House Intelligence Committee last week.

Even as he insisted that he had been "the subject of leaked stories, conjecture and false attacks" about a 2005 land exchange, Renzi became entangled in the U.S. attorneys probe when his chief of staff acknowledged calling Arizona's prosecutor's office to discuss the matter.

The prosecutor, Paul Charlton, was one of the eight prosecutors fired by the Justice Department over the winter.

Whoops...

oh, please, SD...this is how Republians handle it when they come under suspicion. In order to maintain any credibility, they remove themselves from positions. The Democrats, however, put people like this guy in positions of power rather than asking them to step down temporarily. Funny, this guy removes himself while the investigation is going on, no hint that HE did anything wrong, just his chief of staff, yet just to make sure, he steps down. Find me one democrat that did that. In fact, there are several Democrats already guilty and already indicted that have been recommended for important posts.

You really should do your research before you try to rub someone's nose in something. It just makes you look stupider than you probably are.

More about Rep. Rick Renzi's (R-AZ) relationship with the DoJ from the Wall Street Journal:

As midterm elections approached last November, federal investigators in Arizona faced unexpected obstacles in getting needed Justice Department approvals to advance a corruption investigation of Republican Rep. Rick Renzi, people close to the case said.

The delays, which postponed key approvals in the case until after the election, raise new questions about whether Attorney General Alberto Gonzales or other officials may have weighed political issues in some investigations....