Saturday, August 4, 2007

THE U. S. ATTORNEY GENERAL "CRISIS" - NOT!

Before I get into my topic, I want to include a link to Carolyn's journal, NO APOLOGIES - BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVES ON WORLD EVENTS.  This link takes you to an excellent entry she made recently.  It concerns the "Islamification" of our country while not affording the same privileges to Christian faiths.  This is a very long entry, but it's REALLY, REALLY worth your time.  The discrimination is clear, and we are much farther down this road than you may realize.  Please take the time to read this entry.

I've been following the U. S. Attorney General story off and on since it began.  The issue is supposedly the firing of eight Attorney Generals by U. S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.  When all of this started, I wondered what all the hub-bub was about since anyone in an appointed positions serves solely at the pleasure of the appointing authority.  That means that the individual can be fired for NO reason.  I was a personnel officer for a state government agency for almost ten years, so I knew that firsthand.  Appointed positions are THE MOST political positions there are no matter what anybody says.  This so-called "scandal" is just another move by the Democrats to discredit the Bush administration - nothing more.  On July 29, 2007, Chris Wallace with the Fox News Channel did an interview with Senator Russ Feingold.  Senator Feingold's responses indicate there is absolutely no story here.  Here is the transcript from that part of the interview: 

WALLACE: Meanwhile, this week a House committee held two White House aides in contempt, and a Senate committee issued a subpoena for Karl Rove to testify, all in the investigation of the firing of U.S. attorneys.Senator, so far, Congress has been investigating this issue all year. You've heard from 14 witnesses. You've received 8,500 pages of documents.Can you point to a single smoking gun, any hard evidence, that the White House has done anything illegal?

FEINGOLD: I think clearly with regard to the NSA surveillance program that we've been talking about...

WALLACE: No, no, I'm talking about the U.S. attorneys, sir.

FEINGOLD: Well, I believe they probably have. I can't give you anything definitive on that, but I do believe there's been terrible misconduct and misleading approaches here.

And look. My view is that our first priority is getting us out of Iraq. We have had successes in terms of raising the minimum wage. We are going to pass a major lobbying and ethics bill. We've passed an energy bill. We've got the pay-go rule back in place. This is what we spent six months on.

But now we have started some accountability. This was a week of accountability — a censure resolution proposal that I made, the call for the special counsel, the issuing of contempt orders.

This administration is trying to prevent us from learning the facts about these situations that you've asked me about. Until we can learn the facts, how do we know whether they have committed anything illegal?

That's something that we as members of Congress have an obligation to find out, not just a question of whether we should do it or shouldn't do it. We need to ask these questions or we're not doing our job.

WALLACE: But you know, I think the question is, is this really going anywhere? Is this substantive oversight or is this political theater?I mean, the point is on the U.S. attorneys which we're talking about, six-month, seven-month investigation, 8,500 pages of documents, 14 witnesses, and you say yourself as a member of Senate Judiciary you haven't found any hard evidence that the White House has broken the law.

FEINGOLD: Well, I happen to think they probably did break the law here, but I don't think the investigation is over, and...

WALLACE: But do you have any evidence of that?

FEINGOLD: ... until we — well, that's why we're asking for people like Karl Rove and others to come down and testify so we can actually examine the evidence.

We haven't had access to the evidence. How are you supposed to examine it when you can't look at it?

WALLACE: Finally, while all this is going on, as you pointed out, you plan to introduce legislation or resolutions this week to censure the president, two resolutions.

When you tried this last year, only three Democrats signed on to your motions or to your resolutions. Wouldn't the American people rather see Congress do something about lower drug prices, about energy policy, about student loans, all part of the Democratic agenda, that you haven't passed so far rather than engage in this political theater?

FEINGOLD: Well, Chris, that's just not true. We have passed a major energy bill in the Senate. We have passed major legislation on student loans and higher education. The fact is we have done those...

WALLACE: But forgive me, Senator, but none of it has gotten through Congress.

You can see how Senator Feingold evaded the questions and did not want to admit that after all this expenditure of YOUR MONEY, there is absolutely NO evidence of any wrongdoing on this!  But, apparently, he intends for this charade to continue.  I agreed with Mr. Wallace in that I would rather see Congress spend their time and MY MONEY on worthwhile endeavors.

There is avery good article on the Media Research Center's website about another aspect of this "controversy."   The mainstream news media ignored the firing of NINETY-THREE U. S. Attorneys during the Clinton administration.  Yes, that's right - former President Clinton fired ninety-three U. S. Attorneys.  I can't put the entire article here due to its length, so click on the Media Research Center hyperlink above and read it in its entirety.  Here is one quote from the article:

"The broadcast network evening newscasts, which didn't care in 1993 about the Clinton administration's decision to ask for the resignation of all 93 U.S. attorneys, went apoplectic Tuesday night in leading with the "controversy," fed by the media, over the Bush administration for replacing eight U.S. attorneys in late 2006 -- nearly two years after rejecting the idea of following the Clinton policy of replacing all the attorneys. Anchor Charles Gibson promised that ABC would "look at all the angles tonight," but he skipped the Clinton comparison."

Here is another portion of the article expalining Brit Hume's reaction to the new media ignoring the Clinton firings:

"Brit Hume led his Tuesday night Grapevine segment by scolding his media colleagues for how "news stories reporting that the Bush administration had considered firing all 93 U.S. attorneys across the country failed to mention that that is exactly what Bill Clinton did soon after taking office back in 1993." Hume explained how that was not noted, "even in passing, in front-page stories today in the New York Times and the Washington Post, or in the AP's story on the subject."

It's clear how one-sided this is and what the real intent is.  It has nothing to do about justice or doing what's right.  It's ALL about discrediting the Bush administration in an attempt to give the Democrats an edge in next year's elections.  Is it ANY coincidence that all of this is going on right before the elections take place?  I have an idea this won't be the only thing we see tried in order to gain a political advantage.  I have some advice for the Democratic party and the candidates running for the Presidency:  Why not run on YOUR OWN MERITS, YOUR OWN TRACK RECORD, YOUR OWN QUALIFICATIONS, and let the voters decide who they want?  I know this is a new concept, LOL, but as I recall this is what our electoral system was designed for.

Please click on my hyperlinks and read these articles in their entirety.  It's well worth your time to read it for yourself.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

And the real losers in all of this are us, the average citizens.  Not just in wasted money.  People looking to just stir up trouble and fingerpoint waste time.  Waste ideas.  Waste opportunites.  Where have all the Mr. Smith's gone?  The Jimmy Stewart good guys that just want to do what's right and what's best.  That want to lift us up and not tear us down.  -  Barbara

Anonymous said...

Hi Dirk- What I remember is the big stink everyone made about Kenneth Starr in his investigations about REAL issues during the Clinton years- all the affairs- Vince Fostergate, Travelgate, Chinagate, and on and on- now, they are doing the same things- but note Fiengold- he "happens to THINK that someone MAY have broken the law" .  He doesn't have a clue- and as for Clinton firing most of his attorneys, well, they did touch on that a little, but they tried to justify him doing it because he supposedly did it at the beginning of his administration.  All this "corruption" just keeps showing the American people that the dems are a bunch of vindictive, sore losers.  Great entry Dirk.  Thank you!  God Bless!  Carolyn

Anonymous said...

Hello Dirk, hope this finds you and Ne doing well. Tell her i miss her and you keep writing ok?
Hugs and love from Colorado
Deb

Anonymous said...

Is it any wonder why we lose faith in our government these days. Whatever happened " for the people, of the people" . Anymore it seems like a sham , are we getting any say at all or are we just going to turn our heads and point a finger. Makes you think long and hard about who exactly you want in office. Tell Nelishia she's in my thoughts and prayers on the smoke! I miss her. (Hugs) Indigo

Anonymous said...

HI Dirk,
I have to agree with the commenter Barbara. She nailed it. I have also followed the Gonzalez controversy. Part of me agrees with you and parts of me does not......politely I disagree :). I'm a proud Democrat, not to say that I like what they say and do all the time because I do not. I wish Congress spent their time better as promised, but.......  Gonzalez and the Bush administration does warrant "some" looking into.

Huggers and hi to Nelishia,
Gayla