narus.info PRISM/US-984XN

Once again he says that it is “constitutionally irrelevant” whether a person proven to be innocent is executed.

Picture right now the fits of anxiety going on among corporate PR people over whether he will say something about the health care bill. Here is the story so far.

UPDATE: The guy has been trapped in a car for hours and won’t get out. Bomb-squad robots are being used around him, he’s completely surrounded in the parking lot of the Federal Building in Los Angeles. Here’s a photo, he’s inside the red VW.

This is what happens when the national media falls for the bait and runs down to “town hall” meetings looking for spectacular video. Last night I saw a clip from Missouri being repeated over and over again, without context, showing an African-American woman, seemingly upset, being carted out of a Claire McCaskill town hall by the police. Here’s a typical example of Tuesday’s cable news coverage, from CNN:

But here is what actually happened and was not shown on national TV:

The woman the media enjoyed shown being dragged away, was holding a poster of Rosa Parks. When she tried to show it to a journalist, a wingnut attacked her and ripped up the sign. Guess which person was then shown on TV acting “unruly” while being dragged out of the hall and humiliated? Which one had 5 cops jump on her, and which one got only one cop?

Washington Post reporter John Solomon did everything he could to spy on fellow reporter Dan Eggen and to undermine and soften a Washington Post story at the crucial beginning of the US Attorney purge story. Remember, at this time it was Josh Marshall at talkingpointsmemo.com who had raised this story into the public consciousness, so much so that the Post and other big newspapers were forced to cover it. And when sabotaged stories like this one, with Solomon literally coordinating his writing with White House allies, threatened to make the story of the political purge fade, it was TPM who kept doing more original reporting and brought the story back to life. It ended with the resignation of Alberto Gonzales and the exposure of massive corruption in the White House and the Justice Department. Or at least those are the major results so far. I believe that the indictment of Karl Rove is now likely.

E-mails released by Attorney General Eric Holder show that Rove lied to the public, and it means he lied to the Judiciary Committee under oath when his testimony was finally recently forced this summer.  He lied extensively to Congress, which is illegal, and he did it just weeks ago.  Rove and Miers were directly running the show in firing US Attorneys, and the documents prove it.  This was illegal. Here is some info from the House Judiciary Committee’s press release about the White House documents they’ve just made public:

Key new facts revealed in the materials released today include:[

• 2005 White House “Decision” to fire David Iglesias – It has previously been known that New Mexico Republicans pressed for Iglesias to be removed because they did not like his decisions on vote fraud cases. New White House documents show that Rove and his office were involved in this effort no later than May 2005 (months earlier than previously known) – for example, in May and June 2005, Rove aide Scott Jennings sent emails to Tim Griffin (also in Rove’s office) asking “what else I can do to move this process forward” and stressing that “I would really like to move forward with getting rid of NM US ATTY.” In June 2005, Harriet Miers emailed that a “decision” had been made to replace Iglesias. At this time, DOJ gave Iglesias top rankings, so this decision was clearly not just the result of the White House following the Department’s lead as Rove and Miers have maintained.1

• Iglesias criticized by Rove aide for not “doing his job on” Democratic Congressional Candidate Patricia Madrid – An October 2006 email chain begun by Representative Heather Wilson criticized David Iglesias for not bringing politically useful public corruption prosecutions in the run up to the 2006 elections. Scott Jennings forwarded Wilson’s email to Karl Rove and complained that Iglesias had been “shy about doing his job on Madrid,” Wilson’s opponent in the 2006 Congressional race. Just weeks after this email, Iglesias’ name was placed on the final firing list.2

• An “agitated” Rove pressed Harriet Miers to do something about Iglesias just weeks before Iglesias was placed on the removal list – Karl Rove phoned Harriet Miers during a visit to New Mexico in September 2006 – according to Miers’ testimony, Rove was “agitated” and told her that Iglesias was “a serious problem and he wanted something done about it.”3

• Senator Domenici personally asked Bush’s Chief of Staff Josh Bolten to have Iglesias replaced –In October 2006, Senator Domenici stepped up his campaign to have Iglesias replaced. According to White House phone logs and emails, as well as Rove’s own testimony, Domenici spoke with President Bush’s Chief of Staff Josh Bolten about Iglesias on October 5, 2006, and during October 2006, Domenici or his staff spoke with Karl Rove at least 4 times.4

• Todd Graves removed in Rove-approved deal with Republican Senator – Kansas City US Attorney Todd Graves was removed as part of a White House-brokered deal with US Senator Kit Bond. In exchange for the Administration firing Graves, Senator Bond agreed to lift his hold on an Arkansas judge nominated to the Eighth Circuit federal appeals court. A White House email stated that “Karl is fine” with the proposal.5

• Miers obtained favorable statement on Rick Renzi in violation of DOJ policy – When rumors of the FBI investigation of Rep. Rick Renzi surfaced in October, 2006, one of Rove’s subordinates contacted Harriet Miers, who called Deputy Attorney General McNulty seeking a possible statement that would have “vindicated” Renzi. Even though this was contrary to standard DOJ policy, such a statement was issued several days later.6

“I have provided a copy of the materials released today to special U.S. Attorney Nora Dannehy to assist in her effort to determine whether federal criminal charges are appropriate and to pursue any such charges,” said Conyers.

This is very convincing evidence of multiple serious crimes against the rule of law in the United States.