Monday, July 02, 2007
National GOP Meltdown Continues
Republicans in Congress, President Bush and would-be presidential candidates are contributing equally these days to the national meltdown of the GOP. Last week, Senate Republicans teamed up with xenophobic Democrats to ensure defeat of critical immigration reform legislation backed by the President. Today, President Bush commuted the prison sentence of convicted felon, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, insultingly calling a 30-month prison sentence for the convicted liar "excessive". The reputed front-runner for the 2008 GOP nomination, former senator and TV actor, Fred Thompson, liked what President Bush did today. ""I am very happy for Scooter Libby," Thompson said. Meanwhile, Andrew Sullivan suggests Thompson, who has quite a reputation as the lady's man, is a switch-hitter. That ought to be enough to seal his fate with the Christian right.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
34 comments:
Reminds me of the pardon Clinton gave before leaving office...
Yeah -- Scooter Libby was the lawyer for Marc Rich who was pardoned by Clinton. Thanks for reminding us! If there's one lawyer in D.C. totally knowledgeable about pardon law and procedures, it is Scooter his own bad self...
Lest we forget: Paris Hilton served more time in jail than Scooter Libby ever did. Judy Miller served more time in jail than Scooter Libby ever did.
Sad but true, Wilson.
As Joe Wilson said on Hardball tonight, Bush's commutation of Scooter Libby's prison term is only the latest evidence that this Administration is "corrupt to its core". To that I say, Amen.
Very Sad.
The GOP can't even defend or put a reasonable spin or rational on these actions that a 6 year old would trust or believe.
Maybe Perot and Bloomberg are right.
The President could've avoided all this by simply waiting until the last day of his term and pardoning Libby.
Whastever...
Now, mark my words, Libby will become fodder for the rightwing book/speech tours. He'll make millions, ala Oliver North, another felon.
It's disgraceful.
What is it that national Republicans drink, inside the beltway? Have they no shame? Don't they realize that outside the beltway, they're being mocked today?
This administration has already made its mark on history, which will not be good. This just cements it, and I'm afraid this is not the last of the stupid W decisions.
He's digging his party's grave.
I'd hand him a shovel, but he's doign fine on his own.
Just keep the damned Supreme Court outta this. If they were involved, they'd likely go even further.
Did Scooter serve more time than Bill Clinton, who lied under oath? How much time did Clinton get for lying?
President Clinton, despite what you personally may imagine, was never convicted. Scooter Libby was convicted of multiple felonies by a jury and sentenced by a judge. In America, one is innocent until proven guilty.
"President Clinton, despite what you personally may imagine, was never convicted. Scooter Libby was convicted of multiple felonies by a jury and sentenced by a judge. In America, one is innocent until proven guilty. "
Depends on your definition of the word "is" (;). Yes, Clinton was never convicted. But a moron can see that he at best was untruthful, at worst lied outright. I've never understood why he lied/misled/ avoided the issue in the first place - it was just some lovin'. And innocent until proven guilty, PLEASE - there are a couple former lacrosse players at Duke who may beg to differ.
That being said, this is a debacle. Bush needed to just wait until the last day of his term, like someone said above me.
I always knew he'd pardon Scooter sometime. The commutation is a half-nelson on justice and fair play.
He took action because a three-judge federal panel, two Republicans and one Dem, agreed with the trial court judge, a Republican, that Scooter should not be free on appeal.
That action came yesterday. Scooter was about to scoot off to jail.
It is certainly within the president's power, and few doubted he would do it in the end. But the timing was awful.
He and Dick don't want Scooter out of their sight. He took a fall for a horrible fear-mongering campaign. You remember, the one where they wanted us all to beleive their were WMDs in Iraq, and that Iraq was behind 9/11, even though logic, the truth and common sense dictated otherwise.
And when someone dared tell the Emporers they had no clothes (Joe Wilson), they came after him with guns blazing.
It shouldn't take too long post-2008 for this entire presidency to unravel. And for the books and speeches to be paid for with tens of millions on far-right goofy money, ala Oliver North.
They're all cut from the same cloth. Remember how long it took ole Ronnie boy to cash in by giving million-dollar speeches in Japan?
Their God is the Dollar. They worship wuite well.
And to the above poster who continually confuses Clinton's lie with a crime: he was not convicted. Maybe he should've been, but he wasn't. And his jury was a lot tougher politically than Scooter's: the US Senate. At the time, it was not a friendly body.
And when Clinton lied, no one died.
People seem to forget WHY Libby ended up in this mess to begin with.
I'vw always been fascinated with some legal scholars and their interpretations of what constitutes High Crimes And Misdemeanors.
The Clinton impeachemnt proceedings were based on the High Crime that he lied about receiving blowjobs.
Now in the case of President Bush, he lied as well. He lied during a pre-invasion speech he delivered on national television by stating that Libya had sold and delivered yellow cake uranium to Iraq to develop nuclear weapons or WMD's as they called it.
The President KNEW that this was a lie. He was informed prior to his speech that Libya DID NOT sell yellow cake to Iraq and it was Plame's husband who provided that information. Yet the President chose to lie to the American people. His lies were NOT based on so-called flawed intelligence because the intelligence community told him prior to his speech that the sale of yellow cake DID NOT happen. He went ahead and lied anyway to provide a pretext to war and now we have nearly 4,000 dead, over 26,000 casualties as a result.
I'm not going to make excuses for Clinton but perjuring one's self regarding an affair and receiving oral sex is NOT a HIGH CRIME or MISDEMEANOR.
Knowingly lying to the American people as a pretext to go to war is. This is what the Libby affair is about.
Impeachment proceedings against the President should have began long ago based SOLELY on the fact he lied about the yellow cake and evidence clearly showed he lied.
Two Presidents lied and one lied to drag us into war. Which one was guilty of High Crimes and Misdemeanors?
I know this doesn't sound reassuring, but it's perfectly legal for the president to lie to the American people. It is illegal, however, to lie to a law enforcement officer or grand jury investigating a potential crime.
True enough Gary, it's perfectly legal for the president to lie to the American people, as he has repeatedly.
HOWEVER, by lying to Congress, Bush violated US Laws related to Fraud and False Statements, Title 18, Chapter 47, Section 1001 and Conspiracy to Defraud the United States, Title 18, Chapter 19, Section 371.
Why-oh-why, do readers of this blog always have to go searching for what is not being said by you...
Kay, get off my back. I'm a Republican who doesn't shy away from criticizing Rs and Ds alike. The whole point of the post is to criticize Rs for things that bother me, and you have the audacity to suggest I'm not fully informing the readers of this blog. Go write your own blog if you don't like it.
You stop with your so called balanced critiquing and I'll stop reading. Audacity, indeed...
Guess you could always ban me and the others who what the whole truth told.
AI, you must be doing something right when you get hit by the wedge-whacks on the left and right at the same time.
Excuse me, but Ron Paul was leading all the polls. Within a day the networks pulled down the polls showing Ron Paul out front.
For more information: http://ronpaul2008.com
As far as I am concerned Bush, Rumsfield, and Cheney are war criminals and traitors.
Where is "the architect" right now?
"I don’t believe my role is to replace the verdict of a jury with my own, unless there are new facts or evidence of which a jury was unaware, or evidence that the trial was somehow unfair."
-- George W. Bush, writing in his autobiography, A Charge to Keep.
On the Fred Thompson thing.... Is attendance at a gay club/gay event now automatic proof of one's "switch-hiting"? Does that mean my hetro attendence at Pride with my wife makes us both switch hitters? Funny, I thought it just made me supportive of a great event...
AI,
At least Clinton DID appear before a Grand Jury.
The Bush White House invokes executive priviledge regarding and tosses subpeonas in the waste can like toilet paper.
Has Bush yet appeared before a Grand Jury to testify on the yellow cake WMD intelligence lie that was at the root of the Libby case to begin with? NO!
You can't lie in front of a Grand Jury if you NEVER get place in front of one!
Gary, go ahead and boot Kay.
She's a nutcase anyway.
You've been entirely fair to her over time.
This blog consistently pokes fun at your own party. Of course, I could observe, there's so much material...
Just for giggles, becasue I don't have ready access, is her US Code cite correct? I tcould be a patent law cite, for all I know.
Anon 4:05, the code cite is irrelevant. Bush hasn't appeared before a grand jury as Clinton did. I don't approve of Bush misleading anyone, the American people or Congress, about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein pre-war, but this is not the first time in American history people have been sold a bill of goods by their president as an excuse for entering a war.
4:05... Gary, is that you?
Nutcase... geez, I was really hoping for something better than that lame standby. Oh sure, dumpster diver, socialist, democrap, drunk, mafia queen, commi, crook, screwball, moron, thug, ... are already taken here but still!
AI: "Anon 4:05, the code cite is irrelevant."
Yep, that would be a YES.
Kay, no the anon comment was not me. I'm not afraid to tell you what I think of you. Your reputation precedes you in the blogosphere. Plenty of people out there with strong opinions of you.
Ha, wayyyyyy too late to try and kiss up to me now, Gary.
Re: "Comprehensive" immigration reform.
When morally indefensible legislation that is opposed by 80% of the electorate comes close to passing the Senate -- twice -- because backroom deals that bypass the committee process and expedited floor schedules intended to shepherd the bill with a minimum of public oversight and comment, the problem is not with the people who voted against the bill. It is with the people who voted for it.
At the Constitutional convention in 1787, James Wilson responded to concerns that the President might be able to pardon his own confederates in treasonous wrongdoing by observing that "[if the President] be himself a party to the guilt, he can be impeached and prosecuted."
Some have suggested that the prospect of an unfavorable judgment by history might check abusive pardons. However, to be concerned about public reprobation, a President must have the ability to feel shame. Pres. Bush does not feel shame. If he did, he would have resigned long ago over the deaths of 3,500 American soldiers in a war fought to appease his own vanity.
In a 2001 article written by a law professor from Drake Univ., the author suggested that the most important aspect of Pres. Clinton's infamous pardon of convicted fugitive Marc Rich was to remind the nation of the potential for abuse of the pardon power and to force the public to apprehend that "a future episode could be much, much worse". I think that day has now come.
Impeachment is the only option left to restore this government to the people, from whom it has been stolen.
kevin said...
You're being too polite, Gary. Kay is a total bitch.
7:53 PM EST
---------
Take it down, Gary.
Kay has never met this Kevin person. He wouldn't know her from the next stranger he passes on the street and he is completely out of line with his slanderous and childish name calling! Some friends you got there big guy!
~ Deb (Someone who actually does know her!)
Duly noted, Deb.
Thanks a hell of a lot, Gary. I was really hoping to get my promotion by the 4th of July.
Oh well, guess I'll just have to try harder...
Post a Comment