It’s Comical, Part 1 (Updated)

Hey, kids, yesterday we focused on books.  Today, I thought we’d cover a different kind of book–comics!  When I was a kid, one of my favorite comic books were the ones about Chimpy Archie and his gang. The Betty and Veronica series was probably my favorite, but the Alberto Gonzales and Monica Goodling Berty and Monica ones were pretty funny, too!

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With Justice For None

From CROOKS & LIARS:

From the moment he entered the White House, President Obama’s attitude towards the crime, corruption and politicization of the Bush Justice Department has been to “look forward and not backwards.” As we’ve seen for the third time in just the last several days, that’s working out just fine for the Bush lawyers.

On Wednesday, prosecutor Nora Dannehy [assigned by Gonzales’ successor Michael Mukasey]  announced she would bring no charges against Alberto Gonzales, Karl Rove, Harriet Miers, Monica Goodling or any of the key players behind the purge of 9 U.S. attorneys.

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Where Thinking Goes to Tank

From THE HUFFINGTON POST:

The George W. Bush Institute — the “action- oriented think tank” that is part of Bush’s Presidential Center — will co-produce a public television show hosted by its executive director, Ambassador James Glassman, in a rare convergence of public broadcasting and a partisan research organization.

“Ideas in Action” will premiere in February and will be co-produced by Andrew Walworth, who produces PBS’s “Think Tank.”

Because we all know how Chimpy always surrounds himself with geniuses.

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(I think I know where Douglas Feith, Dana Perino, Alberto Gonzales, and Chimpy got their ice cream)

They mean what they say….until they take it back

From the raw story:

Either former Bush officials are being pressured to backtrack, or recent flip-flops are just more evidence that they had no convictions in the first place.

In a story entitled Gonzales backtracks on support for CIA probe, The Washington Times‘ Ben Conery reports, “Former Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales said Thursday that his previous assertion that it was ‘legitimate to question and examine’ charges of CIA abuses of suspected terrorists did not mean he endorsed such an investigation.”

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Anyone else think Don Corleone Deadeye Dick Cheney invited Little Abu and Tommy Boy to go on a hunting trip?

Gonzogate: The Story That Never Dies

From The New York Times:

WASHINGTON — Thousands of pages of internal e-mail and once-secret Congressional testimony showed Tuesday that Karl Rove and other senior aides in the Bush White House played an earlier and more active role than was previously known in the 2006 firings of a number of United States attorneys.

Aides to former President George W. Bush have asserted that the Justice Department took the lead in the dismissals, which set off a political firestorm that lasted months. Mr. Rove played down his role in the firings in a recent interview and in closed testimony last month before Congressional investigators.

But the documents, released by the House Judiciary Committee after a protracted fight over access to White House records and testimony, offer a detailed portrait of a nearly two-year effort, from early 2005 to 2007, by senior White House officials, including Mr. Rove, to dismiss some prosecutors for what appear to be political reasons.

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Gonzo’s doing interviews. A little Berty told me!

Hey kids! Gonzo is doing interviews! From The New York Times :

As the first Latino to have served as the attorney general, what are your thoughts as Sonia Sotomayor prepares to become the first Latina on the Supreme Court?
This is obviously a proud and historic moment for all Hispanics.

It has been two summers since you resigned, and you’re still living in Virginia?
I’ve got an apartment in Lubbock, Tex. We’re in the process of moving my family down to Texas. I’ll be teaching this year at Texas Tech University.

When does school begin?
My first day of class is Aug. 31. I’ve also been asked to help the chancellor and the president of the university in recruiting and retaining minorities.

Oh yeah, Gonzo! Send a Rethug to recruit minorities, especially after the Rethuglican senators from Texas, Kay Bailey Hutchsion and John Cornyn voted for Sonia Sotomayor! Oh wait, they voted against her! 😳

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Creepier by the Dozen

From The New York Times:

WASHINGTON — A coalition of left-wing advocacy groups filed legal ethics complaints on Monday against 12 former Bush administration lawyers, including three United States attorneys general, whom the groups accuse of helping to justify torture.

The coalition, called Velvet Revolution, asked the bar associations in four states and the District of Columbia to disbar the lawyers, saying their actions violated the rules of professional responsibility by approving interrogation methods, including waterboarding, that constituted illegal torture.

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Rotten to the Core

Senator Carl Levin:

Today we’re releasing the declassified report of the Senate Armed Services Committee’s investigation into the treatment of detainees in U.S. custody. […] In my judgment, the report represents a condemnation of both the Bush administration’s interrogation policies and of senior administration officials who attempted to shift the blame for abuse – such as that seen at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, and Afghanistan – to low ranking soldiers. Claims, such as that made by former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz that detainee abuses could be chalked up to the unauthorized acts of a “few bad apples,” were simply false.

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