I hear she might name her next kid Mulligan

From Anchorage Daily News:

Gov. Sarah Palin and the head of the Alaska Republican Party said Thursday that Sen. Mark Begich should give his Senate seat up to a special election now that prosecutors have abandoned their case against Ted Stevens.

“Alaskans deserve to have a fair election not tainted by some announcement that one of the candidates was convicted fairly of seven felonies, when in fact it wasn’t a fair conviction,” Palin said in a Thursday interview with the Daily News.

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Now word yet on when she’s going to start campaigning for Gary Condit now that Chandra Levy’s murderer turned out to be someone other than the congressman.

Scuzzy and Harriet

From The New York Times:

WASHINGTON — Karl Rove and Harriet E. Miers, top former aides to President George W. Bush, will testify under oath to a House committee investigating the firings of nine United States attorneys in 2007, under an agreement announced Wednesday by the panel.

The agreement settled a rancorous dispute that began in mid-2007 when the House Judiciary Committee subpoenaed Mr. Rove and Ms. Miers, who, according to e-mail messages released by the Justice Department, played a role in the firings.

In a statement after the agreement was announced, Representative John Conyers Jr., a Michigan Democrat and chairman of the judiciary panel, declared victory and said the committee had finally succeeded in breaking through the Bush administration’s absolute immunity claims.

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Smell that? The turds must be blossoming!

Editorial from The New York Times:

Last year, Karl Rove defied a Congressional subpoena ordering him to testify about the politically driven hiring and firing of United States attorneys. The House Judiciary Committee has now issued another subpoena. Congress and the Obama administration should do everything they can to compel him to testify.

Americans deserve a full accounting. Monica Goodling, a top aide to Alberto Gonzales, admitted that she hired lawyers for nonpartisan jobs based on their politics. The Justice Department’s inspector general found that Bradley Schlozman, the onetime head of the civil rights division, politicized his staff and made false statements to Congress. Other witnesses have told investigators that prosecutors were allowed to keep their jobs or were fired based on whether they brought cases that helped Republicans win elections.

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This Canary Should Be a Jailbird

From Scott Horton at The Daily Beast:

When a former Alabama governor was convicted for selling public offices, it set off an investigation into improper conduct at the Justice Department that leads directly to the White House.

The most dramatic political prosecution in the 21st century—involving a former governor in Alabama, the U.S. Attorney’s office, and the Bush White House and Justice Department—has been rocked by incriminating new disclosures by a knowledgeable career Justice Department staff member who has provided information charging serious misconduct by the prosecutors.

Among other disclosures shattering the credibility of the case, U.S. Attorney Leura Canary’s “recusal” for conflict of interest is revealed as a sham. Moreover, The Daily Beast has learned, the matter has touched off concerns within the Justice Department over efforts to sweep accusations of unethical conduct under the carpet.

It appears the Justice Department was aware of even more startling allegations of misconduct but it chose to hide this from the court and from opposing counsel.

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Inherit the wind? Or, just blow me!?

From OpEd News, written by Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL):

Conyers Opens Door to Inherent Contempt for Rove

Karl Rove has simply refused to appear, as he is legally required to do. His actions, endorsed by the Bush/Cheney Administration, are a challenge to our system of checks and balances and Congress must respond to this type of outrageous behavior with appropriate severity.

Today, Judiciary Chairman John Conyers courageously stated today that inherent contempt will remain an option for the House of Representatives so long as Rove and this Administration refuses to abide by the law.

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Monkey Business

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Bush’s former chief political adviser denied meddling in the Justice Department’s prosecution of Alabama’s ex-governor and said Sunday the courts will have to resolve a congressional subpoena for his testimony.

“Congress, the House Judiciary Committee, wants to be able to call presidential aides on its whim up to testify,” Karl Rove said. “It’s going to be tied up in court and settled in court.”

Last week, the committee ordered Rove to appear July 10. Lawmakers want to ask him about the White House’s role in firing nine U.S. attorneys in 2006 and the prosecution of former Gov. Don Siegelman, D-Ala.

Also under congressional subpoena are Bush’s chief of staff, Joshua Bolten, and his former counsel, Harriet Miers. The White House is citing executive privilege, the doctrine intended to protect the confidentiality of presidential communications, in refusing to let them testify.

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Look what a time-saver I found! I didn’t have to photoshop Chimpy; he was already in the movie!! 😀

Slime and Punishment

From The Raw Story, November 26, 2007:

For most Americans, the very concept of political prisoners is remote and exotic, a practice that is associated with third-world dictatorships but is foreign to the American tradition. The idea that a prominent politician — a former state governor — could be tried on charges that many observers consider to be trumped-up, convicted in a trial that involved numerous questionable procedures, and then hauled off to prison in shackles immediately upon sentencing would be almost unbelievable.

But there is such a politician: Don Siegelman, Democratic governor of Alabama from 1999 to 2003. Starting just a few weeks after he took office, Siegelman was targeted by an investigation launched by his political opponents and escalated from the state to the federal level by Bush Administration appointees in 2001.

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