The New York Times editorial board calls for the dismissal of Alberto Gonzales.
--David Kurtz
Back on March 5th I wrote a lengthy post in which I explained that the defenses offered up by Rep. Wilson (R) and Sen. Domenici (R) actually weren't that different from the charges being levelled against them. This became clear when you reviewed all the facts then becoming available 
and reading between the lines of their carefully crafted public statements. When these two now-disgraced members of Congress said they were reacting to constituent complaints about US Attorney David Iglesias's slow rate of prosecutions, what they really meant was that prominent Republicans back in New Mexico kept complaining that Iglesias wasn't bagging enough Democrats.
That was fairly obvious then with a little close analysis and informed speculation. Now we have the concrete details in Sunday's stories from the Times and McClatchy.
Republican players wanted their Bush-appointed US Attorney to indict more Democrats. The head of the party took the Iglesias problem up with Karl Rove on multiple occasions. "He's gone," Rove assured him at the White House late last year. They got Rep. Wilson and Sen. Domenici to lean on him too. And when he didn't come through with the indictment of Manny Aragon in time to guarantee Wilson's reelection, he was, as Rove put it, gone.
We're now well past the point where anyone can pretend that Iglesias wasn't fired because he refused to use his office to advance the interests of the New Mexico Republican party by indicting Democrats. The evidence, at this point, is overwhelming and beyond dispute. Indeed, it's not even being disputed, as you can glean pretty clearly from tomorrow's stories in the Times and from McClatchy. Rather than continuing to deny it, state party leaders are giving on the record interviews in which they make the case for the rightness of their attempts to get Iglesias fired for not indicting enough Democrats.
We know something very 
similar happened in Washington state.
Now let's cut to the chase, the big story at the heart of all of this: San Diego and the firing of Carol Lam.
Given what we know about New Mexico and Washington state, it simply defies credulity to believe that Lam -- in the midst of an historic corruption investigation touching the CIA, the White House and major Republican appropriators on Capitol Hill -- got canned because she wasn't prosecuting enough immigration cases. Was it the cover? Sure. The reason? Please.
I'm not sure Lam would have been canned simply for prosecuting Cunningham. His corruption was so wild and cartoonish that even a crew with as little respect for the rule of law would have realized the impossibility of not prosecuting him. But she didn't stop there. She took her investigation deep into congressional appropriations process -- kicking off a continuing probe into the dealings of former Appropriations Committee Chairman Jerry Lewis. She also followed the trail into the heart of the Bush CIA. Those two stories are like mats of loose threads. That's where the story lies.
--Josh Marshall
As Josh noted below, Rove's involvement with the U.S. Attorney purge is hardly a surprise. Here's what the Washington Post reported in early February:
One administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity in discussing personnel issues, said the spate of firings was the result of "pressure from people who make personnel decisions outside of Justice who wanted to make some things happen in these places."
Hmmm. People outside of DOJ who make DOJ personnel decisions? That's a one-item list: the White House. Yet, as late as Friday, even the esteemed Dan Froomkin said, "Just how closely was the White House was involved in these firings remains a mystery."
The precise details are yet to be determined, but the White House involvement in this purge hasn't been a mystery for more than a month.
--David Kurtz
We edge a bit closer to the truth on where the list of 8 canned US Attorneys came from. From Newsweek ...
Justice officials say the dismissals were for "job-performance reasons," as well as for failure to pursue Bush administration policy priorities. But where did the list of particular U.S. attorneys to fire come from? Two senior Justice officials, who didn't want to be named discussing the dismissals, tell NEWSWEEK that Kyle Sampson, Gonzales's chief of staff, developed the list of eight prosecutors to be fired last October—with input from the White House. In a recent statement, the White House said it approved the firings, but didn't sign off on specific names.
"With input from the White House." I'll bet.
Here's a bit on Sampson's background from a DOJ press release: "Prior to his service with Attorney General Gonzales, Kyle Sampson served in the Department as Counselor to Attorney General John Ashcroft and in the White House as Associate Counsel to the President. He also served as Counsel to Senator Orrin G. Hatch on the Senate Judiciary Committee."
--Josh Marshall
The New York Times has more on top New Mexico Republican officials urging action against then-U.S. Attorney David Iglesias:
“I fall into the category of those who were ultimately very disappointed in David,” said Pat Rogers, a Republican lawyer in Albuquerque who has represented Mr. Iglesias, Ms. Wilson and the State Republican Party.Mr. Rogers said he spoke with Mr. Iglesias at a private lunch last October in Albuquerque to discuss the perception that he was not pursuing indictments in the courthouse corruption inquiry expeditiously.
“I asked him, ‘Do you understand that everyone in this community is talking about why there hasn’t been any follow-up?’ and he said: ‘Boy, you’re right about that. Someone even told my wife about sealed indictments,’ ” Mr. Rogers said. “I came away from that meeting feeling stunned.”
Mr. Rogers said he thought Mr. Iglesias was shying away from the kinds of career-making cases prosecutors typically jump at, so he voiced doubts to Mr. Domenici.
Mickey D. Barnett, another top Republican lawyer in the state, who once served as an aide to Mr. Domenici in Congress and represented the Bush campaign in New Mexico in the 2000 and 2004 elections, said he had also complained.
“I would say to Pete and Heather: ‘Look, you guys have some influence; I don’t have any influence. Can we get something done?’ ” Mr. Barnett said.
Against the backdrop of complaints from top Republicans, Domenici and Wilson called Igelsias about the courthouse investigation just days before the mid-term elections only for informational purposes? Please. At least we know who they were talking about when Domenici and Wilson said they were getting constituent complaints about Igelsias.
--David Kurtz
McClatchy blows it open. Just out ...
Presidential advisor Karl Rove and at least one other member of the White House political team were urged by the New Mexico Republican party chairman to fire the state's U.S. attorney because of dissatisfaction in part with his failure to indict Democrats in a voter fraud investigation in the battleground election state.In an interview Saturday with McClatchy Newspapers, Allen Weh, the party chairman, said he complained in 2005 about then-U.S. Attorney David Iglesias to a White House liaison who worked for Rove and asked that he be removed. Weh said he followed up with Rove personally in late 2006 during a visit to the White House.
"Is anything ever going to happen to that guy?" Weh said he asked Rove at a White House holiday event that month.
"He's gone," Rove said, according to Weh.
"I probably said something close to 'Hallelujah,'" said Weh.
Let's not pretend we didn't see this coming.
--Josh Marshall
A question, probably for our congressional staff readers:
In his recent New Yorker piece on the Bush Administration's "redirection" in the Middle East, Sy Hersh recalled the Iran-contra scandal as he reported on clandestine activities being conducted by the Department of Defense deliberately outside of the purview of the congressional intelligence committees:
Iran-Contra was the subject of an informal “lessons learned” discussion two years ago among veterans of the scandal. [Elliott] Abrams led the discussion. One conclusion was that even though the program was eventually exposed, it had been possible to execute it without telling Congress. As to what the experience taught them, in terms of future covert operations, the participants found: “One, you can’t trust our friends. Two, the C.I.A. has got to be totally out of it. Three, you can’t trust the uniformed military, and four, it’s got to be run out of the Vice-President’s office”—a reference to Cheney’s role, the former senior intelligence official said.. . .
“This goes back to Iran-Contra,” a former National Security Council aide told me. “And much of what they’re doing is to keep the agency out of it.” He said that Congress was not being briefed on the full extent of the U.S.-Saudi operations. And, he said, “The C.I.A. is asking, ‘What’s going on?’ They’re concerned, because they think it’s amateur hour.”
The issue of oversight is beginning to get more attention from Congress. Last November, the Congressional Research Service issued a report for Congress on what it depicted as the Administration’s blurring of the line between C.I.A. activities and strictly military ones, which do not have the same reporting requirements.
So here's my question: if an administration can avoid the congressional oversight mechanism put in place after the CIA abuses of the 1970s by shifting the covert activity to the Pentagon, cutting out the CIA, and running the operations out of the Office of the Vice President, is serious legislation pending to close this loophole?
I don't mean to concede the argument that in fact the intelligence oversight mechanism cannot legally be circumvented so easily. But set that aside. If there's a purported loophole that top level Bush Administration officials believe is big enough to run a black-bag squad through, is Congress taking steps to close that loophole?
Late Update: Steven Aftergood, of the Federation of American Scientists' Project on Government Secrecy, responds:
In response to David Kurtz's question, Congress appears to be at an early stage of grappling with apparent loopholes in its oversight of quasi-covert actions conducted outside of established CIA channels.Among the questions posed by the November 2006 Congressional Research Service report cited by Hersh are such elementary ones as these (at page 11): "How should Congress define its oversight role? Which committees should be involved?" Thirty years after the establishment of the intelligence oversight committees, one might have expected such questions to be answered long ago. But no.
That CRS report is available from the Federation of American Scientists here.
--David Kurtz
Pelosi blasts President in new statement: Bush offers nothing but "war without end."
--Greg Sargent
A gay man living in New York writes a powerful letter to the hometown paper he delivered as a boy imploring that it drop Coulter's column.
--Greg Sargent
John Edwards raising cash off the fact that he was the first to pull out of the Fox-hosted debate.
--Greg Sargent
When Republicans eat their own, from Legal Times:
It was an uncomfortable -- and perhaps unprecedented -- airing of private personnel matters. Granted, U.S. Attorneys are "at-will" employees who serve at the pleasure of the president and can be fired without cause, yet even some of the administration's staunchest supporters were embarrassed at the breach of decorum."They have the right to fire them; they do not have the right to smear them," says Joseph DiGenova, a conservative commentator who was U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia during the Reagan administration. "Everybody involved in it at the Justice Department and White House should be taken to the woodshed. This is really a pathetic way of running government."
Other former U.S. Attorneys, all Republicans, said they were "stunned" or "flummoxed" or found the way the firings were handled "insulting."
"It is unfortunate that the department felt the need to attack the performance of these people," says Thomas Heffelfinger, who served as U.S. Attorney in Minnesota from 2001 until last year. "It wasn't necessary and it wasn't warranted."
Of course, the U.S. Attorney's job is inherently political; in the past, however, departures were handled with considerably more tact.
"It was handled discreetly, it was handled professionally, and people were given every opportunity to have a soft landing," says Mark Corallo, who was Justice Department spokesman under then-Attorney General John Ashcroft. "These are people who worked hard in the pursuit of justice. To go out and trash their reputations -- it's galling."
By the end of last week, some of the most conservative Republican senators were publicly assailing the department's handling of the matter. Pennsylvania's Arlen Specter, a moderate, even suggested that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales might have to step down. And in an about-face, Gonzales said on March 8 that he would support a change in the law that would limit the attorney general's ability to appoint interim U.S. Attorneys.
"Regardless of the substance of the dismissals, it was so poorly handled that one has to question the leadership at the department," Corallo says. "Was anybody awake? Was anyone paying attention?"
Legal Times asked Republican superlawyer and former Solicitor General Ted Olson if this past week's hearings were like a circular firing squad: "That's a good way to put it," Olson said.
Update: I was bemused by the Republican infighting and the spectacle of GOP talking head Joe DiGenova suddenly becoming a champion of civility in politics. But be careful, some readers have warned me: this is faux GOP outrage designed to diminish the scandal. Writes TPM Reader GC:
Note that the Republican criticism of the Justice Department centers on the wrong issue. (They have no right to smear good people etc). All that may be true-but it's a minor/trivial issue compared with whether or not these new appointments were made because the agenda of the replaced US-As was not sufficiently political. i.e. The Republican crit/outrage is centered on an issue of personal dignity & not the administration malfeasance. In my view some of this Republican criticism may be designed to deflect attention from a far more significant issue.
That's true, as far as it goes. But there is both a substantive legal aspect and a political aspect to this scandal. Right now, as is usually the case when a scandal is breaking hot and heavy, each aspect feeds the other in what, for the targets of the scandal, is a vicious cycle. GOP senators began abandoning the White House on the purges on Thursday, and now big-wig Republicans are scampering away, too. With fewer defenders, the White House is in a weaker position to fend off congressional Democrats' efforts to get at the substance of what happened here. That is to say that the legal and political are inextricably linked.
--David Kurtz
Here's the letter Harry Reid sent to Fox News saying that Dems are pulling out of the debate.
--Greg Sargent
I just got this press release from the Committee to Protect Journalists ...
New York, March 9, 2007— The Committee to Protect Journalists is disappointed that a freelance video blogger will remain in jail after a court-appointed arbitrator was unable to mediate a settlement that could have led to the journalist’s release. Joshua Wolf has spent 198 days in jail, the longest incarceration of a journalist in U.S. history, for refusing to provide the court with a videotape of a 2005 protest.“We’re disappointed these talks have thus far failed to lead to the release of Joshua Wolf,” said CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon. “There is no useful purpose in continuing to imprison this journalist.”
Wolf’s tape documents clashes between demonstrators and San Francisco police during a June 2005 protest by anarchists over a Group of 8 economic conference. One police officer was injured, and some protestors allegedly tried to set a police cruiser on fire. A federal grand jury is investigating the alleged crimes. U.S. District Court Judge William Alsup held Wolf in contempt of court and ordered him jailed on August 1. Wolf was briefly released on bail pending appeal but was ordered back to jail in September.
Last month, a federal judge appointed U.S. Magistrate Joseph Spero to arbitrate the dispute. Wolf’s attorney, Martin Garbus, had asked the judge to consider privately viewing the videotape to determine whether the contempt charges against Wolf could be dismissed.
Spero said in a court filing that four hours of negotiations on Thursday had failed to reach a settlement, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. He said he would consult with lawyers in the case as to whether to schedule another meeting. Wolf could remain in jail until July when the grand jury’s term expires.
Freelance writer Vanessa Leggett, who was jailed in 2001, had been the longest incarcerated U.S. journalist. Leggett spent 168 days behind bars in Texas for refusing to disclose to a federal grand jury her research and sources for a book she was writing on a murder trial.
Here's a letter we received here at TPM on July 19th of last year from Wolf ...
Tomorrow about this time, I will be in front of Judge William Alsup facing contempt in Federal Court. I am an independent video journalist who asserted my constitutional rights when commanded by the Federal Grand Jury to turn over the unedited tape of a protest that I shot on July 8th of last year.The Federal Government is attempt to circumvent the California State Shield law through this grand jury proceeding, and their only claim to juridiction on this case is that an SFPD patrol vehicle was allegedly vandalized, and as the City gets some of it's money from the Federal Government, the US feels that they have a legal and fiscal interest in this possible vandalism.
Supervisors Ross Mirkarimi and Chris Daly introduced a resolution yesterday to the Board of Supervisors that would establish that the City of SF opposes these actions of the US Government.
Please help publicize this issue for me, as I may be in jail tommorow afternoon and unable to continue speaking publicly about my case.
Thanks.
I have set-up a resource page with all the documents and media associated with my case at http://joshwolf.net/grandjury/
If you have any questions feel free to contact me via e-mail at mail@joshwolf.net or give me a call at (415)794-2401
Josh
--Josh Marshall
I was going to summarize this report from Louisville television station WHAS-11. But I think it's best just repeated in toto. Note the points emphasized with italics ...
WHAS 11 NEWS HAS LEARNED THAT INFORMATION ABOUT POSSIBLE FEDERAL LAW VIOLATIONS BY STEVE HENRY HAVE BEEN REFERRED TO THE U-S ATTORNEY'S OFFICE IN LOUISVILLE.U.S. ATTORNEY DAVID HUBER CONFIMS HIS OFFICE HAS RECEIVED WHAT HE CALLS QUOTE "A MATTER" INVOLVING THE FORMER LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR AND CURRENT DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE FOR GOVERNOR.
HUBER WOULDN'T SAY WHAT INFORMATION HIS OFFICE HAS RECEIVED ABOUT HENRY -- BUT TELLS US IT'S BEEN REFERRED TO THE U-S JUSTICE DEPARTMENT IN WASHINGTON.
WHAS ELEVEN NEWS HAS OBTAINED THESE DOCUMENTS, WHICH SHOW HENRY GOT CORPORATE CONTRIBUTIONS FOR WHAT HE SAYS WAS N EXPLORATORY CAMPAIGN FOR U-S SENATE.
CORPORATE CONTRIBUTIONS TO POLITICAL CAMPAIGNS ARE ILLEGAL AND ARE USUALLY INVESTIGATED BY THE FEDERAL ELECTION COMMISSION.
Henry's campaign manager C.D. Marshall says this is old news. He says Henry followed the law when he was collecting donations for his exploratory committee. Henry earlier told WHAS11 News that he was returning those contributions.More info for you blog readers: Huber says a "matter" does not imply that there's any sort of investigation going on, only that his office has received information it has agreed to look into. Also, Huber says he's in the process of personally recusing himself from any matter involving Henry because he doesn't want to be accused of playing politics. Huber used to work for Sen. Mitch McConnell.
I guess this doesn't need a lot of explanation.
Did he get a call?
And it's quaint, isn't it, how Huber chooses to recuse himself from the case after discussing it with a local tv news reporter and possibly giving him xeroxes of the documents in question.
--Josh Marshall
Fox-hosted debate is effectively dead as Richardson and Nevada Dems pull out.
--Greg Sargent
A suddenly chastened Alberto Gonzales on his department's firing of prosecutors: "it's something that we're looking at internally about how we got to where we are today."
--Paul Kiel
Okay, so we've made a little progress in solving today's mystery.
We've managed to get just a little closer to figuring out what the deal is with this new group "Firefighters for Rudy." But only a little.
Update: You won't want to miss this one. The Associated Press got snookered so badly in its coverage of "Firefighters for Rudy" that it has to be seen to be believed.
--Greg Sargent
The House Dems extend their purged prosecutor investigation into the White House.
--Paul Kiel
Bluejersey.com is asking their readers to call up the six Republican members of the New Jersey congressional delegation and ask whether any of them contacted US Attorney Chris Christie about the Menendez investigation, in the lead up to the November election. So far they've got one answer, from Rep. Michael Ferguson (R) who says he didn't call Christie.
--Josh Marshall
Did the administration intend to replace the fired U.S. attorneys wtih handpicked party loyalists and then avoid Senate confirmation?
Well, that's what Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) said one of the former prosecutors told him.
--Paul Kiel
This is getting good.
A seventh newspaper has now given the hook to Ann Coulter with some very tough language.
--Greg Sargent
Get ready for the latest winger attack: John Edwards could become our "first woman President."
--Greg Sargent
Isn't it a little odd that in all the uproar over Domenici, Wilson, and Hastings leaning on U.S. attorneys, there has not been one word about it from the Justice Department?
I don't mean an investigation, though that may be warranted (criminal, internal, or otherwise). But not a peep about how DOJ will not tolerate elected officials attempting to influence its prosecutors, how DOJ has its prosecutors' backs, how DOJ would remind prosecutors to report any such contacts, and would urge anyone who has not previously reported such contacts to come forward now.
Not a peep.
Seems strange to me. Bet you feel alone on an island if you're an independent U.S. Attorney with a story to tell --if any independent U.S. Attorneys are left.
--David Kurtz
The hits just keep on coming. A sixth newspaper has now dropped Ann Coulter's syndicated column in the wake of her "faggot" comment.
--Greg Sargent
Today's Must Read: a new inspector general report finds that the FBI is breaking the law.
--Paul Kiel
Krugman ...
For those of us living in the Garden State, the growing scandal over the firing of federal prosecutors immediately brought to mind the subpoenas that Chris Christie, the former Bush “Pioneer” who is now the U.S. attorney for New Jersey, issued two months before the 2006 election — and the way news of the subpoenas was quickly leaked to local news media.The subpoenas were issued in connection with allegations of corruption on the part of Senator Bob Menendez, a Democrat who seemed to be facing a close race at the time. Those allegations appeared, on their face, to be convoluted and unconvincing, and Mr. Menendez claimed that both the investigation and the leaks were politically motivated.
Mr. Christie’s actions might have been all aboveboard. But given what we’ve learned about the pressure placed on federal prosecutors to pursue dubious investigations of Democrats, Mr. Menendez’s claims of persecution now seem quite plausible.
In fact, it’s becoming clear that the politicization of the Justice Department was a key component of the Bush administration’s attempt to create a permanent Republican lock on power. Bear in mind that if Mr. Menendez had lost, the G.O.P. would still control the Senate.
This raises a key point we've hinted at several times as the US Attorney story has risen to a boil over the last three weeks. We've now heard enough to know that using federal prosecutions to score political points was an accepted way of doing business in the Gonzales Justice Department. The two cases we know about are ones in which the US Attorney refused to play along and paid the price. So what about the ones who did play along?
Given what we know now, does anyone think the Iglesias and McKay cases are the only ones?
As Krugman says, perhaps the Christie subpoenas were aboveboard. But they did they play directly into the campaign narrative Tom Kean, Jr. was trying to run on against Bob Menendez, they came at a very convenient time in a bitterly contested race and, as we reported at the time, the alleged infraction was patently silly.
Of course, to the best of my knowledge, Kean's defeat seems to have sapped all the interest out of the investigation. So go figure.
We're focused now on what happened to the US Attorneys who didn't play ball. It's time to focus on just what kinds of games Alberto Gonzales has been playing.
--Josh Marshall
Gonzales grins and takes it. From the Post ...
Specter emerged from the meeting saying he still had no clear understanding why the prosecutors were dismissed. He said he instructed Gonzales to take back remarks he made in an op-ed in Wednesday's USA Today, in which he called the issue an "overblown personnel matter." Specter also asked Gonzales to do something to help remove the "significant blemish" now on the records of the fired prosecutors.
--Josh Marshall
What USAgate tells us? Without congressional oversight, bad acts never see the light of day.
--Josh Marshall
Here's a behind-the-scenes glimpse of some of the backstage tensions that abounded among House Dems today over what to do about Iraq.
--Greg Sargent
And the House Dems are pressing forward in their investigation of the prosecutor purge too. Today they sent a letter to AG Gonzales requesting testimony from six Justice Department officials.
--Paul Kiel
Partial success! We've made radio contact with the president of the syndicate that distributes Ann Coulter's column!
And as per your requests, there's also a list of the papers that carry her weekly efforts.
--Greg Sargent
Purge update: the administration backs down. In a meeting with senators from the Judiciary Committee today, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said that he would not oppose their efforts to change the law governing the appointment of U.S. attorneys back to what it was.
--Paul Kiel
This is weird. Earlier today I linked to a supposed post by Michael Barone attacking the Bush administration over the fired attorneys scandal. It certainly seemed out of character, given the tone of Barone's commentary over recent years. Some readers have been pointing out that though the post itself shows up on the specific URL, it doesn't show up on the main blog page. The post in question very much seems to reside on the US News website. It's not an instance of spoofing. But Michael Barone has confirmed to Andrew Sullivan that he did not write the post. According to Sullivan, relaying on Barone I assume, a hacker got into Barone's site and inserted the post.
Late Update: Well, it's hard to know at this point with the US News blogging platform. But it appears now that the non-post from Michael Barone actually wasn't a hack. It shows up right there on the front page of Bonnie Erbe's US News blog. So perhaps it's a glitch rather than a hoax? Given it's a US News blog, at this point I'm not making any assumptions.
(ed.note: Here at TPM we were noting that this did seem like very much a niche sort of hacking, with a rather rarefied audience. Imagine the chatter on the hacker underground discussion boards: "Dude! Just uploaded a sane post on the US Attorney story to BARONE's blog! Freaky ..."
--Josh Marshall
GOP House leader responds: We will defeat Democratic efforts to end the war.
--Greg Sargent
Former New York Daily News columnist Jim Sleeper on why Rudy Giuliani really shouldn't be president.
--Andrew Golis
Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) today: "One day there will be a new attorney general, maybe sooner rather than later."
--Paul Kiel
From the Arkansas Times, Karl Rove answers questions about the US Attorney flap ...
See the Arkansas Times website for more info.
Update: We have a transcript of Rove's remarks here. Help us catalogue the distortions.
--Josh Marshall
Here are some questions we've emailed to the president of United Press Syndicate, which is under mounting pressure to stop distributing Ann Coulter's column in the wake of her "faggot" remark.
Maybe you can help us get him to answer them.
--Greg Sargent
CREW files ethics complaint against the ethics committee's ranking member, Rep. Doc Hastings (R-WA).
--Paul Kiel
Purge update: Senators to meet with AG Gonzales later this afternoon about the testimony of Justice Department officials.
--Paul Kiel
Things are starting to move. A fourth newspaper has now dropped Ann Coulter's syndicated column in the wake of her "faggot" comment.
--Greg Sargent
Will the House ethics committee actually chase Rep. Heather Wilson (R-NM)?
It depends on whether Democrats will do anything more than talk about doing something.
--Paul Kiel
[ed.note: The post by Michael Barone referenced below was subsequently revealed to be a hoax. Someone apparently hacked into the US News website and added it to Barone's blog.]
Even Michael Barone goes off the reservation?
From his US News blog from yesterday ...
The emerging scandal surrounding the dismissals of eight former U.S. attorneys should signify to American voters the depth, breadth, and permeation of corruption in the Bush administration.When a U.S. senator (to wit, Pete Domenici, a New Mexico Republican) feels free to call a prosecutor at home and hang up on him for resisting political pressure in the course of executing his prosecutorial duties, the line between politics and law enforcement has been so thoroughly violated that it no longer exists.
What will Jay Carney say?
--Josh Marshall
House Dem leaders unveil their plan to end Iraq war. Key provision: We'd be out of Iraq by September 2008 at the latest.
--Greg Sargent
Not all the senators up in arms about the administration's prosecutor purge are Democrats. Sen. John Ensign (R-NV), for one, "can't even tell you" how upset he is.
--Paul Kiel
Dear Alberto, We don't believe you.
Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) write AG Alberto Gonzales about the prosecutor purge.
--Paul Kiel
Liberal House Dems have just concluded their press conference laying out their plan for ending the Iraq War. Details on what they said here.
--Greg Sargent
Today is a key day for anyone watching the internal battles among House Dems over what to do about Iraq.
We'll be providing periodic updates over at TPM Election Central.
--Greg Sargent
Things are heating up among House Dems right now over what to do about Iraq.
Speculation was swirling tonight that the House Dem leadership had reached a deal with liberal Dems over an approach to ending the war, but liberal House Dems have just shot down those rumors.
--Greg Sargent
In case you missed it, Huffington Post got juror #9, Dennis Collins, to discuss his experiences on the Libby jury.
--Josh Marshall
Senate to vote tomorrow on issuing subpoenas to five Justice Department officials.
--Paul Kiel
Liberal House Dems prepare to go public with their own plan to halt Iraq War.
--Greg Sargent
It's good to be the spouse of a former President.
An internal Hillary fundraising email says that Bill is hosting five private fundraisers for her in March alone.
--Greg Sargent
I guess we're not watching the same White House.
David Gergen: "This is an administration that has been mostly free of scandal over the last six years and now they have the taint that they cannot erase. It has damaged this White House, and I think it's damaged the Republican prospects for 2008 in taking the White House and keeping it."
Thanks to TPM Reader RB for the catch.
--Josh Marshall
We know they had the ear of the White House. But here are details on Washington Republicans' campaign to sack U.S. Attorney John McKay.
--Paul Kiel
Politico editors John Harris and Jim VandeHei respond to the criticism voiced here and elsewhere over their Dan Gerstein screw-up.
--Greg Sargent
We're just finishing up a major chapter in the Plame-Niger-Uranium scandal. The core of that story is that when the Bush administration's back is against the wall, the accusers have to be destroyed. Usually by a campaign of leaks and anonymous accusations delivered to reliable, pro-administration reporters.
Any guess who's going to get the call?
--Josh Marshall
Paging all wingers: Keith Ellison, the first Muslim Congressman and a frequent right wing target, is now working in concert with the Bush administration to promote America's image abroad.
--Greg Sargent
The Justice Department official who called ousted U.S. Attorney Bud Cummins to let him know that if the fired prosecutors kept talking, the dirt on them would come out, has written a letter to tell his side of the story.
He's "shocked and baffled" at the prosecutors' interpretation of that as a threat.
--Paul Kiel
If you missed the canned attorneys hearing yesterday, here's Sen. Schumer's (D-NY) opening statement ...
And here's Sen. Specter's (R-PA) questioning of the witnesses ...
--Josh Marshall
Two more papers have now dropped Ann Coulter's syndicated column in the wake of her "faggot" comment.
--Greg Sargent
If a President can be impeached for lying about a blow job then by God a Vice President should be impeached for setting in motion the forces that destroyed an intelligence network during a time of war.
--Andrew Golis
DOJ spokesman's new phrase for the fired US Attorneys: "former disgruntled employees grandstanding before Congress."
--Josh Marshall
Universal Press Syndicate responds to calls that it drop Ann Coulter's syndicated column in the wake of her "faggot" comment: Sorry, no can do.
--Greg Sargent
Today's Must Read: Rep. Doc Hastings (R-WA) and his former chief of staff get their damage control messages scrambled.
--Paul Kiel
Straight to the top.
John McKay, the former US Attorney from Washington state who didn't open an investigation into claims of voter fraud in the 2004 state gubernatorial election, heard from someone else beside Rep. "Doc" Hastings (R-WA).
From the Post ...
In remarks after the hearings, McKay said that officials in the White House counsel's office, including then-counsel Harriet E. Miers, asked him to explain why he had "mishandled" the governor's race during an interview for a federal judgeship in September 2006. McKay was informed after his dismissal that he also was not a finalist for the federal bench.
--Josh Marshall
Some puffs of deceit and ridiculousness need to be lined up next to each other for full effect.
First, the decription of Mr. Iglesias's testimony on Sen. Domenici (R-NM) from the Post ...
Domenici also began asking about the local corruption case, which involves Democrats and a courthouse construction project, specifically inquiring about indictments."Are these going to be filed before November?" Domenici asked, according to Iglesias's testimony. Unnerved by the call, Iglesias said he responded no.
"I'm sorry to hear that," Domenici replied, according to Iglesias, who added that the senator then hung up on him. "I felt sick afterward. . . . I felt leaned on, I felt pressured to get these matters moving," Iglesias told the committee.
From the testimony this conversation appears to have happened toward the end of October, 2006, placing it within two weeks of election day.
Then Sen. Domenici's (R-NM) response to Iglesias's testimony ...
In his testimony today, Mr. Iglesias confirmed that our conversation was brief and that my words did not threaten him, nor did I direct him to take any course of action. While I recall, as I stated previously, that I asked Mr. Iglesias about timing of the investigation, neither I nor those who overheard my side of the brief conversation recall my mentioning the November election to him ... In his own testimony, Mr. Iglesias confirmed that nothing I actually said was threatening or directive. I did not pressure him. I asked him a timing question. He responded. I concluded the conversation.
"I concluded the conversation."
Remember, this was a call to Iglesias's home. Domenici's Chief of Staff placed the call. And led with claims that "there were some complaints by constituents" about Iglesias's tardy pace in indicting Democrats.
Pity Mr. Iglesias got the wrong impression.
--Josh Marshall
Looking back over today's testimony what stands out aren't just the big lies that have been alleged but the small ones. In particular I'm thinking about cases in which Justice Department appointees said one thing only to have one or more of the US Attorneys come back and say the statements were simply false.
For instance, William E. Moschella, Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General said that one of the reasons the Department had relieved Mr. Cummins of Arkansas was that he'd "indicated" earlier that he did not plan to complete his term. Not so, said Cummins, when his turn came to testify. According to Cummins, the only time he'd said anything like that was after he'd already stepped down.
"I was trying to be discreet," he said.
In other words, he was trying to paper over what had happened and provide his DOJ bosses with an alibi. And Moschella took Cummins' white lie and tried to use it as a rationale for his dismissal. (This was flagged in Paul Kiel's running commentary on the House hearing.)
Earlier Moschella went down a list of the various fired US Attorneys' deficiencies.
Let me quote from Paul Kiel's running coverage ...
Of Carol Lam, he said that her gun prosecution numbers "were are the bottom of the list." And that her border related prosecutions "didn't stack up."Of John McKay, he said that the department didn't really have a policy difference, but that they were concerned with the manner "in which he went about advocating particular policies," whatever that means.
Of Cummins, he said that he was not fired for performance reasons. He added that Cummins had indicated that he was not going to finish his term, and that Griffin was "interested in the USA position."
Of Bogden, he said that "given the importance of [Bogden's] district," that the department felt they needed "renewed energy, renewed vigor" in that office in order to "take it to the next level."
Of Iglesias, he complained that he'd "delegated to his first assistant the running of the office."
Of Charlton, he said that Charlton had had a policy of "taping FBI confessions," a policy that had ramifications throughout the government and that was "completely contrary" to the department's policy.
These claims didn't "stack up" very well, as Moschella might say, under committee questioning.
For instance, did anyone ever speak to Lam about the problems with her gun or border prosecutions? Moschella said former Deputy Attorney General James Comey (who's been very critical of the firings) spoke to Lam about the gun cases. Remember, Comey left in 2005. And the border prosecutions? Moschella didn't know if anyone ever had.
Let's be clear. The DOJ needn't establish a lengthy or any paper trail to justify firing a US Attorney. Maybe they didn't like the way she prosecuted gun crimes. Or maybe her bosses at Main Justice just didn't like how she went about her job. Maybe they just plain didn't like her. That's fine. And while it would be irregular to fire a US Attorney in the middle of a president's term for no evident wrongdoing, it would not in itself be improper. None of the USAs, as they're called, are irreplaceable. And they do serve at the president's pleasure.
The issue here is different. There is a clear and growing body of evidence that at least three of these firees were canned for not allowing politics to dictate their prosecution of political corruption cases. Or, to put it more bluntly, for not indicting enough Democrats or indicting too many Republicans. Which is to say they were fired for not perverting justice.
In the face of that evidence the administration has come up with a series of changing and often contradicatory alternative explanations, which range from the frivolous to the ridiculous.
The administration isn't at war with the fired attorneys or Congress. They're at war with the obvious.
--Josh Marshall
Sen. Domenicii releases a new statement about David Iglesias' testimony today:
In his own testimony, Mr. Iglesias confirmed that nothing I actually said was threatening or directive. I did not pressure him. I asked him a timing question. He responded. I concluded the conversation.
Read the complete statement here.
--Paul Kiel
Here are some fresh signs that the House Dem leadership is facing a mounting challenge from liberals in the House over its approach to ending the Iraq War.
--Greg Sargent
The House hearing on the prosecutors is still going on, and we're providing running updates here.
The latest: former United States attorneys Daniel Bogden of Utah and Paul Charlton of Arizona both gave accounts of conversations with acting Associate Attorney General William Mercer about the firings. Mercer told them plainly that they'd been fired in order to free up some plum patronage spots.
Mercer told Charlton that "this was being done so that other individuals could 'touch base' as a United States attorney before the end of the president's term."
He was more explicit in his conversation with Bogden. Bogden testified that Mercer told him "the administration has a very short, two year window of opportunity concerning United States Attorney positions" and that "this would be an opportunity to put others in those positions so they could build their resumes, get experience as a United States Attorney, so that for future opportunities, being a federal judge or another political type position, they would be better enhanced to do so."
--Paul Kiel
As we mentioned, the Department of Justice is today for the first time publicly trotting out explanations for why eight U.S. Attorneys were asked to resign. But a commenter over at TPMmuckraker adds a few more:
Actually, there were additional problems with the attorneys' performance that Moschella left off for lack of time. Here's the remaining items.Carol Lam: Always greeted the judges and juries with "Howdy" instead of the customary "Good Morning Vietnam!!!"
John McKay: Found to be at fault for the deaths at Nakatomi Plaza.
Bud Cummins: Always left the toilet seat up.
Daniel Bogden: Did not use the correct form when filling out the expense reports.
David Iglesias: Does not sing as well as his brother Julio.
Paul Charlton: Called the technical supervisor to fix the printer instead of the supervising technician.
And so it goes.
--David Kurtz
Dem Presidential candidates react to Libby conviction.
Update: Now Hillary has weighed in, too.
--Greg Sargent
If you're following the new Rep. "Doc" Hastings (R-WA) dimension
of the fired US Attorneys story, the Seattle Times has the latest on what might charitably be called Hastings' side of the story.
The short and sweet version is that Hastings' office first denied that Ed Cassidy, Hastings' former chief of staff had made the nudge call. Later Hastings released a statement insisting that Cassidy's call and conversation with US Attorney McKay "were entirely appropriate."
I guess that means he did call, right?
Then there's this ...
"It was a simple inquiry and nothing more -- and it was the only call to any federal official from my office on this subject either during or after the recount ordeal," Hastings said.He said Tom McCabe, the executive vice president of the Building Industry Association of Washington, which backed Rossi, did contact his office in July 2005 to ask that Hastings urge the White House to replace McKay.
"I flat out refused to do so, which Ed Cassidy told him in the bluntest of terms," Hastings said."
So, Cassidy gets a call from a Rossi backer (Rossi's the failed gubernatorial candidate) asking that Hastings ask the White House to can McKay. Then Cassidy calls McKay asking for an 'update'. Clearly McKay's subsequent firing is a coincidence.
Someone send us a database programmer so we can keep track of all the sub-scandals coming out of this US Attorneys mess.
--Josh Marshall
So now six of the former US Attorneys have come to Capitol Hill to provide testimony. Two of the six have alleged clear instances in which members of Congress or their aides tried to pressure them into either pursuing or hastening corruption investigations against Democrats. A shadow hangs over the circumstances of the firings of the remaining four -- particularly that of former San Diego US Attorney Carol Lam who was in the course of pursuing one of the biggest corruption investigations in US history when the ax fell.
If this were a preliminary hearing or a grand jury and we were trying to ascertain whether probable cause existed to move on to a full investigation I don't think there's any question that the burden would have been met in today's hearings.
In this case, that means a full investigation. The prosecutors themselves can only speculate -- based on various pieces of evidence -- about why they were fired. The people who know are in the Justice Department and in the White House. Most awkwardly, for a congressional investigation, they're in Congress itself.
It's time to call up the people who really know, put them under oath and find out what happened.
--Josh Marshall
We hadn't heard much from Paul K. Charlton, the canned U.S. attorney in Arizona, but he sure ripped the lid off this thing in his testimony before the House Judiciary Committee a little while ago.
After Associate Deputy Attorney William E. Moschella testified that Charlton was asked to resign because of a dispute with the FBI over whether it should begin taping the confessions of criminal suspects, Charlton testified that he found it ironic that DOJ was giving that as the reason for his dismissal and then laid out the following sequence of events:
Charlton's district included Indian country, which made Charlton the top law enforcement officer for the reservations and meant he was in charge of prosecuting a host of crimes not usually prosecuted at the federal level, like child molestation cases. In those cases, taped confessions are essential, Charlton said, and his office was losing cases and pleading them down because the FBI policy is not to tape confessions.
So Charlton started requiring the FBI to tape confessions in his district. That led to complaints to Main Justice and an order from DOJ that he change his policy. At that point, Charlton himself threatened to resign unless his policy was left in place, and he explained why. In response, DOJ suggested that Charlton begin a pilot program using the taped confessions and reporting back examples of cases which would have been lost or pleaded down without the confessions. He never heard more from DOJ about the policy or the program.
So you might say Charlton got canned for being too aggressive in his prosecution of child molesters--if you believe the taping dispute was really why he was fired.
Paul has more on the responses of the other USAs to the explanations being given by Moschella for their dismissals, which they are hearing themselves for the first time today.
--David Kurtz
If you're looking for the very latest on the fired US Attorneys story, our up to the minute coverage is at TPMmuckraker.com.
--Josh Marshall
You won't want to miss this latest from the Matt Drudge Rules Our World files.
CNN didn't think Hillary's southern "drawl" was at all significant until Drudge told them so.
--Greg Sargent
The top DOJ official representing the department at this afternoon's House hearing on the U.S. attorney purge just testified that none of the fired U.S. attorneys were told about their offices' supposed deficiencies before they were terminated.
--David Kurtz
Andrew Sullivan responds to Ann Coulter's appearance last night on the Hannity show.
--Josh Marshall
It's really amazing what crawls out when you look what's under the rock.
Quite apart from the Lam and Iglesias cases, from this morning's testimony we now know that in 2004, the Chief of Staff of Rep. "Doc" Hastings (R-WA) called US Attorney John McKay to nudge him about opening an investigation into alleged Democratic vote fraud in the 2004 Washington state governor's race. (Here's the video of McKay's discussion of this incident at today's hearing.)
At the time, Hastings was a member of the House Ethics committee. Only months later, he was promoted to Chairman of the House Ethics committee, as part of the DeLay purge.
Now, several points follow from this revelation.
First, the Chief of Staff in question is Ed Cassidy. Hastings wanted to make Cassidy the Ethics committee's chief legal counsel. So that tells you something about the state of the Ethics committee under Hastings' rule.
And then there's Hastings himself. The case of Rep. Wilson (R-NM), and her interference with Iglesias's investigation, will likely now come before the House Ethics committee. Hastings is now the senior Republican on the Ethics committee. What position is he in to review Wilson's behavior when he -- or at least his office -- appears to be guilty of more or less precisely the same wrongdoing?
Next, how common is this?
Having barely begun the investigation, we've already found a member of the House, the Chief of Staff of a member of the House Ethics committee and a senior United States senator making inappropriate calls to US Attorneys trying to get them to push indictments against Democrats. And both of the US Attorneys in question were subsequently fired.
According to former US Attorney Carol Lam, she received no calls. But we do know she was fired -- with no credible explanation -- and that she was working on one of the biggest corruption investigations in US history.
Anyone want to place any wagers on whether she got a call too?
And finally, we now have strong evidence that US Attorneys who resisted pressure to crack down on Dems were canned. What about those who didn't resist?
In other words, if these folks were canned for not being political enough in their prosecutions, what about those who were? That's now the shoe that hasn't dropped. I won't get into specifics right now. But there are a few cases from last fall when US Attorneys dropped helpfully timed subpoenas investigating Democrats who were then locked in high profile races. There didn't seem any cause to question the timing then. But given what we know now, they may merit further scrutiny.
--Josh Marshall
Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General William E. Moschella is testifying before the House Judiciary Committee. Part of his opening statement is up here. He is running through the "performance-related" reasons for each U.S. attorneys firing right now. More in a moment.
--David Kurtz
Daily newspaper drops Ann Coulter's syndicated column over "faggot" comment.
--Greg Sargent
You can watch this afternoon's House Committee hearings on the U.S. Attorney purge via the web, and Paul is providing periodic updates at TPMmuckraker.
--David Kurtz
Among the most startling testimony in this morning's Senate Judiciary Committee hearings came in response to a line of questioning from Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI). Video of the exchange is up at TPMm.
--David Kurtz
We have the video of the key portion of former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias' on the calls from Pete Domenici and Heather Wilson.
--David Kurtz
White House in on the meddling with Domenici?
Look at this exchange from this morning's gaggle at the White House (italics added) ...
Question: Does the White House have a response to the revelations regarding the two members of Congress from New Mexico contacting US Attorney Iglesias?Deputy Press Secretary Dana Perino: We were aware of the Senators' concerns. We've referred those to the Department of Justice, as appropriate. And one thing I'd remind everyone is, when you have political appointees, all of us that are political appointees and serve at the pleasure of the President, if an agency or department wants to make a change in a political appointee's status, then those recommendations are run by the White House -- especially at that senior level, especially. That was the case here. That's standard operating procedure. It would have been odd if they hadn't. We did not object to the Justice Department's recommendations.
Question: You didn't object to the Justice Department's recommendations, but no recommendations originated in the Office of Counsel?
Perino: Right.
Question: Dana, does the White House think it's proper for a Republican Senator to ask a US Attorney about an investigation of Democrats in advance of the election?
Perino: I think that's something that the Hill's going to talk about, and I know that there's calls for investigations into that. I think that, from our perspective, we get complaints all the time at the White House, not just about US Attorneys, but, as you can imagine, about multitudes of things. And the standard practice is to refer those concerns or complaints to the appropriate agency.
Question: Did Domenici approach the White House on this?
Perino: I don't know . Yes, I believe we were aware of his concerns; I don't know the form in which that took, whether it was phone calls or personal contact.
So the White House was "aware of [Domenici's] concerns." And as we showed last night, it's pretty clear that Domenici's concerns were Iglesias's too slow pace of indicting Democrats. So let's hear just what Domenici said and to whom at the White House he said it.
--Josh Marshall
Nancy Pelosi weighs in on Libby verdict: This isn't about one individual. It's about the Bush administration.
--Greg Sargent
Lesson of the day: running the administration as a criminal enterprise is much harder when the opposition controls Congress.
--Josh Marshall
As I mentioned below, the then-chief of staff of Rep. Doc Hastings (R-WA) called U.S. Attorney John McKay, then the top federal law enforcement officer in Seattle, about whether there was an investigation ongoing into the 2004 Washington governor race, McKay testified today. We have the video up.
--David Kurtz
Get out the pardon pen: Libby guilty on multiple counts.
Update: The four counts are here.
--Josh Marshall
Libby verdict should be here any minute . . .
guilty of 4 of 5 counts, CNN says.
--David Kurtz
As I watch the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on the fired U.S. Attorneys, I'm reminded of the Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas hearings. I don't think any congressional hearings have been as riveting since then, nor have any generated as much news as this one. A seminal moment.
--David Kurtz
Wow--Cummins, McKay, and Iglesias all said that they would have opened an obstruction investigation based on the phone call to Cummins from Michael Elston, the chief of staff to Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty--if they were still in office, of course. The Cummins email recounting that conversation is here. Video shortly . . .
Late Update: Video here.
--David Kurtz
We have posted the email Bud Cummins sent to the other canned U.S. Attorneys after he received what he perceived as a threatening phone call from Deputy AG Paul McNulty's chief of staff. A must-read . . .
Update: Video of Cummins' testimony here.
--David Kurtz
The canard that the canned U.S. Attorneys were not following DOJ priorities has been pretty much exploded by their testimony. David Iglesias read a letter to him from Michael Battle dated January 2006, praising him for his leadership in pursuing DOJ priorities. John McKay said much the same thing. None of them ever received any indication from DOJ that they were not following those priorities.
--David Kurtz
From the Matt Drudge Rules Our World Department:
CNN, MSNBC, and ABC News are all out there pushing the dishonest Hillary "drawl" story promoted by Drudge.
--Greg Sargent
More bombshells: Rep. Doc Hastings' (R-WA) then chief of staff called Seattle U.S. Attorney John McKay to inquire about whether the feds were investigating allegations of voter fraud in the 2004 Washington governor's race, McKay testified. McKay said he stopped the chief of staff before he went too far with his questions, but was troubled enough by the call to discuss it with his top assistant.
Developing . . .
Update: Paul is providing updates on the hearings at Muckraker.
Late Update: We have the video here.
--David Kurtz
The Senate Judiciary Committee hearings are turning out to be even more explosive than expected.
David Iglesias says Pete Domenici called him at home to specifically ask about the New Mexico public corruption investigation of a Democrat and whether the indictments would be filed before November.
When Iglesias said no, Domenici said he was very sorry to hear that and hung up the phone, according to Iglesias.
Iglesias said he felt pressured by Domenici and "leaned on." The call made him "sick," Iglesias told the committee, noting that it was "unprecedented" for him to get a call from a member of Congress at home.
Two weeks earlier, Iglesias had received a call from Rep. Heather Wilson while he was in a DC hotel room on DOJ business. That call was also brief, and Iglesias said Wilson asked whether there were any "sealed indictments." Iglesias demurred, and the call ended with Wilson saying she guessed she would have to take his word for it and the call ended, according to Iglesias.
Video up soon . . .
Late update: Here's the video.
--David Kurtz
The congressional hearings have begun.
We'll be posting running updates at TPMmuckraker.
Update: CREW has requested an ethics investigation of Rep. Heather Wilson (R-NM).
--Paul Kiel
Today's Must Read: what the purged prosecutor scandal has taught Alberto Gonzales.
--Paul Kiel
It was a busy night in the canned US attorney scandal. You can see our main posts on the latest on Rep. Wilson here and the latest on Sen. Domenici here.
--Josh Marshall
Another prosecutor forced out in 2005 for investigating a Republican?
The former federal prosecutor in Maryland said Monday that he was forced out in early 2005 because of political pressure stemming from public corruption investigations involving associates of the state’s governor, a Republican.“There was direct pressure not to pursue these investigations,” said the former prosecutor, Thomas M. DiBiagio. “The practical impact was to intimidate my office and shut down the investigations.”
Mr. DiBiagio, a controversial figure who clashed with a number of Maryland politicians, had never publicly discussed the reasons behind his departure. But he agreed to an interview with The New York Times because he said he was concerned about what he saw as similarities with the recent firings of eight United States attorneys.
Shocked?
--Josh Marshall
Sen. Cornyn (R-TX) to be a no-show at tomorrow's fired US attorney hearings.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader BS isn't buying it ...
If I read Darrel Issa’s press release correctly, Carole Lam gets fired because she’s not prosecuting enough border crime, even though she’s prosecuting a major Congressional and DoD corruption case; Dave Iglesias gets fired because he’s prosecuting too much border crime, and not enough local corruption. So where’s the happy median for the Bush Administration? If Lam filed as many border crime cases as Iglesias, and Iglesias as many corruption cases? Even their cover stories have holes the size of the Pentagon in them…
TPM Reader DS sees the same problem ...
Do I have this straight? Iglesias failed at his job because he devoted too many resources to border crimes and not enough to public corruption. Lam failed at her job because she devoted too many resources to public corruption cases and not enough to border crimes.The attorneys who didn't get fired must have threaded a pretty tight needle.
--Josh Marshall
It just gets better.
The administration's only leg to stand on in firing Cunningham prosecutor Carol Lam has been that she'd been on the receiving end of complaints from hapless California Congressman Darrell Issa (R). Now he's going to be testifying at tomorrow's hearing too.
Here's a press release up at his website announcing his appearances and cataloguing Lam's alleged history of prosecutorial sins that led him to drive her from office.
He doesn't getting around to mention her positive performance review.
This is the joker the White House is going to bat with.
--Josh Marshall
I noted below that Rep. Heather Wilson (R-NM) now says that in response 
to complaints from constituents about US Attorney Iglesias's slow rate of indictments on corruption investigations, she called him two weeks before election day to allow him to clear his name.
But let's back up for a moment to look at the story that is emerging.
In his statement yesterday, Sen. Domenici attempted to paint a picture of rising frustration with Iglesias's lackluster performance going back over several years -- particularly tied to his inability "to move more quickly on cases" even after Domenici had made sure to make more resources available to his office.
As we noted yesterday, Iglesias's DOJ performance reviews show no evidence of this. And federal judiciary statistics show just the opposite.
But late this afternoon we looked a bit further. Domenici claims he and his office had reacted to "public accounts" of Iglesias's inability to move cases quickly enough. So we decided to look back through published articles to see whether there was really anything in the public record to substantiate Domenici's claims.
And what did we find? Just one article.
And it's very revealing.
It's from the December 19th, 2006 edition of the Albuquerque Journal, the article announcing Iglesias's resignation.
After noting Iglesias's resignation the articles continues ...
Rumors that Iglesias was in trouble with his superiors at the Department of Justice have been circulating for months.The chief criticism of Iglesias has been that he had not provided enough resources for public corruption investigations. Some of that criticism has come from the political arena and some from the FBI, which has made political corruption its No. 2 priority behind terrorism.
Iglesias' defenders, in private conversations, argued that the federal prosecutors are overwhelmed with immigration and narcotics cases because of the state's southern border with Mexico.
The article then describes the guilty plea Iglesias got from former state Treasurer Robert Vigil, a Democrat, and then continues with this ...
Iglesias' resignation also comes while a second corruption case is in the law enforcement pipeline. That case could be as explosive as the Treasurer's Office investigation.The FBI has been investigating a kickback scheme centered on the construction of the multimillion-dollar state and metro courthouses Downtown.
Last month, Iglesias assigned additional prosecutors to that investigation, which had been in the works since September 2005. The investigation became public last spring when FBI agents began reviewing construction records at the Metropolitan Courthouse.
The pace of that investigation has apparently been a point of contention between investigators and Iglesias' office.
The FBI confirmed in July that it had sent a case involving the courthouses to the U.S. Attorney's Office. Since then, indictments have been expected or rumored on a monthly basis.
This is the case that the whole scandal turns on, the one against former State Senator Manny Aragon.
And here the full picture starts to come into focus.
There's no evidence that Iglesias wasn't moving quickly enough through his office's caseload, as Sen. Domenici claimed. But well before any of this story became radioactive national news, we have this press account of rumors that Iglesias was in trouble with the folks at Main Justice over not "providing enough resources for public corruption investigations."
Some of the criticism came from the "political arena" and some from the FBI.
So it seems that there were complaints about Iglesias. But the evidence at hand suggests they all stemmed from claims he wasn't putting enough muscle into investigating corruption cases. Indeed, Rep. Wilson (R-NM) now claims that many of her constituents had complained about "the slow pace of federal prosecutions" in corruption cases.
As we've seen, both the major public corruption cases Iglesias pursued were of Democrats. And the one all the fuss was about last year was the investigation of Manny Aragon. Now, indulge me for a moment. When not enough drug dealers are getting put away people complain. When too few illegals are getting rousted people may complain. But there's a particular group of people who complain when an indictment of a Democratic isn't coming down quickly enough: they're called partisan Republicans. And yes, same thing if the shoe were on the other foot.
The December 19th report says that FBI investigators weren't happy either. And I'll be curious to hear more about that. You only need to watch a few TV cop shows to know that investigators are often out in front of prosecutors in the course of a criminal investigation. And any reporter will tell you that the way investigators' complaints often surface is by way of political partisans. But however that may be, it's the prosecutors job to decide if and when to indict.
So, as I said, the picture starts to come into focus and we see that the defense proferred by Wilson and Domenici is not so different from the accusation.
Wilson and Domenici were hearing from Republican supporters that Iglesias was taking too long dropping that indictment on Democrat Manny Aragon -- it was commonly believed last fall that Wilson's political future depended on it. Wilson and Domenici weren't too happy about it either since Wilson was banking on an indictment before the election to save her seat. According to the Albuquerque Journal, Iglesias's bosses in Washington weren't happy with how long it was taking either. So within two to three weeks of the election both Wilson and then Domenici call Iglesias to ask what the delay is. He gives them both the cold shoulder. On election day Wilson wins reelection by fewer than one thousand votes. Five weeks after that, Iglesias gets the call from Michael Battle telling him he's fired.
Pretty bad when you consider that that's not the accusation but the defense.
--Josh Marshall
More from McClatchy ...
A high-ranking Justice Department official told one of the U.S. attorneys fired by the Bush administration that if any of them continued to criticize the administration for their ousters, previously undisclosed details about the reasons they were fired might be released, two of the ousted prosecutors told McClatchy Newspapers.While the U.S. attorney who got the call regarded the tone of the conversation as congenial, not intimidating, the prosecutor nonetheless passed the message on to five other fired U.S. attorneys. One of them interpreted the reported comments by Michael Elston, the chief of staff to Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty, as a threat.
Justice Department officials denied that the conversation with the U.S. attorney ever took place, and Elston said he called several of the fired U.S. attorneys but never made any such comments.
--Josh Marshall
Running out of time to come clean, Rep. Heather Wilson 'fesses up.
But Wilson's explanation turns out to be even more comical than Sen. Domenici's.
Wilson released a statement to the Washington Post in which she says: "I did not ask about the timing of any indictments and I did not tell Mr. Iglesias what course of action I thought he should take or pressure him in any way. The conversation was brief and professional."
We pick up the story from the Post ...
Wilson said in her statement that many of her constituents had complained about "the slow pace of federal prosecutions" in corruption cases and said she was told by one unidentified constituent that "Iglesias was intentionally delaying corruption investigations."Wilson also said she was trying to help Iglesias: "If the purpose of my call has somehow been misperceived, I am sorry for any confusion. I thought it was important for Mr. Iglesias to receive this information and, if necessary, have the opportunity to clear his name."
Wilson said Iglesias's dismissal occurred "without input from me." Justice officials said they are not aware of any contacts by Wilson about Iglesias. But they said Sunday that Domenici complained to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales three times in 2005 and 2006 and spoke to Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty in the first week of October 2006.
Now, let's be honest. This is so risible as to almost be sad.
Consider what Wilson is asking us to believe: she says she didn't ask Iglesias about the timing of the expected indictment. Nor did she tell him "course of action" she should take. She called because so many of her constituents had complained that this Republican US Attorney, appointed by President Bush, wasn't moving quickly enough in his corruption investigation of a prominent New Mexico Democrat. Indeed, one unidentified constituent said Iglesias was intentionally bottling up the investigation. And Wilson called to give him the chance to "clear his name."
Imagine Iglesias not understanding that in placing this call Wilson was just looking out for his own good?
Enough. Wilson would have done better to follow the Domenici route and just pretended she was making an informational call. After reading this transparently bogus line from Wilson this is the first moment when I think there's a decent chance there will be a special election some time over the next twelve months in the first district of New Mexico. Anyone who reads even Wilson's defense knows that she did precisely what Iglesias said she did: muscled a US Attorney to issue an indictment two weeks prior to election day because she believed it would help her save her seat.
Again, even going by Wilson's account of what happened, there's really no other reasonable explanation.
--Josh Marshall
Okay, here's a little TPM due diligence for you. If you've been following the latest chapter of the fired US attorneys scandal, you know that Sen. Domenici (R-NM) is claiming that he tried to get US attorney David Iglesias fired because of his "inability" to "move more quickly on cases."
Unfortunately, federal judiciary statistics show just the opposite was the case.
--Josh Marshall
House Dems planning to keep the public focused on the Walter Reed scandal by pushing the story in VA hospitals in their districts.
--Greg Sargent
Okay, I got no dog in this fight. But I thought this was clever. So I'll pass it along.
(ed.note: I've been assured that the creators are not connected to the Obama campaign.)
--Josh Marshall
Here's the ousted prosecutors' joint written statement, which will be read before tomorrow's hearing in the House by former U.S. Attorney Carol Lam of San Diego.
--Paul Kiel
Breaking: Heads rolling in 
advance of tomorrow's rumble?
We're hearing that Michael Battle the executive director of the Executive Office for United States Attorneys has resigned.
He's the one who made the firing calls on December 7th of last year.
More soon.
Update: The AP has confirmed it. Details here.
Late Update: I realized when a reader brought it up that the way I led this post gave the impression that Battle had been fired. On the contrary, our strong impression is that he resigned.
Even Later Update: The DOJ spokesman insists Battle's "departure is not connected to the U.S. attorney controversy whatsoever." This story is still awash with coincidences.
--Josh Marshall
Purged prosecutors to testify before both the House and Senate tomorrow.
(Update: In anticipation of tomorrow's hearing, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) put out the following statement: "The plot continues to thicken. No one believes anymore these U.S. Attorneys were fired for any good reason and we will start to uncover the real truth at our hearing on Tuesday.")
--Paul Kiel
Funny request: are you a) a Tivo subscriber, b) a Time Warner Cable subscriber and c) do you live in Manhattan? If you're 'yes' to all three, can you shoot us an email? Thanks much.
--Josh Marshall
A view from an anonymous TPM Reader in the trenches ...
I'm an Assistant United States Attorney in [*******], and am, of course, outraged by the U.S. Attorney purge, as most AUSAs are. I appreciate all the work you've been doing on this story.My own sense is that this purge has to be viewed as part a much larger story on the devastating impact of this administration's policies on the institution of the U.S. Attorney's Office.
From a fiscal perspective, the administration has essentially abandoned the U.S. Attorney's Offices. That has led to a precipitous drop in the numbers of federal prosecutions, particularly in larger districts like Los Angeles. The effects of the budget crisis at U.S. Attorney's Offices across the nation are well documented.
http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/whitecollarcrime _blog/files/usao_ltr_final.pdf. True to form, Alberto Gonzales has virtually ignored these problems, despite congressional inquiries.
Likewise, from a policy perspective, the administration's War on Terror (TM) policies and practices have undermined the sacred foundations of the work we do as federal prosecutors. I strive every day to make sure that the Fourth Amendment rights of evn the worst criminals are scrupulously observed, only to learn that the folks I work for view those rights as disposable, inconvenient anachronisms. I operate in a criminal justice system properly designed to maximize due process for even the worst criminals, only to watch the administration kick and scream when forced to provide even the most basic due process rights to suspected terrorists.
And now the purges. So they've slashed U.S. Attorney's budgets, trashed rights we have sworn to uphold, and now, tried to toady-up the ranks of our leadership by firing some of our best and brightest, apparently to make room for wingnut-annointed political hacks. Folks who do stuff like this deserve
to get caught.One final note: U.S. Attorneys are referred to as the top law enforcement officers in their districts -- even the FBI answers to the U.S. Attorney because the FBI can't bring cases without the U.S. Attorney. Can you imagine if the administration had treated the FBI the way they've treated the U.S. Attorney's Offices? Of course not -- they wouldn't dare. Because the public understands all too well what happens when the FBI's integrity is undermined or its leadership politicized (see J. Edgar Hoover's tenure).
The very same dangers lurk here. Thanks for helping to bring them to light.
--Josh Marshall
Conservative blogger posts a petition demanding that CPAC nix future Ann Coulter appearances in the wake of her "faggot" comment.
Will others follow suit?
--Greg Sargent
On the matter of Mr. Iglesias's testimony on Tuesday, let's remember a few things. Sen. Domenici (R-NM) and the political appointees at the Justice Department have strong motivations for supporting each others claims about management shortcomings during Mr. Iglesias's tenure -- despite the fact that there appears to be little if any evidence for this prior to Iglesias's ouster. Domenici has already if not lied then intentionally misled the public about his contacts with Iglesias. Remember, when first asked about Iglesias's claims about calls to his office from members of the New Mexico delegation, Domenici said "I have no idea what he's talking about." It's only by the most generous and clement interpretation that that statement doesn't peg Domenici as a liar. So he's already misled the public and taken an action which even by the most innocent reading appears to violate congressional ethics rules. He doesn't have much credibility. The folks at Main Justice don't have much either when you consider that they've run through several different explanations at this point for why Iglesias was fired.
So let's see what Iglesias says. He's levelled extremely serious charges. So he deserves scrutiny too. But let's not miss that we're about to witness that most familiar of Bush era storylines, the whistleblower heading into the buzzsaw, with the full panoply of DOJ, Republican senators, National Review yakkers and RNC smearlords ready to crank up the noise machine to make sure Iglesias is too bashed and bruised by the end of the week to make his charges amount to anything.
--Josh Marshall
Interns!
We have two slots opening for spring cycle interns here at TPM. Our interns work out of our offices in Manhattan. It's a great opportunity to get experience working in new media with the oldest values in journalism. Interns get hands-on experience doing everything from formatting photographs documents and articles, to online research to writing for our news blogs. These two new interns will be closely involved in all aspects of our coming redesign and relaunch of the site.
If you live in the New York area and you're interested in our internship, please send an email to the comments email address on the upper right. Include the subject heading 'TPM Internship'. Include a resume and a brief description of your interest in the gig.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader RS chimes in from near San Diego ...
I wonder who the "the few conservative congressmen" are who were complaining about Carol Lam. I live in Duke's district and the only congressman here who has complained publicly is Darrell Issa.Duncan Hunter has been strangely silent and he's usually the first one to feign outrage on an immigration issue. Hunter was involved with Duke in pressuring the Pentagon to give Brent Wilkes some of his contracts so I expect the FBI is investigating him.
While I have read in the press that Issa and "other members of congress" have complained about Lam, those others have never been publicly identifed. Locally, neither Hunter nor Brian Bilbray (duke's successor) issued any press releases about this matter.
--Josh Marshall
In the Post Dan Eggen provides a few more key nuggets in the Domenici/Iglesias timeline ...
Domenici's remarks came four days after Iglesias alleged that two New Mexico lawmakers had called him in mid-October and pressured him about the pace of the investigation. Iglesias, one of eight U.S. attorneys fired by the Justice Department, said he believed the calls were at the root of his dismissal....
Two sources with knowledge of the calls have said that Wilson made the first contact, followed by Domenici about a week later. The sources spoke on condition of anonymity because they did not want to be named discussing the matter before a congressional hearing tomorrow.
The Justice Department said last night that Domenici called Deputy Attorney General Paul J. McNulty during the first week of October to discuss Iglesias.
This followed three calls to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales in September 2005, January 2006 and April 2006 during which, Justice Department spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said, Domenici "expressed general concerns about the performance of U.S. Attorney Iglesias and questioned whether he was up to the job . . .
"At no time in those calls did the senator mention this corruption case," nor did he specifically ask for Iglesias's ouster, Roehrkasse said.
The spokesman said he was not aware of any similar calls or complaints to the Justice Department from Wilson.
Be interesting to see what Iglesias can add to the mix.
--Josh Marshall
Here is a disturbing but I fear enlightening piece on the danger Israel faces today not from without but from within.
--Josh Marshall
The Domenici/Iglesias story continues to unfold -- this time with a few more nuggets from the Times.
In his statement today, Sen. Domenici said his frustration with Iglesias's performance had been growing for years and that several months before the infamous nudge call to Iglesias he had told officials at the Justice Department that he believed Iglesias should be ousted.
Here's what the Times adds to the mix ...
A Justice Department spokesman said on Sunday that records at the agency showed that the senator complained about Mr. Iglesias in calls to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales in September 2005 and again in January and April 2006. The senator made a brief call to Paul J. McNulty, the deputy attorney general, in October 2006 when the deliberations over Mr. Iglesias’s dismissal began.In each of these calls, said Brian Roehrkasse, a Justice Department spokesman, Mr. Domenici expressed general concerns about Mr. Iglesias and questioned whether he was “up to the job.” Mr. Roehrkasse added, “At no time did they discuss the public corruption case.”
Now, some of this, let's just note for the record. DOJ says there were four calls complaining about Iglesias. But let's look at the fourth -- that 'brief call to Paul McNulty' in October of last year. That's right about exactly the same time that Domenici put in his call to Iglesias about the Dem indictment. So which call came first?
Anyway, let's stick a pin in this point in the timeline to note it for future reference.
And the folks at DOJ seem to have come up with another reason for Iglesias's ouster. From the Times: "Justice officials have said that F.B.I. officials complained that Mr. Iglesias was not bringing corruption cases fast enough, but have not mentioned Mr. Domenici’s efforts to remove him."
So now it seems that tardiness on bringing corruption indictments was one of the reasons Iglesias was axed. Only Domenici never mentioned it, just the FBI.
Now, before I go, indulge me a moment of deja vu.
If someone tells you one reason they're doing something, you may believe me. If someone tells you twenty reasons they're doing something, and some of the reasons contradict each other, it's very hard not to get suspicious. That was the story of the lead up to the Iraq War -- it was about al Qaeda, or WMD, or democratizing the Middle East or stabilizing the Middle East, or about human rights or defending Israel or maybe Saudi Arabia. There were so many good reasons to invade Iraq that only a fool could pass on the opportunity. But for those watching closely the very multiplicity of rationales suggested we were being scammed and weren't hearing the real story.
Here too, perhaps these folks were fired for incompetence, or maybe over policy disagreements, or maybe because the FBI didn't think they were moving quickly enough on corruption cases, or maybe they were being shoved out to open up slots for deserving GOP lawyers. Any of these explanations might be true. But when we hear them all, in succession, in little more than a week, you begin to suspect that none of them are true. And that it's all so much flimflam trying to obscure the real explanation.
--Josh Marshall
A busy news day here at TPM, especially for a Sunday. Let me sign off with a comment from TPM Reader BG that I think captures an important historical and political dynamic at play in any number of Bush Administration disasters, scandals, and foul ups. BG is responding specifically to this post on the conditions at Walter Reed, but the larger point resonates far beyond that single sorry case:
What's really at issue here is the extent to which problems with the military, specifically, and the government, generally, are a result of policy. The common explanation for the catastrophic results of many of the Bush administration's initiatives (from Iraq to New Orleans and back again) is that they are the result of "incompetence."Incompetence, the lack of capacity or skill, is ultimately an exculpating trope. It insinuates that the plan, or effort, was sound and could have succeeded had it been competently carried out. Moreover, the incompetent are in way less liable: their lack of ability lets them off the hook. Thus, "incompetence" insulates the actors from accountability and leaves the policy itself unscathed.
My personal opinion, which has recently been reinforced by much of what I read in Rajiv Chandrasekaran's Imperial Life in the Emerald City, is that the Bush disasters are a result of the administration's policies and not of some failure to effectively carry them out.
No one says, retrospectively, that Calvin Coolidge's failure to help the victims of 1927's Mississippi River flood was a result of incompetence. No one says that Mellon, with his inaction and insistence that the Great Depression would burn itself out through 'liquidation,' was incompetent. Both of these positions were wholly in keeping with the policies of the Coolidge and Hoover presidencies, policies that were not discredited until Roosevelt's victories and the institution of the New Deal.
The problem, a problem that Waxman seems to be keenly aware of, is that as long as the government retains the same kind of policies, the nation will continue to suffer the same hardships. It is not until the beliefs that inform the ways in which the Bush administration runs the government are firmly linked to their consequences that the nation will stop voting for politicians who promulgate, and enact legislation based on, those creeds.
These policies will not (again) be discredited until they are tied to their reprehensible results. Insisting on the 'incompetence' of the Bush administration turns attention away from this linkage between policy and result. In fact, it insulates the policies while discrediting the men who are trying to implement them. It, thus, sets the stage for those policies to be enacted again.
Bravo.
--David Kurtz
I've spent the weekend watching from sidelines as the Canned US Attorney story picks up momentum. And it's been a couple days of interesting reading. Kevin Drum has it right when he flags this as the weekend of copping to the lesser offense to try to head off a real investigation.
That's what the White House is doing, admitting that, yes, they mishandled the whole attorney firing and yes they signed off on it. But they really didn't have anything to do with it and anyway it was just to clear out a few US Attorneys who weren't addressing the administration's law enforcement priorities.
And now we have the august Sen. Domenici (R-NM) coming clean about jawboning US Attorney Iglesias for information about the investigation of the New Mexico Democrat. He's awfully sorry about it. But it's wholly unrelated to Domenici's request to the Justice Department that Iglesias be fired.
Coincidence is a bitch.
One thing you can say about the US Attorney scandal is that it just draws folks with bad luck to it like moths to a flame. First you've got the White House, not knowing Iglesias had been jacked up by state Republicans for not indicting that Democrat before the election when they went ahead and fired him for completely unrelated reasons.
And then you've got Domenici having this lapse of judgment calling Iglesias when he was trying to get him fired for completely unrelated reasons. With luck this bad you can imagine a lot of other really unfortunate coincidences cropping up over the coming days and weeks.
In all seriousness, the most humorous and telling part of Domenici's and the White House's attempts to get out in front of this doozie is watching them rummaging around for policy and management rationales for these firings.
Let's listen to Domenici ...
During the course of the last six years, that already heavy caseload in our state has been swamped by unresolved new federal cases, especially in the areas of immigration and illegal drugs. I have asked, and my staff has asked, on many occasions whether the federal prosecutors and federal judiciary within our state had enough resources. I have been repeatedly told that we needed more resources. As a result I have introduced a variety of legislative measures, including new courthouse construction monies, to help alleviate the situation.My conversations with Mr. Iglesias over the years have been almost exclusively about this resource problem and complaints by constituents. He consistently told me that he needed more help, as have many other New Mexicans within the legal community.
My frustration with the U.S. Attorney’s office mounted as we tried to get more resources for it, but public accounts indicated an inability within the office to move more quickly on cases. Indeed, in 2004 and 2005 my staff and I expressed my frustration with the U.S. Attorney’s office to the Justice Department and asked the Department to see if the New Mexico U.S. Attorney’s office needed more help, including perhaps an infusion of professionals from other districts.
This ongoing dialogue and experience led me, several months before my call with Mr. Iglesias, to conclude and recommend to the Department of Justice that New Mexico needed a new United States Attorney.
Okay, so Sen. Domenici has been feeling for years that federal caseloads have been too heavy in the state. And the prosecutors and the judiciary both needed more money. And the senator's been trying to get them more resources. And when he talked to US Attorney Iglesias about it, Iglesias agreed that they needed new resources. But as he was making these efforts to bring in more resources "public accounts indicated an inability within the office to move more quickly on cases." He brings this up with Main Justice and this "ongoing dialogue and experience led me, several months before my call with Mr. Iglesias, to conclude and recommend to the Department of Justice that New Mexico needed a new United States Attorney."
Now, if I'm reading this right, Sen. Domenici is saying that Administration Story #1 -- poor performance on the job -- actually is the reason that Iglesias got canned. He doesn't allege any policy differences, any deprioritization of immigration or drug arrests. Iglesias just couldn't get the job done, even as Domenici was getting more federal dollars for justice in New Mexico.
So Domenici and the administration can't even get their explanations straight. Or maybe Domenici is just having a hard time keeping up with the pace of the story since 'poor performance' on the job went down the memory hole a few weeks ago.
And of course Iglesias' performance reviews appear to show no signs of any of this. And indeed, the best Domenici can seem to do is point to "public accounts" of the poor performance of Iglesias's office. So like the rest of the explanations of poor performance and policy disagreement, this was an instance of poor performance no on else seemed to know about, notwithstanding the aforementioned 'public accounts.'
In truth, the accounts provided by administration sources for the firing of various prosecutors are similarly wispy and contradictory. Read the Times article from today and the list of proferred reasons is simply all over the place. No one on the administration side even seems to have been able to come up with anything specific on Nevada US Attorney Daniel G. Bogden. About him the Times reports that "Justice Department officials said they regarded Mr. Bogden as competent but insufficiently aggressive, although they acknowledge that his removal was a tough call."
Now, here's one last point I'll conclude with. Tough calls come in cases where decisions need to be made. I've got three great job candidates but only two jobs. Someone's got to be cut. Tough call. Or I need to open up seven US Attorney slots. So I've got to find seven to fire. Has to be someone. And maybe Bogden was right on the edge. Tough call.
But no one had to do any of this. We're supposed to believe that some senior officials at DOJ got together last December and pulled together a list of US Attorneys who weren't in sync with administration law enforcement policy priorities. They came up with the names of six who had to go. Then they took a look at Bogden. They didn't find any reason for complaint on policy or competence grounds. But he seemed "insufficiently aggressive" so he was out too. But it was a "tough call".
I'm sorry. None of that adds up. Even setting aside the Iglesias smoking gun and perhaps more to come, the administration's story, simply on its own terms, collapses under the weight of its own ridiculousness.
--Josh Marshall
A breaking prior restraint case in Kansas City, where on Friday a state court judge ordered the Kansas City Star and the local alternative newsweekly, The Pitch (owned by Village Voice Media), to remove articles about the Kansas City Board of Public Utilities from their websites and barred them from publishing certain articles about the BPU in their print editions.
At issue was a confidential letter, upon which the articles were based, written to BPU officials by the board's attorney about BPU power plants. (h/t to Scatablog).
As if the prior restraint were not egregious enough, the judge didn't schedule the next hearing on the matter until next Friday.
Late update: As a couple readers have pointed out, the stories in question weren't pulled from the newspaper websites before they were cached by the search engines, a fact that may often make such prior restraint orders moot in this day and age, in addition to all of the other constitutional problems. The Pitch story is in Google's cache, and the KC Star story is cached in Google as well. Thanks to TPM Readers PK and MD for the links.
--David Kurtz
TPM Reader DJ, on Ann Coulter's remarks:
I've been wondering why no one has pointed out that among the conservatives it isn't saying the word 'faggot' that gets you chucked into rehab, but actually turning out to be one.
Good one. Why didn't I think of that.
--David Kurtz
TPM Reader JN checks in from Texas:
Can you believe it? The first time Pete Domenici attemps to exert improper influence on a U.S. Attorney and he gets busted. That's some bad luck. And Heather Wilson too. What are the chances? Dang....
They just do sarcasm better in Texas than in most places (see, e.g., Molly Ivins, God rest her soul).
--David Kurtz
TPM Reader NC of Australia, responding to the post below on David Hicks:
As an aside on this issue, Australians have generally fallen in love with Major Michael Mori. Every time we see him he is in his uniform, even at official functions. He seems to be the only American who gives a damn about what America has done to David Hicks.When all this is over and done with, Major Mori can immigrate to Australia and become an Australian citizen. If he chooses to run for Prime Minister, people will welcome it.
At least one American comes out of this looking better.
--David Kurtz
Newt Gingrich blames victims of Hurricane Katrina for their "failure of citizenship."
--David Kurtz
I must admit that the case of David Hicks, the Australian held at Guantanamo, has been off my radar lately, and it shouldn't be. It's a national embarrassment. Here's the latest.
Hicks this week became the first person charged under the new military tribunals set up by Congress just before the mid-term elections in response to the Supreme Court's Hamdan decision striking down the old tribunal system.
After being held for five years without a trial and being originally charged with conspiracy to commit murder and engage in acts of terrorism, attempted murder and aiding the enemy, Hick was charged with a single count of providing material support for terrorism, which, his lawyers argue, wasn't outlawed until 2006.
Australians are outraged. Understandably so.
Now comes word that Hicks' trial may be delayed because his American military lawyer, Maj. Michael Mori, is being threatened with prosecution under the UCMJ by the chief American prosecutor, Col. Morris Davis:
Colonel Davis has accused Major Mori of breaching Article 88 of the US military code, which relates to using contemptuous language towards the president, vice-president, and secretary of defence. Penalties for breaching the code include jail and the loss of employment and entitlements.Major Mori denied he had done anything improper but said the accusations left him with an inherent conflict of interest.
"It can't help but raise an issue of whether any further representation of David and his wellbeing could be tainted by a concern for my own legal wellbeing," Major Mori told the Herald. "David Hicks needs counsel who is not tainted by these allegations."
Major Mori, who has been to Australia seven times, will seek legal advice. The issue will also have to be raised with Hicks when his legal team next sees him.
Morris has criticized Mori's frequent trips to Australia; and, as The Times reported yesterday, American embassy officials tried and failed to have the Pentagon bar Mori from coming to Australia.
Why would anyone doubt that Hicks will get a fair trial?
--David Kurtz
A well-written piece in the Sydney Morning Herald about CPAC, Ann Coulter, and the dearth of Republican heroes.
--David Kurtz
Oh, this is good.
One of the fascinating dynamics in the Justice Department for going on 4 years now has been the tension between the Bush loyalists and those loyal Republicans who still have a shred of decency left. The poster child for the latter category has been James Comey, the deputy attorney general for part of John Ashcroft's tenure, who appointed his old friend Patrick Fitzgerald as special prosecutor to investigate the Plame affair. Comey was also the guy who refused to reauthorize the NSA warrantless wiretapping program, forcing the White House to get Ashcroft to sign off on it from his hospital bed. Bush, as is his way, nicknamed Comey "Cuomo."
Comey is two years removed from DOJ, now serving as general counsel for Lockheed Martin. But, as Josh noted, Comey popped up this week singing the praises of canned U.S. Attorney David Iglesias to the Washington Post: "David Iglesias was one of our finest and someone I had a lot of confidence in as deputy attorney general."
You could almost hear the knives being sharpened.
Then yesterday, as Paul noted, the Bush loyalists fired back, telling the Post that Comey had been consulted by his successor as deputy attorney general, Paul McNulty, about some of the canned prosecutors before McNulty approved the final list.
Ooops. Not so, the Post says today:
In a related matter, administration officials said they were mistaken in saying that Deputy Attorney General Paul J. McNulty consulted his predecessor, James B. Comey, about some of the U.S. attorneys before they were fired. Comey was not consulted, the officials said Saturday.
In a different era, this would call for pistols at dawn. Good stuff.
--David Kurtz
Sen. Pete "I have no idea what he's talking about" Domenici (R-NM) has had an epiphany and now does have an idea what canned U.S. Attorney David Iglesias was talking about when he said Domenici called him about a high-profile public corruption case in New Mexico shortly before the mid-term elections.
Oh, THAT call.
Well, sure, I called him, Domenici said in statement released to home state media Saturday, but I never told him what course of action I thought he should take, or pressured him, or threatened him in any way. Nonetheless, hindsight being 20/20, I regret making that call. And even though I didn't threaten, pressure, cajole, suggest, hint, wink, or nod, I apologize.
I was waiting for him to say that he's just some old guy who wanders Capitol Hill in his pajamas. Who would take that guy seriously?
Well, when a U.S. Senator--a senior Senator from your own party, no less--calls you about a case, you can be damn sure it's not a social call. Here's what Domenici says transpired on the call:
I asked Mr. Iglesias if he could tell me what was going on in that investigation and give me an idea of what timeframe we were looking at. It was a very brief conversation, which concluded when I was told that the courthouse investigation would be continuing for a lengthy period.
What timeframe "we" were looking at? The royal "we." It's just us Republicans here, old boy. Notice too that Domenici's version of events doesn't preclude him having abruptly hung up the phone, as Iglesias claims.
But Domenici knows he screwed up. Otherwise, what's to apologize for? Maybe with a mea culpa, I'm sure the thinking goes, he can put this behind him and move quickly on. Nice touch, that written statement. No follow-up questions. No need to provide a timeline. May get the local reporters off his back for a while.
So many question remain. Here's one: Did the good senator ever have any discussions with Rep. Heather Wilson (R-NM) about their calls to Iglesias?
--David Kurtz
The National Republican Congressional Committee's slimeball tactics: bad enough to give even Republicans pause. (Well, a few Republicans, and so they say.)
--David Kurtz
Sen. Pete Domenici (R-NM) releases a statement about his call to U.S. Attorney David Iglesias: "I regret making that call and I apologize."
Read the whole statement here.
--Paul Kiel
The New York Times follows on the heels of the Washington Post, with a heavily reported piece trying to make sense of the U.S. attorney purge, and like the Post comes up short.
While The Times piece claims to "provide new details and a fuller picture of the events behind the dismissals," it is really a scatter-shot of speculation about what prompted the firings:
[S]ome prosecutors believe they were forced out for replacements who could gild résumés; several heard that favored candidates had been identified.Other prosecutors may have been vulnerable because they had had run-ins with the Justice Department, not over corruption cases against Republicans, but on less visible issues.
Paul Charlton in Arizona, for example, annoyed Federal Bureau of Investigation officials by pushing for confessions to be tape-recorded, while John McKay in Seattle had championed a computerized law enforcement information-sharing system that Justice Department officials did not want. Carol C. Lam of San Diego, who successfully prosecuted former Representative Randy Cunningham, had drawn complaints that she was not sufficiently aggressive on immigration cases.
In other words, the prosecutors, and by extension The Times, don't really know why they were fired, but they have some guesses, which coming from loyal Republicans tend toward the benign, with the exception of New Mexico's David Iglesias.
Oddly, The Times lets stand a Justice Department assertion that none of the firings were prompted by politics: "Justice Department officials deny that the dismissals were politically motivated or that the action resulted from White House pressure."
That's simply not true in the case of the removal of Bud Cummins in Arkansas, which Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty has already conceded in congressional testimony was done in order to provide a post for Karl Rove aide Timothy Griffin. The piece notes then-White House counsel Harriet Miers' intervention with DOJ officials on Griffin's behalf, but makes no mention of McNulty's testimony.
The Times also makes no mention of the Patriot Act provision that allows the Attorney General to appoint interim USAs for indefinite terms, an essential ingredient to the purge story that is inextricably wrapped up in politics.
There is one interesting tidbit in the piece that deserves further exploration: "The White House eventually approved the list and helped notify Republican lawmakers before the Dec. 7 dismissals, officials said."
Which lawmakers were notified? Those in the home states of the purged USAs? Those on the judiciary committees? What were they told by the White House and DOJ? How does that square with what the White House and DOJ are saying now?
Maybe The Times can turn its reporting guns on those questions.
--David Kurtz
Add another name to the cast of characters involved in the decision to sack U.S. attorneys. In addition to Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty, Kyle Sampson, Alberto Gonzales' chief of staff, was in on the decision, according to a Justice Department official who spoke to Newsweek's Michael Isikoff. A DOJ official also confirmed that Sen. Pete Domenici (R-NM) had contacted senior department officials to "express general concerns" about New Mexico U.S. Attorney David Iglesias. Domenici's office has previously said he raised concerns about Iglesias' handling of immigration issues, among other things. Still no comment from Domenici or Heather Wilson (R-NM) on whether each of them placed calls to Iglesias before the mid-term elections inquiring about the status of a public corruption investigation of a state Democrat, as Iglesias claims.
--David Kurtz
Pro-democracy demonstrators clubbed and detained by police in St. Petersburg.
If you have only a vague sense of how bad things have become in Putin's Russia, you might be interested in Michael Specter's recent piece in The New Yorker.
Late update: More on the St. Petersburg clash here.
--David Kurtz
