no thanks…

Posted on Saturday 9 June 2007

A Justice Department lawyer under fire for bringing criminal voter-fraud charges on the eve of the 2006 election may revise his Senate testimony about the case, which angered other U.S. prosecutors, officials familiar with the matter said.

Bradley Schlozman, who as U.S. attorney in Kansas City obtained indictments charging workers for an activist group with submitting fake voter-registration forms, defended the timing of the case to the Senate Judiciary Committee this week by saying he acted "at the direction” of the department’s Public Integrity Section.

The explanation, which Schlozman repeated at least nine times during the June 5 hearing, infuriated public integrity lawyers, who say it implied the section ordered him to prosecute, said two Justice Department officials. Public integrity attorneys handle sensitive cases involving politicians and judges and pride themselves on staying out of political disputes.

A clarification of Schlozman’s testimony would stress that he consulted with the section and was given guidance, not direction, said the officials, who asked to remain anonymous because the matter is being deliberated internally. The clarification wouldn’t say that Schlozman’s Senate testimony was inaccurate, the officials added.
We’ll pass [on some kind of negotiated, bullshit semi-truth]. Bradley Schlozman was asked over and over the same question, and he answered it over and over the same way. He doesn’t need to be "covered" by the Public Integrity Attorneys. He needs to be charged with perjury and obstruction of justice in a Congressional Hearing. Bring him back to the hearing and let’s us ask him again. Then bring in the Public Integrity Attorneys and let us hear what they said to him, and what he was saying to them. Bradley Schlozman was obnoxious enough to justify throwing any number of books at him just for sheer arrogance. And we don’t need his superiors "debating internally" about what to say. We’d prefer they stick to the facts. They can all testify along with Mark Thor Hearne and Sara Taylor
Bush aide admits hiring boasts
Says he broke no rules giving jobs to conservatives

Democrats focused on an incident less than a week before the 2006 election, when Schlozman brought four voter-registration fraud indictments against workers for a liberal group.

A department election-crime manual instructs US attorneys to wait until after ballots are cast to bring charges, lest the investigation become a campaign issue or otherwise influence the outcome. Missouri Republicans used the indictments to bash Democrats late in the campaign.

Schlozman said that he received permission from Justice Department headquarters to bring the charges when he did. He said he has e-mails proving that he was told that he was allowed to bring the indictments right before the election because voter-registration fraud cases do not involve interviewing voters.

But Democrats expressed incredulity, saying that nothing in the written text of the policy says anything about an exception for voter-registration fraud cases. Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Patrick J. Leahy , Democrat of Vermont, told Schlozman to give the e-mails to Congress.

The controversy over the Missouri indictments also led to a heated retort from Leahy, who had asked Schlozman why he didn’t wait until after the election to bring the case.

"The Department of Justice does not time prosecutions to elections," Schlozman said.

Shouted Leahy: "Yes they do! That’s what the manual says!"
"he has e-mails proving that he was told that he was allowed to bring the indictments right before the election" is a lot different from being directed to bring his suit. He’s skirting the question of "Why?" But Joe Rich, former career lawyer in the Civil Rights section, didn’t mince any words about that in an interview last month:

Schlozman is emerging as a focal point of the investigation into the firing of eight US attorneys last year — and as a symbol of broader complaints that the Bush administration has misused its stewardship of law enforcement to give Republicans an electoral edge.

No stranger to election law controversy, Schlozman previously spent three years as a political appointee in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, where he supervised the voting rights section.

There, he came into conflict with veteran staff over his decisions to approve a Texas redistricting plan and a Georgia photo-ID voting law, both of which benefited Republicans. He also hired many new career lawyers with strong conservative credentials, in what critics say was an attempt to reduce enforcement of laws designed to eliminate obstacles to voting by minorities.

"Schlozman was reshaping the Civil Rights Division," said Joe Rich , who was chief of the voting rights section until taking a buyout in 2005, in an interview. "Schlozman didn’t know anything about voting law. . . . All he knew is he wanted to be sure that the Republicans were going to win."
Mickey @ 8:20 PM

Frat boy, Fratto…

Posted on Saturday 9 June 2007


Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), who has led the investigation into the firing of several U.S. attorneys, announced Friday that a vote of no confidence in Attorney General Alberto Gonzales will be taken in the Senate Monday.

“If all senators who have actually lost confidence in Attorney General Gonzales voted their conscience, this vote would be unanimous,” the senator said.

However, Schumer added that he expects the president to pressure members of his party to vote against the measure.

“We will soon see where people’s loyalties lie,” he said.

Schumer has fiercely criticized Gonzales’s role in the firings and his conduct during the investigation and has repeatedly called for the resignation of the attorney general.
This vote has been delayed for a few weeks. I’m not sure why. It seemed like the fire was more in the belly shortly after Gonzales’ pitiful performance in the hearings. My guess would be that the delay was to get the votes in place to pass it. In this climate, partisan politics is the only kind of politics we have.

But this is the part that gets me:
Following publication of this story, White House Deputy Press Secretary Tony Fratto sent a sharply worded response to The Hill.

“If Senator Schumer had a conscience he would end his political vaudeville act and let the Senate get back to work on important legislation,” said Fratto. “These games are a discredit to the Senate.”
Tony Fratto is a lobbyist turned Presidential mouthpiece. He’s not earned the right to say the kinds of things he says. If George W. Bush wants to be flip, let him come out and be flip himself.
Mickey @ 1:52 AM

come to order…

Posted on Friday 8 June 2007


Chaos Theory brings the dimension of non-linearity to mathematics [and gives us beautiful images to ponder]. Essentially, the theory posits that there is order in chaos, that chaos occurs at the edge of different types of order. So the cool ocean and the warm atmosphere interact to produce beautiful clouds and turbulent weather. The edge between ice and water produce the infinitely variation of snow flakes. It’s only on the edge of things that complexity and variance appear – the center of things [the black forms in the images above of the Mandelbrot set] are ordered and simple.

The so called U.S. Attorney Firing scandal [Purge-Gate] may be beginning to make more sense. Originally, the focus was on the firing of seven U.S. Attorneys on December 4, 2006. The clarity is coming on the edge, almost off the Radar. There were two other firings, before the November elections – also a number of other suspicious quittings. As for the quittings, Deborah Wong Yang in California who was about to indict Republican Congressman Jerry Lewis took a lucritive job with a private firm – the one defending Congressman Lewis. In Minnesota, Thomas Heffelfinger was prosecution Republican donor Dr. William McGuire for Stock Option fraud and was replaced by Rachel Paulose, who was with the firm defending McGuire. But it’s a toss up there, because Heffelfinger was also an ombudsman for the Native Americans – not a popular position with the Administration. Those were just some of the quittings. But what of the firings?

In Arkansas, Tim Griffin replaced Bud Cummins. From the start, they admitted it was because Griffin was one of Rove’s fair haired boys from the RNC and the Civil Rights section of the DoJ [revise your thoughts about the meaning of the words "Civil Rights"]. They wanted Tim to have a place. Even that may have been a lie. It seems that Bud Cummins was investigating Missouri Governor Matt Blunt and a law firm he had hired to work with his campaign – specifically a lawyer Mark "Thor" Hearne [Why an Arkansas U.S. Attorney was investigating a Missouri Governor is lost on me]. Who is Mark "Thor" Hearne [Let’s call him Thor]. ? It’s a long story, but here’s the short version [see the BradBlog for the whole story]. Thor is a Republican Lawyer, active in the National Republican Lawyers Association, in charge of their voter’s fraud initiative. He was also the Chief Counsel to the Bush/Cheney 2004 campaign.

When Congressman Bob Ney [now in prison, an Abramoff casualty] held hearings on voter irregularities in the Ohio 2004 election, Thor testified to the widespread voter fraud in Ohio as a representative of the American Center for Voting Rights. It turns out that this auspicious group was incorporated by a post office box in Dallas Texas four days before his testimony, and put up its web site a couple of days later. As of yet, no one knows who owns their headquarters [the post office box]. But then, he and two other members of this post office box organization were members of the Election Assistance Commission, a group of experts convened to study voter fraud. Who else was on this Commission? Big guys. Here’s a Report that lists the members and their conclusions [but I’m getting ahead of myself]. Just note that two of the people are Joseph Rich and Craig Donsanto, two long time career DoJ lawyers involved with voter’s rights.

Well, the Commission met about a year ago, and concluded that there wasn’t any evidence of widespread voter fraud. There was one dissenting opinion, the guys from the American Center for Voting Rights [Imagine that]. But anyway, you didn’t hear about that report, because it wasn’t released. It didn’t get released until December 6, 2007 – after the election – after the U.S. Attorneys were fired – and it had been altered! It’s findings watered down. So Thor is a Republican Operative from St. Louis, posing as an expert working for a made up organization. He’s involved in the Bush campaign, he was an "observer" in the Florida 2000 recount, he’s active in the National Republican Lawyers Association, and he’s under suspicion in the Missouri Governor’s race. The U.S. Attorney who was investigating him was abruptly replaced by one of Karl Rove’s Political Operatives, friend of Monica Goodling.

Meanwhile, still in Missouri, there was a hell of a race for a Senate seat – neck and neck. Todd Graves, U.S. Attorney in Missouri was replaced [before the election] by Bradley Schlozman [the odious worm who testified last week also from the Civil Rights section]. Schlozman, as you know, brings a voter fraud suit four days before the election against the Guidelines for U.S. Attorneys, Guidelines written by Craig Donsanto [I told you to remember his name]. It seems that it must’ve been an attempt to influence the voters in the Senate race. It didn’t work, by the way. The Demorcrat won by a nose.

Last week, Bradley Schlozman was testifying, and claimed Craig Donsanto told him to go ahead with the suit. David Iglesias, fired USA in New Mexico, says that it is inconceivable that what Schlozman said was true. Donsanto, he claims, would never say that. Oh yeah, that other name on the Election Assistance Commission, Joseph Rich? He wrote the editorial in the L.A. Times quoted in full in my last post accusing the Republicans of destroying and politicizing the DoJ.

See the order? It’s pretty clear. There are a bunch of Republican Clones inside and outside of the DoJ trying to get control of the voting process through hook or crook to keep the Republicans in power in perpetuity. Missouri has been ground zero for the plan.

At the center, it’s simple, clear, orderly…

Note1: The web site for the American Center for Voting Rights has just  disappeared
Note2: The C.E.O. of Thor‘s Law Firm, Lathrop and Gage, has just  resigned
Note3: Here are some articles about the American Center for Voting Rights and some of their documents preserved by their critics:
  • American Center for Voting Rights, Vote Fraud Exhibits A-O (8/2/05)
Mickey @ 2:14 PM

too important to edit…

Posted on Thursday 7 June 2007


Bush’s long history of tilting Justice
The administration began skewing federal law enforcement before the current U.S. attorney scandal, says a former Department of Justice lawyer

By Joseph D. Rich … JOSEPH D. RICH was chief of the voting section in the Justice Department’s civil right division from 1999 to 2005. He now works for the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.

THE SCANDAL unfolding around the firing of eight U.S. attorneys compels the conclusion that the Bush administration has rewarded loyalty over all else. A destructive pattern of partisan political actions at the Justice Department started long before this incident, however, as those of us who worked in its civil rights division can attest.

I spent more than 35 years in the department enforcing federal civil rights laws — particularly voting rights. Before leaving in 2005, I worked for attorneys general with dramatically different political philosophies — from John Mitchell to Ed Meese to Janet Reno. Regardless of the administration, the political appointees had respect for the experience and judgment of longtime civil servants.

Under the Bush administration, however, all that changed. Over the last six years, this Justice Department has ignored the advice of its staff and skewed aspects of law enforcement in ways that clearly were intended to influence the outcome of elections.

It has notably shirked its legal responsibility to protect voting rights. From 2001 to 2006, no voting discrimination cases were brought on behalf of African American or Native American voters. U.S. attorneys were told instead to give priority to voter fraud cases, which, when coupled with the strong support for voter ID laws, indicated an intent to depress voter turnout in minority and poor communities.

At least two of the recently fired U.S. attorneys, John McKay in Seattle and David C. Iglesias in New Mexico, were targeted largely because they refused to prosecute voting fraud cases that implicated Democrats or voters likely to vote for Democrats.

This pattern also extended to hiring. In March 2006, Bradley Schlozman was appointed interim U.S. attorney in Kansas City, Mo. Two weeks earlier, the administration was granted the authority to make such indefinite appointments without Senate confirmation. That was too bad: A Senate hearing might have uncovered Schlozman’s central role in politicizing the civil rights division during his three-year tenure.

Schlozman, for instance, was part of the team of political appointees that approved then-House Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s plan to redraw congressional districts in Texas, which in 2004 increased the number of Republicans elected to the House. Similarly, Schlozman was acting assistant attorney general in charge of the division when the Justice Department OKd a Georgia law requiring voters to show photo IDs at the polls. These decisions went against the recommendations of career staff, who asserted that such rulings discriminated against minority voters. The warnings were prescient: Both proposals were struck down by federal courts.

Schlozman continued to influence elections as an interim U.S. attorney. Missouri had one of the closest Senate races in the country last November, and a week before the election, Schlozman brought four voter fraud indictments against members of an organization representing poor and minority people. This blatantly contradicted the department’s long-standing policy to wait until after an election to bring such indictments because a federal criminal investigation might affect the outcome of the vote. The timing of the Missouri indictments could not have made the administration’s aims more transparent.

This administration is also politicizing the career staff of the Justice Department. Outright hostility to career employees who disagreed with the political appointees was evident early on. Seven career managers were removed in the civil rights division. I personally was ordered to change performance evaluations of several attorneys under my supervision. I was told to include critical comments about those whose recommendations ran counter to the political will of the administration and to improve evaluations of those who were politically favored.

Morale plummeted, resulting in an alarming exodus of career attorneys. In the last two years, 55% to 60% of attorneys in the voting section have transferred to other departments or left the Justice Department entirely.

At the same time, career staff were nearly cut out of the process of hiring lawyers. Control of hiring went to political appointees, so an applicant’s fidelity to GOP interests replaced civil rights experience as the most important factor in hiring decisions.

For decades prior to this administration, the Justice Department had successfully kept politics out of its law enforcement decisions. Hopefully, the spotlight on this misconduct will begin the process of restoring dignity and nonpartisanship to federal law enforcement. As the 2008 elections approach, it is critical to have a Justice Department that approaches its responsibility to all eligible voters without favor.
If it looks like I quoted the whole article, I did. It was too important to remove a single word. This man was a career DoJ employee until 2005. He’s the second real "insider" to speak out that I know of. James Comey, former Deputy Attorney General, spoke only when summoned to a Congressional Hearing. Joseph Rich is speaking on his own. There are plenty of people that know what this Administration has done to our Justice Department – turning it into an arm of the Republican Party, specifically designed to influence the outcome of our elections.

The testimony this week by Bradley Schlozman, a blatant political operative, was infuriating. In that testimony, he claimed that his bringing the ACORN suit four days before a closely contested election [counter to the DoJ guidelines] was approved by the author of those guidelines, Craig Donsanto, the director of the election crimes branch at the DoJ. Here’s what David Iglesias, one of the fired U.S. Attorneys had to say about that:

Former U.S. Attorney for New Mexico David Iglesias said he finds Bradley Schlozman’s testimony about Craig Donsanto unbelievable.
Donsanto is a career attorney at the Justice Department who literally wrote the book on Justice Department policy. One of the policies he outlines bars US attorneys from bringing election fraud cases before an election to prevent a chilling effect on voters.

Iglesias oversaw a voter fraud task force from 2004 until the summer of 2006 in New Mexico. He said during that time he consulted Donsanto on numerous occasions, including just before the 2004 election because the elections crime director was known as a "wise old owl when it came to voter fraud cases."

I asked Iglesias about an email we flagged yesterday that he had sent to a Justice Department aide saying there would be no indictments before the 2004 election because Donsanto would never approve it.

"I actually saw the email that I sent on TPMmuckraker and I know exactly what you’re talking about,” he said. “I had numerous conversations with [Donsanto] over the course of two years, I can’t believe that he’d have gone 180 degrees on that policy," Iglesias said. "I just don’t believe it."

Iglesias was in touch with Donsanto up until the summer of 2006, just before Schlozman would have received approval to bring the indictments. Iglesias said he can’t imagine a scenario where Donsanto would have changed his mind on the department’s voter fraud policy.

“Giving Brad Schlozman the benefit of the doubt, he must have completely misunderstood what Donsanto told him,” Iglesias said.
I’m less willing to give Bradley Schlozman any benefit of the doubt [it’s tough to have a personality that turns people off as quickly as he did]. In the hearings, Schumer implied that Craig Donsanto would be asked about this. I hope Schumer follows through with that. And how about calling those "Seven career managers" who "were removed in the civil rights division" to testify.

There are lots of whistles to be blown. Let the symphony begin…
Mickey @ 9:33 PM

letters…

Posted on Thursday 7 June 2007

I remember when I was in the Air Force, I had to fill out performance reviews on the corpsmen in our clinic. They were wonderful guys, and I gave them the highest of ratings. So, when the hospital commander called me in and said, "Are you trying to destroy their careers?" I didn’t know what he was talking about. It seems that there’s a code that’s used to assure someone’s promotion. One has to write the narrative using special words that indicate that the person you’re writing about is simply the best person that has ever been. I sort of snickered, and he said, "I know. I know… Just do it." So I did it.

I thought about that when I read the letters to Judge Walton supporting Scooter Libby. Even under supervision, I couldn’t have made up such flowery malarkey. But besides that [that being the baloney in those letters], I was confused by their point. The plea from Libby, consider "my whole life," or the requests in the letters to "consider all of his good works," or even the ones that said the verdict must be wrong because Libby just wasn’t that kind of guy, surprised me. I thought justice was blind. A crime is a crime, no matter what one’s history. And asking the judge to ignore the verdict based on Libby’s previous good works seemed bizarre [I’ll bet they didn’t take the previous lives of those prisoners in  Guantanamo into account]. Does that mean if you’ve been good, you get a free pass on being bad every once in a while?

I hate to over-read things, but it seems to me the letter writers are hopelessly naive, or live in a bubble. The way to get leniency is to admit guilt and apologize, not feign sainthood. Libby and his supporters don’t seem to think he did anything wrong to this day. My point is that there’s an elitism in that whole set of people that’s staggering – above the law. It reminded me of that Bush line at some posh fund-raiser, "Some call you the elite. I call you ‘my base.’"… 

Mickey @ 6:11 PM

will they never stop!

Posted on Thursday 7 June 2007

Dr. James W. Holsinger Jr.

President Bush’s nominee for surgeon general, Dr. James W. Holsinger Jr., wrote a paper in 1991 that purported to make the medical argument that homosexuality is unnatural and unhealthy. Doctors who reviewed the paper derided it as prioritizing political ideology over science, and Democratic aides on Capitol Hill say the paper will make his confirmation hearings problematic, if not downright bruising.

Holsinger, 68, presented "The Pathophysiology of Male Homosexuality" in January 1991 to a United Methodist Church’s committee to study homosexuality… The church was then considering changing its view that homosexuality violates Christian teaching, though it ultimately did not do so. Relying on footnotes from mainstream medical publications, Holsinger argued that homosexuality isn’t natural or healthy.
I’ve posted Dr. Holsinger’s paper here. Read it and weep…
Mickey @ 2:29 PM

it’s about time…

Posted on Thursday 7 June 2007

The DoJ email dump was on my mind when I woke up this morning [I guess someone put a pea under my matress]. In the emails in the last post, Monica Goodling is setting up the order for she and Kyle Sampson to take over hiring and firing – make it un-numbered [secret], use positions rather than names, communicate about it using email "outside the system." It’s all happening in early to mid January.

Yet remember this from the earliest email dumps?

It’s the timing that’s stuck in my craw. The earliest copies of Sampson’s negotiations with Miers were in early January 2006. At almost the same time, Goodling was already drafting the AG’s coming order to turn hiring and firing over to operatives, she and Sampson. It sounds to me like there was a lot of wheeling and dealing in early January 2006, gearing up for a firing of some kind or another.

What difference does the timing make? It has to do with "volition."  In this January email, Sampson points out the problems with firing. By March 2006, they had a plan to deal with the problems in place. They had a provision to go around the Senate in the Patriot Act and an order delegating personell matters to Sampson and Goodling:

Which brings me to my point. All of this planning had to do with firing the U.S. Attorneys right after the midterm elections. When they lost, there was a postponement for several weeks, during which they revised their plan and girded their loins for opposition from the new Democratic Majority. Then, they fired seven Attorneys on December 4, 2006.

The powers that be claim that all of this was a routine personell matter. No one believes that – at least no one with even the slightest bit of information about the sequence of things. But, as the scandal broke, mor things came to light. There were others, eased out over the year before the firing. Heffelfinger in Minnesota was replaced with Rachel Paulose, probably because of his advocacy for Native Americans. Tim Griffin, a Rove aid and clone unseated Bud Collins in Arkansas. In Missouri, Todd Graves, a solid citizen, was replaced with a Republican operative and weasel, Bradley Scholzman. It’s highly possible that Scholzman got put in place early to file a suit designed to influence the Missouri Senatorial race.

These new emails do add something. They strengthen the case that the U.S. Attorney firings were a carefully orchestrated Republican ploy to influence elections and further Administration policies. Monica Goodling and Kyle Sampson were grunts in this campaign [add Sara Taylor, recently resigned and still behind a firewall]. This is criminal activity, and it’s going to come to light. It can’t be swept under the rug anymore. There’s too much evidence already. Is there a Special Prosecutor in the house?

Mickey @ 1:50 PM

there’s a new DoJ document dump…

Posted on Wednesday 6 June 2007

 

I saw two nuggets on a quick perusal. In the second set, there are emails suggesting that Monica Goodling was intimately involved in drafting the secret order that she and Kyle Sampson would take over hiring and firing at the DoJ – including deciding that it would be secret:

There are also emails suggesting that there was an alternative email conduit being used to communicate [the RNC Server?]:

Both things are a big deal. Monica Goodling’s testimony certainly never indicated that she was a participant in getting this authority, or was, perhaps, the architect of that order, or its secrecy. But there it is in black and white. I don’t recall her being questioned about an alternative email route bringing it up, yet here she is asking for email communication to travel outside the DoJ system [in secret]. I can think of no benign reason for her to route email outside the system. How about inviting her back to the committee for another round?

Mickey @ 11:04 PM

prosecute Bradley Schlozman…
and where is Sara Taylor?

Posted on Wednesday 6 June 2007

Obviously, my attempts to put Bradley Schlozman out of my mind are failing. So here’s the part that lingers. In the ACORN case, he was repeatedly confronted about bringing this suit four days before a contested election. The facts are simple:
  • The guidelines for the U.S. Attorneys [written by Craig Donsanto] say that you don’t bring political suits close to elections [for obvious reasons].
  • ACORN was cooperating with the Justice Department.
Schlozman retorts:
  • They’re only guidelines, not rules.
  • His bringing this case was "approved" by Craig Donsanto in the Election Crimes Division. Specifically, he said, "If you’ve got a case, prosecute it."
While no one questions that the Guidelines are not binding, here’s my question. If you don’t follow the guidelines, there must be a reason to over-ride them. If you’re on the phone, questioning the guidelines with their author, and get him to say "If you’ve got a case, prosecute it," you must be pressing to go ahead with the case. What possible reason could there be for pressing to get a case out there that couldn’t wait a week? I cannot think of any reason for rushing the case that’s not political.

Bradley Schlozman is saying, "You can’t prove my bringing this suit was politically motivated, therefore it wasn’t politically motivated." In the absence of any other conceivable reason, it was politically motivated, Bradley. You’re lying…

Update: Apparently this points sticks with others…

Bradley Schlozman pointed to Craig Donsanto in his testimony today when he was asked who gave him the go ahead to press criminal voter fraud charges days before the 2006 midterm election, in an apparent violation of agency policy.

Donsanto, though, is the director of the Election Crimes branch of the Justice Department and author of the manual outlining that policy. It seems a bit surprising that he’d be the one to approve skirting that election policy, when he’d literally written the manual.

Schlozman’s account also conflicts with an email former U.S. Attorney from New Mexico, David Iglesias sent to a Department of Justice legislative aide in 2004, just before an election. The email, contained in a DOJ document dump in April, shows Donsanto’s stance was on bringing charges just before an election:

There will be another meeting of the EFTF (Election Fraud Task Force) on Wed, Oct. 6. Craig Donsanto has not authorized the FBI to open any case.

The federal members of the EFTF should be aware of the DoJ policy of not attempting to influence the outcome of an election through investigation or prosecution. I am not aware of any prosecution which will commence before November 2, 2004. I know Donsanto would not authorize such action because he has stated the same.

Note that last line again: " I am not aware of any prosecution which will commence before November 2, 2004. I know Donsanto would not authorize such action because he has stated the same."
I say prosecute Bradley Schlozman… 
Mickey @ 10:07 AM

the real deal…

Posted on Wednesday 6 June 2007

This morning, I went to CSPAN-3 and watched yesterday’s Senate Hearing with Bradley Schlozman and Todd Graves. I’d watched some of Schlozman [in horror]. I think the reason the Senators were so hard on him was that he was a contemptuous person. He reminded me of Douglas Feith. I’m not big on character assassination – I prefer to talk about what people do rather than what they are. But with Schlozman, words like "twerp" or "weasel" kept coming to mind. He was the worst yet. I was surprised at Monica Goodling. She seemed young, misguided, but at least competent. This guy [Schlozman] was someone only a mother could love.

But I didn’t watch all of Bradley Schlozman yesterday. It felt like life-quenching activity. I put some new seats in our aging aluminum boat as a more productive alternative to sitting in front of a T.V. set watching in disbelief – that he was a high ranking anything, much less government official. This morning, I moved to the end of the Hearing. Senator Whitehouse [D-Delaware] questioned Todd Graves, the U.S. Attorney from Western Missouri who was fired to make room for Bradley Schlozman. What a contrast! Todd Graves was a solid citizen. Sort of a Jack Armstrong, All American Boy type who typified what a Federal Prosecutor ought to be. He was like Patrick Fitzgerald. And his answers and his view of the Justice Department were solid as a rock.

The very idea that Todd Graves was fired to make way for a whiney political operative like Schlozman is unimaginable on any level. If you need a boost this morning, go to CSPAN3 and look for recent clips. Like my English Professors used to ask on final exams:

Compare and Contrast Bradley Schlozman and Todd Graves.
Which one was the "real deal?"
Explain your choice?

Mickey @ 9:18 AM