Mueller notes counteract Gonzo testimony

FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III handed over his notes pertaining to the Ashcroft bedside visit to the House Judiciary Commitee - and although they are highly redacted - meaning almost everything is crossed out - the items still visible are noteworthy.

For example... attendees at the meetings where the secret wiretapping program was discussed: the highest ranking official being... VP. I'm guessing we can be pretty sure who made that call. The question of the hour is whether Bush even knew many of the details of this program in the first place.

Mueller also backs up Comey's testimony that Ashcroft was in much worse shape than Gonzo admitted, and that Gonzo and Card were in fact badgering a very sick man.

From the Washington Post:

Mueller's description of Ashcroft's physical condition that night contrasts with testimony last month from Gonzales, who told the Senate Judiciary Committee that Ashcroft was "lucid" and "did most of the talking" during the brief visit. It also confirms an account of the episode by former deputy attorney general James B. Comey, who said Ashcroft told the two men he was not well enough to make decisions in the hospital.

"Saw AG," Mueller writes in his notes for 8:10 p.m. on March 10, 2004, only minutes after Gonzales and White House chief of staff Andrew H. Card Jr. had visited Ashcroft. "Janet Ashcroft in the room. AG in chair; is feeble, barely articulate, clearly stressed."

And of course... that Gonzo apparently lied under oath once again:

First thing to note. Mueller testified on July 26, contra Gonzales, that the legal dispute between Gonzales and Acting Attorney General Jim Comey that prompted the rush to Ashcroft's hospital room had to do with the program now known as the Terrorist Surveillance Program. (Gonzales insisted on July 24, as he had in testimony last year, that Comey objected to "other intelligence activities," not the TSP.) The surveillance program known as the TSP was but one component of a constellation of surveillance activities, even though Comey and others at the time of the March 2004 controversy considered the whole effort -- authorized under a single 2001 executive order -- to be a unitary enterprise. Now notice that all throughout Mueller's memo, he refers to "program" -- singular.

It is also almost unfathomable that Ashcroft - then the Attorney General - was kept mostly in the dark about the details of the program.


From TPMmuckracker:

According to FBI Director Robert Mueller's notes on the March 10, 2004 visit to Ashcroft's hospital room, Ashcroft told Andrew Card and Alberto Gonzales that "strict compartmentalization rules" by the White House prevented him from "obtaining the advice he needed" about the warrantless surveillance program. At first glance, I thought that meant that Ashcroft himself was prevented from knowing certain aspects of the program. Several commenters read it differently, and judged that Ashcroft was complaining that his key advisers were barred from information about the program that would inform Ashcroft about its legality. And today, the Washington Post backs them up, citing anonymous official sources.

This, however, seems like two sides of the same coin. If Ashcroft couldn't consult with senior legal advisers about Program X, the White House was essentially keeping Ashcroft -- and the Justice Department -- in the dark about the legal basis for the surveillance program, expecting him to simply bless the effort without asking too many questions. After all, Ashcroft's tenure showed a consistent deference to presidential prerogative -- most notably, when he warned the Senate about the Patriot Act that "those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty, my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists." If Ashcroft couldn't vet the program with his legal advisers, it's an open question about what he really "knew" about its legality. Sure enough, as soon as the program was opened to Ashcroft's deputy, Jim Comey, a longtime U.S. attorney and Justice official, Comey saw a program riddled with legal problems.

Ashcroft was never told...

Well no wonder he wouldn't sign off on the wiretapping program. The White House wouldn't even tell John Ashcroft what they were doing!

Wow - who knew? It appears that Ashcroft was never a Bushie: apparently he didn't have insider 'Bushie clearance.'

And so, because he wouldn't play the game and sign whatever piece of paper they put in front of him, Bush replaced Ashcroft with Gonzo. And Gonzo knew exactly what he was signing -- because he and Loo undoubtedly wrote it -- although now, of course, he doesn't recall...

I should have saved the 'banana republic' pic for this. Can we have Ashcroft back? Or better yet: can we have Comey? Why don't they impeach Gonzo and give us someone we KNOW is honest?

This from Matt Renner of truthout.org:

Notes from FBI Director Robert Mueller, released Thursday by Congress, revealed that Bush administration officials may have prevented Attorney General John Ashcroft from conducting a review of a spying program, while at the same time attempting to gain Ashcroft's approval of the program.

Former Counsel to the House of Representatives Stanley Brand said it is "unbelievable" that "the Attorney General of the United States was barred from getting information on a decision that the law required him to make." Brand said, "This notion that the President can seal himself off from his own Attorney General is ludicrous."

In May, former Deputy Attorney General James Comey told Congressional investigators that in March 2004 a standoff between the White House and the Justice Department ensued because Comey would not authorize a continuation of a warrantless wiretapping program instituted by the Bush administration. According to Comey's testimony, his refusal to reauthorize the spy program resulted in a street race between himself and two White House officials to the hospital, where then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales and President Bush's former Chief of Staff Andrew Card tried to coerce a barely conscious Ashcroft to approve the controversial eavesdropping program.

Mueller told Congress that he recorded and kept notes about this incident because of the extraordinary nature of this encounter.

According to his notes, Mueller arrived at the hospital at 7:40 p.m., 20 minutes after receiving a call from Comey saying that Gonzales and Card were en route to the hospital and requesting Mueller's presence in order to "witness the condition of the Attorney General." By the time Mueller arrived, Gonzales and Card had already left. Mueller's notes of the subsequent conversation between Comey, Ashcroft and Mueller reveal that the top law enforcement officer of the United States may have been prevented from reviewing the wiretapping program that had already been put in place by the president.

In his notes, Mueller says that Ashcroft "reviewed for Gonzales and Card the legal concerns relating to the program. The AG also told Gonzales and Card that he was barred from obtaining the advice he needed on the program by the strict compartmentalization rules of the White House."

John Conyers, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, called this new revelation "particularly disconcerting."

Gosh -- ya think?

Gonzogate update

According to RAW STORY, Hospital-gate hero James Comey disclosed a little more dirt on Gonzo today, indicating that Gonzales tried to remove a layer of oversight (over himself) once he took over as Attorney General at the beginning of Bush's second nightmare term. (Oops, that slipped out.) Apparently Comey was still Deputy Attorney General when Gonzales' reign of terror began.

"Soon after Gonzales became attorney general, his then chief of staff, Kyle Sampson, told Comey that Gonzales's 'vision' was to merge the deputy's office with Gonzales's own office," wrote Chitra Ragavan.

Raghavan quoted Comey as saying that he opposed the move.

"You may want to try that with the next deputy attorney general. But it's not going to work with me," he reportedly told Gonzales's ex-Chief of Staff Sampson.

I am really starting to like this guy.

"Mr. Sampson explained to me a vision for the operation of the Attorney General’s office and the Office of the Deputy Attorney General that would involve operating those respective staffs as essentially one staff," Comey wrote in responses to questions for the record submitted by members of the House Judiciary Committee. The responses were sent to RAW STORY.

Comey went on to explain how Gonzales's plan to merge his office with Comey's would have eliminated a layer of oversight on the Attorney General's decision-making.

"I think such an arrangement risks elimination of the separate vetting and advice function of the DAG and his or her staff. There is great value in having that office – called ODAG -- available to make decisions that need not reach the Attorney General or to review and advise on matters headed to the Attorney General for decision," the former top government attorney wrote. "The risk inherent in combining the staffs is that the separate review and advice function is lost, which would not be in the interest of the Attorney General or the Department."

Comey also answered additional questions about the now famous hospital attack of then sick John Ashcroft by then-White House Counsel Gonzales and fellow White House thug, Andy Card. The two accosted Ashcroft in his hospital room and tried to get the sick man to sign off on the legality of a domestic spying program operated by the National Security Agency.

Comey told House investigators that while John Ashcroft's wife was in the room for the discussion (she did not have a security clearance - like the thugs would have cared; that was the least of their concerns,) Comey didn't know if any classified information had been discussed.

"I did not discuss classified information," he said. "I do not recall whether Mr. Gonzales mentioned any aspects of the matter that would be considered classified, including the name of the program – which was itself classified, as I recall – when addressing Mr. Ashcroft."

Comey also noted that Ashcroft's hospital room had not been cleared as a secure location for discussing classified subjects, or patently illegal breaches of Constitutional law... etc.

Who made the call?

And now the question everyone has been asking - and of course, the question that the president will not answer: who made that famous 'Wednesday Night AmBush' phone call? (See Comey testimony via YouTube below.)

According to the Washington Post, it doesn't really matter that the president refused to answer one way or another (what - no lies this time?)

I personally think it does matter: as do all of the other lies, misdirections, 'lost' emails, secret meetings with partisan agendas, fired prosecutors, stolen elections, secret torture camps, the entire illegal premise for the Iraq war and a myriad of Constitutional attacks committed during his watch.

Everything matters.

But then again... I suppose it doesn't matter... if no one in Washington is willing to do anything about it.

According to the Washington Post, Friday editorial:

IT DOESN'T much matter whether President Bush was the one who phoned Attorney General John D. Ashcroft's hospital room before the Wednesday Night Ambush in 2004. It matters enormously, however, whether the president was willing to have his White House aides try to strong-arm the gravely ill attorney general into overruling the Justice Department's legal views. It matters enormously whether the president, once that mission failed, was willing nonetheless to proceed with a program whose legality had been called into question by the Justice Department. That is why Mr. Bush's response to questions about the program yesterday was so inadequate.

Somehow - in the days of my childhood - it was still possible to prosecute a president caught breaking the law.

I remember seeing Nixon's resignation speech on television when I was, well, old enough to realize that this was something completely new. What I didn't realize was that it was the surest sign that democracy was working as it should: that there were consequences for breaking the law, even at the highest level of the Federal government.

Apparently, the democracy of my childhood is now hopelessly broken. Everyone is screaming... but nobody is acting.

Come on - you know its atrocious when a still living, ex-president comes right out and says Bush is the "worst president in history" at handling international relations. Think about that. A former president calling the current president "the worst in history." Has that ever happened before? I highly doubt it. But then again, we've never seen behavior like this from within the White House.

Bill Clinton is mum of course; (golfs with W's daddy and his wife is running for president, so there is duct-tape over his mouth.) In contrast, the ever conscientious President Carter has obviously seen enough:

Former President Carter says President Bush's administration is "the worst in history" in international relations, taking aim at the White House's policy of pre-emptive war and its Middle East diplomacy.

The criticism from Carter, which a biographer says is unprecedented for the 39th president, also took aim at Bush's environmental policies and the administration's "quite disturbing" faith-based initiative funding.

"I think as far as the adverse impact on the nation around the world, this administration has been the worst in history," Carter told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in a story that appeared in the newspaper's Saturday editions. "The overt reversal of America's basic values as expressed by previous administrations, including those of George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon and others, has been the most disturbing to me."

I have given up even asking 'what will it take?' It doesn't matter.

It is increasingly obvious that Bush could grab a high-power rifle and start picking off passersby from an upstairs window of the White House, and no one would raise a finger.

I doubt ABC would even cover it.

A night at the movies with Jon Stewart

I keep hearing that ABC and the other major networks are doing everything possible to avoid the Comey testimony (amazing as that may seem.)

This is to be expected from Fox, of course: but surely the other networks would be unable to resist something this sensational.

Lest we ever question the motives of their corporate owners: um ABC... your Bushie underwear is showing...

Meanwhile, those of us "highly educated and politically informed" viewers of The Daily Show were not disappointed!

Banish the "Mayberry Machiavellis"

To all of you reasonable, decent, law-abiding, Constitution-adhering Republicans out there: have you had enough yet?

This can't be pleasant for you. Its horrifying for all of us, but I can only imagine how difficult this must be for those of you who actually voted for it.

You were deceived.

This 'compassionate conservative' lied to you. It happens.

Those of us who voted for Clinton also discovered a few dirty little secrets after he left office - Monica was the least of it. Clinton was simply a lot more clever at hiding issues that wouldn't be particularly popular with the masses - like selling out our media to monopolization by corporate overlords. Wonder why you always have to turn to cable TV to find anything authentic: ie, not white-washed, sanitized and 'dumbed down'? Thank Clinton.

This is much worse of course, because these Bushies don't make even a pretense of abiding by the rule of law. Its 'partisan-way or the highway' if you want to work in the Bushland: and they don't even bother to find qualified stooges for some of the most critical departments in our nation's government (*cough* FEMA.)

If you're a loyal Bushie, you too can be Ambassador to the UN! You too can be head of the FDA! Want your mining company to expand at an unprecedented rate and have rights to drill literally anywhere in the country, including National Parks and public lands from sea to shining sea? If you are a loyal Bushie - you too can be head of the EPA or Fish and Wildlife, or Forest Service, or Department of the Interior! Hate wolves? If you are a loyal Bushie, you can wipe them off the face of the planet! Want your business to make triple its previous annual earnings in a few months? If you are a loyal Bushie, you too can be an Iraq contractor! Are you totally unqualified to run a rural McDonalds, but you've always wanted a hot-shot position high up in the Federal government? No problem! If... you are a loyal Bushie.

But what if - heaven forbid - you are a Republican with a conscience?

After listening to former deputy attorney general, James Comey's testimony yesterday via YouTube, it occurred to me how absolutely horrific this must be for those within the administration that actually have souls, ethical centers and who believe in the rule of law. Comey is a real patriot: he was prepared to tender his resignation rather than allow illegal warrantless wiretapping to take place without the authority of the Department of Justice. From the sound of it, the entire department, as well as the head of the FBI -- all were willing to give up their jobs, because they believed in something greater than themselves. They believed in America. They believed in law and the Constitution.

Our government is going to hell in a handbag under the Bush Administration and its racketeers. Frank Rich, of the New York Times, summed it up pretty well, when he wrote:

By my rough, conservative calculation — feel free to add — there have been corruption, incompetence, and contracting or cronyism scandals in these cabinet departments: Defense, Education, Justice, Interior, Homeland Security, Veterans Affairs, Health and Human Services, and Housing and Urban Development. I am not counting State, whose deputy secretary, a champion of abstinence-based international AIDS funding, resigned last month in a prostitution scandal, or the General Services Administration, now being investigated for possibly steering federal favors to Republican Congressional candidates in 2006. Or the Office of Management and Budget, whose chief procurement officer was sentenced to prison in the Abramoff fallout. I will, however, toss in a figure that reveals the sheer depth of the overall malfeasance: no fewer than four inspectors general, the official watchdogs charged with investigating improprieties in each department, are themselves under investigation simultaneously — an all-time record.

Wrongdoing of this magnitude does not happen by accident, but it is not necessarily instigated by a Watergate-style criminal conspiracy. When corruption is this pervasive, it can also be a byproduct of a governing philosophy. That’s the case here. That Bush-Rove style of governance, the common denominator of all the administration scandals, is the Frankenstein creature that stalks the G.O.P. as it faces 2008. It has become the Republican brand and will remain so, even after this president goes, until courageous Republicans disown it and eradicate it.

Until courageous Republicans disown and eradicate it. Bingo.

My own Senator, Richard Lugar, is probably the best representative I've ever had in my life - hands down. No matter what the subject, concern or issue - every time I write to his office, I receive a personal response. Recently I wrote to him and begged him to do something about the pet food disaster (the tainted food ingredients imported from China.) I happened to mention that I was a Celiac and that its hard enough to find food that I myself can eat, let along trying to keep my pets from dying of ingredients I can't even verify. I received - as always - a response from his office, on his letterhead. It was an absolutely amazing letter, in that he responded to every bit of my content - right down to expressing his regret that I suffered from Celiac, and that he was working to get better labeling for food additives! Talk about representation... the man actually reads his letters. He also cares.

I don't agree with many of his votes, but I realize that in this now partisan time, his choices are limited. He can vote with his party, now ruled by these 'Mayberry Machiavellis;' or he can vote against his conservative values and with the Democrats - something that will be loudly attacked and trumpeted through the press as a betrayal to his party.

After a lifetime serving as a Republican Senator in a predominantly Republican state, I can see why he isn't willing to line up against his party. But I keep waiting for him to speak out against the unconscionable behavior of his associates.

Lugar is a good man. What is a good man doing in the middle of this new 'sewer' politics?

I am watching him closely, occasionally begging him to line up with Hagel or at least consider speaking out, where he can. Lugar has a soul, a conscience. Lugar is one of the chief reasons I can't throw the conservative baby out with the dirty, stinking neocon bathwater. And there are many other Lugars out there; the term 'conflicted' probably doesn't even come close to describing their current predicament.

Gentlemen and ladies: save your party. You don't have to put up with this... criminal behavior. Seriously, you don't. None of us should be tolerating this blatant abuse of power.

As an independent, its easy for me to rail against it, because I don't 'own it.' But I also believe that because you were so gravely deceived by these people who now run roughshod over our government - you don't have to own it either. You can, in the words of Nancy Reagan, 'just say no.'

Say no to the corruption. Say no to corporate pandering, lies, illegal behavior, torture, bigotry and just bad governance. Say no to partisanship and choose instead to be 'American' rather than just 'Republican.' Defend your Constitution against those within your party who blatantly attack and undercut it, and through these attacks - our democracy.

It is time to defend America here at home. This is stuff you can sink your teeth into... real patriotism, not just empty words.

Let's get it done. The only way we're going to clean up this stinking mess that sociopathic neocons have made out of our once working Federal government, is to pull together as a nation of citizens... and just say no.

Ashcroft refused to authorize warrantless wiretapping

I've never been a big fan of John Ashcroft.

However in light of recent testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee by former Deputy Attorney General James Comey... I'm seeing John Ashcroft in a whole new light.

According the testimony by Comey, Ashcroft was so offended when he discovered that the Bush Administration had initiated a program of warrentless wiretapping on American citizens in 2004, that he was actually prepared to resign in protest. Other members of the Defense Department also threatened to resign, along with FBI Director Robert Mueller.

Ashcroft apparently believes in the sanctity of the Constitution.

This would not have come as a shock to us in 2004. We were still innocent then. Long ago - in 2004 - most of us still believed that all of our legislators adhered to the Constitution, on which they had taken their oath of office.

Compared with Bush, Cheney and gang, Ashcroft seems almost heroic in the stand he took against warrantless wiretapping during his watch. And he did manage to squelch it, at least for awhile. Or at least the most blatantly illegal portions of it, the portions that were completely indefensible. Exactly what any of this entailed is, of course, secret. Everything that involves our Constitutional rights - completely secret. And whatever Ashcroft managed to avoid for us only lasted until Alberto Gonzales took over.

The story that came out in Comey's testimony, of Ashcroft - lying sick in a hospital bed with pancreatitis in March of 2004 - is startling in its coldly calculated attempt at manipulation.

Apparently, the GOP does eat its own.

Comey told Congress that Ashcroft refused to sign off on the spying campaign because he believed it was unconstitutional (proving once and for all that the Justice Department, at least initially, believed the surveillance program to be illegal.)

Comey then told the Justice Committee a little story.

It seems that then White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales and White House chief of staff Andrew Card actually tried to coerce Ashcroft into re-authorizing the program as he lay seriously ill in a hospital bed with pancreatitis, after then acting-Attorney General Comey (who was covering for him in his absence,) refused to sign off on the program.

Apparently hoping to catch Ashcroft at an unguarded moment while he was sick and perhaps incognizant, Gonzales and Card raced to the hospital in an attempt to get Ashcroft to sign from his hospital bed. When Comey discovered their plan, he too raced to the hospital, arriving ahead of them to support Ashcroft.

From McClatchy:

The Bush administration ran its warrantless eavesdropping program without the Justice Department's approval for up to three weeks in 2004, nearly triggering a mass resignation of the nation's top law enforcement officials, the former No. 2 official disclosed Tuesday.

In testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee, former Deputy Attorney General James Comey said that those he believed were prepared to quit included then-Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller.

Comey said then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales and former White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card visited Ashcroft as he lay gravely ill in a hospital bed on March 10, 2004, and pressed him to re-certify the program's legality. Ashcroft refused.

"I was angry. I thought I had just witnessed an effort to take advantage of a very seriously sick man, who did not have the powers of the attorney general because they had been transferred to me," Comey recalled. "I thought it was improper."

Comey, who'd assumed Ashcroft's powers on an acting basis, had raced ahead of Gonzales and Card to the George Washington University Hospital, his car's emergency lights flashing, and dashed up the stairs to Ashcroft's room, trailed by his security detail.

"That night was probably the most difficult time of my professional life," Comey recalled.

Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) called Comey's words "some of the most powerful testimony I've heard in 25 years as a legislator." Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA), a long time critic of the eavesdropping program, praised Comey for standing up to the White House.