Look Over There, It's The Libby Trial!

I never thought that I'd say this but this week the Libby trial is small potatoes.

Remember "Support the troops" and it's corollary "Any Criticism Is Treason"? Well, how about the Walter Reed Scandal.

Remember The Constitution? How about The Magna Carta? Well, what have you done about the removal of the right of Habeas Corpus from our country for anyone that our President labels an 'enemy combatant' - someone who might be a critic of the U.S. or administration policies.

But ... that's nothing.

From CNN:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A fired federal prosecutor told a Senate committee Tuesday that he felt "leaned on" and sickened as Republican Sen. Pete Domenici hung up on him in disgust last fall when told that indictments in a corruption case against Democrats would not be issued before the fall elections.

"He said, 'Are these going to be filed before November?' " former federal prosecutor David Iglesias, one of eight U.S. attorneys summarily fired in recent months, told the panel. "I said I didn't think so. And to which he replied, 'I'm very sorry to hear that.' And then the line went dead."

Cummins said in an e-mail released by the Senate Judiciary Committee that
Mike Elston, chief of staff to Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty, had called and expressed his displeasure that the fired prosecutors talked to reporters about their dismissals.

"If they (DOJ) feel like any of us intend to continue to offer quotes to the press, or organize behind the scenes congressional pressure, then they feel forced to somehow pull their gloves off and offer public criticisms to defend their actions more fully," Cummins said in the e-mail to five other fired prosecutors.

The Justice Department denied that any threat, implied or otherwise, was made.

From NY Times

Another prosecutor, John McKay of Seattle, said he received a call in late 2004 from Ed Cassidy, a former chief of staff to Representative Doc Hastings, Republican of Washington.

At the time, Mr. McKay was weighing whether to convene a grand jury to investigate accusations of voter fraud in a close election for governor. He said Mr. Cassidy called to inquire about the status of the investigation.

Mr. McKay said he cut off the conversation, telling Mr. Cassidy that he was certain he would not want to ask about confidential prosecution matters. “I was concerned and disconcerted by the call,” Mr. McKay said

And this letter to Andrew Sullivan, outlining a level of governmental subversion of dissent that even Richard Nixon could never have dreamed of:

The key is crude political direction of the prosecutorial service - go get Democrats, and do it in a way to get maximum electoral benefit; lay off the corrupt Republicans; use your prosecutorial authority for voter suppression projects targeting minorities. This is exactly the sort of conduct that the system is constructed to make impossible. For three years now I've heard a steady flow of whispers from DOJ professionals that this sort of stuff is going on, and even I (certainly no friend of the Administration) kept thinking: no, it can't be. But it is. This will call for very stringent action: the appointment of a special prosecutor, an independent investigation, and certainly the dismissal of Gonzales and McNulty. Ultimately perhaps their prosecution.

What the hell has happened to us? And who will lead us out?

I think that the term "Bush Hater" has become synonymous with "visionary".