Fun with the confirmation hearings for Alberto Gonzalez

Ideally they would use Gitmo techniques on Gonzalez...

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1802&u=/washpost/20050105/ts_washpost/a48446_2005jan4&printer=1

Alberto R. Gonzales, the White House counsel, intervened directly with Justice Department lawyers in 2002 to obtain a legal ruling on the extent of the president's authority to permit extreme interrogation practices in the name of national security, current and former administration officials said Tuesday.
...
The request by Mr. Gonzales produced the much-debated Justice Department memorandum of Aug. 1, 2002, which defined torture narrowly and said that Mr. Bush could circumvent domestic and international prohibitions against torture in the name of national security.
...
John Yoo, a senior Justice Department lawyer who wrote much of the memorandum, exchanged draft language with lawyers at the White House, the officials said. Mr. Yoo, now a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley, said in an article published Sunday in The San Jose Mercury News that Mr. Gonzales did not apply any pressure on him to tailor the memorandum to accommodate the White House.

Instead, Mr. Yoo said that Mr. Gonzales was merely seeking to "understand all available options" in a perilous time, when the United States faced unprecedented threats.

But a senior administration official disagreed, saying that the memorandum's conclusions appeared to closely align with the prevailing White House view of interrogation practices. The official said the memorandum raised questions about whether the Office of Legal Counsel had maintained its longstanding tradition of dispensing objective legal advice to its clients in executive-branch agencies.

While the nature of Mr. Gonzales's specific discussions with the Justice Department remains unclear, administration officials said that Mr. Gonzales's customary way of dealing with Justice Department lawyers was to pose questions about issues rather than offer his own conclusions, although one said his preferences could sometimes be inferred easily from his questions.

So, to step back for a second and take it all in...the U.S. Congress is about to approve as attorney general of the United States of America a man who sought and actively applied legal guidelines legitimizing the use of torture.

One thing I'll say for the Bush administration is that, even after 4 years, they somehow still manage to always be worse than I think.

"Gonzalez Vows to Follow Law"

On the enemy combatant thing -- the cons always sidestep this one. As the NPR reporter pointed out, no one has debtated the fact that Al Qaeda prisoners are not POWs. The question is about Taliban fighters, who, like it or not, were soldiers of their country defending their land.

wow. ALL EIGHT Democrats voted against the guy.

....but the 10 repubs voted for. So that was that.

also,

Asked about Gonzales' written response the CIA (news - web sites) was not specifically forbidden from abusing detainees overseas, Bush said: "Listen, Al Gonzales reflects our policy, and that is we don't sanction torture. He will be a great attorney general."

Reid says up to 30 of the 44 Senate Democrats may vote against Gonzalez on Thursday. There's even this line:

"The idea that the other side of the aisle is even considering filibustering this manifestation of the American dream that's represented by Judge Gonzales is simply beyond me," Frist told reporters.

and, of course, whenever I think of The American Dream, there's only one image in my mind:

ihttp://perso.club-internet.fr/austinwm/HTLM/Photos/D/Dusty_Rhodes/Dusty_Rhodes_-_Virgil_Riley_Runnels_Jr_01.jpg

"Right here, ONNNNAA Muthaship!"

TOUGH JOB MARKET: Former attorney general Alberto Gonzales has been unable to interest law firms in adding his name to their roster... Developing...

lol

Although I don't feel bad for the guy, he has kind of become a scapegoat. I mean he's just as responsible as anyone else for the legal nightmare of this administration, but it neither started nor ended with him.