Purge

We may see Monica on the stand yet. Conyers (MI) and Sanchez (CA) responded to Goodling's attorney:

[T]he Fifth Amendment privilege, under long-standing Supreme Court precedents, does not provide a reason to fail to appear to testify; the privilege must be invoked by the witness on a question-by-question basis.

As we thought, Monica was jumping the gun a bit by taking the Fifth before she even took the stand.

Game on.

Gonzo Woes

Ooooh. Unfair.

The Senators have sent another demand.

The committee wants all the relevant documents, all the lists, all the rankings of U.S. attorneys, every scrap of paper.

[...]

In particular, the committee members asked for Gonzales' cheat sheets on the firings.

  TPM Muckraker article

They're asking for the little notes he's writing to himself while he's preparing for his testimony. That's just not right. It should make it all the harder for him, since he doesn't appear to be the kind of guy who can wing it. But I'm having a hard time working up any sympathy for Gonzo.

The Committee wasn't too happy with the document dump they received from their last request, either. Now they want...

...the full text of all documents that had been partially or completely blacked out in the Justice Department's initial release of more than 3,000 pages last month. [... and] an unredacted list ranking the performance and standing of each of the 93 U.S. attorneys.

By the way, Kyle Sampson's replacement as Chief of Staff for Gonzo is Kevin J. O'Connor No, not that Kevin J. O'Connor. This one.

gwb43

The side issue to the Attorney purge - or I should say a side issue - is the use of "unofficial" email services to avoid required scrutiny.

A White House spokesman defended the use of outside e-mail accounts as an appropriate method of separating official business from political campaign work.

But the use of those accounts by officials discussing the firings -- and one from now-imprisoned lobbyist Jack Abramoff -- have led a liberal watchdog group to accuse administration of trying to skirt the law governing preservation of presidential records.

  CNN article

And, speaking of Jack Abramoff, a commenter on Josh Marshall's blog reminds us that there was another instance of an attorney being removed, albeit in a different manner, who was directly connected to the Abramoff case, back in 2005.

[...] Bush "promoted" the head of the Public Integrity Section, Noel Hillman, to a federal judgeship in New Jersey. Hillman had been running the section’s investigation into the lobbying activities of Jack Abramoff. Three weeks prior to his nomination, Abramoff announced his guilty plea and agreed to testify against others, including members of Congress and White House staff.

Obviously, Hillman had to go.

Bush also removed another attorney who was investigating Abramoff back in 2003.

Carol Lam, one of the attorneys purged, was of course, prosecuting the Duke Cunningham case (as you know, Cunningham is the convicted, receiving half of the Abramoff bribery case), and it's speculated that she might have been after other powerful targets.

That Jack Abramoff bribery case just won't go away, will it? It's a deep, deep rabbit hole. (It may even circle round and connect to Insane McCain, but who knows where all those tunnels lead?)

Waxman's committee released another chain of e-mails it said illustrated the type of exchange taking place on the account. The e-mails began with a February 2003 message from Abramoff to Susan Ralston, the former executive assistant to President Bush's top political adviser, Karl Rove.

[...]

When an associate notified him that his e-mail had been forwarded to another White House aide, Abramoff replied, "Dammit. It was sent to Susan on her RNC pager and was not supposed to go into the WH (White House) system."

[..]

Ralston resigned in October out of concern that her ties to Abramoff would be "a distraction," the White House said.

A distraction. Making it hard to focus on keeping Karl out of jail.

And speaking of those email services the GOP has been using for rabbit tunnels around the law, a blog called Neomeme has a list of other domains the Republicans have registered for various purposes. The names are kind of fun to run through, but the ones they've registered to avoid having them used by opponents are even better...

Yup, that’s right. georgewbushsucks.net, officially registered by the Republican National Committee.

....but hey, do what you want....you will anyway.

Surge and Purge

Troop Surge

A few weeks ago, [Mark] Benjamin wrote a piece exposing how a group of soldiers from the 3rd Brigade-3rd Infantry at Ft. Benning, GA had their medical statuses summarily downgraded in February so they could be re-deployed to Iraq.

This week, Benjamin examines how some of those soldiers, plus many others, were recently sent to the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, CA for "training," despite being physically unable to perform most usual exercises.

The injured soldiers were not forced to train, but were simply housed in tents on site--their physical presence apparently being good enough to count them among the numbers cited as "trained" for the surge.

  Iraq Slogger post - links embedded

Attorney Purge

Warned to shut up.

...[FBI] bureau chief for San Diego Dan Dzwilewski had complained to the press about Carol Lam's firing, said that he "guaranteed" politics was involved, and that without her, a number of ongoing investigations might be jeopardized. Specter didn't want to hear that from the press -- he wanted to hear that sort of thing from [Bureau Chief Robert] Mueller.

Mueller responded that Dzwilewski hadn't passed such complaints up the chain, and that "my understanding is that our chief out there believes he was misquoted, but that our investigations were continuing, without any diminishment."

Misquoted? Sen. Dianne Feinstein followed up:

FEINSTEIN: Well, we followed up and I had my chief counsel call them to verify what they said. And they said, yes, they said it. But they also said they'd been warned to say no more. Are you aware that they had been warned to say no more?

MUELLER: Yes, I am.

  TPM Muckraker article

Carol Lam's dismissal is (okay, "allegedly") connected to the Duke Cunningham bribery case, the fallout of which is ongoing.

[Congressman Henry] Waxman has asked for all MZM contracts related to the White House and other materials...

[...]

It could be that MZM in the summer of 2002 managed to snag a small White House contract in legitimate fashion, even as Wade was plotting a quick, bribery-greased rise to the top. But given that the Cunningham/MZM tale is one of sleaze and crime--I haven't even mentioned the prostitutes Cunningham received as bribes--Wade's first contract with the Bush administration deserves scrutiny. Republican legislators--no surprise--expressed no interest in this when they ran Congress. And, coincidentally or not, the US attorney in charge of the Cunningham case, Carol Lam, is one of the prosecutors who was fired by the Bush administration. But here comes Waxman, and the Case of MZM's First Contract is alive and open.

  David Corn post

Gettin' a little hot in the kitchen for Gonzo.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales dashed out of a Chicago news conference this afternoon in just two and a half minutes, ducking questions about how his office gave U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald a subpar rating.

Gonzales, who increasingly faces calls for his resignation, was here to promote a new ad campaign and had planned a 15-minute press availability. He left after taking just three questions over a firing scandal consuming his administration.

Before leaving, Gonzales said he wanted to "reassure the American people that nothing improper happened here."

  Chicago Sun Times article

Rich.

....but hey, do what you want....you will anyway.