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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: pompsander who wrote (763817)	7/25/2007 10:32:52 AM
From: Karen Lawrence	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 769670

Here's the scary part, I had thought Ashcroft was the worst, and yet Bush replaced him with Gonzales. Should Gonzales quit - okay, realistically should he be forced out - who's next? someone even 'worser'? Very possible indeed.

To: pompsander who wrote (763817)	7/25/2007 11:20:51 AM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Respond to of 769670

GOP senator challenges White House Contempt steps threatened in prosecutor case Marisa Taylor and Margaret Talev McClatchy Newspapers Jul. 25, 2007 12:00 AM azcentral.com WASHINGTON - A powerful Republican senator said Tuesday that if the Bush administration wouldn't appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the firings of nine U.S. attorneys, Congress should consider starting contempt proceedings on its own against the White House. The proposal from Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the senior Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, ratchets up a seven-month standoff between the White House and Congress over whether former and current White House officials should be compelled to testify or provide documents related to the firings. The White House has refused to cooperate with congressional probes and has blocked testimony from several former and current White House aides. Last week, administration officials announced that they intend to prohibit the Justice Department from initiating any congressional effort to hold executive-branch officials in contempt of Congress. Specter's stand Tuesday suggests that some in Congress may see the White House stance as an institutional insult to their coequal branch of government under the Constitution. If Specter's recommendation prevails, lawmakers of both parties could join in opposing the White House rather than Republicans siding reflexively with President Bush, as they often do in legislative clashes with Democrats. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday that he can't appoint a special prosecutor because of his role in the prosecutors' firings, but that U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement could do so. Specter said that if Clement didn't act, Congress could initiate contempt proceedings on its own authority. Under that scenario, the Senate Judiciary Committee could initiate a congressional trial to determine whether White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten, former White House counsel Harriet Miers or others should be found in contempt for refusing to testify or turn over documents. Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, plans to pursue criminal contempt charges over the same issues today. In an interview, Specter played down any inference that he was seeking a dramatic constitutional clash. "We're not going to go for any spectacles," he said. "We want to have a mature, civil adjudication." Two other Republicans on the judiciary panel, Sens. Jeff Sessions of Alabama and Jon Kyl of Arizona, signaled that they aren't inclined to support contempt proceedings as envisioned by Specter. Instead, they suggested that Congress could ask the courts to rule on the legitimacy of the president's executive-privilege claim. "I don't think we should try to unilaterally figure out a way to just go to war with the White House over it," Sessions said. Senate Minority Whip Trent Lott, R-Miss., agreed: "The courts will make that decision. Let them decide." Asked how the question would get before the courts, given the Bush administration's posture, Lott said: "I want to talk to Senator Specter about it." Kyl said he did too. Gonzales tried to deflect criticism of his attempts as White House counsel to persuade former Attorney General John Ashcroft to approve a warrantless wiretap program despite internal opposition to it. In May, former Deputy Attorney General James Comey testified that Gonzales and then-White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card had pressured Ashcroft in March 2004 to reauthorize the program as Ashcroft lay gravely ill in a hospital bed. Comey said the Bush administration ran the 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. Gonzales said the hospital visit had taken place only after the so-called "Gang of Eight" top congressional and intelligence committee leaders from both parties had told him to proceed with the program despite Comey's opposition. Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., the chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, said he didn't recall the Gang of Eight meeting as Gonzales described it. "I think he was untruthful," Rockefeller said.

To: pompsander who wrote (763817)	7/25/2007 12:02:45 PM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

CRS VIEWS CONGRESS'S CONTEMPT POWER A major new report from the Congressional Research Service provides a detailed account of Congress's contempt power, including the use of contempt proceedings to coerce compliance with congressional demands for information or testimony and to punish non-compliance. "This report examines the source of the contempt power, reviews the historical development of the early case law, outlines the statutory and common law basis for Congress's contempt power, and analyzes the procedures associated with each of the three different types of contempt proceedings. In addition, the report discusses limitations both nonconstitutional and constitutionally based on the power." The 68-page report also examines the Justice Department position that "Congress cannot, as a matter of statutory or constitutional law, invoke either its inherent contempt authority or the criminal contempt of Congress procedures against an executive branch official acting on instructions by the President to assert executive privilege in response to a congressional subpoena." See "Congress's Contempt Power: Law, History, Practice, and Procedure," July 24, 2007: fas.org

To: pompsander who wrote (763817)	7/25/2007 3:19:40 PM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769670

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, is "under criminal investigation in the Justice Department's widening inquiry into alleged influence-peddling and self-dealing in Congress," and so is Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska. "The two lawmakers are among the highest-ranking members of either party to come under scrutiny in the wave of public-corruption probes that has swept Washington in the past three years," the Journal's John R. Wilke writes. online.wsj.com