Reply With Quote
You have absolutely no evidence of that. Just cir stantial ties that have assumed results.
Show me an alleged evil act that doesn't have a valid reason. You cannot!
The number of justices is NOT fixed. It has been as low as 6, as high a 10. A capsule history:
July 26, 2007
Op-Ed Contributor
Stacking the Court
By JEAN EDWARD SMITH
Huntington, W.Va.
WHEN a majority of Supreme Court justices adopt a manifestly ideological agenda, it plunges the court into the vortex of American politics. If the Roberts court has entered voluntarily what Justice Felix Frankfurter once called the “political thicket,” it may require a political solution to set it straight.
The framers of the Cons ution did not envisage the Supreme Court as arbiter of all national issues. As Chief Justice John Marshall made clear in Marbury v. Madison, the court’s authority extends only to legal issues.
When the court overreaches, the Cons ution provides checks and balances. In 1805, after persistent political activity by Justice Samuel Chase, Congress responded with its power of impeachment. Chase was acquitted, but never again did he step across the line to mingle law and politics. After the Civil War, when a Republican Congress feared the court might tamper with Reconstruction in the South, it removed those questions from the court’s appellate jurisdiction.
But the method most frequently employed to bring the court to heel has been increasing or decreasing its membership. The size of the Supreme Court is not fixed by the Cons ution. It is determined by Congress.
The original Judiciary Act of 1789 set the number of justices at six. When the Federalists were defeated in 1800, the lame-duck Congress reduced the size of the court to five hoping to deprive President Jefferson of an appointment. The incoming Democratic Congress repealed the Federalist measure (leaving the number at six), and then in 1807 increased the size of the court to seven, giving Jefferson an additional appointment.
In 1837, the number was increased to nine, affording the Democrat Andrew Jackson two additional appointments. During the Civil War, to insure an anti-slavery, pro-Union majority on the bench, the court was increased to 10. When a Democrat, Andrew Johnson, became president upon Lincoln’s death, a Republican Congress voted to reduce the size to seven (achieved by attrition) to guarantee Johnson would have no appointments.
After Ulysses S. Grant was elected in 1868, Congress restored the court to nine. That gave Grant two new appointments. The court had just declared uncons utional the government’s authority to issue paper currency (greenbacks). Grant took the opportunity to appoint two justices sympathetic to the administration. When the recons uted court convened, it reheard the legal tender cases and reversed its decision (5-4).
The most recent attempt to alter the size of the court was by Franklin Roosevelt in 1937. But instead of simply requesting that Congress add an additional justice or two, Roosevelt’s convoluted scheme fooled no one and ultimately sank under its own weight.
Roosevelt claimed the justices were too old to keep up with the workload, and urged that for every justice who reached the age of 70 and did not retire within six months, the president should be able to appoint a younger justice to help out. Six of the Supreme Court justices in 1937 were older than 70. But the court was not behind in its docket, and Roosevelt’s subterfuge was exposed. In the Senate, the president could muster only 20 supporters.
Still, there is nothing sacrosanct about having nine justices on the Supreme Court. Roosevelt’s 1937 chicanery has given court-packing a bad name, but it is a hallowed American political tradition participated in by Republicans and Democrats alike.
If the current five-man majority persists in thumbing its nose at popular values, the election of a Democratic president and Congress could provide a corrective. It requires only a majority vote in both houses to add a justice or two. Chief Justice John Roberts and his conservative colleagues might do well to bear in mind that the roll call of presidents who have used this option includes not just Roosevelt but also Adams, Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln and Grant.
Jean Edward Smith is the author, most recently, of “F.D.R.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/26/opinion/26smith.html
You have absolutely no evidence of that. Just cir stantial ties that have assumed results.
Show me an alleged evil act that doesn't have a valid reason. You cannot!
Gonzales's Truthfulness Long Disputed
Claims of Misstatements to Shield Bush Stretch Back a Decade
By Dan Eggen and Amy Goldstein
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, July 30, 2007; A01
When Alberto R. Gonzales was asked during his January 2005 confirmation hearing whether the Bush administration would ever allow wiretapping of U.S. citizens without warrants, he initially dismissed the query as a "hypothetical situation."
But when Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.) pressed him further, Gonzales declared: "It is not the policy or the agenda of this president to authorize actions that would be in contravention of our criminal statutes."
By then, however, the government had been conducting a secret wiretapping program for more than three years without court oversight, possibly in conflict with federal intelligence laws. Gonzales had personally defended the effort in fierce internal debates. Feingold later called his testimony that day "misleading and deeply troubling."
The accusation that Gonzales has been deceptive in his public remarks has erupted this summer into a full-blown political crisis for the Bush administration, as the beleaguered attorney general struggles repeatedly to explain to Congress the removal of a batch of U.S. attorneys, the wiretapping program and other actions.
In each case, Gonzales has appeared to lawmakers to be shielding uncomfortable facts about the Bush administration's conduct on sensitive matters. A series of misstatements and omissions has come to define his tenure at the helm of the Justice Department and is the central reason that lawmakers in both parties have been trying for months to push him out of his job.
Yet controversy over Gonzales's candor about George W. Bush's conduct or policies has actually dogged him for more than a decade, since he worked for Bush in Texas.
Whether Gonzales has deliberately told untruths or is merely hampered by his memory has been the subject of intense debate among members of Congress, legal scholars and others who have watched him over the years. Some regard his verbal difficulties as a strategic ploy on behalf of a president to whom he owes his career; others see a public official overwhelmed by the magnitude of his responsibilities.
( other than Yoni and WC, does ANYBODY see Gonzo as competent, professional government employee and skilled administrator of the DoJ? He's exactly the kind of weasal-wording, s bag lawyer that typifis the profession )
Administration officials say Gonzales's enemies are distorting his words for political gain. The Justice Department has portrayed the criticism as unavoidable and a matter of routine misunderstanding, provoked by the attorney general's presence at a "friction point between the executive branch and Congress when it comes to national security policy," as spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said Friday.
Gonzales told senators earlier this year that allegations that he had been untruthful "have been personally very painful to me." But Gonzales's critics on and off Capitol Hill say he has had trouble with the truth for more than a decade, pointing to a controversy over Gonzales's account of why Bush was excused from jury duty in 1996 while serving as the governor of Texas.
Sen. Charles E. Schumer (N.Y.), who joined other Democrats last week in calling for an inquiry into possible perjury by Gonzales, said Friday that "most public servants -- Democratic or Republican, conservative, moderate or liberal -- seem to want to try to tell the truth. . . . With Gonzales, whatever answer fits he will tell, whether it's true or not. It almost seems pathological."
Over the past 2 1/2 years, lawmakers have accused Gonzales of dissembling on many topics, including civil liberties abuses under the USA Patriot Act and his role in reviewing aggressive interrogation tactics. After a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in February 2006, Gonzales sent the panel a six-page, single-spaced letter to "clarify" six major points of testimony, including his erroneous claim that the Justice Department had never undertaken a legal analysis of domestic wiretapping.
But scrutiny of Gonzales increased dramatically this year as a result of Democrats' aggressive investigations into the Justice Department's firings of nine U.S. attorneys in 2006. Gonzales has particularly come under fire for his shifting explanations of his role in the dismissals and for his statements that he could not recall a host of details about the firings.
At a Senate hearing in April, for example, Gonzales said more than 60 times that he could not recall events or facts related to the firings, including a final, high-level meeting in his office at which the dismissal plan was formally approved.
Democrats and some experts on the use of language say that Gonzales's gaffes are too numerous and consistent to be chalked up to misunderstandings. In most instances, his answers, or his refusals to answer, have served to obscure events that would be damaging to the administration, Gonzales or Bush.
One example involves the Terrorist Surveillance Program, which allowed the National Security Agency to monitor telephone calls between the United States and overseas in which one party had been tied to al-Qaeda. Gonzales has testified repeatedly that there was never "serious disagreement" among administration officials about the program and that an unusual visit by Gonzales to the hospital bed of then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft was focused on "other intelligence activities."
But FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III testified last week that the NSA program was the subject of a fierce debate within the administration and was the issue under discussion during the hospital visit.
Gonzales and his aides say the differing accounts boil down to a dispute over terminology: Gonzales was referring only to the surveillance program in the precise form that was confirmed publicly by Bush.
A news account yesterday said that the legal wrangling was about an effort to mine databases for sensitive information, which was linked to the NSA program but not acknowledged by Bush. That suggests that Gonzales's description might have been technically accurate.
But others privy to details of the surveillance activities -- including several lawmakers and Mueller -- have suggested that they were all part of a single NSA program. Gonzales's critics say his distinction was a lawyerly one that stretched the bounds of the truth.
"He's a slippery fellow, and I think so intentionally," said Richard L. Schott, a professor at the University of Texas's Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs. "He's trying to keep the president's secrets and to be a team player, even if it means prevaricating or forgetting convenient things."
"This almost subconscious bond of loyalty" between the attorney general and the president "may be driving a lot of this," said Schott, who has studied relations between the executive and legislative branches of government and the role of psychology in political behavior. "It's obvious that Gonzales owes Bush his career. Part of his behavior comes from this gra ude and extreme loyalty to Bush."
Bill Minutaglio, a University of Texas journalism professor and author of biographies of Gonzales and Bush, said Gonzales kept an "extremely, extremely low profile" in the three jobs Bush gave him in the Texas government -- general counsel, secretary of state and judge on the Supreme Court -- and had little practice before he came to Washington at responding publicly to stiff scrutiny. "The grilling he's enduring right now is beyond anything he had ever experienced in his life. He was ill prepared for it," Minutaglio said.
Gonzales has irritated congressional Democrats, and a few Republicans, by saying that he is responsible for decisions made within the Justice Department but distancing himself from the process that led to the prosecutor firings. At the April hearing, he said a dozen times that he accepted responsibility. But he also has told Congress that he did not know who placed the names of prosecutors on the firing list, and he has pinned much of the responsibility on his outgoing deputy, Paul J. McNulty, who has said he was only marginally involved.
Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) told Gonzales at the hearing that much of his testimony was "a stretch," and Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said he was "taken aback" by Gonzales's memory lapses. Last week, Sen. Arlen Specter (Pa.), the Judiciary Committee's senior Republican, warned Gonzales to review his remarks, saying: "I do not find your testimony credible, candidly."
Deborah Tannen, a professor of linguistics at Georgetown University who has written about the confrontational character of dialogue in public life, said Gonzales's responses to grilling by lawmakers are an extreme example of a rhetorical style that many politicians adopt when they get into trouble. Although accepting responsibility, she said, they "very explicitly stop short of, 'I made a mistake. I'm at fault.' "
Stephen Gillers, a professor of legal ethics at the New York University School of Law, said that Gonzales's strengths "may lie elsewhere, but they are not in management."
"The idea that nine U.S. attorneys could be fired and the head of the department is only casually in the loop -- it is preposterous that a manager would let that happen." Gillers also said he thinks that Gonzales has exacerbated his problems because "when the inconsistencies are pointed out, he refuses to back down," adding: "He is digging himself deeper and deeper into a hole."
Questions about Gonzales's willingness to shade the truth on Bush's behalf came to prominence in the 1996 episode in which Bush was excused from Texas jury duty in a drunken-driving case. Bush was then the state's governor, and Gonzales was his general counsel. If Bush had served, he probably would have had to disclose his own drunken-driving conviction in Maine two decades earlier.
The judge, prosecutor and defense attorney involved in the case have said that Gonzales met with the judge and argued that jury service would pose a potential conflict of interest for Bush, who could be asked to pardon the defendant. Gonzales has disputed that account. He made no mention of meeting with the judge in a written statement submitted to the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Research editor Alice Crites contributed to this report.
==================
Gonzalez is living indictment, a "quality indicator", of the s bags in the dubya and head Exec.
As I have mentioned already I cannot fathom anyone wanting our govt to doing things in complete secrecy. Any administration wanting these powers should be checked or balanced by some type of oversight. This isn't a right vs left rather it's an American issue. Of course the administration follow- alongs will deride this as an attack on Bush...
So, I take it you missed Yoni's "Dictator for a Year" post?
It tells you everything you wanted to know about him, why he supports the President so fervently. He wants totalitarianism, he wants an oppressive state, fill the courts with new "moral crime" legislation and hes not quiet about what dissension means to him and how it should be dealt with.
Because he knows he wouldnt be persecuted under such cir stance. Of course, alot of people he knows and loves would, but theyre just casualties for the cause.
Methinks Yoni has a very idealized view on the world and how it should be by any means necessary, but the actual implementation of any such system would haunt him...he just doesnt know it.
I think you missed my post as well.
I love the way Democrats continue to admit they're idiots.
It’s downright hilarious to see Democrats trying to simultaneously play the “Bush is a moron” and “Bush duped me” angles.
Seriously, if he’s as dumb as they claim… yet he’s been one-upping them at every turn, what’s that actually say about them?
The latest is Chuck Schumer, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee and heads the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, referring to the confirmation of Justices Alito and Roberts:
Nevermind the threats of filibusters and unprecedented theatrical presentations on the Senate floor during the confirmation hearings of both men… no, Chuckie was still hoodwinked.
And in 2006, it was John Rockefeller of West Virginia, the lead Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee who was “duped”.
In 2005, co-president for 8 years and 2008 Democrat Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was “misled”.
And back in 2004, Democrat Presidential candidate John Kerry was “misled” too.
If I were a Democrat, I’d be embarrassed as that such a moron has been so successful at misleading, duping and hoodwinking the collection of self-absorbed geniuses that represent me.
But, even at that, the Democrats can't hold a candle to the British!
UK wanted US to rule out Bin Laden torture
So, Bush's poodle wouldn't hand over intelligence on bin Laden because apparently the Clinton administration wouldn’t promise to avoid torturing him.
But you know what’s funny? The Guardian is apparently blaming Bush for this:
Why would this report be criticizing the Bush administration? Bush wasn’t President in 1998. You know who was President in 1998? Bill Clinton. And you know who invented the practice of extraordinary rendition? Why, that was Bill Clinton too.
Strangely, though, he isn’t mentioned in this article. I wonder why that is?
Bush Derangement Syndrome -- It's not just for American Democrats anymore.
If Bush withehld information that would have caused the Congress to think twice about rushing to war then they were misled. Yoni you seem to be a failry smart person but I wonder if you are just playing stupid some of the time. When people say they were misled it seems to be obvious that they were not given all of the information necessary to make an inofrmed decision. Of course you then take these comments out of context and apply them to a completely different cir stance. Bush duped and misled people by withholding information..I know you understand this but you still like to play dumb..
sort of like a DA 'duping' a jury... witholding evidence that would put guilt in questions.... That doesn't take away from the fact that the prosecutor is a complete idiot..
And, yet, there's been a congressional investigation that found there was no manipulation of the intelligence. And, we know that the Senate Intelligence Committee had access to the same intelligence Bush did. If they were misled, they need to specifically let the country know about what.
What information did he withhold? And, if he's such a moron, why would Congressional Democrats vote for the AUMF in Iraq without holding hearings to vet the intelligence upon which they based their votes?
If Bush is the moron the left claims, coming up with evidence they were duped shouldn't be so hard. Where is it?
maybe they took Bush at his word... BIG MISTAKE
So, if that's the case, who's the idiot? Particularly since Democrats have been characterizing him as the dim-witted puppet of Darth Cheney for damn near the entire two terms of his presidency.
(But, in any case, where has Bush's word been proven to be intentionally misleading?) Hint: No where.
For millioneth time,
dubya/dichead/rummy cherry-picked and hyped supporting intelligence, including outright lying, while classifiying and suppressing all serious doubts and negative scenarios (which were accurate).
Their campaign against Iraq goes back to the 90s when PNAC/AEI/neo- s were agitating for Clinton to invade Iraq, long before AQ was a world-wide threat, and long before the WTC.
So is Bush a puppet of Cheney or the diabolical mastermind of a global conspiracy?
Boutons it's obvious to anyone with an ounce of common sense that the intel was cherry picked to make a sound case for war... Yoni will never admit that... if the intel hadn't been cherry picked we may not be where we are today..
So either he's an idiot or the cleverest man ever to inhabit 1600 Penn Ave.
I think he knew what he was doing.. that's what makes it so wrong.
So he's not an idiot?
I think he is an idiot for listening to those around him but I don't think he is a dumb man.. he's just plays one really well..
id·i·ot /ˈɪdiət/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[id-ee-uht] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun 1. an utterly foolish or senseless person.
2. Psychology. a person of the lowest order in a former classification of mental re ation, having a mental age of less than three years old and an intelligence quotient under 25.
#1 is a winner!!
I love how GGA calls someone an idiot yet fails to see the irony in his recent post contradicting himself senslessly and foolishly.
shouldn't you be out picketing planned parenthood today? what about starting a gay marriage protest?
Holy shimolies! Now you've got a liberal at the Washington Post defending Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. It appears the lies and distortions can only be maintained for so long, eh?
Short of Perjury
I take exception to this because the Attorney General was in the unenviable position of having to defend himself, in public, on matters that were both secret and no longer so. Careful consideration of his words were more likely serving that end than they were intended to make his testimony tedious. In fact, Gonzales offered to go into closed session and more openly discuss the matter -- the committee refused.
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Posting Permissions
