To me, it seems like the money that backed the Dem’s put pressure to go along with the plan. And from the administration, remember those warrantless wiretaps weren’t solely directed at international terrorists. I believe the bush administration was wiretapping the offices and the private phone lines for every Democratic politician in Washington D.C., and many State officials as well. They weren’t looking for terrorists; they were simply looking for any dirt they could get their hands on, and that information was used as blackmail, carrying a threat of exposure of details that would damage their political careers, their personal family lives, and in many cases, where evidence of illegal activity (bribery, insider trading, etc.) was discovered the threats were confirmed by people connected with the Justice Department who made it clear that once bush/cheney gave the word, indictments and criminal indictments would swiftly follow.

In the short run, that’s the damage the bush administration has done to our government and justice system. When you hear the term “crime family,” it’s not just an idle insult. The bush administration has been a criminal conspiracy from the get go.

In the longer run, the damage was done back in the mid-to-late 1800’s when corporations gained the status of living persons, and were afforded the protections guaranteed to Citizens of the U.S. by the Constitution. That is a complete distortion of the intent contained within our State Documents. Thereafter, big business has waged an on-going, never relenting struggle to gain supremacy in the legal and economic life of the nation. The profits of business have been directed toward corrupting the national government to do the bidding of business. With the bush-2 administration, the process is nearly complete.

my bad. perhaps i’m paranoid as well as congenitally cynical.

in response to your point, i do agree that there’s been a lot of illegitimate character assassination going on, mostly to hobgoblinize the gop’s many opponents because the gop candidates can’t compete with them directly otherwise.

but that wasn’t what i was trying to do. i may have been inartful about it, but what i was trying to do was bring a little of my own experience to the discussion about the importance of these indictments. and i think a look at who brought the indictments, the nature and substance of the indictments, and the abuse of the system that could occur as a result of the indictments are all relevant to that discussion.

turns out the d.a. is a lame duck and probably won’t be around to actually prosecute the indictments. i figure it’s just as likely they’ll be dismissed by the incoming d.a. as it is that bush will use the indictments as a pretext to issue bulletproof pardons, preventing any prosecution of cheney and gonzo in any u.s. or state court. those are my concerns around this issue specifically.

in a more general sense, i think a big part of what’s wrong with our government right now is that the powers given to check the abuse of power were not necessarily placed in the hands of those who would be incentivized to use it. Example: if it’s true (and i honestly don’t know whether it is) that the reason the dems wouldn’t impeach bush and cheney is that they feared their own involvement in, e.g., warrantless wiretapping, would be exposed, then it doesn’t make sense to give the power of impeachment solely to a body that could be implicated in the same malfeasance. solution: like the power to propose constitutional amendments, the power should be shared with the state legislatures who could not possibly end up in the same bed with the administration on foreign policy and national security deliberation and decision.

that’s what i think would bring real change: make sure the checks in government are given to those who would be incentivized to make the most robust use of them.

There’s a definite culture in Washington D.C. that takes in newly elected officials and guides them around, “teaching” them the ropes. In other words, they become convinced that they need to go along with the way things are done, or they will have no support from their colleagues. That Washington culture exists to support the interests of power, wealth, and big business.

I’m not a heavy Obama backer. I distrust him in many respects, and his Senate career didn’t do a lot to foster any hope that a vote for Obama was a vote for change. I believe he was brought to heel pretty quickly.

Having said that, there is one aspect to Obama’s campaign that stood out from the start. In his public speeking he always used the terms “we,” “our,” and “us.” He understands the nature of the divisiveness that’s been used to split the electorate down the middle on wedge issues in order to create a false sense of opposition and antagonism between the People.

Whatever Obama says or does, if the People of this nation do not come together pretty quickly, the United States will not recover from the economic turmoil currently afoot.

I can’t let what seems to me to be character assassination taking place without pointing out how this generally indicates the tactics of those who have divided us. This particular technique diverts attention from the person/entity/issue that threatens the income stream of the elites, and attempts to discredit whoever is speaking out on the side of justice and the welfare of the People of the U.S.

Get the V.P. and Bozo Gonzo charged with a lesser crime just to render a blanket pardon that makes them immune from any further charges that include torture, war crimes, murder…

I fear that this may be just a move in the grand chess game at play, too.

.

If this compels testimony that leads to more serious charges, I support the effort. But, what’s published looks weak.

i suspect part of that may be aimed at me. it’s true, i have not investigated the d.a., as i mentioned. my recollection was that he was, shall we say, unconventional, and not particularly methodical. it struck me as odd that it would be this d.a. out of the thousands in the u.s. who could file as similar indictment, who chose to do so. in texas. and in a half-assed way, through some kind of conflict of interest/vicarious liability argument. something’s wrong with this picture.

don’t get me wrong. i’m not defending the administration. far from it. i have doubts that this will result in anything good, and suspect it’s been orchestrated to produce something really really bad.

Now when there’s a report that two members of the bush crime family are being investigated by a legal body having legal jurisdiction, we hear people trying to conflate the District Attorney and the Grand Jury in this case with those involved in the de-lay case, as if the two possess the same degree of credibility, without any corroborating facts. It’s as if they are hoping to make use of the lies told back then to reinforce their false contention that every high-ranking member of the bush administration is innocent of having committed any and all crimes during the bush-2 administration.

And now that the full impact of the disasterous bush administration policies and performance are beginning to come to light, it mystifies me as to why these thugs are willing to continue defending the criminals.

UNFORTUNATELY I WOULD RENDER A GUILTY VERDICT BEFORE THE TRIAL BEGAN

People were murdered in association with this scandal, this thing won’t just go away. And there are no statute of limitations for murder.

(thank you wayne)

—

i get very skeptical when people start naming judges in criminal or civil complaints. in my experience, it’s a nutjob flag.

Could this be compared to Al Capone finally being imprisoned on income tax evasion?

—

hehe, can you imagine if bush were convicted and sent to texas’ death row? does the texas appeal process last more than 8 years? or is that only if you have a lawyer who stays awake during your murder trial?

The Vanguard surely has a lot of investors but I’m willing to bet none that can manipulate American policy to enrich themselves quite like ole tricky Dick

Still this will go nowhere, fun to read, but just as accountability doesn’t seem to touch anybody that really deserves it, it wont touch Dick

From the Brownsville paper:

A Willacy County grand jury under District Attorney Juan Angel Guerra returned multi-count indictments Monday against Vice President Dick Cheney, former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, plus several other public officials.

The indictment accuses Cheney and Gonzales of engaging in organized criminal activity. It criticizes Cheney’s investment in the Vanguard Group, which holds interests in the private prison companies running the federal detention centers. It accuses Cheney of a conflict of interest and “at least misdemeanor assaults” on detainees by working through the prison companies.

Gonzales is accused of using his position while in office to stop an investigation into abuses at the federal detention centers.

Another indictment charges state Sen. Eddie Lucio Jr. with profiting from his public office by accepting honoraria from prison management companies.

Also indicted are state District Judges Janet Leal, state District Judge Migdalia Lopez, The GEO Group (formerly Wackenhut Corporation), former U.S. Attorney Mervyn Mosbacher, Gus Garza and Gilberto Lozano.

They all face a stream of criminal charges including abuse of office, profiting from office, and murder.

The federal government is very difficult to sue and prevail against.

—

yes, the feds are hard to sue *civilly* for *money damages*. here we’re talking about criminally prosecuting two obvious criminals who are and were members of an outgoing administration. i imagine any documents that still exist and/or would prove their guilt will be easier to obtain legally after january 20.

true, there are other roadblocks that could be put up to moving the criminal cases along, jurisdictional challenges, appeals, motions to change venue, etc. to me it smells of subterfuge. is the south texas d.a. the only one in the country with the cojones to indict the bush criminal network? does that make sense? and to then do it so vaguely and half-assed as it seems it’s been done? does that make sense?

maybe i’m jaded or just congenitally cynical, but i’m not holding my breath on this one.

one, re federal/state:

article ii, section 2 says:

“The President [...] shall have Power to Grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.”

that makes me think “Offenses against the United State” means federal crimes. i’ve looked around but i haven’t found anything corroborating that. and i left my constitutional law books at the office. drat.

two, i haven’t investigated the d.a., but if it’s the same crackpot d.a. who went after tom delay, this may be much ado about nothing. my immediate thoughts were whether the point of the indictment was to get bush to pardon them, since you can’t pardon someone for a crime he hasn’t been charged with yet. if the indictment were very broad and included technical charges for everything under the sun, and bush pardoned them, it would be effective even against other jurisdictions.

that is, south texas indicts them for war crimes, conspiracy to commit murder, corruption, violating FISA, violating the Hatch Act, kicking al gore’s dog, stealing a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and public indecency. even if there’s no evidence to link these charges to specific crimes, i think that bush would then be able to issue pardons to cheney and gonzo for “war crimes, conspiracy to commit murder, corruption, violating FISA, violating the Hatch Act, kicking al gore’s dog, stealing a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and public indecency” and that would be binding on any state or u.s. court and prevent any criminal prosecution on those grounds.

i should research that, but that’s my gut feeling.