Libertarian Leanings

Monica Goodling testifies

Monica Goodling finally testified before the House Judiciary Committee yesterday, after having been granted immunity from prosecution.  Goodling claimed she would take the 5th if called to testify before congress, not because she had committed a crime, but because she believed congressional Democrats would spring a perjury trap.  Her testimony does not add to the furor over the dismissal of those U.S. attorneys.  As it happens, her testimony did not not diminish the credibility of Attorney General Roberto Gonzales.  It attacked his accuser instead.

WASHINGTON - The Justice Department's former White House liaison denied Wednesday that she played a major role in the firings of U.S. attorneys last year and blamed Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty for misleading Congress.

McNulty's explanation about the dismissals, on Feb. 6, "was incomplete or inaccurate in a number of respects," Monica Goodling told a packed House Judiciary Committee inquiry into the firings.

She added: "I believe the deputy was not fully candid."

McNulty was said to have turned the firing of U.S. prosecutors into a political fiasco with his congressional testimony in February.

Friends of Sampson were angry at McNulty's testimony on Feb. 6 when he told the Senate Judiciary Committee that most of the U.S. attorneys were removed for performance reasons.

In testimony that angered even Gonzales, according to a Justice Department e-mail, McNulty said that one prosecutor, H.E. Cummins 3rd of Arkansas, was dismissed solely to make room for J. Timothy Griffin, who had been named as the temporary replacement with the backing of Karl Rove, the senior White House political adviser.

Friends of McNulty said he had tried to be candid about what he knew of the firings. In his secret congressional testimony, McNulty said he did not realize until later the extensive White House involvement in Griffin's appointment or Sampson's nearly yearlong effort to compile a firing list.

Although McNulty claimed he had been mislead about the firings, he was also said to have been unhappy in his role as second-in-command under Gonzales.  Whether or not that had anything to do with the accuracy of his testimony is anybody's guess.  But Goodling had this to say in her testimony.

Of McNulty, Goodling said he "simply didn't communicate all that he knew" during his Senate testimony, which focused on whether the prosecutors were fired for underperforming. "I'm not saying it was deliberate," she added.

Let's see how long Democrats will be able keep this faux scandal alive.

Method to the congressional madness

Tod Lindberg makes a pretty good case for an underlying motive to the Democrats' ongoing persecution of U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.  The surface issue is the firing of eight U.S. attorneys who the administration claims were sacked because they were not on board with Bush law enforcement philosophies, which includes among other things a focus on voter fraud.  Early announcements of the firings characterized U.S. attorney decisions not to pursue voter fraud and illegal immigration cases as "performance" issues.  But clarifications and apologies were issued to both the attorneys who had been removed and to congress for the misunderstanding. 

You might think that would clear up the matter, since it is the President's right and duty to appoint U.S. attorneys.  However, the investigation into these removals is alive and well.  It's a remarkable performance in which congressional Democrats have been investigating the possibility that there were political motives behind the dismissals. 

Democrats in the House and Senate say they intend to press ahead with their investigation to determine whether partisan politics played a role in the dismissal of the eight U.S. attorneys.

For their part, Republican leaders counter that politics is driving the investigation.

Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.), the GOP party chairman, sent out a message Wednesday accusing Democrats of "feigning outrage" over the Justice Department's actions.

"There is no question that U.S. attorneys, like all political appointees, serve at the pleasure of the president," Martinez said. "That was true when Bill Clinton's Justice Department replaced all 93 U.S. attorneys, and it remains true today."

As the Democrats press forward, Mr. Lindberg points out that there is a method to their madness.  It's not really Gonzales the Democrats are after.  It's the opportunity to negotiate the confirmation of his replacement.  Former Representative Elizabeth Holtzman, who served on the House Judiciary Committee when it voted to impeach Richard Nixon in 1974, has written a book entitled The Impeachment of George W. Bush: A Practical Guide for Concerned Citizens.  She and others recall the chain of events leading up to the resignation of Richard Nixon over the Watergate scandal.  Take the case of Richard Kleindienst, who had resigned as Nixon's attorney general.

Nixon looked to his recently installed secretary of defense, Elliot Richardson, to move over to the Justice Department. The confirmation process before the Democratic-controlled Senate Judiciary Committee was brutal. The price of confirmation for Richardson was his willingness to appoint a "special prosecutor" with a broad mandate and a grant of independence to investigate the Watergate crimes and unfolding coverup.

The price for confirmation of Gonzales' replacement will be another special prosecutor, one the Democrats hope will be far more successful than was Patrick Fitzgerald, who failed to find any conspiracy or coverup in the White House over the Valerie Plame affair.  As with that faux scandal, this one is nurtured and kept alive with help from the media.  With their support the current House Judiciary Committee Chairman, Representative John Conyers, who by the way has his own book on the market, George W. Bush Versus the U.S. Constitution: The Downing Street Memos and Deception, Manipulation, Torture, Retribution, Coverups in the Iraq War and Illegal Domestic Spying, remains in the hunt.

Lately however, Gonzales' prospects for staying on have improved.

The mostly muted five-hour hearing in front of the House Judiciary Committee was a sharp contrast to Gonzales‘ sometimes testy appearance three weeks ago when Senate Republicans questioned his competence to run the Justice Department. One senator at that session joined a small GOP chorus saying he should step down.

That did not satisfy exasperated Democrats, who accused Gonzales of being evasive.

"I accept responsibility," Gonzales answered.

President Bush steadfastly has stood by Gonzales, his longtime counselor and friend. Even career Justice Department staffers angered by the attorney general‘s response to the firings acknowledge Gonzales appears to have beaten back calls to leave.

We can expect that the calls for Gonzales to leave will keep coming.  Next up in the witness chair is Monica Goodling who earlier had refused to testify, citing Fifth Amendment protections against self incrimination, and who, through her lawyer, had accused Senate and House Democrats of setting a perjury trap.  Ms. Goodling has been granted immunity, and so she will testify.  House and Senate Democrats will undoubtedly say there is something in Ms. Goodlings testimony that cries out for the resignation of Alberto Gonzales.  But it's not Gonzales that they care about.  It's that special prosecutor.  And if you think this is a witch hunt...

Immunity for Goodling?

House Democrats and the media are making the most of the White House dismissal of those eight U.S. attorneys.  Today the Washington Post reports that the House Judiciary Committee is considering an offer of immunity in return for testimony of Monica Goodling.

Frustrated by Monica M. Goodling's refusal to testify, committee Democrats said they may grant limited-use immunity to the former counsel to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales.

Such a grant of immunity, which would require the approval of two-thirds of the nearly 40-member panel, would free Goodling to speak about the plan to fire the U.S. attorneys and the dismissals' aftermath, without fear that prosecutors could use her testimony in a criminal proceeding. Goodling has invoked her Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate herself.

This is not news.  We find farther along in the article that there was a vote on this subject already in the works.  In fact it was scheduled for today, but has now been put off until later this month.  No doubt there will be more news about it tomorrow, and then more the next day.

Attorney General Albert Gonzales was originally scheduled to testify today to explain to the Senate Judiciary Committee the meaning of the word "regularly".  His testimony has also been postponed, but only until tomorrow.  Media has one more day in which to speculate on it.

The point is to maintain for as long as possible the impression that the White House is engaged in an illegal cover up.  But the fact of the matter is that Democrats in congress can make it stick if they can charge somebody with perjury or lying.  Like the trap that caught Scooter Libby, the perjury will be substitute proof of wrong doing on the part of the White House.

We are trying to get to the front page

And the Washington Post is only too happy to oblige.  The resignation of Monica Goodling yesterday, provides another event around which Democrats and the Washington Post can stage endless accusations and innuendo that there is something nefarious going on in Washington with the dismissal of those eight U.S. attorneys.

"We are trying to get to the truth," Leahy, Schumer and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) wrote in a letter to Gonzales yesterday. "Documents should be provided without restrictions on disclosure so that they may be used to question witnesses -- including yourself -- on any issue that is an important part of our inquiry."

Gonzales' ex-chief of staff, D. Kyle Sampson, testified that Gonzales had been regularly briefed on the progress to replace eight U.S. attorneys who were felt to be not on board with President Bush's judicial philosophy.  Senate Judiciary Committee members say this contradicts Gonzales' testimony in which he claimed to have no role in the firings.  The Post words it this way.

Seven prosecutors were dismissed in December and another was removed earlier as part of a plan set in motion by the White House to replace U.S. attorneys viewed as insufficiently loyal to President Bush or his policies. Gonzales has sought to minimize his role in the firings, but recently released documents and testimony show he was regularly briefed on the effort.

However, "regularly briefed" according to Mr. Sampson means roughly five times over a two year period.

The two men talked about the dismissal plans over a two-year period, Mr. Sampson said, beginning in early 2005 when Mr. Gonzales was still the White House counsel. Mr. Sampson said he had briefed his boss at least five times before December 2006, when seven of the eight prosecutors were ousted.

Do five briefings over a two year period constitute active participation?  Possibly.  However, since Gonzales was responsible for signing off on the firings, not only would you have to assume he would be briefed on them, it would be absurd to think he wouldn't.  Yet Democrats would like to interpret his claim of non-involvement in the dismissals to be a claim that he was totally unaware of what was going on, and thus a contradiction.

According to the Post, acting Assistant Attorney General Richard A. Hertling wrote that Gonzales and McNulty have "taken steps to ensure that no actual or apparent conflict of interest would arise" in connection with the dismissals, and Sampson testified that none of the eight U.S. attorneys were dismissed because of investigations that they were either pursuing or not pursuing.

When Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., asked if he was "prepared to swear under oath that no U.S. attorney was asked to resign because the U.S. attorney was pursuing an investigation ... or failing to undertake a prosecution,'' Sampson answered yes. Later, in response to questioning from Sen. Herb Kohl, D-Wis., Sampson was even more explicit that "no U.S. attorney was asked to resign for the purpose of influencing a particular case for a political reason.''

Do committee Democrats choose not to believe either of them?  Which of it do they choose to believe, what exactly are they after?  Leigh Ferrara writing in Mother Jones article offers this clue.

At this point, Gonzales' fate seems uncertain. If he did in fact make misleading statements about his role in the controversy, he did so in front of the press. Yet, Gonzales is not completely in the clear. Should Congress determine that he was intentionally lying, it remains a remote possibility that he could be charged for obstructing a congressional investigation. When I called the Senate Judiciary Committee to inquire whether it might consider taking action of this kind, a spokesperson said she was unaware of an effort to do so. She did, however, bring up the case of J. Steven Griles, the former Interior Department official and Abramoff lackey, who recently pled guilty for doing just that.

Committee Democrats have set a perjury trap Monica Goodling does well to avoid.  And by postponing Gonazales' testimony from April 12th until the 17th, they've given themselves and the Post five more days in which to plaster this story on the nation's front pages.  Let's see how many they can get in between now and then.

Stand off

Rather than force her to testify in the matter of the Bush Administration's recent dismissal of eight U.S. attorneys, House Democrats asked Monica Goodling to come to Capitol Hill for "private interview".  Gee whiz, she can't just refuse to testify, they said.  Apparently, Democrats feel pretty damned important these days.

"Her claims do not constitute a valid basis for invoking the privilege against self-incrimination," Reps. John Conyers of Michigan and Linda Sanchez of California wrote in a letter to Dowd today.

One must not refuse to speak with Democrats, say the Democrats, and they're in the majority, so what they say goes.  However, Monica and her lawyer do not agree.

"Threats of public humiliation for exercising her 5th and 6th Amendment rights are not well taken," Dowd said in an e-mail responding to the letter. "In a free country, every citizen should have the liberty to exercise their rights without threats or coercion."

No soap.  She's not talking, conversing, interviewing, or testifying.  Ah, but there's blood in the water.  There's a chance to get one of the higher ups for something - maybe even Bush, himself.  Jon Carroll of the San Francisco Chronicle demands,

Grant her immunity. She testifies and nothing she says can be used against her in court [nor can anything it leads to] be used against her in court. Oliver North was forced to testify under immunity, and his later conviction for Iran-Contra was tossed because the government could not prove that it didn't use material from his testimony before Congress to prosecute him. Putting Monica Good-ling behind bars isn't the goal of a congressional investigation.

Oh?  You might make the case that putting Scooter Libby behind bars wasn't Patrick Fitzgerald's goal when he prosecuted Libby for criminal disagreement with a reporter, but that's what might happen.  Fitzgerald won a guilty verdict against Scooter for lying to the grand jury.  Then, as now, we were witness to a fishing expedition. The jury's decision that Libby lied was a substitute verdict on the "Bush lied, people died" charge - a case Democrats can make only in their dreams.

So these days, in addition to fishing expeditions Democrats are into playing chicken.  There's a stand off over funding for the Iraq war.  Actually, you could make the case that it's an Iraqi law and order issue now, which is just what the Democrats have always wanted the war on terror to be - a law and order issue, not a military issue.  No matter.  Whatever it is, they want it to stop, this thing that President Bush is doing.  So Senator Harry Reid, Democrat from Las Vegas, is proposing a bill to eliminate funding for it.  Feeling their oats, the Democrats.

Chances are they'll play chicken with Monica, too.  They'll try to send her to jail for contempt over the exercise of her constitutional right against self incrimination.  And won't they look good then - beating her down over it, hoping to find something nefarious in the President's exercise of his constitutional duties to appoint, and dismiss, U.S. attorneys. 

Will it play in Peoria?  Hard to say, but in their obsession to defeat George Bush, Democrats turn out to have something in common with al Qaeda.  Both the Democrats and al Qaeda want American troops out of Iraq.  If I were a Democrat, I'd be a little uncomfortable with that arrangement, but the crop that sits in Congress right now doesn't seem to mind it a bit.  Stomping on the constitution shouldn't bother them either. 

A track record

Jeffrey Lord offers a bit of insight into why Monica Goodling recently decided to take the fifth rather than testify in the matter of the eight U.S. attorneys who were let go.  Lord was on hand in February of 2002 for the Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings for Bush Third Circuit judicial nominee D. Brooks Smith.  At that time Smith was Chief Judge of the Western District of Pennsylvania, having been appointed by Ronald Reagan fourteen years earlier, and Ms. Goodling was assigned by the Department of Justice to work on Judge Smith's nomination.  Then, as now, the Democratically controlled Senate committee was on the lookout for political ammunition.

Misleading a Witness and Obstruction of Justice: A liberal Pennsylvania doctor, a longtime friend of Smith's, took it upon himself to praise Smith in an e-mail to fervid Smith opponents at the left-wing interest group the National Organization for Women (NOW). To his amazement the Smith supporter was shortly on the receiving end of a phone call from a woman identifying herself as an investigator for Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy. Immediately she told an untruth: that Leahy was looking for "additional grounds to support Judge Smith." The problem? Unbeknownst to the doctor, Leahy had already announced his opposition to Smith. It is a violation of Senate rules, found under a section entitled "Obstruction of Justice," to misrepresent facts to a potential witness. The apparent reason for the call: to falsely represent Leahy's views in the hopes of getting dirt on Judge Smith.

The attempt failed only after a vigorous threat -- including a promise of disbarment proceedings against the investigator -- by a staff member working for Republican Senator Arlen Specter. But launching a Senate investigator on a private citizen -- and then lying to that witness -- as the result of an e-mail to a special interest group was not the only sign of corruption at Leahy's Judiciary Committee...

Also on the day of the Committee vote, Washington Times reporter Audrey Hudson reached out for a press release being handed to her by a conservative in the crowd. A linebacker-sized Leahy aide grabbed Ms. Hudson by the wrist, wrenching it behind her back so hard she was literally doubled-over. Twisting her arm he demanded she give him the release she was clutching, forcing her into the corridor where the incident was spotted by a Capitol police officer. Ms. Hudson reported the incident to her bureau chief. The bureau chief promptly called Leahy's press secretary -- who denied the incident ever happened. The Director of the Senate Press Gallery would later ask if she wanted to file charges of assault. A reporter to the core, she declined.

SO LET'S SAY YOU'RE Monica Goodling, what would you do?