You're welcome!
Posted by iamcoyote at March 21, 2007 01:54 PMAccording to FDL, Tony Snow admitted that Rove has an RNC email address. There's also a great diary at Kos exploring the fact that Bush, Condi, Rove and others don't use email, which could be construed as a violation of the Presidential Records Act.
Posted by iamcoyote at March 21, 2007 02:09 PMPresident Sparky's plan: stall stall stall and run out the clock until July 2008 and then everyone will be focused on November.
Leahy should introduce a resolution impeaching Alberto Gonzales for obstructing justice today.
Get the ball moving.
Impeach Alberto Gonzales.
Impeach Richard Cheney.
Impeach George W. Bush.
Do it now.
Posted by Alex at March 21, 2007 02:10 PM"...that Bush, Condi, Rove and others don't use email, which could be construed as a violation of the Presidential Records Act..."
Not using email is fairly smart if someone doesn't want to leave a trail.
Posted by Alex at March 21, 2007 02:14 PMWhat is it with the number "18" and Republican political scandals?
Posted by Christopher at March 21, 2007 02:15 PMyes he did admit the email address, but in a fashion you'd have to have seen to believe. The lady asked the question and he pretended not to understand her,she repeated it and he said, sotto voice,"yes" and immediatly took the next question. I thought it was very slick.
Posted by T2 at March 21, 2007 02:15 PMT2, I was reading Holden's Obsession w/the gaggle, and it appears the question was asked if Rove had an RNC email, Tony went "um", the questioner asked if Tony could find out, and Tony said yes. Sounds like a trick question, but it still needs to be nailed down.
Posted by iamcoyote at March 21, 2007 02:34 PMiamcoyote, good catch. I'll be the first to admit I wasn't paying rapt attention.
Posted by T2 at March 21, 2007 02:52 PMThe “executive privilege” defense already unravels: why assert a privilege for an executive you claim had nothing to do with the decision?
Well, I'm pretty sure it's a derivation from this "Unitary Executive" theory: Executive Branch employees answer to Bush, the theory goes, not to Congress. So Congress can't make those employees answer questions unless Bush waives the privilege. In effect, all executive communications are treated as if they were candid advisory communications with the president.
Snow may or may not have heard this notion in his preparatory briefings. Either way, it's good for the administration that he didn't explain it. All sorts of negative consequences might've ensued.
Posted by dj moonbat at March 21, 2007 02:59 PMHaving thought about it, I think the logic goes like this: Say you have legal representation. Your conversations with her are privileged. If you talk to a trusted agent of that lawyer, for the purpose of furthering the representation, the privilege works its way up the chain.
Under the Unified Executive theory, everybody in the Executive Branch is there for the purpose of getting Bush better information and helping him act on it. Because the presidential privilege is there to protect his access to good information, then, the privilege applies to all his trusted agents.
It's not a very good theory, but I think that's the outline of how it works.
Posted by dj moonbat at March 21, 2007 03:29 PMArianna found who made the 1984 video. T2, I was reading FDL, and thought it was too good to be true, so went right to First Draft.
Posted by iamcoyote at March 21, 2007 03:29 PMExecutive privilege exists supposedly to assure that candid advice is freely available to the president and "high government officials". If President Pinhead's story is that he wasn't even in the loop here, then this made-up, non-constitution based doctrine shouldn't even come into play.
I think the current refusal to produce KKKarl and Harriet the stooge is based on their "presidential advisor" status. Like "domestic political dirty tricks" is the kind of communications that presidents need to have constitutionally protected. BS.
Plus, aren't they refusing to give up KKKKarl's communications with DOJ? How's executive privilege implicated there?
The most "traditional" formulation of the equally dubious "unitary executive" theory is that the president must have complete and utter control over every aspect of the federal government that could be considered "executive".
Hence the old (expired) special prosecutor statute was supposedly improper, and all the federal agencies with independent commissioners who don't answer to the president are improper, etc. Another authoritarian "conservative" misreading of the constitution.
I'm sure Cheney thinks it means much, much more than this.
Posted by euzoius at March 21, 2007 04:07 PMFor those who really, really want to sit around reading about the very obscure details of all this legal stuff, the leading blog (as most know) is Balkinization, run by a consortium of law professors.
Not that there aren't plenty of great daily posts on this appalling scandal right here at TLC.
Posted by euzoius at March 21, 2007 04:14 PMI wonder if Tony Snow's last name helped him land a position with the Fox Proganda Network and the bush administration. (Snowjob?)
Posted by smooth at March 21, 2007 04:38 PMThis was a very good post to read. Tony Snow just had a day he will never forget. It's going to get worse, too. Much worse.
Posted by paradox at March 21, 2007 05:36 PMYeah but on the flip side of the argument, Junyah and company have constantly used the phrase "they serve at meh pleasure" "they serve at the pleasure of the president" in defending the firings of the USAs. Apparently these USAs no longer pleasured him, so he decided (being the decider he claims he is)to stop having them serve him. So which is it, Junyah was out of the decision making process here and therefore it was someone else who decided for him that these USAs no longer pleased him....and therefore the executive privilege argument and the pleasure of the president argument they claim don'y apply? Or Junyah was in the loop and apparently was aware that the USAs were not Loyal Bushies and these USAs longer pleasured him so he axed them? So how is it they no longer pleased them because that story changes depending on the day of the week it is too.
I'm always amazed that the Loyal Bushies will throw any and all arguments out there to justify their actions, even contradictory ones as we have heard today...but they don't care because they just keep on talking in circles and or deny saying things (that is why it is so important people discuss these issues under oath) that's what a Loyal Bushie does.
Posted by emal at March 21, 2007 06:26 PMEuzoius - Balkinization is indeed a leader, but don't forget Glenn Greenwald now over at Salon, he's been hitting this one pretty hard as well.
I'm inclined to think that we may be seeing the edges of a Cheney black op intersecting with a Rove black op. I'm intrigued by the instances where Cheney seems to have gotten stung by something CIA related-Plame & now MZM/Foggo via Cunningham. Lam's notice to the AG that she was looking upward may have triggered a faster implementation of Rove's plan to get her out before she walked thru the doors of the WH and thus her firing could be directly tied to obstructing an investigation.
Christopher at 2:15 pm
Good point. Perhaps someone in the Bush administration will come forward to be this government's Rose Mary Woods, by claiming that he or she simply left his or her finger on the delete button just a wee bit too long.
Posted by Erroll at March 21, 2007 06:31 PMOh yeah, and Shumer was on KO tonight and he seemed to think the Loyal Bushies have pissed off a lot of people in the Justice department (he said there were a lot of disgruntled people in the justice department because of this issue) and the truth will come out eventually. If Bushie wants to dig in his heels and fight this whole issue then the truth will come out in a drip... drip... drip fashion. I can't imagine that being a good thing..you know pissing off people in the justice department ...in addition to his past pissing off of people in the CIA and the Military. Come to think of it he's pissed off a lot of people these days, his circle of friends and the network of Loyal Bushies is shrinking day by day.
Posted by emal at March 21, 2007 06:34 PMSnowjob Tony took a hit in the press gaggle this morning with a column he wrote during the Clinton years. Here are some highlights:
"Evidently, Mr. Clinton wants to shield virtually any communications that take place within the White House compound on the theory that all such talk contributes in some way, shape or form to the continuing success and harmony of an administration,'' the columnist wrote. "Taken to its logical extreme, that position would make it impossible for citizens to hold a chief executive accountable for anything.''
"In order to exonerate the chief, aides have made fantastic claims: that they lied to their personal diaries, that Velcro-brained lawyers couldn't recall crucial incidents, that files vanished or moved from one place to another as if by magic, that scores of people with nothing to gain from lying nevertheless perjured themselves, and that this contagion of amnesia, sloppiness and venality was just the gosh darnedest series of coincidences ever witnessed by man or beast."
"One gets the impression that Team Clinton values its survival more than most people want justice and thus will delay without qualm. But as the clock ticks, the public's faith in Mr. Clinton will ebb away for a simple reason: Most of us want no part of a president who is cynical enough to use the majesty of his office to evade the one thing he is sworn to uphold the rule of law.''
http://newsblogs.chicagotribune.com/news_theswamp/2007/03/snow_swallows_h.html
Sauce for the gander, Tony?
Posted by cheSF at March 21, 2007 07:14 PMSteve et al,
Has anyone figured out who exactly "WH leg, political, and communications" are [in that Dec 4th "green light" email from William Kelly announcing that everyone had "signed off" and that the Attorney Plan was a "go."]? It's the first email after the 18 day gap.
Posted by Mickey at March 21, 2007 07:16 PMSnow is pretty tall to be driving a Fiat. (Fix It Again, Tony)
Posted by TIKI AL at March 21, 2007 07:44 PMCREW's got a piece up (via ThinkProgress) about the AZ USA that was fired just as he was investigating charges against what CREW had rated the most corrupt member of Congress. Just gets worse and worse.
http://blog.citizensforethics.org/node/743
Prayers for Elizabeth & John Edwards tonight.