Monthly Archives: March 2007

Hunches

Posted on March 13, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

If there's a blog out there that I most tend to agree with, it's probably The Carpetbagger Report.

But not always. In a discussion of the prospect of Sen. Schumer forcing Karl Rove to testify about the Gonzales Eight, today's entry says,

Call it a hunch, but if Rove is called to testify, and he hires counsel to help him through his testimony, his lawyer will strongly urge Rove to tell the truth. If he’s unclear about that, Rove can always call his buddy Scooter about the consequences.

My hunch is that his lawyer tells him to take the Fifth.

Posted in Politics: US: GW Bush Scandals | 1 Comment

Latest ‘Gonzales 8’ Developments

Posted on March 13, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

In the course of an excellent roundup of the latest in the Gonzales 8 scandal, Talking Points Memo has this useful bit of perspective:

As has happened so many times in the last six years, the maximal version of this story — which seemed logical six weeks ago but which I couldn't get myself to believe — turns out to be true. Indeed, it's worse. We now know that Gonzales, McNulty and Moschella each lied to Congress. We know that the purge was a plan that began at the White House — and it was overseen by two of President Bush's closest lieutenants in Washington — Miers and Gonzales. Sampson is the second resignation. There will certainly be more.

And remember this key point: The 'document dump' is meant to get bad news out of the way fast. But it's always a hedge. It never includes the really bad stuff. And if you're not in deep crisis mode, ya' never do it on a Monday.

And this is sort of odd. The first head has rolled:

The aide in charge of the dismissals — [Gonzales's] chief of staff, D. Kyle Sampson — resigned yesterday, officials said, after acknowledging that he did not tell key Justice officials about the extent of his communications with the White House, leading them to provide incomplete information to Congress.

So did the guy actually lie to his colleagues? Stay silent in meetings, sending them off to lie to Congress (with what he may have thought was deniability)? Or is he just the fall guy?

Not that it really matters. Offering up a mid-ranking sacrifice at this stage is little more than throwing a baby off the sleigh to briefly placate the pursing wolves. The key point remains that any of these scenarios is completely incompatible with the idea of a Justice Department with a minimal sense of ethics. And we know who to blame for that.

Posted in Politics: US: GW Bush Scandals | Comments Off on Latest ‘Gonzales 8’ Developments

Professional Deformation

Posted on March 13, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

You know you're a law professor when you look at a story like this and think, “I bet that would make a great Torts final exam question.”

And I don't even teach Torts. (Actually, there's probably some way to make it a Property final exam question too, if you do easements…)

Posted in Law School | 2 Comments

Soldiers Claim Medically Unfit Being Resent into Combat Theater to Make Up Shortages

Posted on March 12, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

This is an amazingly serious charge. It seems credible given that it's corroborated by several soldiers.

The Army is ordering injured troops to go to Iraq: As the military scrambles to pour more soldiers into Iraq, a unit of the Army's 3rd Infantry Division at Fort Benning, Ga., is deploying troops with serious injuries and other medical problems, including GIs who doctors have said are medically unfit for battle. Some are too injured to wear their body armor, according to medical records.

On Feb. 15, Master Sgt. Jenkins and 74 other soldiers with medical conditions from the 3rd Division's 3rd Brigade were summoned to a meeting with the division surgeon and brigade surgeon. These are the men responsible for handling each soldier's “physical profile,” an Army document that lists for commanders an injured soldier's physical limitations because of medical problems — from being unable to fire a weapon to the inability to move and dive in three-to-five-second increments to avoid enemy fire. Jenkins and other soldiers claim that the division and brigade surgeons summarily downgraded soldiers' profiles, without even a medical exam, in order to deploy them to Iraq. It is a claim division officials deny.

Read the whole thing. I suppose it might not be true — but we'll never know for sure unless Congress (or SecDef Gates) investigates. And if true, it's just further black irony on the “support the troops” mantra.

Posted in Iraq | Comments Off on Soldiers Claim Medically Unfit Being Resent into Combat Theater to Make Up Shortages

Alberto Gonzales’s Role in the Plame Cover-Up

Posted on March 12, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

As Senators start to pile on our lamentable Attorney General for presiding over Karl Rove’s politicization of the US Attorneys Office — an offense known as ‘obstruction of justice’ — I would like to direct your attention to a similar but somehow forgotten scandal.

Everyone seems to have forgotten that then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales also presided over one of the more sordid aspects of the Plame scandal. When Gonzales first learned that the Justice Department had started an official investigation into the Plame leak, Gonzales waited twelve hours before putting the White House staff on notice that they had to preserve documents and electronic files. Which seemed than — and seems now — like an open invitation to “shredding and deleting,” not to mention getting your story straight. In short, obstruction of justice.

And it’s not as if Gonzales dithered trying to make up his mind what to do. He told White House Chief of Staff Andy Card about the investigation right away — many hours before sending the official notification to preserve all evidence.

Here’s how Senator Harkin described the sequence of events back in October 2003:

On September 26, the Department of Justice officially launches its investigation.

Interestingly, it took 4 days after that “official” launch for the Justice Department to call White House Counsel Gonzales and notify him of the official investigation. Gonzalez then asked for an extra day before the Justice Department gave the White House the official notice, which means all documents and records must be preserved.

A recent letter was sent to the President from Senators Daschle, Schumer, Levin, and Biden which also expresses concern about this break from regular procedure.

They wrote:

Every former prosecutor with whom we have spoken has said that the first step in such an investigation would be to ensure all potentially relevant evidence is preserved, yet the Justice Department waited four days before making a formal request for documents.

Interestingly, the letter goes on:

When the Justice Department finally asked the White House to order employees to preserve documents, White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales asked for permission to delay transmitting the order to preserve evidence until morning. The request for a delay was granted. Again, every former prosecutor with whom we have spoken has said that such a delay is a significant departure from standard practice.

Lest you think this is much ado about nothing, consider that when Patrick Fitzgerald came looking, key emails to or from the Vice President’s office mysteriously could not be found in the White House computer system’s archives.

Posted in Politics: The Party of Sleaze | 6 Comments

Making it Official

Posted on March 12, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

Let the jokes with tinges of nervousness begin: Halliburton to Move Headquarters to Dubai.

When I first saw this headline, I thought it was a parody, some jape about the location of the nerve center of the military-industrial complex. But it's in the New York Times, not the Onion…

Posted in Politics: International | 2 Comments