From The Loonatic Left

Scooter...lied

Well if that is it...if THAT is it...it would be hard for anyone to view this as anything but an extreme embarassment for the media and those who have been salivating for Karl Rove and Dick Cheney's scalp.  "They will be frog marching Rove out of the White House"...so said Ambassador Wilson...also known now as 'Ambassador Liar Liar Pants on Fire'.  Not even close...in fact it would be harder to get any further from the truth.

To recap what has actually happened...the media and the left have been embarassed again.  That's right the entire Valerie Plame 'leak' investigation has resulted in the indictment of the Vice President's chief of staff...not for the criminal act of exposing a top secret agent.  NO!  He has been indicted because his testimony disagrees with the testimony of several reporters.  He has been indicted for perjury.  He claimed that he didn't talk to reporters, the reporters said he did. 

In what has to be the most curious indictment ever issued...Scooter Libby has been indicted for telling reporters the truth about Ambassador Joe 'Liar Liar' Wilson's trip to Nigeria and then not admitting that he told them the truth in his testimony to the Grand Jury.

First off...this is not what the investigation was supposed to be about.  The investigation was about whether a crime was committed when reporters were leaked the identity of a secret agent.  It turns out that a crime was not committed or there would be an indictment for that crime.  So hold this thought in your head:  There was NO crime committed.  If there was no crime committed...let me point this out carefully...

WHY THE HELL DID WE JUST SPEND THREE YEARS INVESTIGATING IT!!!!????!!!!

If this is it...what an embarassment for the media.  What an indictment..not of the administration...of the administration's critics in the media and those politicians who tried to make this something it was not.

This indictment further identifies who was lying...it was not Bush or Cheney, Rove or Libby...it was Amabassdor Wilson.  Wilson lied to the media, in his Op Ed to the New York Times, in his book...in fact the only time that Wilson did not lie was apparently in his testimony to the Grand Jury OR he would have been indicted as well.  The report makes clear that Wilson was lying constantly in all of his public statements...just not when he was testifying under oath.  I hope he is proud of this 'achievement'.

How did the media allow this liar to fool them for three years?  How could competent media outlets publish lie after lie after lie for three years?  He has made an ass out almost every major media outlet.  The Washington Post may have to run a special edition just containing corrections about news reports they have run containing Wilson's lies and misrepresentations.  So how?

There is a simple answer...when something appeals to a media outlet's bias...no research is performed to verify facts.  When a reporter likes the 'facts' he or she is given...they run with it.  Look at Judy Miller on Iraq...and most of all look at EVERY MEDIA OUTLET on this Plame leak investigation.

What an awful embarassment.

For those who feel like we just relived the Clinton indictment's and scandals...THAT at least contained a germ of a criminal act.  Sexual harassment is, after all, a criminal act.  When the big boss is sexually harassing the staff, any other company would be engaging in disciplinary proceedings at a minimum but we hardly needed a 5 year investigation into every Clinton official to end up with a weak perjury indictment.

I am consistent...I thought the Starr Report and the investigation was an unnecessary embarassment and the impeachment proceedings were a sham.  For those who want to argue about this investigation...are YOU consistent?

Confirmation War

If you think that the Judge Bork hearings were a debacle, wait until the Miers hearings get rolling.  Bork was a tough minded thoroughly experienced jurist with years of practice arguing constitutional law issues.  Miers is a con law neophyte who as far as anyone can tell, has learned more constitutional law since her nomination than she ever knew before it.  But this is about more than just about her legal inexperience, the following explosive issues are sure to be a part of the hearings:

1. Bush's National Guard Service!  How?  Well guess who was involved in the Texas Lottery Commission Scandal?  None other than the infamous Bob Barnes.  You remember him.  He is the former Lieutenant Governor of Texas and Democratic fundraiser who remembers helping George W. Bush obtain a hard to get slot in the Texas Air National Guard.  It turns out he is also a guy who received a $23 million payoff when his consulting contract with the Lottery vendor in Texas ended.  What does this have to do with Miers?  She was the person who decided that a no-bid contract was just the ticket for the Texas Lottery Commission.  Barnes is going to be called as a character witness and you can bet that everything he has claimed regarding Bush's Guard service is going to get another public airing.
2. Abortion Rights - No surprise here.  What is surprising is that the one argument in favor of Miers - that is she is a stealth candidate - has been blown away by her answers on a 'right-to-life' questionaire and the stupid Administration media blitz to social conservatives.  There is nothing like publicly reassuring James Dobson and other social conservatives that Miers was opposed to Roe v. Wade to give away all claims to being an independent minded jurist.  What is Miers supposed to do now?  She will definately be asked about this and she can't very well answer that she doesn't know how she would rule when the White House has been telling any social conservative who would listen that she is anti-Roe.
3. Constitutional Law questions - This lady has zero experience and, as far as anyone can tell, zero knowledge of constitutional case law.  We can expect that Senators from BOTH parties are having their staff experts research obscure cases to frame trapping questions.  This lady is going to stagger from one embarassment to another in her confirmation hearings.  Usually a nominee can count on supportive Senators from one party providing softball questions.  That is not going to happen here for two reasons: (1) neither side is reliably pro-Miers; and (2) I doubt this nominee will have sufficient time to cram up on Constitutional Law to even recognize a softball question when she gets one.
4. Politics is similar to show business and in show business there is a well recognized saying that you never want to follow a great act.  No matter how you look at this, Miers is following Roberts who put on a great act.  She can not hope to be as conversant as Justice Roberts proved to be on Constitutional Law questions and will suffer in comparison.  I am certain that this will be a very unpleasant experience for Harriett Miers and that she will personally and professionally be damaged by this - even if she is ultimately confirmed.

The hearings are bound to be a sad spectacle, sort of a dark comedy.  When you compare this to what could have been, this pick is awfully hard to defend.

The New York Times and Judy Miller - A Potential Explanation

There are many people who are heaping derision on the New York Times for their silence on the Valerie Plame leak investigation.  The New York Times has been scooped on the 'partial' content of their own employee's testimony, the agreement to testify, the existence of additional notes and has been completely silent from both an editorial and reporting perspective on what has become a major, at least for the Washington beltway crowd, investigation into who leaked the name of Joseph Wilson's wife to members of the press.

Judy Miller went to prison to protect her source, believed to be 'Scooter' Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, even after Libby had signed a waiver releasing Miller.  This puzzling act was initially credited as an in-your-face response to the hardball tactics of Fitzpatrick, the special prosecutor investigating the leak.  Miller was credited by the New York Times as taking a principled stand to protect her sources and the first amendment.

As time had passed, the leak investigation ground on with Miller cooling her heals in prison, and the New York Times writing editorials about her courageous stand.  Then...something happened.  Suddenly the Times went silent, and Miller agreed to testify.  Initially we were told by the New York Times this was because Libby, her source, had provided specific assurance that his blanket release of confidentiality was voluntary.  Libby's attorney objected to that interpretation of events and backed it up with documentation, a letter and an e-mail which clearly stated that Libby was voluntarily waiving his right to confidentiality.  Further, both of these documents pre-date the prison sentence.  Another rather interesting fact is that Miller switched attorney's from a constitutional attorney to William Bennett, a well respected criminal attorney.

Clearly there is a story here and the New York Times and the employee of the New York Times is involved and surely both of them know what the story is.  Why then has the New York Times thus far failed to report on this story?

Some folks have said that there are only two possible explanations:

1. The story involves criminal liability for the New York Times employee and they are trying to protect the employee from that liability.
2. The story could create liability for the New York Times itself, and as long as the investigation is going on, the story will not be told by the New York Times.

In either case the New York Times in their handling of the matter has not distinguished themselves...that is unless there is another explanation:

What if the prosecutor has missed something that would become obvious if the New York Times were to produce a complete report of everything they have uncovered?  What if the New York Times has in its possession information that could blow the entire case wide open and reveal once and for all who was orchestrating the entire leak?  So what...how would this affect the decision to publish?

What if that information revealed that the leak was coming from inside the CIA or from a source who has not been identified by the special prosecutor?

If this were the case it would completely explain the limited disclosure, the lack of detailed reporting and the silence taken by the New York Times.  If the New York Times were to reveal the information in their possession, the unidentified source could be exposed.

There is only one other explanation:

The New York Times could be in possession of information so damaging that the prosecutor needs to keep it quiet.  If this is the situation, it is likely that this could be a far larger and damaging case than we know of at this point.  It also might have very little to do with Libby, Rove and the existing administration folks who have been the only targets focused upon by the press.

Justice Harriett Miers

We have now entered the realm of farce.

This is such a comical mis-step that I am embarassed for the people whose job it is to defend it.  Here is a record of some of the arguments being repeated to support this nominee...

1. The President has asserted forcibly that he believes she is the best candidate for the vacancy.  Apparently he is hoping that no one notices that she has zero Constitutional Law experience.
2. Democratic Senator Harry Reid (Senate Minority Leader) is 'pleased' with the nomination.  This reflects either one of two things: (1) Either Senator Reid has as poor a judgment as President Bush; or (2) Senator Reid is happily anticipating watching the self-destruction of the Republican Senators as they deal with this nominee and is looking forward to it's impact on the 2006 mid-term elections;
3. Miers used to bring coffee and donuts to church meetings preparing her for a similar role as the newest Associate Justice;
4. Miers attended an evangelical church in Texas and taught Sunday School, of course Jimmy Carter attends an evangelical church in Georgia where he teaches Sunday School as well but this does not make him a conservative legal scholar (actually Jimmy Carter is probably more of a legal scholar than Harriett Miers, at least if we evaluate that based upon a persons written record);
5. Miers was in charge of the Texas Lottery Commission and the Texas Bar Association which is relevant how?;
6. Miers is a born-again Christian which means that at some point she either changed her mind or decided that in Texas this was the way to get ahead (in fairness it could also be a genuine conversion) of course Jimmy Carter is a born again Christian as is Bill Clinton and Manuel Noriega...why this qualifies as a credential for the Supreme Court is lost on me;
7. Miers regularly returns to Texas to attend church with her mother and her pastor likes her (I'm sure she is nice to her cats too);
8. There have been other nominees with no judicial experience in the past who have turned out to be great justices, of course the two nominees who most closely resemble Harriett Miers are Abe Fortas (in as much as there were many charges of cronyism, not the charges of fraud) and "Justice Charles Whittaker, a detail-obsessive judge who imploded from the stress of life on the Supreme Court."

9. So what does a truly conservative justice think about the nomination?  I speculated last week about what Judge Bork would think of the nomination...we don't need to speculate any more, he is now on the record: 

TUCKER CARLSON, MSNBC HOST: Are you impressed by the president’s choice of Harriet Miers?

JUDGE ROBERT BORK, FORMER SUPREME COURT NOMINEE: Not a bit.  I think it’s a disaster on every level.

CARLSON: Why?  Explain the levels on which it’s a disaster.

BORK: Well, the first one is, that this is a woman who’s undoubtedly as wonderful a person as they say she is, but so far as anyone can tell she has no experience with constitutional law whatever.  Now it’s a little late to develop a constitutional philosophy or begin to work it out when you’re on the court already.  So that—I’m afraid she’s likely to be influenced by factors, such as personal sympathies and so forth, that she shouldn’t be influenced by.  I don’t expect that she can be, as the president says, a great justice.

And Finally:      

All of these explanations make this nominee appear weak in the extreme but even they pale in comparison to this burst of stupidity by former senator Dan Coates 

''If great intellectual powerhouse is a qualification to be a member of the court and represent the American people and the wishes of the American people and to interpret the Constitution, then I think we have a court so skewed on the intellectual side that we may not be getting representation of America as a whole.'' 

Who is he and why is he saying such a dumb thing?  He is former Senator Dan Coates and is the person selected by the Bush administration to assist Harriett Miers through the confirmation process...after appointing this ding-dong to 'help' his nominee...Bush says to "trust him" on the nominee selection.

Forgive me for being just slightly concerned about his judgment.

If there are any excellent arguments in favor of this nominee's qualifications I would be delighted to review them.  Thus far this is the best case which has been made for approving this nomination.  There is one other argument that has been floated:

Failure of his party to approve this nomination will damage Bush's credibility...

...as if making the nomination in the first place hasn't already achieved that result.

A Poor and Disturbing Choice for a Supreme Court Nominee

I am afraid that I must add my own small whining voice to the cacophony of disappointed conservatives however, I'm confident that I have quite different reasons for doing so.  Those who fault the nominee's ideological 'purity' in my judgment are missing the mark.  Even if she were guaranteed to be a social conservative, I would be wringing my hands over this selection.  Why?

If Harriett Miers is a great pick for a justice, then so is virtually any political lawyer.  For those who don't know what lawyers do, I'd like to offer a mini tutorial...

• Lawyers rarely ever deal with Constitutional Law issues.
• Supreme Court Justices are supposed to ONLY deal with constitutional law issues.

Nothing more really needs to be said about this nominee.  She is totally unqualified.

Consider her resume:  She has never been a judge, so her trial experience is limited to whatever cases she actually argued herself as an attorney.  She has never been an appellate judge, so she has never had to decide cases which present a conflict of laws.  This type of experience is critical for any Supreme Court justice because the extremely fine shades of meaning that Supreme Court decisions frequently turn on, requires that a justice consider the ramifications of a decision throughout the law, not just on a particular case.  Cases on appeal do not have witnesses; they have records of the previous decisions and what is at issue is mostly errors of law.  There is almost never new evidence, but merely decisions regarding the applicable law.  Supreme Court appellate decisions are even more precise...they only deal with conflicting interpretations of federal law.

Therein lies my disquiet with the current nominee...a total lack of relevant experience.  But that is only part of my problem with this nominee...

I am very worried, not just by the selection of a poorly qualified nominee, but by what has clearly become the conventional wisdom behind this type of selection.  The process has degenerated to such an extent that a nominee's experience for the Supreme Court is less relevant than their political views on various issues.  This all started of course with Robert Bork.  Since that nomination, the 'borking' of nominees has become standard fare.  This has had a negative impact and will likely have a disastrous impact as time goes on.

In his book The Tempting of America, Bork predicted the current legal crisis.  When legal decisions become political decisions the Judiciary becomes a mini-legislative branch.  The problem is that justices are not elected.  Because so many political fights have been settled in court rooms, justices are now acting as little more than unelected Congress critters.  It is because of this that the nomination process has become a surrogate for a national political election.

It is often said that brilliant Americans avoid politics.  Why?  Easy answer...who wants to be smeared and slandered by special interest groups?  It may be that brilliant judges and lawyers will avoid Supreme Court nominations in the future for the same reason that brilliant people avoid politics.  Unfortunately if there is any legal position which requires brilliance, it is being a Justice on the Supreme Court.  Sadly we have created a strong incentive for mediocre nominees...the exact same incentive that exists for mediocre politicians.  Anyone who can do better...will.

 

Like the old saying...those who can do, those who can't teach.  Those who can't even teach should consider a career in politics.

The outrageous treatment of nominees to the highest court at the hands mostly of liberal special interest groups, has destroyed much of the credibility of the Democratic Party and has now caused the strategic selection of a nominee who is a mere shadow of a legal constitutional scholar.  A court which should attract the best and the brightest has become a court attracting neither. When ideological charlatans or stealth nominees with little experience or written records are the preferred nominee, something is horribly wrong.  Never before has a lack of experience been considered an asset for an appointment to anything.  It would be hard to argue that this isn't the case today.  Even by recent standards, this selection plumbs a new low.

Things that are an Irritant

This shall be a recurring column and is an opportunity for me to unload my list of irritations and an opportunity to share yours.  Let's start out with a biggie!

Mainstream Media Outlets - If you want the truth.  If you want the facts.  These are NOT the people to give them to you.  The scandalous manner in which they twist the news to meet agendas can drive you batty if you are someone who spends enough time to learn the actual facts.

The print media make more of an attempt than the broadcast media...the broadcast media never correct their mistakes.  But with the print media correcting the misrepresentations after the fact is a weak and tepid means of setting the record straight.  Here is why...when the headlines scream something that must be corrected on page 25 at bottom next to the farm futures reporting; the damaging inaccurate information is already established as truth.

Because of the agenda driven mainstream media...we have a huge population of ill-informed voters...I like to call them by a derogatory term:  Democrats

Using the comments section...share your irritation.