Charles Schumer, official dickhead on Mukasey

)Seconded by Harry Reid, though.)

First, Frank Rich rips him a new one, then the NYT editorial board piles on.

First, the editorial, which begins by taking a shot at Harry Reid, without naming him:

Democrats offer excuses for their sorry record, starting with their razor-thin majority. But it is often said that any vote in the Senate requires more than 60 votes — enough to overcome a filibuster. So why did Mr. Mukasey get by with only 53 votes? Given the success the Republicans have had in blocking action when the Democrats cannot muster 60 votes, the main culprit appears to be the Democratic leadership, which seems uninterested in or incapable of standing up to Mr. Bush.

Then, it focuses on Schumer:

The claim that Mr. Mukasey will depoliticize the Justice Department loses its allure when you consider that he would not commit himself to enforcing Congressional subpoenas in the United States attorneys scandal.

Then, it finishes by shooting at all the Democrats on this one:

All of this leaves us wondering whether Mr. Schumer and other Democratic leaders were more focused on the 2008 elections than on doing their constitutional duty. Certainly, being made to look weak on terrorism might make it harder for them to expand their majority.

And, here’s a thought from Rich:

What makes the Democrats’ Mukasey cave-in so depressing is that it shows how far even exemplary sticklers for the law like Senators Feinstein and Schumer have lowered democracy’s bar. When they argued that Mr. Mukasey should be confirmed because he’s not as horrifying as Mr. Gonzales or as the acting attorney general who might get the job otherwise, they sounded whipped. After all these years of Bush-Cheney torture, they’ll say things they know are false just to move on.

Don’t worry, though: Schumer is out saving hedge funds from additional taxation as we speak.

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Nice to see Schumer doing some heavy-duty pandering

Or, telling an outright lie about why he opposes an increase in taxes on hedge funds. Schumer says an increase in tax increase on private equity and hedge fund executivescould lead to a massive exodus of financial services jobs from New York City.

Please.

First, it’s a federal tax, so it will apply everywhere.

Second, if it leads New York State to raise similar state taxes, well, last I checked, Schumer was a United States Senator, not a New York State one. That said, he can lobby the state legislature against that, if push comes to shove.

Third, if the Democratic Congress remains committed to pay as you go budgeting, unlike the GOP that gave us plenty of complicity in six years of Bush deficits, money for new programs has to come from somewhere. Even Schumer acknowledges this part of the calculus.

Now, whether his “poison pill” alternative of including real estate and energy folks is legitimate or just a poison pill, I don’t know. Big Oil would be nice for a shakedown, but, unless the real estate tax were narrowly targeted at some high rollers, I think it would make the housing slump a lot worse.

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More on the DoJ--Minnesota and Wisconsin

Is Department of Justice melting down? I just got back from the grocery store to discover more on the Rachel Paulose matter. It seems the two Minnesota senators are now refusing to discuss the leadership collapse at the Minneapolis office. Senator Schumer calls it an example of prosecutors being "deprofessionalized" under Gonzales.

The Carpetbagger Report blogs on the tragic lengths to which Wisconsin U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic went to be a "Loyal Bushie" in last years election. Apparently as part of a thankfully failed Republican effort to unseat Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle, Biskupic brought a politically motivated but bogus case against a member of Doyle's administration and somehow won a 16 month conviction.

Since the official was convicted,how do we know the charge was bogus?

Well, when it reached the Court of Appeals the case was summarily thrown out on the day of the oral argument and Biskipic's target was ordered immediately released.Steven Walters and John Diedrich of the Milwaukee Sentinal Journal report

The three-judge panel in Chicago acted with unusual speed, ruling after oral arguments by Thompson’s attorney and the U.S. attorney’s office.

During 26 minutes of oral arguments, all three judges assailed the government’s case, with Judge Diane Wood saying at one point that “the evidence is beyond thin.” During a news conference later Thursday, Doyle, a former state attorney general, said the three judges did an “extraordinary thing” by entering an order finding Thompson innocent and ordering her immediate release.

Are there no depths the "Loyal Bushies" won't plumb to advance Karl Rove's political agenda?

The tragedy in this farce is that Biskupic's victim, Georgia Thompson, was subjected to a humiliating trial, spent 4 months in jail, had to pay for her defense, probably wrecking her financially, and lost her $77,000 per year state job, all to advance the political chances of some Republican politician.

“[T]he public must perceive that every substantive decision within the department is made in a neutral and non-partisan fashion. Once the public detects partisanship in one important decision, they will follow the natural inclination to question every decision made, whether there is a connection or not.” Bud Cummins.

UPDATE: At least one Milwaukee defense lawyer thinks Biskupic should be fired. His blog has a link to the audio of the oral argument. Skip to the last 15 minutes. It's a hoot. Rarely does a court ever trash a lawyer, especially a DoJ lawyer, so badly.

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Dear Alberto

March 8, 2007
The Honorable Alberto Gonzales
Attorney General of the United States
United States Justice Department
Washington, DC 20510

Dear Attorney General Gonzales:

This letter is to express our strong disappointment with how your Department has handled the cases of eight U.S. Attorneys who have been asked to resign over the past few months, and to take issue with a number of assertions you made in an op-ed in yesterday’s USA Today.

We have come to believe that this was a clumsy effort to force these U.S. Attorneys out for reasons that have little or nothing to do with their performance as prosecutors. The U.S. Attorneys who testified before the House and Senate had solid records as independent prosecutors. They are good people. And they didn’t deserve to be treated this way.

Now you write that these forced-resignations were based on “policy, priorities and management.” You also stated unequivocally before the Judiciary Committee that you “would never, ever make a change in the United States attorney position for political reasons.”

But these assertions don’t hold up. There is evidence suggesting that the intent was to replace some of these U.S. Attorneys with others who might be more politically-connected. This was the case with Mr. Cummins, who was replaced with a protégé of Karl Rove. And your Deputy, Paul McNulty, has acknowledged as much before the Judiciary Committee. There are suggestions that this may be the case with others as well.

The fact is that the U.S. Attorneys in question received favorable performance evaluations. This was done by several dozen independent reviewers who were asked to evaluate each U.S. Attorney’s priorities and policy decisions, as well as their prosecution statistics. When we reviewed the reports your office provided, it was clear that each of the U.S. Attorneys were individually evaluated to have a strategic plan and appropriate priorities to meet the needs of the Department and their districts.

Given these evaluations, it is difficult to now accept that the reason these U.S. Attorneys were fired was because they failed to meet the Department’s priorities. It is even harder to accept the answer, given each of the U.S. Attorneys was a rising star. It is also hard to accept that 7 U.S. Attorneys lost your confidence simultaneously, especially since all were “surprised” by the call requesting their resignation.

U.S. Attorneys are at the forefront of many of this country’s most important cases, and as each of them testified yesterday, U.S. Attorneys must have some level of independence given the seriousness of their job.

While the President has the right to fire U.S. Attorneys, we do not believe the American people are best served if the President chooses to fire U.S. Attorneys for political reasons – whether to put in place young ideologues or because he is displeased with the cases the U.S. Attorney is pursuing.

We strongly believe that if a President chooses to fire U.S. Attorneys for any reason, but especially for political reasons, he should explain and justify his decision.

However, the change to the law last March has wiped out Congress’s role to hold the Administration accountable for its actions.

If the Department of Justice is comfortable justifying its reasons and is committed to going through the Senate confirmation process, then the Department should also support our efforts to pass legislation requiring Senate confirmation of U.S. Attorneys.

We ask that you support this legislation and restore the independence of U.S. Attorneys.

Sincerely,


Dianne Feinstein
United States Senator


Charles Schumer
United States Senator

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Senator Kyl Blocks Repeal of Correction To Patriot Act

For those who have been paying attention the President wants the power to appoint any of his friends to the position of US attorney without dealing with the pesky senate confirmation process. During the passage of the USA Patriot Act a Republican staffer snuck in a change to the law allowing the AG to permanently appoint US attorneys without Senate approval. Recently the AG used the new law to fire 9 US attorneys and to appoint their replacements without Senate confirmation. Some of the firings involved US attorneys who were involved in fighting Republican corruption. One of the others resulted in the appointment of one of Karl Rove's henchmen as US attorney in Arkansas. Any guesses why Rove would want one of his boys down in Little Rock during the run up to the 2008 election?

When Specter found out that giving away the Senate's confirmation power had been attributed to him, he was shocked. Apparently nobody told him about the change. It turned out that a staffer who fancied himself Senator inserted the language at the request of the Administration without telling his boss. Senator Feinstein recently sponsored a bill restoring the law to status quo ante. Well, it seems the administration has had its Senate waterboy, Senator Kyl, block the legislation. That resulted in an uproar on the Senate Floor this afternoon. Enjoy Senator Schumer's comments.

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