July 27, 2007
A Political Perjury Game
National Review Online: Accusations That Gonzales Lied To Congress Are Without Merit
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Play CBS Video Video Political Happenings Vaughn Ververs, Sr. Pol. Ed. for CBSNews.com, weighs in on the Alberto Gonzales scandal as well as the 2008 Presidential candidates.
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Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is sworn in on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, July 24, 2007, prior to testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on his role in the U.S. attorney firings. (AP Photo/Dennis Cook)
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Who's Who Firings Firestorm Justice Department at center of controversy over firing of eight U.S. attorneys.
In March, we argued that Alberto Gonzales should step down, or be told to step down, as attorney general. “He cannot defend the administration and its policies even when they deserve defense,” we wrote. This week we saw just how much credibility he has lost: He is no longer believed even when he is telling the truth.
Democrats are claiming that Gonzales perjured himself in testimony before the Senate, and are calling for a special counsel to investigate. In the disputed testimony, from February 2006, Gonzales was talking about the Terrorist Surveillance Program. He said that “there has not been any serious disagreement about the program that the president has confirmed.”
The Democrats say that this was untrue, because there was a lot of intra-administration strife about the National Security Administration’s surveillance of terrorists. In 2004, for example, John Ashcroft (at that time the attorney general), Gonzales (at that time the White House counsel), and other officials sparred over the program in Ashcroft’s hospital room. Ashcroft and his aides thought that the NSA was going beyond its authorization. Only in 2007 did this episode come to light.
The administration’s surveillance of terrorists has, however, undergone several modifications over the period since September 11, and some of the details remain secret. Gonzales’s phrasing was careful, and it was careful because he was trying to avoid disclosing those details.
As best as we can tell, here is how events unfolded. After September 11, the NSA began running wiretaps on suspected al Qaeda operatives. The surveillance program was reauthorized every 45 days. In 2004, however, Justice Department officials, for the first time, raised legal objections to the scope of the program. The resulting dispute within the administration led to the famous hospital scene, after which President Bush sided with the Justice Department officials and narrowed the program. Many months later, the New York Times revealed the existence of this now-narrowed program; President Bush then confirmed its existence and named it the “Terrorist Surveillance Program”; and Gonzales defended it.
When Gonzales said that “there has not been any serious disagreement about the program that the president has confirmed,” then, he was referring to the later, narrowed version of terrorist surveillance, and as far as we know he was correct. Other disputed Gonzales comments appear to follow the same basic pattern.
Thursday afternoon, the press and the Democrats started to play up testimony by FBI director Robert Mueller about the hospital-room meeting, testimony that supposedly contradicts Gonzales. But all Mueller said was that the meeting concerned a legal disagreement over the NSA’s surveillance. If our account of the chronology of the program is correct, there is no contradiction here.
The Democrats say that to defend Gonzales on these terms is to play games with words. But what was Gonzales supposed to say? The controversy about which he was testifying was the existing surveillance program. He could have said that an earlier version of it had provoked controversy: But given that the administration’s (defensible) position was that publicizing the program’s existence in the first place had jeopardized it, it would have been impossible to say that without inviting further questions that would have revealed more details about the program.
It is a convoluted story; and much of it is beside the point. The country is at war. The commander-in-chief and his agents have to be able to listen in on the enemy. Our surveillance appears to have played an important role in disrupting at least two terrorist plots. But our ability to wage this part of the war has gotten progressively weaker as it has continued. The program narrowed first because of legal objections by the Justice Department, and then because of the political fallout from the New York Times’s reporting. We fear that it will grow weaker still now, because Democrats who ought to know better insist on playing “gotcha” with the attorney general.
By the editors of National Review Online
Reprinted with permission from National Review Online.
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See all 116 CommentsIf there is such a crime, then let the law deal with it, just like the impeachment process for Bush. It never gets off the ground because THERE IS NO BASIS TO IT RATHER THAN LOUD WHINNING
President Clinton was never adjuged guilty of perjury in ANY court of law. As it relates to a perjury charge - there was never a trial, never a jury, never a verdict, never a court imposed penalty. There was a politically driven successful impeachment vote, by congress 12/18/98, However, on 02/12/99 the senate acquited him of the impeachment charge.
This cognitive stripping orginally affected 45-49% of the population, but over the years this number has lessened to 30%. These poor americans' cognitive ability is so low that they
scream that democrats are lying, reporters are lying, newspapers are lying, foreign leaders are lying, Critical republicans are lying, former Republican appointees who have spoke out are lying, everyone is lying BUT --- GWB. GWB & his administration is the only one telling the truth, & EVERYONE ELSE is LYING!
It may be that this mental condition has except mutated into a condition that not only affects cognitive ability, but is causing pyschiatric problems as well.
Presently, your assertions are at least a misunderstanding of the facts. But, now that you have been put on notice as to their falsity, anyone repeating them in the future their reputation to that of a liar.
Warm Regards,
Crushed
We are at war. Granted. That however, does not give the president, vice-president, attorney general, et al a blank check.
This is supposed to be a nations of laws and not men.
I expect the highest official in the land to obey the law, speck truthfully and not obstruct justice.
But as I have observed, this is not the case. We have a runaway administration that seeks to be a dictator. They speak in polite tones and use very expensive collegiate words that mean one thing: Shut up and obey. We know better. We are smarter. We deserve your obedience and by the way, how much money Do you have?
I watched Gonzo weasel through the hearing and it is plain to anyone without rose colored glasses that he is trying to hide what he is up to and trying to smokescreen what this administration is up to.
Unfortunately, we have too many Rushaholics who make excuses for this power grab.
If we could only fast forward to February 2008.
24% of all American's prefer a Nazi style government. 100% of these weak, arrogant, mostly Southern HYPOCRITS vote Repuglicon.
28% of all American's continue to blindly support the Neocon/Bush/Cheney agenda of lies, theft, cronyism, incomptence. The vast majority of these fools listen to FOX News.
Therefore, 85.7% of all Neocon/Bush/Cheney supporters are weak, arrogant, Southern Repuglicons, which is now nothing more than a regional party of bigots.
There is a battle between Good and Evil taking place in this country.
The neo-cons must be driven back into Hell, where they came from.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/document/document_20070723.shtml
Looks like the acorn doesn't fall far from the tree.
When Gonzales said that %u201Cthere has not been any serious disagreement about the program that the president has confirmed,%u201D then, he was referring to the later, narrowed version of terrorist surveillance, and as far as we know he was correct."
That explanation doesn't even make sense - if you guys could explain it without needing to disclosing any details, then why wouldn't/couldn't the nation's top lawyer? Silence when one would expect clarity from the average AG is considered circumstantial evidence of guilt admissible in a court of law.
And furthermore, if Gonzales and the President were so desperate to get a broader wiretap law passed that they were willing to badger an sick man in ICU, then how did it come to be that they were okay with the more narrow one given that the terrorist threat is greater now than before and given that Bush is saying Iraqi terrorists are trying to get into the country and that there are unknown sleeper cells?
You're a poor excuse for a human being. Don't even talk to me you pig.
Posted by katg21 at 11:19 AM : Jul 28, 2007
I reported you to CBS News.
We discuss issues here, not insult people.
you guys make me sick!
how does it feel when the shoe is on your foot?
you re-pubic-an hypocrite
Posted by liberalameri at 09:06 PM : Jul 27, 2007
Different, Clinton actually LIED and was PROVEN to have done so. You can throw the lying card around all you want but you better *** well prove it. Just because you say he lied doesn't make it so.
Ya know, Mr Web, I think that we may be on the opposite sides of many issues, but I don't hesitate to agree with much of your posts, and I see you have the civility to at lease entertain some of mine. If only those idiots in power could also shed some of their partisan gainsaying, disagreeing with the truth simply because the other party tells it, then maybe we could get something done for this once great nation, whose greatness is diminished only by its own worsening corruption.
On this subject, I think that Gonzo, and the LA mayor are in the pockets of big business, (who love the $3 per hour wages) and therefore actually out of touch with those of similar ethnicity.
Who in the White House or DOJ is coaxing witness testimony?
You and I have had some nice discussions in the past and I enjoy reading your Post. The illegal immigrant issue is a very sensitive one for me and I've studied the Mexican culture in all its aspects during a full semester in college, so I'm very well educated on the topic. For me its a simple matter of doing whats right and its not about race or culture for me, its about Law and Order. I can get very ugly discussing this topic and prefer not to comment any further, not go there! But the world does not deal in absolutes, black or white, but many shades of gray! People go back and forth, G_A_Y_S go back and forth between straight and G_A_Y too, so do cultures, whatever is convenient! I remember the joke about the Lone Ranger and Tonto when they were surrounded by Indians and the Lone Ranger told Tonto, well old buddy, I guess this is it, we are surrounded and Tonto replied; what do you mean we? Don't get me started on this topic, I could write a book!
Brother I'll stand with you any day.
IGNORE THEM! DIVIDE AND CONQUER IS MILITARY STRATEGY 101
Never before have all Americans been on the same page about so many issues but... never before have the Zionist tried to make their final move toward a global financial takeover of the world.
The central bankers that have filled our congress with blackmailed perverts and crypto jews are planning to destroy everything that is good about America. They are planning to rule the world from Israel through the central banks.
We don't know what we don't know, but what we do know is that we will have to stand together or we will continue to fall one at a time. It is time to stand together.
The reason?
According to the US justice dept. attorney, many of the boys were gay anyway and enjoyed it. No wonder Jeff Gannon (the gay prostitute posing as a white house reporter) spent 300 nights at the white house. Daddy Bush had a similar problem during his administration. Seems the apple does not fall far from the tree.
This could only happen in America controlled by the Ashkenazi Jews that have taken control of our white house, government and about anything else where there is money.
Bet you didn't know that one of Bush's direct ancestors studied Hebrew and wrote a book about Mohammad.
Even Hitler, a man who Prescott Bush supported in WWII, was of Ashkenazi Jewish descent. Giving IG Farben 100M during WWII is how they lost their assets under the Trading With The Enemy Act in 1942, it is no wonder that George W Bush business partner in Arbusto Oil was the half brother of Osama Bin Laden and these are undisputed facts.
Wake up America, the press is controlled by this same group of people and that is why it is not reported. We have a government of puppets being controlled by teh Ashkenazi Jews.
Your post has logic, but I think you are misled on one point, the AG and the LA mayor are not doing it to "help their fellow countrymen" as they are Americans, not Mexicans. It also is not a matter of an ethnic group "looking out for their own", as most naturalized and American born citizens of Mexican heritage look down on the illegals as trash, even more so than non Mexicans might, I call it the "Uncle Tom and Aunt Condoleeza syndrome".
The real cause is business welcomes this, as it allows them to pay slave wages that would be illegal if the employees were citizens. It gives business the alternative to dealing with labor unions, which have been systematically emasculated due to pressure from the "trickle downers", and in part to their own corruption.
For our time has now been called.
The greatest fear of our founding fathers has been realized - the forces of tyranny now control two branches of our once American government, the executive and judicial branches.
Only the American people can save us now.
Thank goodness.
We have never failed before.
ST
"The Constitution... is a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary which they may twist and shape into any form they please."
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"Is it the Fourth?"
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