AG Mukasey Given Clean Bill Of Health

Top Law Enforcement Official Collapsed During Speech, Tests Show No Signs Of Stroke, Spokeswoman Says

(CBS/AP)  Attorney General Michael Mukasey was given "a clean bill of health" and hoped to check out of the hospital after extensive medical tests following his collapse, the Justice Department said Friday.

Departmental spokeswoman Gina Talamona said that the 67-year-old Mukasey underwent a host of exams after being admitted late Thursday to George Washington University Hospital after he collapsed during a speech at a Washington hotel.

"The results are in. Everything looks great," Talamona told reporters gathered outside the hospital in late morning. She reported that that Mukasey had passed a treadmill stress test, a stress echocardiogram, and an MRI. She also said doctors ruled out a stroke or cardiac problem.

"He's in good shape," she said, adding that Mukasey hoped to be able to leave the hospital some time later Friday.

Talamona said the physicians specifically had ruled out TIA - or transient ischemic attack - which is a mini-stroke.

Neither she nor other Mukasey aides would say specifically whether the attorney general would fly home to New York for the weekend or remain in Washington.

Talamona said earlier that at no time had Mukasey transferred his authority to his deputy during the period when he was stricken at a dinner of The Federalist Society and during his time in the hospital through the night and into Friday.

"There's no indication that he suffered a stroke or any heart-related incident," she said earlier. "It really appears to be a fainting spell."

President Bush telephoned the attorney general shortly before 7 a.m. EST to wish him a speedy recovery, press secretary Dana Perino said, describing Mukasey as "sounding well" and saying he was getting "excellent care."

Talamona noted that Mukasey had had a very busy day before going to a Washington hotel to give the keynote speech to a black-tie dinner of society, a conservative-oriented legal group. During the talk, he began to slur his words, nodded, turned and started to collapse when he was caught by men standing nearby.

His spokeswoman noted that he "works long days. He's very active. It was a late-night speech under hot lights."

Mukasey opened his speech on terrorism with a wry remark about expecting the mood at the conservative Federalist Society dinner to be "somber or sober." He slumped over the podium about 15 minutes later after slurring his words and could be seen swaying and shaking slightly. Three or four men in suits rushed on stage and caught him at the lectern.

"Oh, no, no!" people in the audience cried out as Mukasey fell. "Oh, my God!"

Mukasey, a retired federal judge, is Mr. Bush's third attorney general. The flinty but measured New Yorker has said the job initially discouraged him, and he has scaled back his public appearances in recent weeks.

A former prosecutor who saw Mukasey hours earlier described the attorney general as tired-looking and drawn.

Justice spokesman Peter Carr said Mukasey did not transfer his power to Deputy Attorney General Mark Filip.

"The attorney general is conscious, conversant and alert," Carr said after Mukasey was hospitalized. "His vital statistics are strong and he is in good spirits."

Talamona said Mukasey's wife, Susan, was with him at the hospital.

After collapsing, Mukasey lay on the stage for about 10 minutes being attended to by his FBI security detail and medical personnel at the dinner, said eyewitness Abigail Thernstrom, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Though he lost consciousness initially, Mukasey appeared to be awake when he was taken from the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in northwest Washington, she said.

"It was hard to watch such a thing," Thernstrom said. "It was horrible."

A Republican staffer on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Jack Daly, who was also at the dinner, said in an e-mail to colleagues sent at 10:20 p.m. EST: "AG Mukasey collapsed in the middle of his keynote address at tonight's fed-soc dinner. He is still on stage after ten minutes and his security detail has called 911. The paramedics just arrived."

Twenty minutes later, Daly added in another e-mail: "Mukasey did regain consciousness before he was taken away."

Mr. Bush, a fierce loyalist, ventured outside his circle of friends and Texas associates to tap Mukasey 14 months ago to replace Alberto Gonzales, who had resigned in disgrace. Gonzales, the president's longtime friend and fellow Texan, quit after months of senators' demands for his resignation and investigations that called his credibility into doubt.

In a sun-drenched morning announcement on the White House lawn, Mr. Bush introduced Mukasey as "a tough but fair judge" and asked the Senate to confirm him quickly.

"Judge Mukasey is clear-eyed about the threat our nation faces," Bush said, praising his reputation as a smart and strong manager.

Mukasey, the former chief U.S. District Court judge in the Manhattan courthouse just blocks from ground zero, earned a reputation as a tough-on-terrorism jurist with an independent streak.

As a judge, Mukasey ordered the detention of young Muslim men as so-called material witnesses in terrorism cases following the Sept. 11 terror attacks. While those decisions drew sharp criticism from immigration lawyers, Mukasey won praise from Bush administration lawyers.

Mukasey endorsed much of the USA Patriot Act, which Mr. Bush pushed through Congress following the terror attacks to secure broad new law-enforcement power.

And yet he once criticized the Bush administration from the bench for overstepping in a terrorism case. As a jurist, he was known for his brusqueness and impatience with people who waste his time.

Before joining the administration, the former judge was a partner at New York-based law firm Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler.

[harbinger09]

Wow, someone''''s feeling sadistic today. Considering Mukasey hasn''''t done anything wrong like the rest of the people in the Bush administration, he shouldn''''t be hated like the rest of them.

Posted by nordeck52 at 12:42 PM : Nov 21, 2008


Mukasey defended Bush and others in the war torture cases, has refused to prosecute and investigate various wrong doings of the Bush admin., refused to issue subpoenas as requested by Congress, and only after Obama was slated to win, did he finally relent and agree to look into the Attorney General scandal.

Mukasey, like Tony Snow--is the eternal water carrying boy for Bush so he is just as bad as the people he protects. The USAG is not supposed to work for the President--but for the US--both Gonzales and Mukasey have failed to be unbiased in this regard.

[harbinger09]

What lies. After such a collapse, NO WAY should the USAG get a clean bill of health. A similar incident occurred with my 2nd husband. He simply collapsed at a restaurant. Later tests showed no abnormalities--but then just 2 years later, he had a major heart attack and 2 years after that, he was dead. Prior to death, more sophisticated testing at another hospital revealed that he had suffered numerous "mini-strokes" which had gone unnoticed as they showed up as simply brain pattern fluctuations--but...as explained to me, those fluctuations that endured over a significant amount of time (measured in minutes) indicate possible strokes. One unusually long disruption in pattern coincided with the incident of the slurred words and collapse.

Slurring of speech indicates that an area of the brain was affected. Strokes remain one of the least understood/explained disorders of the human body.

When they said Mukasey''s speech slurred--stroke--but since the jury is still out on predicting or justifying stroke without any discernible symptoms--they are lying and giving him a free pass.

[jamshied]

WELL, THEY SAY DOCTORS GAVE HIM A CLEAN BILL OF HEATH AND AS IF NOTHING HAPPENED. DUUUH!!

THIS DOE NOT SOUND LOGICAL; WHY THE MAN COLLAPSED AND FAINED, HIS SPEEC BLURRED, ETC?

WHY COVER THIS UP? THEY HAVE TO GIVE SOME LOGICAL MEDICAL EXPLANATION AS "WHY" THE AG COLLAPSED. OR JUST SAY THAT NONE OF ANYBODY''S BUSINESS.!!!

THE GUY HAS ONLY TWO MORE MONTHS TO SEVRE AND NOBODY IG GOING TO FIRE HIM. AT THE WORST SCENARIO HIS DEPUTIES CAN HANDLE THE JOB. NO BIG DEAL.
THE BIG DEAL IS , IF THIS IS "NEWS" , AND IF YOU (MEDIA) REPORT IT, THEN YOU SHOULD FOLLOW IT UP AND GIVE AN APPROPRIATE EXPLANATION AS WHAT THE HECK WENT ON, OR GOING ON.

[earache4]

Wow, someone''s feeling sadistic today. Considering Mukasey hasn''t done anything wrong like the rest of the people in the Bush administration, he shouldn''t be hated like the rest of them.
Posted by nordeck52 at 12:42 PM

That''s if you don''t count his record on torture, right?

[rebelscout]

Mukasy had a small stroke. Look at the video, it is obvious.

[dakotaclark]

Hmmm...

I am not an M.D., but it looked and sounded like Attorney General Michael Mukasey experienced a TIA, that is a Transient Ischemic Attack, aka a petite or tiny stroke.

More than likely, there is more to this story, but due to personal medical privacy matters, there will be silence.

[shanev137]

Watching the complete destruction of his Republican party has probably been taking a toll on him.

[idnnsg]

"It''s one thing to blog and express your opinions about political matters...but to slam a person who is seriously ill is another" -- talktokim67

Read the article again; he has a "clean bill of health", so there''s no harm in expressing distaste for his evil enabling of torture.

[kansas1946]

Lying for Bush wears on you after a while. Scott McClellan finally cried uncle. If I had to defend Bush''s policies, I would pass out myself.

[nikosk11]

Too much Viagra will cause an immediate drop in blood preasure!!!!!!

[patronejohn]

Ha! The Framers are very angry. They have unleashed their powers in retaliation of the Patriot Act. This guy is really a Sith Lord.

[idnnsg]

A "clean bill of health" is NOT the same as "good health". The emphasis should be on the word "bill". It just means he paid the doctors enough money for them to say he is OK. In reality, people don''t slur their speech and then collapse if they are in good health. It could have been a stroke, he could be diabetic and he took too much insulin, it could be a lot of things... but he is NOT in good health. Good thing for him that he is retiring soon.

[nordeck52]

I wish him a speedy death, amen.

P/S: please take Bush and Cheney along.

Posted by niceface19 at 12:15 PM : Nov 21, 2008


Wow, someone''s feeling sadistic today. Considering Mukasey hasn''t done anything wrong like the rest of the people in the Bush administration, he shouldn''t be hated like the rest of them.

[enoughya]

Mukasey''s protection of Bush, after all the crimes Bush has committed (torture, illegal spying on Americans, politization of the Judiciary and all branches of government, suspension of habeas corpus, complete disregard for COngressional subpeonas, and on and on), certainly deserves much harsher retribution than mere fainting, but it is somewhat satisfying that it occurred while he was giving a speach in front of one of the most despicable groups in America and while attempting to justify Bush''s criminality yet again. We could only hope for a more pronounced demise for all of the Bush thugs.

[easeup-2009]

I wish him a speedy death, amen.

P/S: please take Bush and Cheney along.

Posted by niceface19 at 12:15 PM : Nov 21, 2008

Myopic ***.

[vsg4]

Some how people in high offices either in denial or for something else do not reveal actual health condition. I re call when judge William Rehnquist was diagnosed with Thyroid cancer on Thursday and under gone tracheotomy , is office said he will be back to supreme court on Monday in 4 days ( that turned out to be more than 4 months after). Why od they lie, I do not get it.

[excoachken]

"A clean bill of health." Now, how about a lie-detector test?

[niceface19]

I wish him a speedy death, amen.

P/S: please take Bush and Cheney along.

[pirmin3]

And the tax payer is stuck paying the health insurance for this POS.

[erasmus81]

Rowdydfw, you want me to take you to President Obama''''s Inauguration Ball?

Posted by FloydZeppd at 09:21 AM : Nov 21, 2008

Geez, where''s your taste?