Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Libby Trial: Defense Rests on a Thin Case


From my "Capital Games" column at www.thenation.com....


Swing and a miss. Swing and a miss. Swing and a miss. As the I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby perjury trial headed toward a finale, Libby's attorneys on Wednesday made several last-minute stabs to bolster its defense--and federal district Judge Reggie Walton shot each down.

The defense wanted to bring Tim Russert, the Meet the Press star, back to the witness stand. Russert had appeared as a key witness for the prosecution. When Libby, then chief of staff for Vice President Dick Cheney, was questioned in 2003 and 2004 by FBI agents and a grand jury investigating the leak that outed Valerie Wilson as a CIA officer, he claimed that at the time of the leak he possessed no official information about Valerie Wilson and her CIA employment and that he had only heard gossip from Russert about her. In his indictment of Libby, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald claimed this was a lie, and Russert testified that he had told Libby nothing about Valerie Wilson because he knew nothing about her.

So Libby's lawyers were hoping to get another chance to attack Russert's credibility. As a prosecution witness, Russert had testified for twelve minutes before Wells cross-examined him for five hours, nicking but not truly wounding the newsman. That was not good enough for the defense. Libby's lawyers argued to Judge Walton--outside the presence of the jury--that they should be allowed to call Russert back to the stand. The issue at hand was a statement Russert made during his testimony in which he said he didn't realize a grand jury witness is not allowed to have a lawyer present when testifying before a grand jury. Libby's legal team--combing print and video archives--had found NBC News clips from the days of Monica Lewinsky and Whitewater when Russert had informed viewers that a grand jury witness couldn't have a lawyer by his or her side.

Why did a contradiction between Russert's recent testimony and a nine-year-old television clip matter? Ted Wells, Libby's lead lawyer, argued that because Russert had been allowed to give a deposition to Fitzgerald in a lawyer's office with his own attorney present--rather than appear as grand jury witness with no lawyer to help him--Russert had received a favor from Fitzgerald and might have consequently crafted his testimony to benefit the prosecution. Wells asked to be allowed to call Russert back and play those Clinton-era tapes for the jury.

Walton said no. "It's a totally collateral matter," he declared.

Wells and his crew desired something else from the judge: permission to enter into the record a statement covering the details of the national security matters that Libby was working on at the time of the leak, his two FBI interviews, and his two grand jury appearances. This statement--based on classified information--was drafted before the trial, and the judge and relevant government agencies vetted the document and agreed it could be presented in court so Libby's defense would not reveal classified material. But Fitzgerald argued that the document had been drafted only for use if Libby testified--to allow him to show the jury what was on his mind at these times without disclosing secret information. If he won't testify, the prosecutor maintained, the statement shouldn't be presented to the jury. John Cline, a Libby attorney, argued vigorously. Walton was not persuaded, noting that the statement "was supposed to be a substitution" for Libby's testimony. Without Libby testifying, Walton said, putting the statement into evidence would not be fair.

Next, the Libby lawyers made a bid to introduce as evidence details from intelligence briefings that Libby received about terrorist threats. The point: Libby was so consumed by hair-raising news of threats he could not be expected to care about or remember the minor Valerie Wilson matter. Fitzgerald objected. He argued that the defense was trying to suggest Libby's (overwhelmed) state of mind to the jury without placing their client on the stand and subjecting him to cross-examination. He also maintained that if the details from these briefings were introduced without context--that is, without explaining that Libby received such information on a daily basis--the jurors would not be able to evaluate whether the material was out of the ordinary and truly mind-bending.

Again, Walton sided with Fitzgerald and ruled against Libby. If he doesn't testify, the judge explained, he can't use this information. Instead, Walton allowed Cline to read a stipulation to the jury that repeated information already introduced. This stipulation noted that at a June 14, 2003 intelligence briefing--during which Libby mentioned Joseph and Valerie Wilson to his CIA briefer--he was presented information about a bomb being defused in Yemen, the arrest of a terrorist suspect elsewhere, a possible al Qaeda attack in the United States, Iraq's porous borders, demonstrations in Iran, developments in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a possible airport hijacking in England by a group linked to al Qaeda, a variety of potential terrorist attacks around the word, the 1920 Mesopotamia insurrection and its relevancy to the Iraqi insurgency, and other matters. Libby, according to the stipulation, requested additional information on two of the two dozen topics in the briefing.

Shortly after the stipulation was read, Wells told the judge, "The defense on behalf of Lewis Libby rests."

Team Libby concluded its case without offering any witness who was a direct party to the events at issue. It finished its presentation without producing any testimony or evidence to back up its assertion that Libby was the victim of a CIA plot, a State Department plot, a White House plot, an NBC News plot or some combination of these get-Libby conspiracies. It supplied little evidence that Libby was particularly forgetful. It offered no testimony to back up the notion that Libby had no motive to lie to the FBI and the grand jury. During opening arguments, Wells claimed he would show that Libby had no reason to fear for his job when he was questioned by the FBI and the grand jury. Wells said he could show that Cheney would have stuck by Libby no matter what and, thus, Libby had no incentive to cover up his involvement in the leak episode. Yet Wells put no one on the stand--say, Cheney--to support this claim. And he presented only one witness--New York Times managing editor Jill Abramson--to impeach the credibility of a prosecution witness: Judith Miller, a former Times reporter. Abramson was on and off the stand within minutes. Most of Libby's witnesses testified about events that were not part of the case.

And Libby said nothing. It was as if Wells didn't dare put his client on the stand to repeat the gymnastics he performed during his grand jury appearance when he essentially said, I forgot to remember what I had known but forgotten about Valerie Wilson. And Wells would not give Fitzgerald a crack at Cheney.

Nothing in defense presentation buttressed the dramatic statements Wells made at the start of the case. Libby's lawyers mounted a bombastic but skimpy defense: a lot of hat, not much cattle. This is not unusual in a criminal case. The defense has no obligation to present a case. The burden is upon the government. A defense lawyer can simply claim the prosecution fell short and leave it at that. Which is practically what Wells and his team are doing. As Wells said after resting his case, "There is no box on the verdict sheet [used by jurors] that says...did you tell the full story? It says guilty or not guilty." When the trial began, Wells claimed he and Libby had a story to tell. It turns out they don't.

Closing arguments are scheduled for next Tuesday.

Posted by David Corn at February 14, 2007 05:47 PM

41 comments:

capt said...

Patriotism in its simplest, clearest and most indubitable signification is nothing else but a means of obtaining for the rulers their ambitions and covetous desires, and for the ruled the abdication of human dignity, reason, conscience, and a slavish enthralment to those in power: Leo Toystoy - Demanding the Impossible: a History of Anarchism by Peter Marshall (fontana press 1992) p374

=
"The vested interests - if we explain the situation by their influence - can only get the public to act as they wish by manipulating public opinion, by playing either upon the public's indifference, confusions, prejudices, pugnacities or fears. And the only way in which the power of the interests can be undermined and their maneuvers defeated is by bringing home to the public the danger of its indifference, the absurdity of its prejudices, or the hollowness of its fears; by showing that it is indifferent to danger where real danger exists; frightened by dangers which are nonexistent." Sir Norman Angell 1872 - 1967

=
"Iniquity, committed in this world, produces not fruit immediately, but, like the earth, in due season, and advancing by little and little, it eradicates the man who committed it. ...justice, being destroyed, will destroy; being preserved, will preserve; it must never therefore be violated." Manu 1200 bc

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capt said...

Is the Military Our Last Hope?



With the "mainstream media," that is, the government’s propaganda ministry, bombarding the American public with "news reports" from unidentified sources that the US government has proof that "the highest reaches of the Iranian government" is supplying weapons to the Iraqi insurgency, Marine General Peter Pace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, demurred. General Pace told the Voice of America on February 12 that he has no information indicating that Iran’s government is supplying weapons to the Iraqi insurgency.

General Pace said that "Iranians are involved," but "what I would not say is that the Iranian government, per se, knows about this . . . I would not say by what I know that the Iranian government clearly knows or is complicit."

Unlike the New York Times, Fox "news," CNN, and the TV networks, General Pace refused to lie for the Bush Regime.

Perhaps America could regain its reputation if General Pace would send a division of US Marines to arrest Bush, Cheney, the entire civilian contingent in the Pentagon, the neoconservative nazis, and the complicit members of Congress and send them off to the Hague to be tried for war crimes.

But he did the best he could and refused to lie for warmongers.

There is absolutely no doubt that Bush-Cheney and the neoconservative nazis are planning revenge against General Pace. We can only hope the general does not have a wife who works for the CIA.

More HERE

*****end of clip*****

An excellent piece.



capt

capt said...

Al Franken Will Run for Senate in Minnesota!

I hope he is a good and successful candidate.




capt

capt said...

Saudi Looking Into Nuclear Energy Offers



Saudi Arabia confirmed Wednesday that it was in talks with Russia over the possible purchase of Russian weapons for the first time and welcomed Moscow's offer to help it develop nuclear energy. "There are no obstacles to cooperation between the two countries in all fields pertaining to... armament and nuclear energy," Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal told reporters two days after Russian President Vladimir Putin visited Saudi Arabia.

Riyadh, a close US ally in the Middle East, has traditionally used Western defence systems, but is seeking to diversify its sources of weaponry.

"On the armament front, there have been discussions between the two countries. They are taking place in accordance with the kingdom's requirements in terms of armament and with what Russia can provide of the kingdom's needs for such equipment," Saud said.

More HERE

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This sounds like more of a concern than Iran. The MSM should be screaming about this 24/7.


capt

capt said...

Recall drive targets McCain over Iraq



A new recall drive targets Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a top contender for the 2008 GOP presidential nomination.

Organizers oppose McCain's continued support of the unpopular Iraq war and consider him complicit in what they perceive as the erosion of American civil liberties associated with the war on terror.

"For the most part, he's been all right, but he's supposed to be representing Arizona, and right now he seems to be just representing himself," said William Crum, treasurer of Americans for Integrity and Justice, the Glendale-based recall committee. "He's got tunnel-vision for the presidency."

The recall application filed Tuesday with the Arizona Secretary of State's Office accuses McCain of "shirking his duties as a senator from the great state of Arizona" and of having "acquiesced in his role as a member of the legislative branch to strongly check the power of the chief executive, who has for all intents and purposes become a king."

"Please, help restore our democracy, recall 'Bloody John McCain,' " the handwritten application says.

McCain's Senate office did not respond to requests for comment. McCain was elected to his fourth Senate term in 2004 and is not up for re-election until 2010.

The recall group faces long odds. It must collect 381,696 valid petition signatures by June 13 to force a statewide vote. That is 25 percent of all votes cast in the 2004 Senate election. Although McCain is a federal officeholder not bound by the Arizona Constitution's recall provisions, he has signed a voluntary pledge on file with the Secretary of State's Office agreeing to resign immediately if defeated in a recall election.

More HERE

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Might only be symbolic but excellent symbolism just the same.


capt

capt said...

Professor Resolves Einstein's Twin Paradox



Subhash Kak, Delaune Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at LSU, recently resolved the twin paradox, known as one of the most enduring puzzles of modern-day physics.

First suggested by Albert Einstein more than 100 years ago, the paradox deals with the effects of time in the context of travel at near the speed of light. Einstein originally used the example of two clocks -- one motionless, one in transit. He stated that, due to the laws of physics, clocks being transported near the speed of light would move more slowly than clocks that remained stationary. In more recent times, the paradox has been described using the analogy of twins. If one twin is placed on a space shuttle and travels near the speed of light while the remaining twin remains earthbound, the unmoved twin would have aged dramatically compared to his interstellar sibling, according to the paradox.

"If the twin aboard the spaceship went to the nearest star, which is 4.45 light years away at 86 percent of the speed of light, when he returned, he would have aged 5 years. But the earthbound twin would have aged more than 10 years!" said Kak.

More HERE

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AN interesting tid-bit for us nerds!


capt

Saladin said...

Carey, it worked so well the first time, why not try it again? They can even spiff up the Niger document to make the case! Of course they rebuffed any diplomatic attempts, the neocons of Israel and the US don't want peace, they want chaos and total control of all that fabulous oil. But this time it isn't a country broken by ten years of sanctions, it is a strong, independent country with important friends, China and Russia. They are fools if they think they can create chaos there and make off with the oil.

Saladin said...

The Neoconservative Empire

by Ron Paul
Excerpt

...The catch-all phrase, “War on Terrorism,” in all honesty, has no more meaning than if one wants to wage a war against criminal gangsterism. It’s deliberately vague and non definable to justify and permit perpetual war anywhere, and under any circumstances. Don’t forget: the Iraqis and Saddam Hussein had absolutely nothing to do with any terrorist attack against us including that on 9/11.

Special interests and the demented philosophy of conquest have driven most wars throughout history. Rarely has the cause of liberty, as it was in our own revolution, been the driving force. In recent decades our policies have been driven by neo-conservative empire radicalism, profiteering in the military industrial complex, misplaced do-good internationalism, mercantilistic notions regarding the need to control natural resources, and blind loyalty to various governments in the Middle East.

For all the misinformation given the American people to justify our invasion, such as our need for national security, enforcing UN resolutions, removing a dictator, establishing a democracy, protecting our oil, the argument has been reduced to this: If we leave now Iraq will be left in a mess-implying the implausible that if we stay it won’t be a mess.

Since it could go badly when we leave, that blame must be placed on those who took us there, not on those of us who now insist that Americans no longer need be killed or maimed and that Americans no longer need to kill any more Iraqis. We’ve had enough of both!

Resorting to a medical analogy, a wrong diagnosis was made at the beginning of the war and the wrong treatment was prescribed. Refusing to reassess our mistakes and insist on just more and more of a failed remedy is destined to kill the patient-in this case the casualties will be our liberties and prosperity here at home and peace abroad.

There’s no logical reason to reject the restraints placed in the Constitution regarding our engaging in foreign conflicts unrelated to our national security. The advice of the founders and our early presidents was sound then and it’s sound today.

We shouldn’t wait until our financial system is completely ruined and we are forced to change our ways. We should do it as quickly as possible and stop the carnage and financial bleeding that will bring us to our knees and force us to stop that which we should have never started.

We all know, in time, the war will be de-funded one way or another and the troops will come home. So why not now?

February 15, 2007
=========
Mr. Paul has my vote. Between his anti-war stance and his call to abolish the Federal Reserve he has found the path to peace. If only the so-called "left" had the courage to speak out this way.

Gerald said...

Bush, the feebleminded brain, is CERTAIN that Iran is supplying Iraq weapons.

Nazi America controls 70% of the sales of weapons to other countries but apparently our weapons that come into the hands of Iran are not counted.

Nazi America is supplying Nazi Israel cluster bombs to kill Lebanese but apparently those weapons are not counted.

Nazi America is an evil, vile, and wicked country.

Gerald said...

Praying Each Day: February 15

Check Shackleton's ad in the newspaper! It is similar to our current ads for Americans and immigrants. However, I would update the ad with the words that you must lust for murdering human beings and torturing humanity. You must also enjoy the vaporizing of babies' human flesh on the streets of Iran after we nuke the shit out of the Iranian people.

Gerald said...

Nazi America and evil are synonymous!!!

capt said...

US Sponsored Terrorism in Iran?



One of the operational assets being used by the Defense Department is a right-wing terrorist organization known as Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK), which is being "run" in two southern regional areas of Iran. They are Baluchistan, a Sunni stronghold, and Khuzestan, a Shia region where a series of recent attacks has left many dead and hundreds injured in the last three months.


One former counterintelligence official, who wished to remain anonymous due to the sensitivity of the information, describes the Pentagon as pushing MEK shortly after the invasion of Iraq in 2003. The drive to use the insurgent group was said to have been advanced by the Pentagon under the influence of the Vice President's office and opposed by the State Department, National Security Council and then-National Security Advisor, Condoleezza Rice.

More HERE

*****end of clip*****

This is what I (and others) have been posting about for years! The tank girls are used as a anti-Iranian asset. 4,000 (last I saw an estimate) are on a US military base living under our protection on the border if Iraq and Iran.

They have Iranian papers/ID and Iranian military uniforms. The obvious set-up for a provocative act can be orchestrated to look like almost anything.


capt

Gerald said...

Coping with Grief

People marveled at how Coach Matt Ballard of Morehead State University in Kentucky held up under his grief after his 21-year-old son was killed when his motorcycle and a pickup truck crashed.

Memories of his son and the love and support of players, colleagues, friends and family helped. Involvement in football distracted him from his loss. Too, Ballard’s strong religious faith sustained him.

“We’re going to miss the daylights out of him,” Ballard said of his son. “It hurts like crazy. I can’t even explain the hurt and the heartache. But the Good Lord didn’t promise us it was going to be easy. He did promise that, ‘I’m going to be with you.’”

Coping with grief is a painful process which can be eased by the knowledge that we are not alone.

Who needs that support from you?

As He approached (Nain)…a man who had died was being carried out. He was his mother’s only son, and she was a widow…the Lord…had compassion for her and…gave him to his mother. (Luke 7:12,13,15)

Who needs my compassion in their grief, Lord of Life?

Dear God, please with all Your love help me to cope with my grief at the sight of Nazi America nuking the Iranian people.

Dear God, only You can ease my grief!!!

Gerald said...

Perhaps the end of the world as we knew it didn't have to be abrupt and violent, but it has been, because ordinary men with no imaginations, men who are entirely representative or their class, white and well-connected, for their own selfish purposes and the short-sighted purposes of their class have made it so.

Gerald said...

The Worst Possible President

Gerald said...

Little George isn't the same guy he was in 2000, the guy described by Gail Sheehy in her Vanity Fair profile--hyper-competitive and dyslexic, prone to cheat at games, always swinging between screwing up and making up, hating criticism and disagreement, careless of others but often charming. He is no longer the guy who the Republicans thought they could control (unlike, say, McCain). The small pathologies of Bush the candidate have, thanks to the purposes of the neocons and the religious right, been enhanced and upgraded. We have a bona fide madman now, who thinks of himself in a grandiose way as single-handedly turning the tide of history. Some of his Frankensteins have bailed, some haven't dared to, and others still seem to believe. His actions and his orders, especially about Iran, seem to be telling us that he will stop at nothing to prove his dominance. The elder Bush(es), Scrowcroft, Baker, and their friends, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Gerson, and the neocons have made the monster and in the process endangered the country, the Constitution, and the world, not to mention the sanity of wretches like Jose Padilla (for an analysis of the real reason Gitmo continues to exist, see Dahlia Lithwick's article in Slate, here. Maybe the bums planned this mess for their own profit, or maybe they planned to profit without mess; maybe some of them regret what they have wrought. However, they all share the blame for whatever he does next.

Gerald said...

Absolute Power

Gerald said...

In a heartbreaking letter from Guantanamo this week, published in the Los Angeles Times, prisoner Jumah Al Dossari writes: "The purpose of Guantanamo is to destroy people, and I have been destroyed." I fear he is wrong. The destruction of Al Dossari, Jose Padilla, Zacarias Moussaoui, and some of our most basic civil liberties was never a purpose or a goal—it was a mere byproduct. The true purpose is more abstract and more tragic: To establish a clunky post-Watergate dream of an imperial presidency, whatever the human cost may be.

Gerald said...

America as we know it is totally destroyed!!!!!

America and evil are synonymous!!!!!

Gerald said...

America is spelled E V I L!!!!!

Robert S said...

Q: A lot of our allies in Europe do a lot of business with Iran. So I wonder what your thoughts are about how you further tighten the financial pressure on Iran, in particular, if it also means economic pain for a lot of our allies.

BUSH: It's an interesting question. One of the problems, not specifically on this issue, just in general, that - let's put it this way: Money trumps peace, sometimes.

In other words, commercial interests are very powerful interests throughout the world. And part of the issue in convincing people to put sanctions on a specific country is to convince them that it's in the world's interest that they forego their own financial interest.

And that's why sometimes it's tough to get tough economic sanctions on countries, and I'm not making any comment about any particular country, but you touched on a very interesting point.

You know - so, therefore, we're constantly working with nations to convince them that what really matters in the long run is to have the environment so peace can flourish.

In the Iranian case, I firmly believe that, if they were to have a weapon, it would make it difficult for peace to flourish, and therefore I am working with people to make sure that that concern trumps whatever commercial interests may be preventing governments from acting.

I make no specific accusation with that statement. It's a broad statement. But it's an accurate assessment of what sometimes can halt multilateral diplomacy from working.

****************************

Whose money? Whose peace? What are the causes and continuing circumstances that create financial monopolies? Where did the endowments of institutions come from? If those endowments are directly from the peculiar institution or perhaps from the old British Opium trade, should they be held as legitimate today? What about the old feudal lords and their inheritances, what legitimacy do they hold? Land grants from monarchies? Or further, the inheritances of the old robber barons, the bootleggers, the war profiteers of old?

****************************

Property is theft.
-P. J. Proudhon
Property is liberty.
-P. J. Proudhon
Property is impossible.
-P. J. Proudhon
Consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson
The Illuminatus! Trilogy, by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson.

Gerald said...

There will be war with Iran

Robert S said...

And lest we forget:

Halliburton operates in Iran despite sanctions
How do U.S. contractors legally do business there?

March 7: U.S. companies have been banned from doing business with Iran, but Halliburton and other American companies continue to work inside the country. How? NBC's Lisa Myers examines.


By Lisa Myers & the NBC investigative unit
Updated: 9:24 p.m. PT March 7, 2005

It's just another Halliburton oil and gas operation. The company name is emblazoned everywhere: On trucks, equipment, large storage silos and workers' uniforms.

But this isn't Texas. It's Iran. U.S. companies aren't supposed to do business here.

Yet, in January, Halliburton won a contract to drill at a huge Iranian gas field called Pars, which an Iranian government spokesman said "served the interests" of Iran.
Story continues below ↓ advertisement


"I am baffled that any American company would want to have employees operating in Iran," says Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine. "I would think they'd be ashamed."

Halliburton says the operation — videotaped by NBC News — is entirely legal. It's run by a subsidiary called "Halliburton Products and Services Limited," based outside the U.S. In fact, the law allows foreign subsidiaries of U.S. corporations to do business in Iran under strict conditions.

Other U.S. oil services companies, like Weatherford and Baker Hughes, also are in Iran. And foreign subsidiaries of NBC's parent company, General Electric, have sold equipment to Iran, though the company says it will make no more sales. (MSNBC is a Microsoft-NBC joint venture.)

*****************************

Old Bob A. Wilson moved off this material plane recently, but just perhaps, there is a disembodied chuckle, somewhere in multiverse, at the previous post being #23.

Gerald said...

Seventy-five percent of Americans want negotiations instead of war with Iran, but the Bush administration is charging ahead. Once again, military preparations are being paired with misinformation, and peaceful options are being dismissed. This time, Americans must inform themselves and take action before it is too late.

The fear and disinformation campaign is on. The administration repeatedly asserts, without definitive evidence, that Iran is developing a bomb, and the public is buying it. Citing legitimate concerns with Iran's past undeclared nuclear activity, Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which monitors Iran, stated that "we haven't seen a smoking gun in Iran."

According to the New Yorker's Seymour Hersh, a recent, classified CIA report came to the same conclusion. But regime change, not fact, is the administration's goal. National Intelligence Director John Negroponte, who estimated a 5-to-10-year window before Iran might have a weapon, is being replaced. The Pentagon's study group known as the "Iranian Directorate" will quash and cherry-pick information, as was done on Iraq. This should ring alarm bells.

The administration would also have us believe that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, master of outrageous statements, determines Iranian nuclear and foreign policy. In fact, it's mainly determined by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who issued a religious decree that Iran shall reject nuclear weapons. Moreover, his newspaper advised Ahmadinejad to stay out of nuclear issues. Ahmadinejad is also rapidly losing support because opposition leaders object to his policies and sanctions are hurting. None of this gets mentioned by the Bush administration, whose anti-Iranian rhetoric bolsters Ahmadinejad.

Gerald said...

Nuclear Liability

O'Reilly said...

The trial of Scooter Libby parallels trials of organized crime families.

Prosecutors are shielded from the truth by lies told by the soldiers, the hit men, the thiefs, the criminal operatives. One by one, soldiers are prosecuted for their lies and as convictions and jail time mount, the prosecutor and the convicted soldier make a deal to turn evidence, eventually exposing the boss
for ordering the criminal action.

What do John Gambino and Dick Cheney have in common? They both ordered their subordinates to break the break the law and they both sought to conceal it. What else do they have in common? Patrick Fitzgerald.

Gerald said...

The physicists's letter stated "A decision that would have a major impact on the course of history and could ultimately threaten the survival of civilization should not be in the sole hands of the President unless absolutely unavoidable". So far, the United States Congress disagrees.

The International Court of Justice has stated that "the threat or use of nuclear weapons would generally be contrary to the rules of international law applicable in armed conflict, and in particular the principles and rules of humanitarian law". Article 25 of the International Criminal Court Statute holds anybody that "aids, abets or otherwise assists" in the commission of a war crime criminally responsible, "including providing the means for its commission". Article 27 explicitly includes "a member of a Government or parliament".

That makes for 535 excellent reasons why the United States should not join the International Criminal Court system.

Gerald said...

Nazi America and her nuclear arsenal plans to nuke Iran, a non-nuclear country. What does that say for the soul of America? For me it means that Nazi America is a totally evil country!!!

Gerald said...

Look around and what do you see in Nazi America? EVIL, A TOTALLY EVIL COUNTRY!!!!!

Gerald said...

Who Is To Be Believed

capt said...

The scoop: Ice cream named for Colbert



Ben & Jerry's has named a new ice cream "Stephen Colbert's Americone Dream" in honor of the comedian. It's vanilla ice cream with fudge-covered waffle cone pieces and caramel. Announcing the new flavor yesterday, Ben & Jerry's called it: "The sweet taste of liberty in your mouth."

The Vermont-based ice-cream maker is known for naming its flavors after people such as Jerry Garcia, Wavy Gravy and the band Phish -- which Colbert sees as a political bias.

"I'm not afraid to say it. Dessert has a well-known liberal agenda," Colbert said in a statement. "What I hope to do with this ice cream is bring some balance back to the freezer case."

Colbert, star of Comedy Central's The Colbert Report, is donating his proceeds to charity through the new Stephen Colbert Americone Dream Fund, which will distribute the money to various causes.


More HERE

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Sounds like something for when the weather warms up.


capt

Gerald said...

So who should we believe: the stories about the great danger that the Bushites are readying the attack, or the markets who see nothing all that troubling in the foreseeable future?

BELIEVE ME!!!

The signature and vintage Gerald states, "Nazi America is an evil country."

Nazi America prides herself on death and destruction.

Nazi American foreign policy stands for total death and destruction of humanity.

Robert S said...

Co-Dependent Congress Must Wake Up: The President Needs a Straight-Jacket and a Padded Cell
by Dave Lindorff | Feb 15 2007 - 9:07am


*********************************

Key House Democrat: For the Bush administration, politics comes before justice
Mike Sheehan
Published: Thursday February 15, 2007


A key Democratic member of the U.S. House of Representatives blasts the White House for putting politics before justice, according to a press release.

Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-IL), House Democratic Caucus chair, says, "For the Bush Administration, politics comes before justice. Talented prosecutors investigating public corruption cases are fired for no reason, while a top Justice official has been vacationing with a lobbyist from the industry she is supposed to regulate."

*****************************

Let's face it folks, if the Democrats were interested in Justice rather than Politics, impeachment would be a given. Followed by Conviction in the Senate and Criminal War Crimes trials to follow. (From the Department of Redundancy Department)

That being the case, and referencing the insanity of the situation we find ourselves in, it appears that rational appeals are failing; there is little point in rational debate with the insane, or the deliberately misinformed.

Therefore:

dada is not dead
dads and moms and kids are
watch your overcoat
stop your government

Brought to you by:

The Surrealist Committee to Re-Levitate the Pentagon *1967-2007*

Robert S said...

Levitate the Pentagon (1967)Peace dove in Pentagon button

On October 21, 1967, 70,000 demonstrators came to Washington, D.C. to "Confront the War Makers." This was the first of the biannual Anti-War demonstrations to fuse protest with the whimsicality of the counter culture and to take civil disobedience to new levels of confrontation. It would become the prototype for the demonstrations at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago -- except that the latter was marred by extensive police violence.
Initiated and organized by "the Mobe" (the National Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam), a loose coalition of 150 groups, some of the events of the weekend were planned and some were not. They provided something for everyone, from committed pacifists to Vietcong sympathizers, united only by the common aim of ending the war.

Robert S said...

Cheney's Call
By Murray Waas, National Journal
© National Journal Group Inc.
Thursday, Feb. 15, 2007


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Hoo boy, I'm posting this link before I finish the article...,

But, here's a little tidbit to whet the appetite.

"Looking back at it, I think we were clearly set up by Dick Cheney and the White House. They wanted to shut us down. And they wanted to shut down a legitimate congressional inquiry that might raise questions in part about whether their own people had aggressively pursued Al Qaeda in the days prior to the September 11 attacks. The vice president attempted to manipulate the situation, and he attempted to manipulate us." Former Senator and Chairman of the Senate Intel Committee Bob Graham

Also by Mr. Graham:

Graham said that Goss shared his concerns. In 2003, according to Graham, he speculated to Goss that the White House had set them up in an effort to sabotage the joint September 11 congressional inquiry. Graham says that Goss responded: "I often wondered that myself."

Gerald said...

China and Russia Are Ready to Attack

Dear Posters:

My friends deep inside our Nazi government have informed me that China and Russia are readying plans to launch nuclear weapons against Nazi America. Both governments view Hitler Bush as a psychopath who is power hungry and out of control.

Plans devised state that China will launch several hundred atomic missiles upon the western states and the west coast. Russia will launch several hundred atomic missiles on the central states and the Midwest section of Nazi America. Nuclear dust and nuclear particles will float to the east coast by way of our westerly winds.

China had believed that Nazi America would pre-empt a nuclear attack before 2015 but Hitler Bush’s insanity seems to have taken control deep inside what brain he has left and they can no longer wait for his irrational thinking to launch the first strike.

Both China and Russia believe that Hitler Bush will declare martial law and cancel the 2008 elections. They also believe that after Iran is nuked an excuse will be made to attack North Korea with several hundred atomic missiles going off course into China.

China and Russia are studying Hitler Bush’s bizarre behavior very closely. High government officials from both these governments say that this nuclear war is imminent.

Sincerely,

Gerald

Gerald said...

I have just heard that Nazi America ranks 17th of developed nations for caring for children. Where are those family values that are so important to the religious Nazis? Don't you just love this devil incarnate nation? Remember G.K. Chesterton and waht he said about the family? Without a strong family unit we cannot be called a democracy! We are a fascist Nazi state lacking in moral values and in God.

Gerald said...

What is what!

Gerald said...

Nazi America will continue to maintain her kill and torture mentality!!!

Gerald said...

Let us sing together the World's National Anthem

capt said...

two new threads!