Showing posts with label attorney general. Show all posts
Showing posts with label attorney general. Show all posts
Monday, August 27, 2007
Gonzo's Gone
By Amorosa
There’s something insidious, maybe unconsciously so, about the Right’s appointment of minorities to august positions in their administrations. On the surface, it all looks good: we can commend their need to be seen as “includers,” folks who though they may not push minority-friendly legislation or multiculturalism, want to give lie to the generally held belief that conservatives are no friend to people of color. (Nor the poor. Nor women.) But, in essence, the choice of candidates so radical or so incompetent only serves to fan the resentment of too many already antipathetic Americans and buoy those die-hards who claim that minorities are “not yet ready” to play with the big guys. These appointees present such administrations a win-win situation and do a great disservice to the groups they represent as they leave them in the dust.
Soon to be former Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales, “a cypher,” an “empty suit,” the man worse for the Department [of Justice] and its morale than anyone in recent history including the Watergate era" (The characterization is Daniel Metcalfe’s, recently retired career attorney in the DoJ, who served under both Republicans and Democrats for over 30 years.), seems to prove the point even more graphically than does Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.
A man who summarily allows people of questionable guilt to be executed WITHOUT EVEN REVIEWING THE CASE is not fit to be the poster boy of the son of Mexican immigrants who makes it big in the land of dreams come true. Nor is a man who cheer leads for torture, the illegal wiretapping of U.S. citizens, fires competent (an operative word in any discussion relating to Gonzales) attorneys to make room for more sycophants at the DoJ, and unconscionably and repeatedly lies to Congress.
It’s not a ladder Alberto Gonzales climbed, but a pit he dug for himself.
If you’re like me, not yet tired of the story, here’s some solid stuff on why Gonzo is gone, including, if I may, a piece I wrote in equal indignation at the time when Bush was thought to be considering him for a Supreme Court seat.
The Spanish language side of the story from Univisión, growing cooler and cooler in their support over the years.
Salon.com’s story on the clemency refusals when he was Governer Bush’s Attorney General in Texas
Ana Simo's jeremiad in The Gully Online at the hypocrisy of Latino organizations for “blithely endorsing” him and a hypothetical “what if” he tried to pull that torture **** in Mexico.
US Washington watcher Michael Tomasky writing in the Guardian of London, Sinking Ship Leaves Rat
The Hispanic American Village's All the President’s Hombres by yours truly.
Tuesday--The morning after: While the press has done nothing but report and comment on the A.G.'s exit, there has not yet been one peep out of the mainstream Latino organizations: MALDEF, NALEO, LULAC, NAHJ (National Association of Hispanic Journalists), supporters of Gonzales' appointment. Maybe there's a lesson to be learned here from African Americans who do not categorically boost one of their own, but will, for the most part, examine a person's record, ethics and suitability for a post before tooting his horn. Thomas is a case in point, an admitted and much-criticized embarrassment to the NAACP and other orgs.
I wish I could vote for the story instead of the man.
Senator Ted Kennedy, voting against confirming Alberto Gonzales as U.S. Attorney General, after hearing the American Dream story of the nominee’s humble, immigrant origins.
There’s something insidious, maybe unconsciously so, about the Right’s appointment of minorities to august positions in their administrations. On the surface, it all looks good: we can commend their need to be seen as “includers,” folks who though they may not push minority-friendly legislation or multiculturalism, want to give lie to the generally held belief that conservatives are no friend to people of color. (Nor the poor. Nor women.) But, in essence, the choice of candidates so radical or so incompetent only serves to fan the resentment of too many already antipathetic Americans and buoy those die-hards who claim that minorities are “not yet ready” to play with the big guys. These appointees present such administrations a win-win situation and do a great disservice to the groups they represent as they leave them in the dust.
Soon to be former Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales, “a cypher,” an “empty suit,” the man worse for the Department [of Justice] and its morale than anyone in recent history including the Watergate era" (The characterization is Daniel Metcalfe’s, recently retired career attorney in the DoJ, who served under both Republicans and Democrats for over 30 years.), seems to prove the point even more graphically than does Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.
A man who summarily allows people of questionable guilt to be executed WITHOUT EVEN REVIEWING THE CASE is not fit to be the poster boy of the son of Mexican immigrants who makes it big in the land of dreams come true. Nor is a man who cheer leads for torture, the illegal wiretapping of U.S. citizens, fires competent (an operative word in any discussion relating to Gonzales) attorneys to make room for more sycophants at the DoJ, and unconscionably and repeatedly lies to Congress.
It’s not a ladder Alberto Gonzales climbed, but a pit he dug for himself.
If you’re like me, not yet tired of the story, here’s some solid stuff on why Gonzo is gone, including, if I may, a piece I wrote in equal indignation at the time when Bush was thought to be considering him for a Supreme Court seat.
The Spanish language side of the story from Univisión, growing cooler and cooler in their support over the years.
Salon.com’s story on the clemency refusals when he was Governer Bush’s Attorney General in Texas
Ana Simo's jeremiad in The Gully Online at the hypocrisy of Latino organizations for “blithely endorsing” him and a hypothetical “what if” he tried to pull that torture **** in Mexico.
US Washington watcher Michael Tomasky writing in the Guardian of London, Sinking Ship Leaves Rat
The Hispanic American Village's All the President’s Hombres by yours truly.
Tuesday--The morning after: While the press has done nothing but report and comment on the A.G.'s exit, there has not yet been one peep out of the mainstream Latino organizations: MALDEF, NALEO, LULAC, NAHJ (National Association of Hispanic Journalists), supporters of Gonzales' appointment. Maybe there's a lesson to be learned here from African Americans who do not categorically boost one of their own, but will, for the most part, examine a person's record, ethics and suitability for a post before tooting his horn. Thomas is a case in point, an admitted and much-criticized embarrassment to the NAACP and other orgs.
U.S. Attorney General Gonzales Resigns
U.S. Attorney General Gonzales Resigns:
"U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is resigning after a stormy tenure as head of the Justice Department. Bush administration officials say Gonzales submitted his resignation to President Bush on Friday. Read/hear VOA National correspondent Jim Malone reporting from Washington for VoA News."
This resignation follows others reported earlier this week, including the departure of Assistant Attorney General Wan J. Kim, the Justice Department's top civil rights enforcer, who resigned Thursday after more than a year of criticism that his office filled its ranks with conservative loyalists instead of experienced attorneys. Seoul-born Kim was the first immigrant and first Korean-American to head the department's civil rights division, his job for just over two years. More at the Asian American Village blog.
"U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is resigning after a stormy tenure as head of the Justice Department. Bush administration officials say Gonzales submitted his resignation to President Bush on Friday. Read/hear VOA National correspondent Jim Malone reporting from Washington for VoA News."
This resignation follows others reported earlier this week, including the departure of Assistant Attorney General Wan J. Kim, the Justice Department's top civil rights enforcer, who resigned Thursday after more than a year of criticism that his office filled its ranks with conservative loyalists instead of experienced attorneys. Seoul-born Kim was the first immigrant and first Korean-American to head the department's civil rights division, his job for just over two years. More at the Asian American Village blog.
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
A.G., the AG is Behind "The Eight" Ball Again
U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is in hot water again for his ethics (or lack of same). Now, his office has summarily dismissed 8 of their own-appointed US attorneys for not toeing the Administration’s sine qua non on loyalty above juris-prudence, and calls for his head are intensifying.
I’ve got a bit of a nit to pick with yesterday’s otherwise on-target L.A. Times editorial that points out, yet again, that the president’s Latino lawn jockey hasn’t understood that his job as Attorney General is to serve the justice system, and thus the American people, and not the every law-trashing whim of a president who at this point may have fallen into the abyss of Nixionian paranoia. My beefette: The Times blames Bush’s ego--so often the tail side of the paranoia coin--for elevating his own Pancho Gonzales (Cisco was so much more benign, and handsome, than G.W.: my apologies to the memory of Duncan Renaldo) to an august mount grander than the height and breadth of Gonzales’ capabilities, but I think we need to hold Gonzales, and not the president, accountable for his continuing history of spinelessness, human rights abuses (remember his blueprint for torture and calling the Geneva Conventions “quaint?”), and unethical politics.
The clamor for Gonzales’ resignation follows two recent disclosures of impropriety. First, the firings, which, while licit, were carried out as retribution for the prosecutors’ going too soft on the Democrats and too hard on fellow Republicans—many of them had led investigations into cases of political corruption and all had positive job reviews--and were part of an even more insidious 2-year plot hatched right under Gonzales’ nose to “push out,” as the administration put it, many, many more. And, breaking earlier this week, were still further charges of the misuse by the FBI, under Gonzales’ watch, of Patriot Act powers to secretly obtain private information about U.S. citizens.
Even Republicans are expressing outrage at the runaround Gonzales initially gave Congress over the circumstances of the firings, with a number of representatives either signing off on a call for Gonzales’ ouster or stating privately that he should be shown the door. (Gonzales petulantly and patently refused to step down: his only master is the president, he says. For sure.) Republican Senator John Sununu was the first in the upper house to break party ranks, to be followed by Senator Gordon H. Smith, but more are promised to follow.
I’ve been on an intensified Gonzales watch since he was being considered for a Supreme Court seat. I’ve been on the moral high road looking down on Latino organizations like La Raza, Lulac, and the National Association of Latino Journalists whose position was, “He’s not that bad, he’s Hispanic.” See All the President's Hombres here and read fast. By the time you’re done, Al may be finished too.
And, here's the latest from AP on the AG, 94 - 2 agin.
I’ve got a bit of a nit to pick with yesterday’s otherwise on-target L.A. Times editorial that points out, yet again, that the president’s Latino lawn jockey hasn’t understood that his job as Attorney General is to serve the justice system, and thus the American people, and not the every law-trashing whim of a president who at this point may have fallen into the abyss of Nixionian paranoia. My beefette: The Times blames Bush’s ego--so often the tail side of the paranoia coin--for elevating his own Pancho Gonzales (Cisco was so much more benign, and handsome, than G.W.: my apologies to the memory of Duncan Renaldo) to an august mount grander than the height and breadth of Gonzales’ capabilities, but I think we need to hold Gonzales, and not the president, accountable for his continuing history of spinelessness, human rights abuses (remember his blueprint for torture and calling the Geneva Conventions “quaint?”), and unethical politics.
The clamor for Gonzales’ resignation follows two recent disclosures of impropriety. First, the firings, which, while licit, were carried out as retribution for the prosecutors’ going too soft on the Democrats and too hard on fellow Republicans—many of them had led investigations into cases of political corruption and all had positive job reviews--and were part of an even more insidious 2-year plot hatched right under Gonzales’ nose to “push out,” as the administration put it, many, many more. And, breaking earlier this week, were still further charges of the misuse by the FBI, under Gonzales’ watch, of Patriot Act powers to secretly obtain private information about U.S. citizens.
Even Republicans are expressing outrage at the runaround Gonzales initially gave Congress over the circumstances of the firings, with a number of representatives either signing off on a call for Gonzales’ ouster or stating privately that he should be shown the door. (Gonzales petulantly and patently refused to step down: his only master is the president, he says. For sure.) Republican Senator John Sununu was the first in the upper house to break party ranks, to be followed by Senator Gordon H. Smith, but more are promised to follow.
I’ve been on an intensified Gonzales watch since he was being considered for a Supreme Court seat. I’ve been on the moral high road looking down on Latino organizations like La Raza, Lulac, and the National Association of Latino Journalists whose position was, “He’s not that bad, he’s Hispanic.” See All the President's Hombres here and read fast. By the time you’re done, Al may be finished too.
And, here's the latest from AP on the AG, 94 - 2 agin.
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