Quote of the Day

Former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, telling the student newspaper of Texas Tech how he is inspiring his students now that the Red Raiders have inexplicably allowed him to teach there.

Gonzales said he wants to encourage Tech students to have high aspirations but to realize that success doesn’t come overnight.

“Dream big but be patient,” he said. “You never know when the next George W. Bush is going to come along and give you a once in a lifetime opportunity like he gave me, but you have to be patient.

"Kids, I'm a big believer in dreams coming true. And one day, if you dream hard enough, a rich, pampered, idiot manchild will like the way you don't talk back to or contradict him. And when he gets swept into higher office, he will drag you along on his coattails and sweep you into a position you are grossly unqualified for. Whereupon, if you're lucky, you'll get to fuck with the most basic institutions of law with an almost sociopathic disregard for ethics or basic humanity. Dream big! It worked for me!"

I imagine at this point his students lifted him up on their shoulders and carried him out triumphantly, chanting "Fre-do, Fre-do, Fre-d0!" After all, who doesn't dream of being a mindless, yes-man cipher who goes on to become a disgraced halfwit all based around not what they know, but who they know? That's preparing kids for the future in a manner that is surely worth the $15k in-state and $23k out-of-state tuition cost.

Is this good?

Despite all of the predictably sad, sadly predictable, and mildly racist conservative opposition to President Obama's nomination of Second Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, one voice of... um... reason has emerged:

I have no questions in my mind about her qualifications in terms of education, experience. A president is not required to nominate the most qualified person to the court. I think he’s obliged to nominate someone who is well-qualified, and I think by any measures, she is well-qualified.

To whom can this measured, level-headed assessment be attributed? None other than former criminal mastermind Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales. I suggest we all forget about the perjury, the abject politicization of the Justice Department, the narrow pursuit of anti-American ideals, and just focus on backhanded semi-endorsement of an Ivy League-educated judicial scholar that the crazy right has sought to vilify and demean for, oh, the last 13 hours or so...

Dogs and cats, living together. Mass hysteria...

Alberto Gonzales......

Alberto Gonzales has popped his head out from behind whatever tenement shack door he's been squatting in for the past few months to ask if you could spare any change...oh and to opine on a new Supreme Court Justice. Apparently the fact that Obama used "empathy" as one of the qualities he looks for in a justice is THE WORST THING EVER. Gonzales doesn't want no empathetic judge on the court, it would lead to chaos.

GONZALES: I do worry a little bit, well, I worry, I worry about about justices on the court making decisions based on what they think makes them feel good. I don’t think it’s fair to expect society to anticipate the outcome of a case based upon what makes a justice feel good. In essence what you’re saying, I think, is that I’m going to, I don’t care what the law says, I’m going to come out, I’m going to pursue an outcome that I think is fair and just. I’m going to rewrite the law. And I think that’s dangerous.

I'm just going to let that one sit there for a minute. Let it soak in.

RIP Irony
1107 BC - 2009 AD
Beloved by all
Murdered by Alberto Gonzales in cold blood

Poor 'lil guy. Couldn't withstand the sheer ignorant force of what Gonzales said.

¡qué pena!

Spanish prosecutors will seek criminal charges against Alberto Gonzales and five high-ranking Bush administration officials for sanctioning torture at Guantánamo

Spanish prosecutors have decided to press forward with a criminal investigation targeting former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and five top associates over their role in the torture of five Spanish citizens held at Guantánamo, several reliable sources close to the investigation have told The Daily Beast. Their decision is expected to be announced on Tuesday before the Spanish central criminal court, the Audencia Nacional, in Madrid. But the decision is likely to raise concerns with the human-rights community on other points: They will seek to have the case referred to a different judge.

The six defendants—in addition to Gonzales, Jay Bybee, John Yoo, William J. Haynes II, David Addington, and Douglas J. Feith—are accused of having given the green light to the torture and mistreatment of prisoners held in U.S. detention in “the war on terror.” The case arises in the context of a pending proceeding before the court involving terrorism charges against five Spaniards formerly held at Guantánamo. A group of human-rights lawyers originally filed a criminal complaint asking the court to look at the possibility of charges against the six American lawyers. Baltasar Garzón Real, the investigating judge, accepted the complaint and referred it to Spanish prosecutors for a view as to whether they would accept the case and press it forward. “The evidence provided was more than sufficient to justify a more comprehensive investigation,” one of the lawyers associated with the prosecution stated.

Awwwww. Looks like the gamble that no country would decide to enforce their own torture laws and treaty requirements seriously didn't exactly pay off, Bush Six. There is one adult country left on earth, even if it is the one that had all its athletes make slanty eyes for pictures promoting the Beijing Olympics.

Don't think that changing judges meant you're cut any slack either. It's procedural, having to do with the fact that the judge presiding over the prosecution of the Bush Six for torturing five Spanish citizens is also the one presiding over the trial of the five citizens on terrorism charges. See, Spain can walk an chew gum at the same time: press charges on terrorists and prosecute men who authorized the torture of them. But that judge switch may not even happen, and if it does all you get to do is move from the guy know for taking on terrorism and Pinochet, Judge Baltasar Garzón Real, and get a guy who is currently running a trial against the use of CIA rendition and black sites against Spanish citizens, Judge Ismail Moreno. It think they have a saying for that: out of the frying pan and into another frying pan.

Anyone in the Obama Justice Department getting any ideas? Maybe we should run our own trials to prosecute men who illegally authorized torture. No? Just gonna pretend it didn't happen? Fine. Thanks again Spain. Want to get a trial started on illegal wiretapping? I'm sure at least one Spaniard got illegally recorded.

Take notes

To the members of the Bush Administration who authorized and condoned torture during your reign, take notes on the Khmer Rouge torture trials going no right now. One: it may be a portent of your future if you step off American soil. Two: even fake apologies filled with caveats are more contrition than any of you have shown.

The commandant of the most prominent Khmer Rouge torture house apologized in court Tuesday for atrocities he had committed but said that he had feared for his own life and that he was being made a scapegoat for others.

“I would like to express my regret and heartfelt sorrow,” said the commandant, Kaing Guek Eav, also known as Duch, who is the first defendant in a trial involving the deaths of 1.7 million people from 1975 to 1979 from starvation, overwork and disease, as well as torture and execution.

“My current plea is that I would like you to please leave an open window for me to seek forgiveness,” said Duch, who is 66.

Remember this for when your trial in Spanish court starts, it might buy you a few years off. Yeah, didn't expect that did you? But that's what happens when you kidnap, wrongly imprison, and torture Spanish foreign nationals. Spain tends to get all mad and its human rights lawyers start filing briefs to Baltasar Garzon, the judge who went after Pinochet, Kissinger, Argentine military officers, and Spain's second largest bank. By the way Spain, signing on to international treaties banning torture and binding you to prosecute those who torture your own citizens.....and then actually following through and obeying those international treaties is sooooo childish. What are you, six?

So to Alberto Gonzales, John Yoo, Douglas Feith, William Haynes II, Jay Bybee, and David Addington, remember to add in just a dash of fake remorse. Doug Feith, with his claim that his complete disrespect and ignorance of the Geneva Conventions actually mean he showed torture laws great respect, hasn't seemed to get the message yet. Oh well, don't leave the country unless you have a human rights lawyer on retainer and bail money. Who ever wanted to see Europe anyway?

Alberto Gonzales to whine about people hating him

Gonzales Defends Role in Antiterror Policies

Alberto Gonzales, who has kept a low profile since resigning as attorney general nearly 16 months ago, said he is writing a book to set the record straight about his controversial tenure as a senior official in the Bush administration.

Mr. Gonzales has been portrayed by critics both as unqualified for his position and instrumental in laying the groundwork for the administration's "war on terror." He was pilloried by Congress in a manner not usually directed toward cabinet officials.

"What is it that I did that is so fundamentally wrong, that deserves this kind of response to my service?" he said during an interview Tuesday, offering his most extensive comments since leaving government.

Where should I start, Alberto? There was that whole attorney firing scandal where you axed people that wouldn't engage in politically motivated prosecutions and investigations. There was that thing where you politicized the Justice Department by going on a concerted effort to hire Republicans and pass over and fire Democrats. That whole thing about not serving subpoenas and essentially aiding and abetting every attempt by the Bush Administration to avoid contact with the law. There was the whole thing about the war on terror and your recommendations and legal opinions on torture that were reprehensible. There was your stunning performances in front of Congressional questioning where you seemed unable to answer or understand basic questions and brazenly lied your way through the others. The surveillance program, eavesdropping without warrants, torture, Goodling, Yoo, am I forgetting anything?

You are the standard by which we will measure bad Attorney General's now. Gonzales-esque or 'at least he isn't as bad as Gonzales" will be what we say. You are near universally reviled for your tenure. Must we be subjected to your whining book about how we're all just dumb rubes who don't understand why we needed to torture, spy illegally on Americans, and have our Justice Department hire only Republicans and act as a political arm of the White House? Grow up, accept responsibility and have the courtesy to go away and not subject us to 300 pages of "Waaaaaaaa!". Pretend Karl Rove told you to clam up.

The only thing worse than the Bush Administration is all the books from people in the Administration talking about how the entire country just misunderstood everything Bush did. We didn't.