My "chertoff" instinct tells me that nobody at bushco is going to enjoy his testimony. More cracks in the levee boys.

Here is the big difference between Goldsmith and Yoo, hence Comey's basis:
Yoo saw NO limitation on Presidential Power based primarily on unenumerated Article II implications.

Goldsmith realized there was more to the constitution than article II.

Yoo:http://www.usdoj.gov/olc/warpowers925.htm
We of course understand that terrorist organizations and their state sponsors operate by secrecy and concealment, and that it is correspondingly difficult to establish, by the standards of criminal law or even lower legal standards, that particular individuals or groups have been or may be implicated in attacks on the United States. Moreover, even when evidence sufficient to establish involvement is available to the President, it may be impossible for him to disclose that evidence without compromising classified methods and sources, and so damaging the security of the United States. See, e.g., Chicago & Southern Air Lines, Inc, 333 U.S. at 111 ("The President . . . has available intelligence services whose reports are not and ought not to be published to the world."); see also Ruth Wedgwood, Responding to Terrorism: The Strikes Against Bin Laden, 24 Yale J. Int'l L. 559, 568-74 (1999) (analyzing difficulties of establishing and publicizing evidence of causation of terrorist incidents). But we do not think that the difficulty or impossibility of establishing proof to a criminal law standard (or of making evidence public) bars the President from taking such military measures as, in his best judgment, he thinks necessary or appropriate to defend the United States from terrorist attacks. In the exercise of his plenary power to use military force, the President's decisions are for him alone and are unreviewable.

Goldsmith: Harvard Law Review, 2005
"Under our framework for interpreting the AUMF, courts should look to its text (including its September 11 nexus requirement), prior Executive Branch practice during wartime, the types of actions that are permitted under the international laws of war, and any conditions that international law places on such actions. In addition, a clear statement requirement is appropriate when the President acts to re-strict the liberties of non-combatants in the United States, but not when he engages in traditional military functions that restrict the lib-erty of combatants."

I'm wondering, as well as David Iglesias, if the resignations of Rove and Gonzales in the last 2 weeks are related in some way. Is there some incriminating information that the WH has hidden away?

http://rawstory.com//news/2007/Iglasias_Gonzales_halftruths_devastating_0827.html

"Here is the big difference between Goldsmith and Yoo, hence Comey's basis: Yoo saw NO limitation on Presidential Power ..."

drational pegs it: All threads in the tapestry that Cheney / Bush have woven since September 11th -- the Patriot Act, Signing Statements; the many Executive Orders (most of them classified, or with large portions restricted from any public review)... *all* are predicated upon Presidential authority "in time of war" having no real limit.

That assumption, and 'Executive Privilege', are the only two protections Cheney / Bush have. If they're seriously challenged, the house of cards will begin to collapse.

-- and that begs the question: How far will this crowd go to protect its own interests? Would it include, say, doing whatever was necessary to create a State Of Emergency that would restrict the powers of Congress? I guess we'll have to wait and see...

Rove resigned August 13
Schlozman resigned August 20
Gonzales resigned Aug 24-27, but he can't recall any particular conversation with the President. It is his understanding that the President received a resignation letter, but he does not know who wrote it. He does remember seeing a letter and he believes that it was the letter that has been discussed in media reports.

TMP's stubborn insistence in reporting that Bush's warrantless NSA snooping was a post-9/11 program is more than a little annoying.

Bloomberg news service has confirmed the Bush/Cheney White House launched the llegal electronic eavesdropping BEFORE 9/11.

Why TMP's insistence on getting this part of the crime incorrect?

See http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/07/02/0659222

Hatch..
"Nothing to see here. Move along."

Reports of Goldsmith's testimony portray it as a foregone conclusion he'll appear. Why couldn't Bush forbid it, just as he has forbid testimony from many others?

Goldsmith originally worked with Haynes at DOD and assisted with some of the worst of the assaults that were put together on both the integrity of our military and our country's domestic legal appratus.

He was an able assistant as Haynes crammed torture down the throats of the military over hard fought objections. The recent leak that Haynes actually had harsh words one time with Cambone notwithstanding, the responsiblity for what has happened to our military - a military which now has no more honor than to go on a rampage of commuted sentences for cilivian murders - lies at the doors of the men who made the calls.

The draft memo on Article 49 that is allegedly tied to Goldsmith is a very sad document to see generated from any lawyer, much less from one with the positions he has held and the opportunities he has been presented with in life.

The surveillance programs and abuses that Goldmsith WAS able to condone and tolerate and advocate and support would be, in any other time, a shocking and horrible commentary. The fact that he has been able to corral, with Comey, good "press" is a bright shiney to distract from the things that were done and were not done - not by others, but by them.

Despite Haynes giving very "truthy" testimony before SJC in his nomination hearings (reported on here at TPM) Goldsmith, Comey, Philbin and Thompson were still strongly aligned to put Haynes on the Fourth Circuit.

It makes for a nice narrative to pretend that Jack Goldsmith and Jim Comey were some kind of "good guys" who didn't actually get their hands dirty with torture and abuse policies that their DOD and/or DOJ put into place, but IMO it's a fairy tale.

The only book I looked to with the same degree of *eagerness* was Tenet's book. Nice to see someone get a conscience right when it can help sell a book.

Well, with the Senate and House Dems track record regarding virtually every investigation, they'll likely screw this opportunity up. They just don't know how to go for the jugular, even when they aren't simply doing it for political reasons (according to the talking heads).

This is a criminal administration and any and all investigations should be treated as a criminal investigative endeavor. It's abundanlty clear the Reeps don't want anything whatsoever to do with real oversight, so the Dems should sideline the likes of Hatch and Specter in an effot to finally get to the TRUTH and take these folks down and out.

This is the Bush Crime Family.

drational - I know when he was phased out and about his time at DOD prior to his time at OLC.

I've gone into it before, but IMO their "standing up" to Gonzales/Cheney may very well have been from a self-interest standpoint vis a vis the fact that there was, relatively contemporaneously, a reported blow up with the FISCt over breached firewalls that the Chief Justices had put in place to try to keep the illegal program separate and segregated from FISA applications. As a matter of fact, the court was reportedly ready to start talking perjury and since you are talking applications that are signed off on by the AG and often the FBI Dir, that would certainly go a long way to explaining Mueller's concerns as well.

If you men Gonzales might be sitting on the Sup Ct in lieu of Alito, I guess time has yet to tell the qualitative differences that might yield. And I do know that Goldsmith & Co. certainly made some very large pushes to try to get Haynes on the Fourth Cir and we already have Bybee on a Circuit Court.

It's fine to say that you admire what they did to "stand up" to Cheney (although I have some strong reservations as to how altruistic, vs. how CYA with FISC, that may have been) but I think, to quote someone much better able to make hammer meet nail than I, it is revisionist Candyland to try to create heroes out of people who DID back and continue to back the program that two FISC Chief Judges had told them was illegal (and which had criminal penalties) and to so thoroughly corrupt the military and domestic justice systems.

If you read the piece up at Salon on Chertoff and his "truthy" episode before Congress on GITMO, there is a very sad email included in the piece. Very sad bc it is an email discussing conversations about how the torture and abuse of prisoners would be a problem for later prosecutions.

What people like Comey and Goldsmith have done is to make those problems "disappear." Because the were able to lead and were looked up to, all the things they did tolerate and advocate have forever and irrevocably changed our justice system.

Certainly admire the fact that Comey dug deep and was actually able to - with support from the FBI director and FBI agents - say 'no' to Fredo if you want.

But then read through his Padilla Press Conf while at Justice - in light of what is now known. Read through his affidavit killing Maher Arar's lawsuit. Read the Article 49 draft memo attributed to Goldmsith or just his WaPo op ed advocating for holding people at GITMO without end.

And consider who you choose for your heroes.

I've always wondered why Russ Tice (former NSA) never testified.

Mary,
You have probably disapperared into the ether at this point but you appear to be wrong about the NSA program.

"create heroes out of people who DID back and continue to back the program that two FISC Chief Judges had told them was illegal (and which had criminal penalties) and to so thoroughly corrupt the military and domestic justice systems."

There are no rulings on NSA program prior to August 2006. Are you making this part up, or do you have access to some non-public information.

Mary is right, I am reposting some of this again

In early 2002 the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court judge reaches an agreement with government lawyers on warrantless wiretaps ALREADY conducted without court approval. These applications are to be “Tagged” and the information used cannot be the basis for a FISA warrant, instead independently gathered information must provide the justification for a FISA warrant.

In mid May of 2002 Chief Judge Rehnquist appoints Coleen Kollar- Kotelly presiding judge of the FISC. She is informed of the secret surveillance program and agrees not to tell the other 10 judges; she also accepts the previous “Tagging” compromise.

Sometime in early 2004 James Baker discovers that the governments failure to share information about it’s spying program has rendered the “tagging” agreement useless. Baker alerts judge Kollar-Kotelly who complains to Ashcroft prompting a temporary suspension. The judge then requires high level Justice Department officials to “certify” the information was complete or face possible perjury charges.

This was reported in the Washington Post in separate pieces and I believe the real reason Comey,Ashcroft and Mueller turned.

". . . . [W]hile many students did not agree with his politics few ever realized it. This was because Goldsmith understood and presented both sides of every argument with such skill and clarity that he never tipped his hand as to where his sympathies lied."

Probably because he understands the fact that law and politics are not the same thing -- unlike the Bushit ideologues who use the law to advance their political agenda, regardless whether elements of the political agenda are antithetical to the Constitution and laws; and regardless whether they violate the law in the process.

Reject ends and means; all that matters is "winning," even if it ends up destroying that one so coveted "winning".

"In retrospect, Jack Goldsmith was certainly the worst person for the Bush administration to have on staff: (i) principled, (ii) educated, and (iii) undoubtedly the smartest person in the hospital room that evening -- and most other rooms where he is found."

I don't know about the "smartest" part, but the first two are sufficient to make him a "threat" to the Bushit criminal enterprise.

"His testimony will be illuminating."

I hope so. And biggers cracks in the damn should begin to enumerate now that Gonzales is no longer there to hand out the plastic sheeting and duct tape.

Posted by: David, NYC
Date: August 28, 2007 2:04 PM