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Mukasey’s Elmer Fudd Defense

I have certainly heard from folks about my reference to Attorney General Michael Mukasey’s explanation for not taking action in the political hiring scandal as the “Elmer Fudd defense”, click here. Mukasey stated that, once again, he would not take action in this matter, but suggested it was due to the fact that the culprits left the Justice Department before he could take action. The problem is that he has blocked action in matters involving clear crimes with officials still in office.

In his speech to the ABA, Mukasey stated that no action would be taken against those responsible for political hiring at the Justice Department, click here. The suggestion is that, if these varmints were not so fast, he could have done something despite his record on non-action in every other area of alleged criminality by Bush officials.

Mukasey explained further that reviewing those hired under the political litmus test would be unfair. This is clearly true with regard to line DOJ people, but Mukasey did not deal with the immigration judges who were hired for their political qualifications and are still handing down rulings.

He also told delegates to the American Bar Association annual meeting, “Not every wrong, or even every violation of the law, is a crime. In this instance, the two joint reports found only violations of the civil service laws.” The problem is that he is barring efforts to investigate clear crimes in the torture program and the unlawful surveillance programs, even after rulings from federal court clearly establishing the foundation for criminal investigations. One federal court has already ruled that the president’s domestic surveillance program was clearly unlawful.

29 thoughts on “Mukasey’s Elmer Fudd Defense”

  2. To me, anyone who can watch any of the stuff at Fox “News,” whether it is O’Reilly or any of the other right wingnuts has much more patience than I do. I honestly tried to watch O’Reilly once, about a year ago, and I didn’t make it past the first 15 minutes of one of his so-called “discussions” or whatever he calls them. He doesn’t debate, he screams at people, at least that’s the way it sounds to me. I got so fed up I shut the TV off and read a book instead. The quiet was a welcome respite from O’Reilly’s nails-on-chalkboard voice. I’ll stick with COUNTDOWN, as I really like KO’s style and his talks with JT and his other guests. I’ll let the really brave souls tackle O’Reilly. 🙂

  3. Russ,

    Classic Bill O’Reilly here…

    http://mediamatters.org/items/200405020006

    I loved it. Seriously, there is no better way to sum up that clown. Faced with an intellectual opponent O’Reilly’s reflex action is to create a fictional statistic from a fictional bussiness journal, ‘The Paris Bussiness Review,’ to support his ludicrous claims that his boycott of french products has cost the country billions in lost revenue. Nevermind that he was completely wrong, since France’s exports to America had increased during the relevant time span.

    What was the point of this foray into make everything up land? It was Bill’s sick, misguided, stupid attempt to threaten Canada with a similar fruitless boycott. OUR LARGEST TRADING PARTNER. What an insanely bloated ego on that man.

    By the way, Bill’s tragic attempt to support his baseless arguement prompted some delightfully silly person to create this site.

    http://www.parisbusinessreview.net/

  4. Russ,

    Wow, Russ. Quite a ringing endorsement of Bill O’Reilly there. But, somehow your post lacks many relevant facts concerning O’Reilly’s proclivities towards dubios editing practices, bullying tactics, dismissal of facts, little white lies, outright lies, made up statistics from made up publications, stalker producers, inability to retract a story despite demonstrable flaws, callous use of grieving families for political punditry, assuring that his guests seats are lower than his, name calling, troop bashing, self promotion, factor product placement, and xenophobia. Not to mention his alleged inability to distinguish a loofah from a falafel.

  5. russ:

    “Throughout the balance of his nightly opinion news show he will have several guests on that have differing opinions and he vigrously debates them and that is why 3 times as many people watch Bill Oreilly as watch Keith Olbermann.”

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

    I watch Olbermann and I watch O’Reilly. I do see opposing views on O’Reilly but they are usually shouted down or he picks such weak representatives that they are intimidated. It’s more like Hannity and Colmes with Colmes playing the straight man. I would much prefer a debate between two reasonable educated men as I have described. The intellectual underpinnings of the right with their college dropout mentality (such as Limbaugh and Hannity who both are only marginally educated)do not interest me, but I would like to hear from an articulate educated man with those viewpoints assuming one actually exists.

  6. You obviously have a lot of pent up rage. Don’t worry, one day you will meet a woman ‘simple’ enough to be with you. Once you loose your virginity, you’ll feel better. I’m not sure, but I don’t think what the other the boys did to you at camp counts. Just remember, it wasn’t your fault.

  7. Mespo,
    I don’t think any liberal would mind having opposing views,but not “set-ups” like the ones that occur on O’Reilly and other Fox News theatre shows. O’Reilly will never have a legitimate “debate” with qualified people on both sides because like some others, he doesn’t want to hear the truth and facts are a very troublesome problem for O’Reilly and Fox News. An Yoo would never debate Turley because it would become too apparent to any observer that Yoo is an expert in quoting his own articles in subsequent articles. How he was hired at a legitimate law school is amazing. When you review what has been dsiclosed of his torture memos, it is amazing that he is allowed to teach the law to young students.

  8. mespo:

    Bill Oreilly has, virtually EVERY night, opposing viewpoints. His starts his show with his “talking points” and then has guests on that typically differ with him and he asks them where he is going wrong if. It is usually an interesting back & forth.

    Throughout the balance of his nightly opinion news show he will have several guests on that have differing opinions and he vigrously debates them and that is why 3 times as many people watch Bill Oreilly as watch Keith Olbermann.

    Factually, Bill Oreilly late night RERUNS have higher total ratings than Keith Olbermanns prime time broadcasts.

    Now why won’t Jonathan Turley go on Bill Oreilly and debate him? I would guess it is because Mr. Turley is so insecure with himself and his ideology that he cannot face man to man someone that disagrees with him.

    Perhaps Mr. Turley would feel more at east debating 14 year old Chinese girl gymnists masquarading as 16 year olds……..

  9. russ:

    As reluctant as I am to admit it, I must agree with you at least in part. With the Olbermann/O’Reilly juxtaposition, what we have is one group of experts plying their base and another group plying theirs. No real dialog occurs because each side simply preaches to its own respective choir. It would suit me to see an honest debate about, say torture, between JT and John Yoo, or a discussion of Administration tactics between John Dean and maybe Karl Rove. While I would hold my nose while those respective neo-cons were talking,I would undoubtedly open my ears.

  10. I think the condom that your father/uncle was wearing when you were conceived had “the lowest ratings of anything around”.

  11. Mr. Turley, when can we have the pleasure of an actual DEBATE between you and someone with an opposing viewpoint? I find it disturbing that you insist that you will not appear on any television opnion shows or news casts in a debate atmosphere.

    What are you afraid of?

    PS: Please ask your Countdown host, blathermouth Olbermann that he needs either 1) some talent on his show or 2) some opposing viewpoints or he will continue going the way of Harcball with the lowest ratings of anything around.

  12. ‘must read’ article highlighting Starr’s negative testimony, as the ICA was expiring in 1999…

    …guess again.

    Starr opposes Independent Counsel Act

    April 14, 1999
    Web posted at: 11:13 a.m. EDT (1513 GMT)

    “…I think it is fair to say that the Act has been a worthwhile experiment. Like most experiments that are professionally conducted, it has yielded significant results,” Starr says. “The results, I believe, support this conclusion: Jurisdiction and authority over these cases ought to be returned to the Justice Department. And who will oversee them? The Congress, the press and the public.”

    http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/04/14/test.top/index.html

  14. This reminds me of the immigration law protest I drove past where they had signs that said “Illegals aren’t Criminals.”

    It bugs me what people and politicians do to the English Language.

  15. I need a little legal knowledge. Didn’t Mukasey have a mildly distinguished legal career? Wasn’t he a Judge when he was nominated? If I’m correct in those assumptions, then I find it so puzzling that he took this job and is behaving in it at a level that approaches the Gonzales debacle. Why would someone do that at the end of his career? Was it the lure of ending his career with being the Attorney General? Could he be so ignorant that he didn’t realize that being a shill Attorney General for the Bush Administration is not a distinguished way to end one’s career? Since I assume he is not a stupid man and also that he can’t get rich from this work, I am truly perplexed by his behavior.

  16. Mukasey is just doing what he feels is right. He is A Zionist Jew covering for a Zionist Christian President because nothing is more important than helping Israel, certainly not any US Laws.

  19. “Professionalism is alive and well at the Department of Justice today,” (Muskasey) Yup, if I keep repeting things enough times they’ll become reality. It’s my understanding that he’s been offering jobs to those who were rejected for positions due to having “wrong thoughts” about bush and lacking strict constructionist views of the Republican party. I took that to mean he’s quite worried about the civil lawsuits and doesn’t want them to proceed either.

    As to his views on criminal proscecution–some animals are more equal than others. Would that such mercy be shown to those without money and connections.

  20. JT:

    Mukasey:

    “Not every wrong, or even every violation of the law, is a crime. In this instance, the two joint reports found only violations of the civil service laws.”

    Legal Maxim Since the Roman Times:

    “Ubi jus, ibi remedium.”
    (Where law prevails, there is a remedy. )

    Obviously, the Bushies live in a place where the law doesn’t “prevail.”

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