Former Bush Attorney General Michael Mukasey now appears to be blaming our legal system for the 9-11 attacks as opposed to documented failures by the FBI and the failure of the Bush Administration to heed direct warnings of an imminent attack. In an op-ed piece this week, Mukasey puts the blame squarely on the shoulders of our rights-infested legal system.
Mukasey stated in the Wall Street Journal that “we put our vaunted civilian justice system on display in these [previous terrorism] cases…
In return, we got the 9/11 attacks and the murder of nearly 3,000 innocents….”
To bring the point home, the editors added a subheading that reads: “We tried the first World Trade Center bombers in civilian courts. In return we got 9/11 and the murder of nearly 3,000 innocents.”
Mukasey is, of course, the same person who stated under oath that he did not know what waterboarding was. When it was defined for him, he then refused to answer questions about it being torture (here). He is also the man who blocked torture and war crimes investigations (here and here). For a prior column, click here. He is also the man who sought to block investigations into the CIA’s knowing destruction of evidence of torture. He is also the man who blocked efforts to punish Bush officials who politicized the Justice Department, here and here.
Mukasey’s op-ed is a disgraceful effort to use these attacks to further an extremist legal campaign. If there were a right of constitutional defamation, this would meet the test. Our constitution has survived every challenge and we have found that our laws are our strength not our weakness in fighting extremism. Mukasey long ago joined the forces of those at war with our fundamental principles of law and legal process. Not only is his historical revisionism patently absurd, but his legal relativism is patently obvious in this column.
For the full story, click
http://www.aclu.org/about/41347prs20091023.html?s_src=RSS
American Civil Liberties Union Mourns Passing Of Former Executive Director Jack Pemberton (10/23/2009)
Pemberton was keenly aware of the role of the ACLU during the turbulent years in which he led the organization. In 1963, he wrote in the official newsletter:
“When parts of our nation are responding to a revolution in race relations with an almost totalitarian repression of ideas, when new reactions to the complexities of an increasingly industrialized and urbanized society are manifesting themselves in more sophisticated forms of intolerance to dissent and unorthodoxy, and when fear-bred responses to constant international tension are threatening liberty everywhere – the need for putting sinew and muscle on the structure of a firm and steadfast guardian of the American ideal is unprecedented.”
(What precedes this is taken directly from the ACLU web site.)
Just as an idea: It would be nice to have “Ridiculous Argument” and “Brilliant Argument” button on your posts, as well as maybe a “Take that lawyer’s license!” button to allow quick feedback to the insane murmurings of members of the legal community which you are documenting. It would be interesting to see in quantitative terms how many other lawyers thing these folk are laudable, wrong and/or deserve to be disbarred.
Mukasey is, of course, an easy case, but others may provoke some excellent discussion.
“Mukasey’s op-ed is a disgraceful effort to use these attacks to further an extremist legal campaign.”
Didn’t the last administration use the violence & fear created by 9/11 for the achievement of their political ends? And not for nothing, but ain’t that the definition of terrorism?
“If there were a right of constitutional defamation, this would meet the test. Our constitution has survived every challenge and we have found that our laws are our strength not our weakness in fighting extremism.”
Hey, that reminds me. I remember watching an episode of Countdown with Keith Olberman and guest Jonathan Turley…
http://crooksandliars.com/2006/10/17/olbermann-the-day-habeas-corpus-died
“Mukasey long ago joined the forces of those at war with our fundamental principles of law and legal process. Not only is his historical revisionism patently absurd, but his legal relativism is patently obvious in this column.”
A man is shot in Dallas, and we get 27 volumes worth of investigation as to what happened. 3,000 people are killed in an attack on 9/11 and we get a total of 23 pages (chapter 1) of an explanation that fails the plausibility test by contradicting itself on its own terms.
So, I ask, as I always ask, what ever happened to those white papers promised by Powell and Blair?
Want to wake America up to the truth regarding 9/11? Here’s how…….
http://blandyland.com/?p=388
Please leave a comment voicing your support for this idea. It is a very small price to pay considering everything that has happened in our world based on the tragic events of that fateful September morning.
Thanks,
Daniel Edd Bland III
http://www.BlandyLand.com
Mike Appleton:
Are you writing for retired General Paul Eaton too?
GEN. EATON: DICK CHENEY WAS “INCOMPETENT WAR FIGHTER”
http://www.nsnetwork.org/node/1442
Mike thank you for the dissection.
Elaine M:
I think we can go all the way with these guys, and call them “immoral.” They do, after all, have that Old Time Religion coursing through their veins as they so proudly showed us time and again.
Well, I guess I’m not surprised by Mukasey’s op-ed piece. After all, he worked for an administration that perceived the agreements of the Geneva Convention as being “quaint.” One word comes to mind when I think of Mukasey, John Yoo, Judge Bybee, Dick Cheney, George Bush, et al: amoral.
Mukasey is a bonafide war criminal. Mike A., you are correct that the scariest thing about reading this is that it is from someone with Mukasey’s educational and judicial background. How does he sleep at night? Or does he just float around at night and sleep during the day in his sealed vault??
DW’s response to Mukasey refuses to answer questions on water boarding in Congress.
deeply worried
1, January 31, 2008 at 11:27 pm
If you strip away America’s ideals and deepest held values, what do you have left?
On what moral authority, on what standing, do we then try to lead the world out of the darkness?
We are never stronger than when we are just and when we are righteous. If you take those away from us, what then will be our shield and buckler?
And how will we teach our children that our country is the light of the world and the hope of humanity?
Let us defend ourselves; we need hire no tribe of torturers to stand between us and the enemies of our land.
http://jonathanturley.org/2008/01/30/mukasey-refuses-to-answer-question-on-waterboarding-in-congress/#more-1042
Oh, good grief!
“Liberal” Fascism.