Still puzzled: Why did the administration allow Fitzgerald to be chosen?

[AlinPA]

Why would the Rove-Bush** administration allow Comey (asst AG now departed- to a job with an aircraft company I believe) to install Fitzgerald, a tough prosecutor with a good reputation of calling them like he sees them, etc. ? Unless there was deal up front, this is damned hard to believe. Fitzgerald has not been leaking (a good sign?); he seems to be taking a hell of a long of time (a bad sign that he is covering it?- or a good sign that he is being thorough and will indict the bastards?). Is he so good that he could bend the grand jury to Bush**-Rove's benefit? Still troubles me why they would put such a respected, tough person in there. Hoping they could buy him out or twist him?

[gademocrat7]

1. Maybe they thought if Comey chose Fitz it was all o.k.

[AlinPA]

7. Comey is a republican, so that sounds possible. They trusted him. nt

[tulsakatz]

2. at the time they chose Fitzgerald.......

.....it was a long time ago, at least 2 yrs ago. I believe, at that time, Bush believed the people who were close to him (like Rove) were innocent.

I think they put Fitzgerald in charge because they wanted the truth.

[laugle]

20. Does this mean you think Bush and Cheney are not involved?

Do you really think that Rove and Libby especially, would do this on their own?

I have no doubt Bush and Cheney are involved, the question is can it be proved. That part will be hard since they can't rat on Bush, since they will need him for a pardon when the indictments come down.

[madame defarge]

3. Ashcroft...

I think I heard that Ashcroft was the one who picked him because Fitzgerald was a Republican. Looks like Ashcroft didn't do his homework very well. Fitz is doing a helluva good job at nailing George Ryan, former Republican governor of Illinois on the license for bribe scandal.

[dmr]

21. No, Ashcroft recused himself, Acting Attorney General James Comey

who then empowered Fitzgerald unilateral authority to "expand" his jurisdiction and "pursue it wherever he wants to pursue it".

We owe a great deal to Comey and his forsight.

You can find more info here at FindLaw:

http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/doj/comey123003doj-pconf.html

[McCamy Taylor]

4. Ashcroft got in trouble for staying involved too long so he had

to hurry and hand the job over to his second in his command a career person in the DOJ and REALLY TRULY let him pick who was gonna do the investigating. If Ashcroft had not tried to interfere and run a cover up at the start, he probably could have gotten away with selecting some old fart sympathetic to the GOP who would have run a low key investigation.This is the trouble a lot of people are in now. Gonzales tried to cover up at the start, too. Now he cant do shit to control Fitzgerald, cause Fitz can say "Hmm, you have a personal interest in this matter, dont you?" Just about everyone in the administration and every high ranking GOPer in DC was involved in covering it up.

http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0538,waas,67952,2.html

"We now know that then attorney general John Ashcroft insisted on being briefed on Department interviews of Mr. Rove that were conducted in connection with the leak. He did so despite his own long-standing ties to Mr. Rove; Mr. Ashcroft had paid Mr. Rove almost $750,000 for work on several campaigns. That Mr. Ashcroft eventually recused himself demonstrates there were conflicts of interest with his continued involvement."

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0107-14.htm

Why Did Attorney General Ashcroft Remove Himself From The Valerie Plame Wilson Leak Investigation?
by John W. Dean

[madrchsod]

5. that second in command is just

as tough as fitz,,,makes ya kinda wonder if the career people in the doj were just waiting for someone to nail these guys

[snippy]

6. I wonder what Bush's criminal defense attorney thinks of Fitzgerald?

I ask only because after seeing a refernce on another thread I have decided to use the phrase "Bush's criminal defense attorney" as often as possible. Later today I am going to my favorite wine shop and I intend to ask the clerk whether it is true that "Bush's criminal defense attorney" is an oenophile. I am going to try and use the phrase "Bush's criminal defense attorney" everywhere I go and in every conversation I have.

One relevant comment I can make regarding your post is that you should keep in mind that much of the delay in Fitzgerald's case has been the result of Cooper and Miller appealing their contempt citations all the way to the Supreme Court, which refused to hear it. If Cooper and Miller had testified when first ordered to by the District Court, Fitzgerald may have finished his investigation months ago and we would be enjoying the trial phase of this case.

[AlinPA]

8. That's true. Thanks. n/t

[dbeach]

9. CS

http://citizenspook.blogspot.com/2005/08/citizen-spook-was-spooked.html

go to left and click on USAGand bush have no legal authority to fire Fitzgerald

read the article of 8/8/05 and gives good factoids

that particular article is clogged but navigatable

CS is a mixed bag on DU but I have learned much from his interpretations..
PS CS says it don't look good for the villains

[KC21304]

10. This is from August, but it is a good background

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1791

[AlinPA]

17. Very good. Thanks, helps me a lot. n/t

[bklyncowgirl]

25. I think they wanted this to die quietly--at least for the time being.

Appointing a prosecuter who was an obvious partisan hack would have opened the administration to accusations of a cover up. Picking an honest prosecuter put the case on the back burner until well after the election.

They believed that by the time Fitzgerald was done presenting his case, the Iraq war would have been long over, a resounding success with minimal casualties and that no one would care less about going after the administration for getting us into it.

They were wrong.

[Enraged_Ape]

11. Did you ever see the classic Costa-Gavras' political film "Z"?

It was about the assassination of a political figure in Greece and the resulting cover-up/shenanigans. The people in power appoint a guy to "investigate" the murder who they consider to be somewhat innocuous and a friend to them. Only he is so appalled and horrified by what they've done, he actually begins to do his job.

[McCamy Taylor]

13. Great flick!

[McCamy Taylor]

12. The GOP will blame Ashcroft but its Bush's fault for getting a politician

when they should have gotten a lawyer to be AG. A lawyer wouldn't have dicked around when he had a suspicion that Karl Rove might be the guilty party meaning that he might be called upon at some stage in the investigation to recuse himself. A lawyer would have distanced himself immediately. Only a politician tries to get away with as much as he thinks the public will let him get away with.

[KnaveRupe]

14. The most plausible scenario is that Comey isn't crooked.

Ashcroft, yeah. He's evil. But when Ashcroft found out in December of 2003 that this was going to be a huge shitstorm, he was smart enough to get as far away from it as possible.

Comey had been a Federal Prosecutor before becoming Deputy AG, and was close friends with Fitz. If Comey is crooked, there's no way he appoints Fitz. If Comey's clean, he gets the best guy for the job he can find, which is what it appears happened.

I would assume that Ashcroft and Comey both caught hell for not making this go away; it would certainly explain why both are gone from the administration now. But once Comey named Fitz, it was out of the Admin's hands. there was literally nothing they could do.

Here's an article by John Dean from 1/04 that has some good info:

http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20040106.html

[snippy]

16. I have always had a feeling that Comey had been pressuring Ashcroft

to recuse himself for some time before he eventually did. Just a hunch, nothing more.

[AlinPA]

18. OK. Hmmm. Thanks. n/t

[AlinPA]

19. Comey indicted Martha Stewart and got a reward with the job in DC.

So he was trusted. Makes sense they would trust his appointment of Fitzgerald. But Fitzgerald was known as tough. No wonder that Comey left town!

[emulatorloo]

15. Because they messed up. . .they have done it before, right?

Surely you can think of several times where this admin screwed up?

[Name removed]

22. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[onenote]

23. oh boy, more flocco crapola

If it was raining outside, this guy would insist (a) its sunny and (b) the rain is being held captive in a closet somewhere.

He's ridiculous.

onenote

[onenote]

24. because contrary to what some people think, they aren't allpowerful

puppetmasters. In fact, far from it. They're incompetent boobs who think they're all powerful. Its called hubris.

onenote