In case you missed it, here's the current Attorney General of the United States acting in his previous capacity as White House Counsel, when he wanted Justice Department approval on the warrantless wiretap program:
The crisis in March 2004 stemmed from a review of the program by the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, which raised "concerns as to our ability to certify its legality," according to Comey's testimony. Ashcroft was briefed on the findings on March 4 and agreed that changes needed to be made, Comey said.That afternoon, Ashcroft was rushed to George Washington University Hospital with a severe case of gallstone pancreatitis; on March 9, his gallbladder was removed. The standoff between Justice and White House officials came the next night, after Comey had refused to certify the surveillance program on the eve of its 45-day reauthorization deadline, he testified.
About 8 p.m. on March 10, Comey said that his security detail was driving him home when he received an urgent call from Ashcroft's chief of staff, David Ayres, who had just received an anxious call from Ashcroft's wife, Janet. The White House -- possibly the president -- had called, and Card and Gonzales were on their way.
Furious, Comey said he ordered his security detail to turn the car toward the hospital, careening down Constitution Avenue. Comey said he raced up the stairs of the hospital with his staff, beating Card and Gonzales to Ashcroft's room.
"I was concerned that, given how ill I knew the attorney general was, that there might be an effort to ask him to overrule me when he was in no condition to do that," Comey said, saying that Ashcroft "seemed pretty bad off."
Mueller, who also was rushing to the hospital, spoke by phone to the security detail protecting Ashcroft, ordering them not to allow Card or Gonzales to eject Comey from the hospital room.
Card and Gonzales arrived a few minutes later, with Gonzales holding an envelope that contained the executive order for the program. Comey said that, after listening to their entreaties, Ashcroft rebuffed the White House aides.
"He lifted his head off the pillow and in very strong terms expressed his view of the matter, rich in both substance and fact, which stunned me," Comey said. Then, he said, Ashcroft added: "But that doesn't matter, because I'm not the attorney general. There is the attorney general," and pointed at Comey, who was appointed acting attorney general when Ashcroft fell ill.
And how did Comey feel about this behavior? He goes on:
Later, Card ordered an 11 p.m. meeting at the White House. But Comey said he told Card that he would not go on his own, pulling then-Solicitor General Theodore Olson from a dinner party to serve as witness to anything Card or Gonzales told him. "After the conduct I had just witnessed, I would not meet with him without a witness present," Comey testified. "He replied, 'What conduct? We were just there to wish him well.' "
Nice. This is your White House. It had no qualms about pressuring a man on his sickbed to approve a program despite questions about its legality, then, speaking to one of the people who'd been in attendance about what went on in the hospital room, trying to fudge the facts.
I find it quite telling that Comey felt he'd better have a witness to whatever Card wanted to talk about with him.
Posted by Linkmeister at May 16, 2007 10:54 AM | TrackBackJohn Ashcroft, Defender of Liberty. How odd does that sound? :)
Posted by: Solonor at May 16, 2007 01:05 PMYeah, I know.
Posted by: Linkmeister at May 16, 2007 01:41 PMFrom today's WSJ:
..............
Democrats and former Deputy Attorney General James Comey put on quite a Senate show Tuesday over the National Security Agency's wiretapping program. With New York's Chuck Schumer directing, the players staged a full length docudrama to create the impression that the Bush Administration broke the law in reauthorizing the program to eavesdrop on al Qaeda.
Senate hearings can be boring, so we'll assume the press corps dozed through select parts. That would explain why no one reported on the discussion as Senator Arlen Specter questioned Mr. Comey on how the great covert operation actually went down. News stories have suggested a pattern of White House misdeeds to accomplish an ultimately illegal end. The transcript tells a different story.
First let's review the background. On March 10, 2004, then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales and White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card visited John Ashcroft in the hospital as he recuperated in intensive care. According to Mr. Comey, the purpose of the visit was to get Attorney General Ashcroft to sign off on the NSA's wiretapping authority, which Mr. Comey himself had declined to do.
In the hearing, Mr. Comey spared no dramatic detail. As Mr. Gonzales and Mr. Card came into the hospital room, Mrs. Ashcroft supposedly stood by the bed "holding her husband's arm." As they queried him on the matter, Mr. Ashcroft "lifted his head off the pillow . . . and in very strong terms expressed himself, and then laid his head back down on the pillow, seemed spent." This is the kind of stuff that can get you into the Oprah Book Club.
In Mr. Comey's spirited retelling, Messrs. Gonzales and Card were trying to "end run" his authority as acting attorney general by taking advantage of a "very sick man" who had delegated his AG powers to Mr. Comey. In a series of events that followed, Mr. Comey, under the guidance of Mr. Schumer, presented himself as further harassed -- summoned to the White House to meet with Mr. Card, and later with President Bush himself.
The implication is that the White House was trying to lean on Justice to do something illegal. But listen to what Mr. Comey actually said as Mr. Specter questioned him. Was he pressured by Mr. Card, Senator Specter asked? No. "I don't know that he tried to pressure me, other than to engage me on the merits and make clear his strong disagreements with my conclusion."
Did they threaten him, or suggest he could be fired? "No sir, I didn't feel threatened, nor did he say anything that could reasonably be read [as threatening]." And what about Mr. Bush, did he twist arms in the Oval? Through FBI director Robert Mueller, Mr. Comey explained, "The President said the Justice Department should do what the Department thinks is right."
So where's the smoking gun here? When the program was reauthorized by the President alone, Mr. Comey and others planned to resign in protest. So, Mr. Specter asked, does that mean the program went forward illegally? Again, negative: "The Justice Department's certification . . . was not [required] as far as I know." That's because, as even Mr. Comey conceded, many judges and scholars believe a President has the Constitutional authority to approve such wiretaps, especially in wartime.
In other words, per Mr. Comey's testimony, nothing illegal was done, he was never threatened by White House officials, and the President told him to do what he felt was right. The Gonzales-Card hospital intrusion was unusual, and politically unwise, but their motive at the time was to gain approval for a program the President thought vital to national security and was about to expire.
By the way, March 10, 2004, the date of Mr. Comey's visit to Mr. Ashcroft's bedside is an historic day for another reason: It was the eve of 3-11 and the Madrid train bombings, which killed 191 and injured 2,000. It was, in other words, the kind of event that brings home the global nature of terrorism, as well as the sophisticated coordination required to execute attacks of such brutality.
What's really going on here is a different form of political theater: Democrats are trying to whip up an aura of "illegality" to create the political leverage to strip a Republican President of his surveillance authority in wartime. They've tried to do this since the program was revealed, and back in 2006 Russ Feingold compared it to Watergate. But unfortunately for the Democrats, wiretapping aimed at America's terrorist enemies is politically popular.
So, rather than arguing the legal merits, Democrats are spinning a yarn about shady deeds perpetrated in a hospital room at night. They are using half-truths to achieve a partisan goal that is dangerous policy, and they shouldn't get away with it.
Posted by: pixelshim at May 16, 2007 11:28 PMPix, you know as well as I do that Paul Gigot and his editorial staff are full-on adjuncts of the Republican party. Of course the WSJ ed pages are going to have that kind of spin.
Posted by: Linkmeister at May 17, 2007 07:31 AM