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Mukasey Channels Gonzales, Claims He "Doesn't Know" If Bush Violated FISA

Posted by Faiz Shakir, Think Progress at 6:59 AM on January 31, 2008.


Mukasey's flacking for the administration's illegal surveillance is deeply unsettling.
Mukasey Channels Gonzales, Claims He

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In yesterday's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Attorney General Mike Mukasey refused to answer whether Bush had violated the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act under the Terrorist Surveillance Program.

Under questioning from Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA), Mukasey said he "can't contemplate" a situation where President Bush would assert "Article II authority to do something that the law forbids."

Specter shot back, "Well, he did just that in violating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act...didn't he?" Mukasey continued to hedge:

MUKASEY:I think we are now in a situation where [that issue] had been brought within statutes, and that's the procedure going forward.

SPECTER: That's not the point. The point is that he acted in violation of statutes, didn't he?

MUKASEY: I don't know whether he acted in violation of statutes.

Specter explained that the question was a no brainer, as FISA "expressly mandates you have to go to a court to get an order for wiretapping. There's really no dispute about that."

The New York Times famously revealed in 2005 that Bush has allowed spying "without the court-approved warrants ordinarily required for domestic spying."

As the contentious FISA legislation moves forward in Congress, Mukasey's flacking for the administration's illegal surveillance is deeply unsettling.

Digg!

Faiz Shakir is the Research Director at the Center for American Progress and serves as Editor of ThinkProgress.org and The Progress Report.


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Didn't the Democrats approve this guy?
Posted by: rancespergl on Jan 31, 2008 7:48 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I thought so.

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and if anyone is surprised
Posted by: KaptainSpiffy on Jan 31, 2008 7:50 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
you haven't been paying attention the past 7 years

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The only thing these people understand is force
Posted by: Moore Hognutz on Jan 31, 2008 8:07 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The only thing these people understand is force

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The issue has been brought within statutes
Posted by: weslen1 on Jan 31, 2008 9:16 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
That's a backhanded way of saying Bush WAS breaking the law but now he's not so there's no crime. I want this guy for my prosecutor if I decide to go rob 20 banks. I can claim immunity from prosecution if I get caught because I'm NOW in compliance with the law if I'm not doing it any more. Ted Kennedy said to this fool, "Saying that torture is illegal but you can't say whether waterboarding is illegal is like saying that stealing is illegal but you're not sure if bank robbery qualifies."
BUT, this criminal TOLD them STRAIGHT UP that he would check with Bush to find out what he thought before he would call anything illegal. He used the line "I will be serving at the PLEASURE of the president." If he admits that waterboarding is illegal, KNOWING BUSH ORDERED IT TO BE DONE, he will HAVE to prosecute the "president", HIS president. And he won't do that. So effectively, BUSH and CHENEY CONTROL all three branches of government AND the PRESS.
The senators get up there and sound off and get all frustrated, bristling with PHONY OUTRAGE when they KNEW he was what he was, and being Guiliani's life long personal FRIEND, should have given them a clue. MAFIA DONS ALL OF THEM. Guiliani, Mukasey, Kerek, Bush, Cheney, etc. They've all crawled out from under their rocks and they like what they've found. Put them in the same category with the drug boss's and loan sharks. I loan you a dollar. In one week you pay me 100. You don't have it all I break your legs and you pay me 1000. You still don't have it, I kill your wife and you pay me 10000. Sort of like the credit card companies huh.

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Doesn't This...
Posted by: Wacre on Jan 31, 2008 9:19 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
crap get old? How about the Senate waterboard this guy because I am not to sure how else to get fairly obvious truths out of him or anyone else in the Bush Administration.

Then we will see how effective torture is (I suspect that, if done to an American by a foreign power 'enhanced interrogation' would quickly morph back into torture)

Let's see...does the government require the consent of FISA to tap the telephones of Americans?

Either 'Yes' or 'No'.

If the answer is 'Yes', then Bush broke the law.

It's that fraggin' simple, and I don't even have years of law school behind me.

And as much as Arlen Spector bothers me (I believe that he was in charge of the investigation–or played a very important role–of the death of John Kennedy; which said his death was caused by a bullet that seemingly defied the laws of physics, bouncing from one person to another, yet somehow remaining pristine) he appears to be taking the lead in going after Mr. Mukasey.

These people set a hell of an example (in an odd sense we're lucky most Americans don't watch much in the way of objective news) because it Mr. Mukasey's actions don't show the advantage of power, skin color, and influence (the idea that what's normally true and fairly obvious to the rest of us changes, when uttered by a rich–though not always white, though it does seem to help–person, says the exact same thing).

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Let's waterboard Cheney...
Posted by: motamanx on Jan 31, 2008 9:33 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
...then ask him if it's torture. If he says yes, then Bush will go along.
Torture doesn't win wars--it loses them. This has been proven long ago.
Too bad our leaders don't read.

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