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The health reform debate is roaring, as it should be,
and we are engaged in pressing the spineless Dems -- including Obama -- to stand
up to the insurance companies and rescue American health care. While we are
enaged in this one noble battle, we are in danger of distracting ourselves from
another urgent situation-- the toxic US Attorneys appointed by Bush are still
in place and their victims are in jail.
These attorneys have engaged in horrific abuses of justice, engaging in serial
prosecutory misconduct that abused the legal system. They jailed innocent
people, bullied elected officials into quitting their elected positions or
withdrawing from political races. They threatened the children and parents and
families of their targets, forcing them to choose between letting their family
members become victims or pleading guilty. The judges in the cases-- Bush
appointees-- often allowed evidence and processes that, ultimately, other
Republican judges reversed and rejected. We are talking about heinous, criminal
misconduct that has turned good citizens into cowering victims of tyranny.
These appointments were the brainchild of Karl Rove, and their express purpose was to pursue political prosecutions of mid level Democratic office holders or activists and contributors-- people who would fly under the radar. The prosecutions took place in less than 20 "swing states" where elections had been close. The plan appears to have been to solidify the states as Republican through abusive prosecutions that took out some elected officials and intimidated others, through resignation, imprisonment or attacks on integrity. We don't know how many were threatened who were never prosecuted. We do know that over 700 were victims who were identified.
It is beyond outrageous. It is obscene that Obama and Holder have not already removed these sociopathic criminals from the judicial system. I have some ideas why: Why Holder and Obama have not fired the Bush Appointed, Rove-Vetted DOJ Attorneys
American justice is at risk, it is being abused and corrupted as you read this because Holder has not removed these vile criminals from their positions in the DOJ.
If you are not already familiar with this situation, the background is in this
50-minute video by John McTiernan, director of Die Hard 1 and 3, Hunt for Red
October and Predator: The
Political Prosecutions of Karl Rove.
When Thomas Jefferson faced similar prospects, he fired the attorneys, freed the wrongly- prosecuted and imprisoned and began impeachment hearings. We expect nothing less of President Obama. Not only US Attorneys but judges have abused their office for politically-motivated witch hunts. The most famous case is Don Siegelman, former Governor of Alabama, who became a target of Rove's machine after he had the audacity to ask for a recount in the suspicious 2002 election in which he "lost' to Bob Riley. This must not stand. As John McTiernan says, Americans must not reach a point where they fear the judicial system, but that has happened to over 700 victims of judicial and prosecutorial misconduct.
Obama has invited us to push him. Let's take him at his word! Lives and families have been destroyed by the monsters still in their jobs as prosecutors and judges. Obama, through Holder, must insist on investigations and prosecutions.
Dana Jill Simpson was an Alabama Republican who worked for the Riley campaign, until she became aware that Rove was concocting charges of "corruption' against Siegelman in order to influence the election. She bravely came forward with this story, but her house has since burned down, and she has repeatedly been threatened. When Karl Rove lied about his role in the Siegelman case, she wrote this article; My Response to the article "Closing in on Rove".
There are over 700 victims, like her, who deserve justice.
Ironically, if these shameful Bush-initiated, GOP backed practices were brought to the public's attention, the right wingers who are now afflicting the Obama Health Reform efforts like swarms of gnats would be in retreat, doing all they could to clean up their image and distance themselves from these horrendous perpetrations.
Meanwhile, Governor Don Siegelman still awaits sentencing and incarceration. How can Holder allow this to stand when he has released Alaska's senator Stevens who was clearly a red herring meant to distract from the otherwise massively partisan witch hunt Rove directed in his corruption of the DOJ?
The fact that the attorneys who perpetrated such injustices are still at their jobs, still threatening people is insupportable. We must create a huge uproar, a massive demand from all corners of the media, from the blogosphere, that he fires the remaining attorneys.
Some argue that the Republicans, like Jeff Sessions, are holding back appointments of replacements. That is a pathetic argument. You don't leave a fox guarding the henhouse just because you haven't found a solid guard dog yet. First, you get rid of the fox.
Judges, too, appointed by Bush, engaged in totally inappropriate, illegal, judicial misconduct, playing a key role in partisan prosecutions. They must be investigated, impeached and prosecuted. Those who are found guilty should be imprisoned.
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