Harriet Miers tells Congress "Bite me"
Will they really jail a sweet little old lady?
Yesterday afternoon, based on no law that anyone knows about, the White House ordered former WH Counsel Harriet Miers to disobey a congressional subpoena from the Senate Judiciary Committee. Her successor, Fred Fielding, insisted that Miers has “absolute immunity.”
Anything about this remind you of Nixon's Last Days?
It's hard to imagine Miers giving a worse performance than former WH political director Sara Taylor .. but apparently the lawyers for the WH mob thought she would. Surely a woman considered to be US Supreme Court Justice material would be able to hold her own before a House Committee.
At least Taylor showed up -- but declined to tell what she knew about the firing of nine US attorneys last year. Turns out her memory is as lousy as that of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales .. who told the committee he "couldn't recall" 64 times.
These people took an oath to be loyal to the CONSTITUTION .. NOT the President.
From Yahoo news.com: "WASHINGTON - The Bush administration says the president's immediate advisers are absolutely immune from having to appear before Congress, but legal scholars say the issue isn't that clear cut.
The question grew more pressing Wednesday as President Bush ordered former White House counsel Harriet Miers to defy a congressional summons in the controversy over the administration's dismissals of federal prosecutors.
The Democratic chairmen of the Senate and House judiciary committees have said they would consider introducing contempt of Congress citations against any subpoena recipients who resist.
....George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley said the White House "could not have picked worse ground" on which to fight executive privilege.[..]"
I don't see how a case can be made that the scandal being investigated touches on "military, diplomatic, or sensitive national security secrets."
The need for a criminal investigation should outweigh the privilege itself .. didn't Nixon find this out the hard way?
Lawyer friends tell me no one has "absolute immunity" .. that the concept simply doesn't exist in the law. "No one can claim that executive privilege entitles you to ignore the body that subpoenas you."
If the Bushies keep pushing this, eventually the Democrats will have no choice but to push back harder.
Barring the terrorist attack the Bushies are setting us up for (Chertoff's 'Gut Feeling'), I'll bet we won't recognize the political landscape of this country by next summer.
Time to hire a special prosecutor? There's no reason to believe Gonzales will allow an investigation any more than there was reason to believe Mitchell would allow one when Nixon was in trouble.
Could ordering a person to disobey a lawful subpoena from a co-equal branch of government be impeachable conduct?
Bring me some more popcorn, I will enjoy watching the GOP stonewall this .. bound to play well in Peoria. Just like it did for Nixon.
