The Hollywood Liberal

Senate limits Gonzales’ hiring authority

AP
Excerpt:
WASHINGTON – The Senate voted overwhelmingly Tuesday to end the Bush administration’s ability to unilaterally fill U.S. attorney vacancies as a backlash to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’ firing of eight federal prosecutors.

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Amid calls from lawmakers in both parties to resign, Gonzales got a morale boost with an early-morning call from President Bush, their first conversation since a week ago, when the president said he was unhappy with how the Justice Department handled the firings.

With a 94-2 vote, the Senate passed a bill that canceled a Justice Department-authored provision in the Patriot Act that had allowed the attorney general to appoint U.S. attorneys without Senate confirmation. Democrats say the Bush administration abused that authority when it fired the eight prosecutors and proposed replacing some with White House loyalists.

“If you politicize the prosecutors, you politicize everybody in the whole chain of law enforcement,” said Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (news, bio, voting

HLs Take
OK now they should go through the rest of the Patriot Act and repeal the other 98% of it that is total BS designed to give Bush total power over everyone and everything.

Democrats in Congress kick oversight into overdrive

LA Times
Excerpt:
WASHINGTON — One day last week, the entire Federal Communications Commission was summoned for the first time in three years before a House committee, where its members were grilled for five hours and told to expect to be “frequent guests.”

On another day, Congress authorized subpoenas for Justice Department officials in its escalating investigation into the murky reasons offered by the Bush administration for its decision to fire eight U.S. attorneys.

And on yet another day, former covert CIA operative Valerie Plame was the star witness at a hearing where she accused White House officials of “recklessly” blowing her cover and destroying her career…..

When Democrats won both houses of Congress in November, they promised vigorous oversight in addition to an ambitious legislative agenda. So far, they appear to be accomplishing more through oversight. None of the bills that were part of the party’s 100-hour spree has yet emerged from Congress. And with their razor-thin margin in the Senate, Democrats cannot count on passing any legislation that most Republicans oppose.

But Republicans can do little to stop the investigative juggernaut.

“The Democrats’ most powerful weapons aren’t legislative bills, but subpoenas and hearings,” said John J. Pitney Jr., a former Republican staffer who is a professor of politics at Claremont McKenna College…..

Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Los Angeles), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, neatly illustrated this dynamic in a recent letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

He wrote to ask why President Bush in his 2003 State of the Union address had cited a discredited claim that Iraq was seeking uranium. Waxman noted that Rice had ignored all but five of the 16 letters he had sent over the last five years when his party was in the minority. Then, he pointed out: “I am renewing my request as the chairman of the chief oversight committee in the U.S. House of Representatives.”

In that one sentence, Waxman captured one of the most significant changes on Capitol Hill. Now that they have the gavels and subpoena power, the Democrats can no longer be so easily brushed off.

The administration learned that in recent days as Democratic investigations into the firing of U.S. attorneys have shaken the Justice Department. The department has turned over to the House and Senate Judiciary committees scores of e-mails that show some officials misinformed Congress about how the dismissals were handled and raise questions about whether the dismissals were orchestrated by the White House for political reasons.

HLs Take
This is just the beginning, we can expect investigation after investigation into scandal after scandal for the next 2 years. See Bush and his cronies thought that it was business as usual after the election. They are just beginning to learn a painful lesson. Everything the republicans thought they got away with will be slowly uncovered and brought out into the light until every mainstream media follower knows what we knew years earlier. The war profiteering, the lies that got us into those wars. Maybe even the big one that got the whole ball rolling 9/11. By the time of the next election the republicans will look so bad they wouldn’t be able to be elected rat catcher at Walter Reed. Bush will scurry off to Paraguay never to be seen again. That is if he makes it through the next 2 years.

Watergate plotter may have a last tale

LA Times
Excerpt:
Two of E. Howard Hunt’s sons say he knew of rogue CIA agents’ plan to kill President Kennedy in 1963.
By Carol J. Williams, Times Staff Writer
March 20, 2007

EUREKA, CALIF. — Howard St. John Hunt remembers the night of the Watergate break-in as a bonding experience with his father.

A sweating and disheveled E. Howard Hunt roused his 19-year-old son from a dead sleep to help him wipe fingerprints from the burglars’ radios and pack the surveillance equipment into a suitcase. Then, father and son raced to a remote Maryland bridge, where they heaved the evidence into the Potomac River just before dawn on June 17, 1972.

“From that point on I felt relevant in his life, that I was the one he could count on,” said Howard St. John Hunt, now 52, who is called St. John.

It also was a turning point for St. John’s brother and two sisters. They learned that their father wasn’t just a Washington advertising executive and former diplomat. He was an ex-CIA agent and veteran of the ill-fated Cuban Bay of Pigs operation who worked for the Nixon White House as part of a secret team of “plumbers” that fixed information leaks.

The unmasking of Hunt, who was convicted in 1973, sent his family into a tailspin: His first wife, Dorothy, was killed in a plane crash in 1972 while carrying $10,000 in hush money from the White House to the burglars’ families; son David was sent to live with his militant Cuban godfather in Miami; St. John later became a drug addict and daughters Kevan and Lisa became estranged from their father.

But before his death at age 88 in January, E. Howard Hunt had reconciled with his children and left the sons one last tantalizing story, they say. The story, which he planned to detail in a memoir and could be worth big money — was that rogue CIA agents plotted to kill President Kennedy in 1963, and that they approached Hunt to join the plot but he declined….

“He told me in no uncertain terms about a plot originating in Miami, to take place in Miami,” said St. John. He said his father identified key players and speculated that then-Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was responsible for moving the venue to Dallas, where the Texan could control the security scene.

HLs Take
And who was working for the CIA at the time shuttling back and forth between Texas and Miami, I don’t have to tell you it was George Bush Sr.

The Kennedy-Nixon-Bush Connection

Totsie.com
Excerpt:
As long as assassins get away with murder, every suicide and every accidental death is a potential murder.

A newly discovered FBI document reveals that George Bush was directly involved in the 1963 murder of President John Kennedy. The document places Bush working with the now-famous CIA agent, Felix Rodriguez, recruiting right-wing Cuban exiles for the invasion of Cuba. It was Bush’s CIA job to organize the Cuban community in Miami for the invasion. The Cubans were trained as marksmen by the CIA. Bush at that time lived in Texas. Hopping from Houston to Miami weekly, Bush spent 1960 and ’61 recruiting Cubans in Miami for the invasion. That is how he met Felix Rodriguez.

You may remember Rodriguez as the Iran-contra CIA agent who received the first phone call telling the world the CIA plane flown by Gene Hasenfus had crashed in Nicaragua. As soon as Rodriguez heard that the plane crashed, he called his long-time CIA supervisor, George Bush. Bush denied being in the contra loop, but investigators recently obtained copies of Oliver North’s diary, which documents Bush’s role as a CIA supervisor of the contra supply network.

In a new video posted at YouTube.com and at his campaign website, Rep. Dennis Kunich (D-OH) asks if it’s time for Congress to begin impeachment proceedings against President Bush.

“This House cannot avoid its constitutionally authorized responsibility to restrain the abuse of Executive power,” Kucinich said on the floor Thursday. “The Administration has been preparing for an aggressive war against Iran. There is no solid, direct evidence that Iran has the intention of attacking the United States or its allies.”

Kucinich added, “Since war with Iran is an option of this Administration and since such war is patently illegal, then impeachment may well be the only remedy which remains to stop a war of aggression against Iran.”

HLs Take
Dennis Kucinich is the only candidate who is not part of the DC insider, protect your buddies gang. He is the best chance this country has of taking it back from the elitists. He’s got my vote in the primary.

Good Morning, happy Monday to you. Here is our latest episode of HLs NBC News Raw Video Blog. We do a short video for NBC News Raw every monday which can be seen on their website at nbc4.tv In todays Vlog I talk about the anti-war march on Saturday and whats coming up this week. Here it is

A huge crowd turned out today for The Anti-War march and rally in Hollywood. It was a beautiful day and the crowd was pumped. Speakers included Martin Sheen, Congresswoman Maxine Waters, who delivered a message that her fellow congressmen were confused about what to do about Iraq. Specifically Bush’s request for a fundamental spending in the amount of another 100 Million Dollars. (or was it 100 Billion?) Waters urged everyone to write their congressman and tell them to vote no on Bush’s latest war spending request. Musical Performances were put on by Jackson Browne, Ben Harper, and Ozomatli. Here are some pics and videos I shot of the afternoon.

Here are videos of live songs by Jackson Browne, Ben Harper, and Ozomatli. (I just uploaded the videos to You Tube, they say it takes a few minutes before you can view them.)

I’ll be there with a sign that on one side has a big green pic of Bush that says “Making a Killing.” The other side has The Hollywood Liberal written out (Its the one in the pic below.) If you see it stop by and say hi.

March 17 Mass Anti-War Protest in
Los Angeles
4th
Anniversary of the Iraq War – Stop the War!
Live Concert by Ozomatli & Performance by Jackson Browne

Saturday, March 17, 12 noon
Gather at Hollywood & Vine, Los Angeles (at Red Line Metro stop) March to Hollywood & Highland for Rally

For more info call 323-464-1636 or email

answerla@answerla.org.

Momentum
for the March 17 mass anti-war protest in Los Angeles is
building every day. On March 17, many tens of thousands of
people will assemble at 12 noon on the corner of Hollywood and
Vine and then march through Hollywood. March 17 is the 4th
anniversary of the illegal Iraq war. We’ll demand "U.S. Out of
Iraq Now!" at this critical time.

45
organizing centers in Southern California, Arizona, Nevada and
New Mexico are mobilizing transportation to the LA protest.
People are bringing buses, vans, carpools and "peace trains."
Many thousands more will come on their own in cars and on public
transportation. Students are also taking a leadership role in
mobilizing for the LA protest. Students from 60 schools are
actively building March 17.

March 17 in LA will be
coordinated with a national march on the Pentagon in Washington,
D.C., and other regional actions. The ANSWER Coalition initiated
March 17 nationally; more than 2,000 groups and individuals have
endorsed, including Cindy Sheehan, Vietnam veteran Ron Kovic,
Academy Award-winning director Paul Haggis, Congresswoman Maxine
Waters, United Teachers Los Angeles, Office of the Americas,
Veterans for Peace, African Americans Against the War and many
others. A large, broad coalition of progressive organizations is
building the LA protest.

The LA March 17 protest will be the largest outpouring of
anti-war sentiment in the city in recent years. Be a part of
this historic action. People are sick and tired of the war and
Bush administration’s lies. As U.S. troops and innocent Iraqi’s
die in a colonial war, people at home lack healthcare, jobs and
necessary social services. Not one more person should have to
die in this illegal, unjust war.

Can Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s ‘tortured’ testimony be trusted?

Raw Story
Excerpt:
Let’s talk about the issue of torture,” NBC’s Matt Lauer said. “He says in his statement that he didn’t make this statement under duress or pressure, but he does also say that he was tortured by the CIA after his capture.”

Last September, CIA sources told ABC News that the harshest technique they were authorized to use on “high-value detainees, such as the 9/11 attacks architect Khalid Sheikh Mohamed…was called ‘water boarding,’ in which a prisoner’s face was covered with cellophane, and water is poured over it (pictured above) — meant to trigger an unbearable gag reflex…”

Lauer notes that “this is a subject” that he discussed during a September of 2006 interview with President Bush, in which he asked, “I mean, if, in fact, there was water boarding used with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and for the viewers, that’s basically when you strap someone to a board and you make them feel as if they’re going to drown by putting them underwater, if that was legal and within the law, why couldn’t you do it at Guantanamo? Why did you have to go to a secret location around the world?”

“I’m not going to talk about techniques,” Bush responded to Lauer in September. “And, I’m not going explain to the enemy what we’re doing.

Important: Huge Problem with KSM Confession

At Largely
Excerpt:
In his confession, KSM claims:

“I was responsible for planning, training, surveying, and financing for the New (or Second) Wave of attacks against the following skyscrapers after 9/11: …Plaza Bank, Washington state”

The Plaza Bank was not founded until 2006 according to their official Web site:

” Founded in early 2006, with a vision of creating the leading commercial bank in the Pacific Northwest, Plaza Bank’s story quickly captured the hearts and passion of some of the region’s leading business minds. From Jack Creighton, former CEO of Weyerhaeuser and United Airlines, to former Seattle Mariner Edgar Martinez, and nationally acclaimed salon operator Gene Juárez, the story of a bank founded to bring “class to the mass” simply could not be contained.”

I think we can say for quite certain that whomever is being held as KSM was either caught recently or that his entire confession is a fraud.

HLs Take:
I always thought waterboarding was where they lay you on a tilting board with your head above a big barrell of water, when you don’t talk they tilt the board so your head is under water. Never heard of the putting cellophane over the mouth trick before. Either way everyone must have known immediately that these “confessions” are just one more way for the Bush administration to get there own scandals and crimes out of the headlines, at least for one more day. Besides I thought it was Bin Laden that did all these crimes. Too bad Bush isn’t concerned with old “Uncle Osama”

Hollywood’s Own Henry Waxman On the Job.

Oversight.House.gov

Excerpt:
He’s one of the very few congressman worth a damn. Thats why I vote for him.

Waxman Renews Niger Queries

Chairman Waxman asks Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to respond to a series of unanswered letters, including two letters raising questions about the President’s claim that Iraq sought uranium from Niger.

Bush Seeks Iraq War Funds ‘With No Strings’

New York Times
Excerpt:

BOGOTÁ, Colombia, March 11 — President Bush on Sunday called for Congress to provide financing for the Iraq war “with no strings attached.” And he defended his decision, made formal this weekend, to send more than 8,000 more troops to Iraq and Afghanistan by saying they would be dedicated to training and support missions.

Referring to the increase of 21,500 troops that he announced in January, Mr. Bush said during a press briefing here, “Those combat troops are going to need some support, and that’s what the American people are seeing in terms of Iraq — the support troops that are necessary to help the reinforcements do their job.”

The president’s aides announced this weekend that Mr. Bush had formally approved the deployment of 4,700 more troops to Iraq — on top of the 21,500 troops being sent as part of his new war plan — and 3,500 to Afghanistan. The Pentagon had already indicated that it would need to send additional troops to Iraq to support the increases Mr. Bush announced in January. But the specific increase for Afghanistan had not been previously mentioned.

Mr. Bush’s aides announced the increases after the president sent a letter to the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, requesting $3.2 billion in emergency funds for the Iraq and Afghanistan missions. Mr. Bush has proposed making up for the increase with cuts elsewhere. He wrote the letter Friday night on his way from Brazil to Uruguay, the first two legs of his tour through Latin America.

He is awaiting approval of a $100 billion emergency spending bill for the operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“My hope, of course, is that Congress provides the funding necessary for the combat troops to be able to do their job — without any strings attached,” he said Sunday.

HLs Take
Congress: Sure Jr. whatever you want. We just have to pretend to be against you a little first, then you’ll get everything, no problem.