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Meet The Press' Tim Russert appeared on Conan O'Brien's show a few days ago, and mentioned that he had been at Woodstock. Tim Russert? At Woodstock? There's a mind-numbing thought. He said he made some money selling Stegmeyer beer for 80 cents a six-pack, so I guess he was there to exercise free market capitalism. Or something.
As I said before, no surprises there. When the Justice Department is given a tool usually reserved to absolute monarchs such as Louis XVI (see my earlier post about lettres de cachet and the similarities between the Bush administration and the regime that was deposed in the French Revolution), the chances are good that they're going to abuse it.
Remember, this is why we wrote our Constitution, to protect citizens from such abuse.
An Announcement
But I didn't just write today's column to feed my ego in one way, I also have an announcement to make: I'm starting my own blog at ChrisWeigant.com. [I know, I know, it's hard to spell -- sorry about that.]
Now, this doesn't mean I still won't be posting here every Wednesday. I treasure the opportunity to reach the Huffington Post audience every week and will continue to do so as long as they'll have me.
I will be traveling this weekend, and so my next post will probably appear on Wednesday.
As for yesterday's story, still no news. Either it's an internet rumor, or it really happened, and the mainstream media decided to collectively ignore it. Not too surprising, but I at least expected some commentary in the blogger [...]
The basic story:
Apparently, at a recent press conference, Rudy Giuliani was asked a question about his prior knowledge of the collapse of the WTC towers - and the reporter was arrested at the orders of Giuliani’s press secretary. The reporter was taken to jail - in violation of the First Admendment - and is being charged with felony criminial trespass. Because the reporter was using a camera, state police are even considering charges of espionage.
President Bush really and truly wanted to exercise this option with Libby -- and he's still probably hoping mightily that the judge lets Scooter stay out of jail for another year and a half (while his appeal is being heard) -- so that Bush can pardon him after the 2008 election. But, unfortunately, the judge involved has gained the reputation of being a "long ball" judge (another baseball metaphor pops up!), consistently ruling "by the book," and thereby bucking the modern trend of letting white-collar criminals stay free on appeal. If all predictions are accurate and the judge orders Scooter to jail before the end of the summer, Bush is going to be forced to make this decision a lot more quickly than he would have liked.
That's it? Kids love Scooter, so don't send him to jail? My kids will miss him at the White House events they attend? My little girls just cannot or will not understand that the "facts" were crimes committed by "Mr. Scooter?"
Livingston wasn't the only target. On the cover of the Flynt Report, it promised to "unmask the hypocrites" Livingston, Henry Hyde, and Bob Barr. It also promised (and delivered!) "fresh dirt on:" Newt Gingrich, Tom DeLay, Mary Bono, Jeb Bush, Charles Canady, and Tim Hutchinson.
I'm talking, of course, about immigration. The problem with the Bush approach is that (for once) they are desperately trying to talk intelligently about solving a problem with real solutions and wonky policy talking points. Their opponents (from within their own party) have a much blunter and more effective weapon, since they have "framed" the issue down to one word -- the dreaded "amnesty." Anything short of rounding up all 12 million illegal aliens and promptly shipping them back to where they came from is howlingly derided as the A-word. Never mind the fact that this would be patently impossible to achieve, anyone proposing any other answer to the problem is met with the oh-so-effective "Amnesty! Amnesty! Amnesty!" chorus.