Smoking Gun Burning Pants..

..Gonzales is Lying to Senate Judiciary Committee AGAIN

Patrick Leahy has been a thorn in the Side of Attorney General Alberto 'Abu' Gonzales since his confirmation hearings last year. This Jan. 6/06 article in Slate shows Leahy's frustration with Gonzales over the latter's refusal to give straight answers to Leahy's direct questions about his position on the President's power to authorize torture of detainees.

"Early in the day, Gonzales professed the requisite faith that America was "a nation of laws and not of men," but his opinion of the president's ability—however limited—to authorize individuals to engage in criminal acts suggests the opposite. This is a government of good men, Gonzales implicitly assured the senators, so there's no need to worry about legal hypotheticals like whether torture is always verboten. Don't worry, because we don't do it. It's a strange argument from a conservative: We're the government. Trust us."

This Feb. 6/06 article from the Washington Post shows that Gonzo's position on Presidential authority was still unclear a month later, and just days after his February 3 confirmation. Now the subject is not torture, but the authority to spy on American citizens without a warrant. Note that the WaPo article includes hearing transcripts highlighting Arlen 'magic bullet' Specter's blocking a Leahy motion to swear Gonzo in, and Gonzo's declaration that his testimony would be the same whether he was under oath or not.

Fast forward another month. Gonzo has written a letter to the Senate 'clarifying' his Feb. 6 testimony, which letter prompts this response from Leahy; "More than three weeks after the hearing you send the Committee a six-page letter seeking to alter your live testimony. Your letter, in fact, does little to clarify your testimony. Instead, it raises many questions, both factual and also some going to the credibility of your testimony.. ..you admit that 'the Department’s legal analysis has evolved over time.'..You will still need to correct or better explain your statements on pages 184 and 187 of the transcript, which you recognize 'may give [a] misimpression.' "

So what Gonzo was really saying on Feb. 6 was that his testimony would be false whether given under oath or not. And as all this history demonstrates, the Attorney General has a well established pattern of mendacity in the service of undermining the Constitution he has sworn to uphold.

Enough on Gonzales history with Leahy. Current events focus on Leahy's grilling of Gonzales over the handling of the Maher Arar case. (thanks, Ice Station Tango.) But here's a new wrinkle. To answer Leahy's question of why Arar, who has been vindicated by a Canadian Commission of Inquiry (that spent millions of dollars and heard hundreds of hours of testimony, BTW) remains on a watchlist, Gonzales promised that the information justifying this would be provided to Leahy within a week. The briefing is supposedly already being prepared.

Here is that exchange

The thing is, the Canadian government already know what is going to be in that briefing, as this Globe and Mail article shows,

"Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day said yesterday there was 'nothing new' in the American dossier on Maher Arar that would justify keeping him on a terrorist watch list, although a top U.S. administration official indicated an explanation may be forthcoming. 'He should not be on the watch list,' Mr. Day said after pressing the issue with U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. 'We have seen some recent information that has not altered our opinion at all.'

Mr. Chertoff refused to comment on why Mr. Arar, a Syrian-born Canadian citizen, still cannot enter the United States or fly over its territory. Barely a kilometre away in Washington, Democrat Senator Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, was also demanding an explanation from U.S. Attorney-General Alberto Gonzalez."

And being lied to. Again. Gonzales should be tried for perjury, and immediately relieved of his job. And based on his fuzzy interpretation of law, he should also be disbarred. Then he and the rest of the Bush Criminal Conspiracy should face war crimes tribunals.

(updated 11:15 pm to add video)

TAGS: Alberto Gonzales, Liar,
Patrick Leahy, Senate Judiciary Committee

My Father

I've had a complicated relationship with my father. He's not dead, but we're not speaking. I was his favorite, his first. We used to stay up late together talking about things like geology and weather and nature and energy and resources, but sometimes about interpersonal things. I'd give him a backrub and massage his feet, and he would tell me about the world. He was especially worried about energy and overpopulation. He was an engineer and a marine. Rather a stoic guy, but around me he became very soft and silly, just to please me. I wore my hair long because he liked it that way; my mom was stuck dealing with my knots. I have always had wild bedroom hair, but that's a story for a different day. Today is about my father.

My father and mother didn't seem to have much in common. I could never figure out why they got married. How they met? He needed a date for a dance, and his friends sent him in to a hotel to ask the first woman he saw. My mom was at the counter. He had Mayflower status; she was the daughter of immigrants. He had aristocracy; she had labor. He had Southern Baptism, to fear; she had Catholicism, to ignore. He had everything to conserve; she had nothing particularly to lose. Of course they divorced.

As a young girl, I was taught very liberal, progressive values. Things like all people have value, everyone is of equal importance, people are generally good, we reap what we sow, intention is almost everything, government exists to serve the people.

When I grew up and hit college, my father confessed to me that he had always refrained from speaking freely with me to appease my mother, but now that I was an adult, he felt free to speak his mind. The things he shared with me revealed racism and sexism that I could not fathom. He used to quote Rush and cite his sources all the time. He loved Rush. I think he could see the nausea wash over my face when he spoke of race. He talked more about gender, perhaps because it was more personal for me, perhaps because in my own bias, I was less sure. His favorite meme: "American society fell apart when women started wearing pants." Then there was the bit about women working outside of the home was destroying America. Birth control was essential for population control; abortion was simply wrong. It made it too easy to be a trollop. And who wants that? We debated abortion all the time, paddling in his fishing boat, driving around in his white Ford truck, which even back then I knew screamed out "Republican."

It was complicated. I loved him so much. For all the times he held me down and tickled me, for the silly voice he used to make me laugh, for the way he teased me, for sharing his love of nature with me, for the way he used to say, "I love you, baby." And yet, as I matured I came to learn that the Venn diagram of our values held rather a thin slice in common. One day, as we were driving in the Ford, out looking for nature, in round number 47 on abortion, he said, "You know, baby, I'm not a woman. Maybe if I were a woman, I'd feel differently. So I guess I can't really know for sure." I think in that moment, I knew more that he loved me than at any other. I knew how hard it was for him to give me this. I knew how uncomfortable he was giving away control. And I felt his love and respect for me as a person, every bit as valuable and important as he, himself. I loved him so much for that.

And today, on the anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark Roe v Wade decision, which protected the rights of individual to make personal decisions based on their own beliefs, I remember my father.

He hated government interference and intrusion. Ranted all the time. Funny how much he agreed back then with the thinking of First Freedom First now:

Individuals may look to their own faith or other ethical considerations as they make these choices, but the government must never mandate that all Americans must follow the tenets of one religious viewpoint.

Funny how the more things change, the more they stay the same.

So for me, it comes down to something really simple. The way to honor and respect and love a woman is to trust her to make decisions about herself, her body, and her life. This is what is meant by everyone is of equal importance. "As long as men control women's sexuality and reproduction, women will never be equal."

So there it is. My response to the question, "Why are you pro-choice?"

---

You know it. I know it. You want the postscript. You want it bad. Fine.

One night on the telephone, as we discussed Clinton's Democratic congress and my father launched attack number 8,042 on Hillary and her law career, I asked my father if he had ever read her legal writings. You see, I had. And I was able to explain why I thought she was brilliant. And correct. I was emboldened. I pushed it. I told him that if I ever had a daughter, I might choose to name her "Hillary" (lie). Further emboldened by his gasp, I pressed on. I told him that if I ever had a second, I might choose to name her "Eleanor" (another lie).

That is the last time we spoke. I guess that's where he drew the line.

The China News

Satellite Killers, Gender Gap, Spam, The Vatican, Pillow Fighting, More

China killed one of its own satellites with a missile a couple of weeks ago, and now they won't talk about it.

This is a truly horrifying event that diplomacy could have solved long ago. China is out of its mind to escalate the situation, and who knows exactly what damage the debris from the satellite will cause.

While this action is way over the top, the Bush administration has been playing fast and loose with space war for a long time and push back is not surprising.

So, in light of yet another looming international crisis, let's take a look a the People's Republic in this installment of...

...The China News:

• Steve Watson writes, "Space Arms Race is Definitely On."
• I don't know what a foreign exchange reserve is, but China has the world's largest and is planning to use it.
• Communist Party and the State Council plan to alleviate China's gender gap. According to The Xinhua News Agency, "118 boys were born for every 100 girls in 2005. In some regions, it said, the figure hit 130 for every 100 girls. The average for industrialized countries is between 104 and 107 boys for every 100 girls."
• The U.S. and China are responsible for two-thirds of the world's spam (email, not meat).
• China and the Vatican are making nice.
• As are China and Japan.
• Hey, remember North Korea? Well, it's not going very well.

VIDEO: Channel 4 reports on China's satellite kill shot.
VIDEO: BBC reports on the Chinese pillow fighting trend.
VIDEO: BBC on China's enormous pollution.

TAGS: China, Space Wars, Arms Race, Spam

Assault on Justice

Knowing full well that they face defeat in court cases covering issues ranging from public corruption to the NSA wiretapping program and the denial of habeas corpus in hundreds of cases, the Bush administration has turned to a new and disturbing tactic. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is dismissing federal judges and replacing them with judges who he expects will make decisions based on political affiliation rather than legal merit.

From the Washington Post,

"[Gonzales] denied any political motives and vowed to quickly submit new nominees for the jobs to the Senate for confirmation.

'What we're trying to do is ensure that for the people in each of these respective districts, we have the very best possible representative for the Department of Justice,' Gonzales testified, adding later: 'I would never, ever make a change in a United States attorney for political reasons or if it would in any way jeopardize an ongoing serious investigation. I just would not do it.'

Gonzales's remarks in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee came in response to questions from Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and other lawmakers about the forced removals of at least six U.S. attorneys, including several who have overseen some of the government's highest-profile corruption prosecutions."

Consider one of the judges who is on the way out; "Carol C. Lam in San Diego, who led the corruption prosecution of former congressman Randy 'Duke' Cunningham (R-Calif.)" On the way in is Tim Griffin, who was recently working for the RNC trying to dig up dirt on Democratic candidates. Despite Gonzo's protests otherwise, that looks political to me.
Senator Feinstein seems to agree.

Diane Feinstein Adresses the Senate

Here's Olbermann with Jonathan Turley's reaction:

Assault on Justice

Turley gets right to the point when he remarks that Gonzo is 'more General than Attorney...he seems just inherently hostile towards the rule of law.' Which when you think of it is just what you want if you're trying to set up a police state. This seems to be something they've been planning for some time, too. Under a little known provision added into the USA PATRIOT Act when it was renewed*, the judges no longer require congressional confirmation.

Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy, titles his post on this subject simply, with an infamous Bush quote, "This would be a whole lot easier if this was a dictatorship…just as long as I’m the dictator!" - This move seems designed to put Bush one step closer to that goal.

UPDATE: (3 am, Jan. 21) While researching for this post, I bookmarked this article concerning Arlen Specter's role in the last-minute change to the legislation that negated the Senate's participation in confirming judges. Sorry I neglected to include the link in the original post.

UPDATE: (Apr. 15) While researching for another post, I reread this one to find my egregious error of identifying the dismissed US Attorneys as Federal Judges. My sincere apologies. It looks like I put this one together when it was late, and I was tired.

TAGS: Justice, Alberto Gonzales, Police State, Putsch

Goodbye Denny

Denny Doherty, the powerful lead voice of The Mamas and The Papas, died today at the age of 66. The Mamas and The Papas' great harmonies allowed them to remain popular through a period when few American bands could hold their own against the British Invasion begun when The Beatles rose to fame.

California Dreamin'

(From Truthdig)

“Everybody used to think that John Phillips, who wrote the songs, was also the main voice of the group, but it wasn’t—it was the angelic voice of Denny Doherty,” said Larry Leblanc, Canadian editor of Billboard Magazine. “He was often overlooked but it was really his voice that carried the group.”

TAGS:
Denny Doherty, California Dreamin', Sixties Music, The Mamas and The Papas

Hmmm...Visitor 12895

We Must Have Hit The Big Time

Click to see image original size.

Look what I found! I make regular visits to sitemeter to check out how the blog is doing, where the visitors are coming from (both geographically and by referral.) One of the first times I did this I found a visitor from the US Senate Sergeant at Arms office, which I thought was interesting. If I'm not mistaken, they're the ones responsible for security on the hill, just as the Secret Service is responsible for White House security. Anyway, since then I often check out any hits we get that originate in Washington D.C.

Say hello to visitor #12,895. Presumably someone in the Army Information Command, Pentagon is searching to see who has been blogging about Alberto Gonzales today. I have to assume due to the office of origin within the Pentagon that this was official business, not just somebody using the Pentagon's computers to do a little surfing during off time.

Just so you know 12, I'm not a terrorist. (Can I call you 12? Mister 895 seems so formal.) Dude, I've never even fired a gun in my life, and I think the smell of AmFo would probably make me puke. Believe me, there are bigger fish to fry than me. That dude in the suit who just jaywalked across K street to get to his power lunch is a bigger threat to democracy. So's that other dude who just parked in a handicap space right there in the Pentagon parking lot. He's not handicapped, unless you count being a Republican.

Another thing dude. (unless you're a babe, not a dude, in which case forgive my sexist presumption. And, while you're at it, forgive my sexist referral to you as 'babe.') Lest you've forgotten, you made a solemn oath to uphold THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, not to follow the lame-brained orders of a monkey in a codpiece that likes to have pictures taken of himself in a flight suit. He would love to think of himself as military, but he avoided service to the extent of his ability to do so, which owing to his family was considerable. You must have incredibly low self esteem to be following orders that originated with that putz.

So have a nice day. Maybe if you do really well at your current post they'll promote you into a more important task, like say counting paperclips. Or busting that guy for taking a handicapped parking space. That'd be good.

TAGS: Domestic Surveillance, Pentagon, Police State, Tactics

Gonzales Caves In

Democratic Majority Begins to Bear Fruit

The first of what we hope to be many Senate hearings into administration malfeasance has had new Justice committee chairman Patrick Leahy questioning Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on the matter of the NSA wiretapping program. The program was declared to be unconstitutional and even criminal by Federal Court Judge Anna Diggs Taylor way back in August. There are a couple of articles at Glenn Greenwald's site here and here for those who wish to be brought up to date on the issue.

In a letter to Leahy and ranking minority [insert taunt here] committee member Arlen "The Enabler" Specter, Gonzales claims that the program will now operate under the authority of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC.) This of course was always legally required, both constitutionally in accordance with the fourth amendment and statutorily to comply with the FISA law set up after the wiretapping abuses of the Nixon administration. Greenwald, who is the acknowledged expert on this matter, was not impressed by Gonzales' reluctant and belated performance of his clear duty as Attorney General.

"[U]ltimately, there are only two options -- (1) the administration is now complying fully and exclusively with FISA when eavesdropping, in which case all of its prior claims that it could not do so and still fight against The Terrorists are false, or (2) the administration has changed its eavesdropping program some, but it is still not fully complying with FISA, in which case nothing of significance has changed (at least on the lawbreaking issues) because the administration is still violating the law."

Let me rephrase that. The administration is pretending that it will now comply with FISA and the constitution because something has changed. Which frankly is a load of crap. The only thing that has changed is the political landscape, where the word oversight now actually means oversight, not overlook. There is not now, nor has there ever been, a legal ruling that allows wiretapping without a warrant being issued.

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
-- Amendment IV, The Constitution of The United States of America

I can hardly wait until Leahy questions Gonzales on what I think are much more pressing issues in Justice's bailiwick: Suspension of habeas corpus under the Military Commissions Act; Incarceration and imprisonment without charges at Guantanamo Bay; Torture; Signing Statements; The theory of unitary executive presidential powers, to name a few. Gonzales needs to be reminded that he swore an oath to uphold the law, not to support his long-time friend George Bush in his newly carved-out dictatorship.

There are few people in the Bush administration who are worse than the Chimperor himself. For his complicity in the kidnapping, torture and deaths of innocent detainees, Gonzales makes it onto that short list.

---

UPDATE (3 pm., 01/18): Here's a snippet from the New York Times article on this.

"Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales is expected to face hostile questioning on Thursday from the Senate Judiciary Committee on the program. And an appellate court in Cincinnati is scheduled to hear arguments in two weeks on the government’s appeal of an earlier ruling declaring the program illegal and unconstitutional.

Some legal analysts said the administration’s pre-emptive move could effectively make the court review moot, but Democrats and civil rights advocates said they would press for the courts and Congress to continue their scrutiny of the program of wiretapping without warrants, which began shortly after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001."

How could this make the standing decision moot? The judge in this case had already determined that there was a prima facie case to pursue CRIMINAL charges against the administration, whatever NSA and CIA operatives that were involved, and even non-governmental agencies like AT&T that may have co-operated. This is like a thief who was already facing charges of holding up several liquor stores being let go because he has promised not to do it anymore. Every criminal in America should be asking their lawyer to pursue that option now that the precedent has been set.

TAGS: Justice Committee, Patrick Leahy
Abu Gonzales, War Criminal

Escalate the People's Power

(Give it a chance to buffer...)

FEEL IT

Mother, Mother
There's far too many of you crying
Brother, brother
There's far too many of you dying
We've got to find a way
To bring some lovin here today

Father, father
We don't need to escalate
War is not the answer
Only love can conquer hate
We've got to find a way
To bring some lovin here today

~Joe Cocker

THINK IT


On Point: The Antiwar Movement Today
Interesting discussion of the anti-war movement today and escalation in Iraq.

"There's a growing sense of the need for active resistance in addition to what obviously was very important political initiative around the last election. But I think there's a great need for people on the streets, for members of our churches to give much more prominent voice to their resistance to this war and to the current strategy and indeed to the whole response to September 11 which, in my mind, has been a very clever manipulation of fear and the creation of the notion of an axis of evil over against which the United States is a unilateral responder. And I think that's done great mischief and raises profound moral questions that the church and many other civil society organizations need to confront." Rev. John H. Thomas

LIVE IT

The power to dream / to rule
to wrestle the world from fools
it's decreed the people rule
it's decreed the people rule
LISTEN
I believe everything we dream
can come to pass through our union
we can turn the world around
we can turn the earth's revolution
we have the power
People have the power ...

~Patti Smith

The People Have the Power.
Let it Surge.

Too Good to Ignore

"Make it Rain Subpoenas"

Truthdig calls it "The Video that's burning up the blogosphere." I first saw it on AMERICAblog, and I agree it is brilliant - an appeal to the Democrats to use their newly-won majority to confront the Republicans on every issue that has been on the back burner for too long. I give it two enthusiastic thumbs up.

TAGS: LonelyDem07, YouTube, Video, Brilliant!

Chavez Continues to Annoy Bush

Hugo Chavez is engaged in a very deadly conflict with the United States. At risk; one of the largest oil supplies in the world, possibly even the largest.

Since his re-election, Chavez has instituted a broad nationalization agenda that has the White House mad enough to just kill him.

Sherwood Ross, in a recent article called, "Can Chavez Beat the Devil?" he writes:

White House press secretary Tony Snow claimed nationalization "has a long and inglorious history of failure around the world," a declaration that overlooks the success right here at home of Halliburton Corp., whose sales and profits have soared dramatically since it became a Frankenstein creature of the military-industrial complex and no longer has to bother with competitive bidding to secure multi-billion dollar contracts for disemboweling Iraq. Most of the other principal corporate piggies at the Pentagon trough are also gorging themselves on non-bid delicacies subsidized by the very taxpayers who voted to elect Free Market Bush.

In point of fact, though, nationalization of basic industries has worked in a number of countries, including Chile, Brazil and Colombia, where state-run oil is the norm, AP says. "A 2004 World Bank study that looked at 181 state-run utilities in 15 Latin American and Caribbean countries that were privatized in the 1990s--- in fixed telecommunications, electricity and water distribution and sewers --- found that on the whole, labor productivity, efficiency and quality of service improved, especially in telecoms" although water and sewers "tended to be problematic." By contraxt, when Argentina's Carlos Menem, a bullish privatizer, sold off scores of firms during his 1989-99 presidency, "the selloffs helped modernize the country, yet critics complained the fortunes reaped were later squandered or illegally pocketed and that many buyers failed to make needed investments. Similar complains tagged sweeping privatizations in Peru and Boliva.

"Given the fact President Bush is as busy in Iraq as a wretch up to his neck in quicksand grasping to crawl out, Chavez can probably nationalize CANTV and the other entities he has in mind without having the CIA come after him the way it pounced on Che Guevera when he tried to foment a revolution in Bolivia. Chavez does not use force and violence like Guevera or nationalize without compensation like Castro. It's a fair question to inquire if any leader anywhere in the world is safe from American meddling if he or she adopts a Socialist economic system, or even a mixed economy system that does not totally embrace Free Enterprise Capitalist Economic Principles, also known in some quarters inhabited by the poor and exploited consumers of the earth by the acronym FECES. If Socialism is such an awful idea why not allow the Chavez's of the world make their own mistakes and, as they are discredited, leave it up to their publics to remove them? Indeed, if Tony Snow thinks State-run enterprises are so dreadful, why doesn't he threaten the mayors of American cities who operate thousands of public electric, waterworks, and sewerage utilities?

(more)

Chavez has taken a radical step that even a fellow leftist like me finds disturbing. He's nationalized his chief critic, a TV station he accuses of having ties to the CIA. In it's place, Chavez is offering state run programming and he's getting into the act with a five hour, weekly TV show called "Hello President".

Chavez is also serving as the unofficial international voice of Fidel Castro, since the Cuban leader fell ill. Chavez disputes reports putting Castro on death's door.

Bloomberg looks at how Putin and Chavez have played the open oil markets. By the way something, if you're paying real close attention, you'll notice that oil supply is one of the most commonly lied about subjects reported on by the corporate media.

VIDEO: BBC Coverage of Chavez's swearing in ceremony.

TAGS: Oil, Hugo Chavez, Fidel Castro, CIA

Joining the Swarm

In my inbox this morning was a link to this post at The Gaelic Starover (h/t Blue Gal.) It seems that the New York Times has picked up on the story of Spocko's Brain, a smallish blog that got itself into a pissing war with media giant ABC/Disney over things being said on the air at Disney-owned KSFO radio.

The story in a nutshell:
-KSFO's right-wing talkshow hosts have been spewing things, including Melanie Morgan's apparent advocacy of murdering Nancy Pelosi, that would make mAnne Coulter think twice. (Check that. I just remembered the 'crème brulée' comment she made about the Supreme Court.)
-Spocko started a campaign against KSFO and ABC/Disney that included posting digital copies of the offensive statements, said copies forwarded to KSFO's advertisers so they would be aware of the hate speech their dollars were funding.
-ABC/Disney retaliated with a letter to Spocko's ISP alleging copyright infringement over the sound clips. The ISP didn't just ask Spocko to remove the clips - they suspended his service, killing his blog.
-Other bloggers, notably Daily Kos, rallied to Spocko's aid, calling for a blogswarm. The Electronic Freedom Foundation agreed to back Spocko by footing his legal bills to fight ABC/Disney. Spocko is back up and running at a new ISP.

My observations:
-For an organization that includes a news service, ABC/Disney seems dismally unaware of the 'fair use' provisions of the Digital Millenium copyright act.
-In Canada, where there is no first amendment, free speech is still protected, but hate speech is a crime. Melanie Morgan, Ann Coulter, Limbaugh, O'Reilly et. al. would find themselves in court facing possible jail time.
-When the MSM does fight for the first amendment, it is in the most egregious and despicable way, as this case involving FOX, resolved in 2003 demonstrates. Court Rules the Media Can LIE

Happy ending: Bloggers really can make a difference. They are showing themselves (at least in the clear air of Greater Left Blogistan, but not in the fetid swampy regions of Lower Right Blogsylvania) to have a thirst for truth and an understanding of journalistic integrity rare in the highly-paid professional newswhores of FOX, ABC/Disney, et. al. SOME small segment of the MSM is beginning to recognize this, as proven by the NYT article and this video clip. Spocko's story has spread far beyond the small readership he had before this controversy arose. Good on ya' Spocko! Way to cut yourself in for a piece of the action.

CBS SanFran on Spocko

TAGS: Spocko's Brain, Blogswarm, Media Bias, Hate Speech

The Secret Government

Nate at Get In Their Face has just posted the full 90-minute version of Bill Moyer's 1987 documentary The Secret Government - primarily an examination of the Iran/Contra scandal, its investigation, and the aftermath. Even though this was 20 years ago it is still relevant, because the secret government is still in operation. The only thing is, what was being done covertly then is now being done openly, even blatantly. And they've dropped the 'secret' from the name. It's just called The Government now.

The Enterprise, as its operatives referred to it among themselves, was designed from the start to be a stand-alone, self-financing entity free from all government scrutiny and outside the bounds of both domestic and international laws. It was in fact created for the express purpose of breaking the law, and should have been prosecuted vigorously under the RICO ( Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations ) statute. Because it illegally diverted US military resources and weaponry outside of the legitimate command structure, many of its members could also have been tried for treason. Instead, even after the worst details of this operation were discovered, leading to the Iran/Contra investigation, many aspects of the scandal were protected by Reagan administration claims of 'National Security.'

Ollie North (pictured right) should have received a cigarette and a blindfold for his part in this mess. Instead he went on to a lucrative career as a speaker at conservative functions and is now a political commentator lying propagandist for FOX "news."

Ollie's boss back then was Reagan's National Security Adviser: Vice Admiral John Poindexter got off scot-free for his central role in the affair and went on to develop the "Total Information Awareness" technology that is at the heart of the NSA wiretapping program.

Anyone who watched the Iran/Contra hearings will tell you I would be remiss in excluding the key role played by Utah Senator Orrin Hatch. He missed no opportunity to block the thrust of the investigation and provide a platform from which the conspirators could exalt their crimes as heroic and patriotic.

As the result of the incomplete investigation, we have no assurance that anything more than the tip of the Secret Government's iceberg of activities ever came to light. Barely enough to cool the drinks at a Republican country club function. One would be naive to think that this 'stand-alone, self-financing' organization would just go away. None of its members ever showed anything but pride in their activities, which by the way were very lucrative. There was considerable financial motive for the gang to keep on doing what they had already been caught red-handed at and, having escaped unpunished, there was little incentive for them to stop. As a result this video looks like history, but feels eerily like current events.

Watch the video. Tell me what you think. See you in comments.

TAGS: The Secret Government, Bill Moyers, Documentary, Iran/Contra Affair