Just in from the House Judiciary Committee…
***Update: House Judiciary Committee Files Contempt of Congress Report with House Clerk***
(Washington, DC)- Today, at approximately 2:45 p.m., the House Judiciary Committee filed its contempt of Congress report with the Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives. The full text is available online here.
The report filed (as linked above) is an 842-page PDF file.
Earlier today RAW STORY reported the “one last chance” being offered to the White House by House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers (D-MI), that would lead to his committee dropping the contempt recommendation.
UPDATE: The report filed is for criminal contempt, versus inherent contempt. The former relies on any contempt citation being picked up by the U.S. Attorney from D.C. The latter is an option, rarely used, available to either house of Congress to hold their own hearings in the Capitol, in which the Sergeant-at-Arms could be instructed to jail those found guilty of such contempt. Unlike criminal contempt, inherent contempt would not rely on the DoJ’s agreement to pursue the charges. Bush attorneys have already made clear that they would not allow attorneys in the Justice Dept. to do so.
Would this be the “criminal” contempt variety of contempt, or the “inherent” type of contempt?
If it’s criminal contempt, there are outside players, like perhaps DOJ and Supreme Court. If it’s inherent contempt, the House can jail people with no interference from the other branches (except perhaps Fourth Branch).
Either way, this is very interesting! Most likely, in about 2 days the Democrats will withdraw the contempt charges and apologize to Miers and Bolton.
Who’s going to enforce it, Mukasey?
I hope it’s the latter… I’d like to see these people in handcuffs.
BeJammin –
It’s criminal contempt, not inherent contempt. I’ll update the story to make that clear. Thanks for asking.
Can anyone say “it is pardon time again”? Assuming the soon to be head of the Department of
JusticeJust Us Judge Mucky Mucasey would prosecute them in the first place.Congress is being treated like an old bitch told to shut the f*** up and is liking it.
Yes, they wouldn’t do anything as bold and sensible and conservative of the Constitution as to just nab their asses and FORCE the observance of the rule of law onto the dictatorship.
The cockiness of the
WhiteWhat House on this issue, and the brown nosed republican preznit candidate attitude:(Arianna) … makes me very suspicious that Brad’s article (a while back wondering if the ’08 preznit election was fixed) may be the talk of the town in two years.
Are they really dumb and dumber or just crazy like a fox … Or perhaps … DemoCons and the neoCons have made a Zell Miller of a deal?
If we still need Bush DOJ to allow this to occur, then it will not occur. The criminal enterprise will not let it happen. Then we get to see that perky, little blond eva braun spokesperson telling the US that the bad Dems are wasting time. Not a word about private citizens ignoring congressional subpoenas – only that the Dems are wasting time again. 9 letters by Conyers. 9 letters and he still plays soft ball with the WH. This republic is doomed.
Interesting… it’s hard to find this story in the MSM… I found a notation buried in CNN’s Politics webpage… nothing on MSNBC’s site.
Agent 99 #6
I think they confuse FORCE with FARCE:
(DemoConyers). I used to think the neoCons were in the greatest denial, but alas, it is the DemoCons who are in the greatest denial.
I mean do they really think that tea party rules are what is at play here after hundreds of thousands of people have been extinguished by this government?
Don’t they realize they too have blood on their hands even if they play pretend they are at afternoon tea?
“BREAKING JUDICIARY COMMITTEE” is the real story, and both the Senate and the House Judiciary committees are broken.
Superbullshit glue will not save a fucking thing, and the only hope we have according to the EI bowel movement is to get rid of DREs … what another fucking joke!
I don’t think the writers strike will have any effect on comedy shows if they use the lines of the government and EI blogs to replace the work of the writers who are on
strike.They are not the least confused, Dredd.
They are frightened and venal, and the combination of these ends up insuring their complicity. Every single peep out of them is designed to give the impression of opposition without opposing anything at all. If there were anything real about all this lameness, it would mean they are all INCOMPETENT and lacking even cursory legal advice, but that is not the case. They are engaging in this deadly collusion that only superficially looks like opposition in order to get to be the figureheads of power in ’08.
There isn’t one bit of it designed to conduct the people’s business in a constitutional manner. Everything is in place. The United States Constitution, SCOTUS, Legislature and elections are window dressing for a dictatorship that merely doesn’t want to be seen as such.
Speaking of the Sergeant-at-Arms, when is the last time this person actually was instructed to jail anyone? I guess I could safely say the Sergeant’s-at-Arby’s?
Guess if Conyers were serious he would have filed inherent contempt charges. bush is really showing his hand when his lawyers say his justice dept. wouldn’t pursue charges. Who knows , maybe things like this will show up in court in the Hague.Guess that scenario would only happen if Iran were bombed and then China/Russia bombs US back. Congress fiddles away while our country is ruined.
Glad little hollow weenies are done reaking havok on our GREAT COUNTRY! Can we FLUSH this compromised CIA DOWN THE TOILET? OH DE OH, DE OH DOE.
Ya know, ghouls and fools, that seems to be all we can come up with!
“Guess if Conyers were serious he would have filed inherent contempt charges.”
Molly, I know that a lot of bloggers write about Conyers “filing charges” as though he were a D.A. I’ve made that mistake myself.
But he’s not a D.A. This thing has to go to a vote. From what I’ve been reading, there was a lot of arm-twisting that took place to get Democrats from conservative districts to go along with criminal contempt, and Conyers did not want to go forward until the votes were there. The Republicans are already pointing the heavy weaponry at those red state, red county Dems.
“We can do without the DINOs!” No. You can’t. Like it or not, any Democratic majority is going to depend on the occasional Dem who squeaks to victory in Crimsoneck County, Alabama or some such place.
The point is, the votes MAY be there — just barely — for criminal contempt. Inherent contempt? I don’t think it is politically possible. That stunt has not been tried since 1934, and in that case, the target was a Hoover leftover involved in a scandal over air mail routes. He had no political supporters. Nobody really gave a damn about him — certainly not FDR! — and nobody cared when he did ten days in the slammer.
I think that in the present case, inherent contempt would be terrific — and it certainly would be wonderful theater. But if it was not possible in the Nixon years, it may not be possible now.
By the way, the Sergeant at Arms for the House is a former Secret Service Agent. I’m sure he has been well-trained.
Bejammin075 said: “Most likely, in about 2 days the Democrats will withdraw the contempt charges and apologize to Miers and Bolton.”
Agent 99 said: “Every single peep out of them is designed to give the impression of opposition without opposing anything at all… The United States Constitution, SCOTUS, Legislature and elections are window dressing for a dictatorship that merely doesn’t want to be seen as such.”
Couldn’t agree more with the both of you. American democracy is an oxymoron. Daily the Dems are proving they are nothing more than a fake opposition party, just a fig leaf for the regime, to make your average American wrongly think they have a choice come election day. A one-party dictatorship works much more smoothly with less opposition from the public if the public thinks it is a two-party system, and even if they think they are only choosing “the lesser of 2 evils” it still is vastly preferable to them knowing the whole thing is fake and that no matter if they vote for the openly fascist Repubs or the fake opposition Dem enablers, the establishment wins every time.
It reminds me of professional wrestling actually, in that they try to give the impression of coming flying off the turnbuckle smashing their elbow down on their opponent’s head but a different camera angle shows it coming down safely a couple inches away while their opponent winces and holds his head from the fake assult. The blood is phony, it comes in capsules.
Well, at least the Democrats are still maintaining the pretense of doing something. Agreed that this is all worth nothing at all, but never forget that without this pretense, we’d have less than nothing.
Side bet anyone?
I bet the incoming Democratic President will issue a full and complete pardon to Bush and the members of his Cabinet for all crimes they may, or may not, have committed in trying to keep us safe from terrorism.
All that in the consideration of national interest, a healing process, if you will.
Woe.
It appears the entire Kabuki theater has been unwound, decomposed, and laid bare.
Are there any patriots left?
Dunno about patriots. Allegiance to a country after it has become a fascist tyranny is pretty dumb. But we’ve got some good people like Keith Olbermann and Michael Moore, they just know better than to run for President.
If he wasn’t a Democrat, Dennis Kucinich would be a good person, and he’s going to make a terrific head of the Democratic Party replacing Howard Dean. That way he can continue being “the only real Democrat,” help them keep up the charade, raise money, and not challenge the system. Okay, he’ll lose a little luster after he fails to get the nomination and tells all his supporters to vote for Hillary so as not to hand the election to Romney, but Democrats are so accustomed to the old “bait and switch” that it won’t phase them.
Like Michael Moore says, “Dude, where’s my country?”
Michael Moore stole that line from me.
I wonder whether the filing of contempt charges may be setting the stage for an impeachment move against Bush-Cheney. It gives Conyers something more immediate to hang his hat on to justify such a move, and with Kucinich pledging to bring up his HR 333 under special parliamentary procedures for a vote very soon….
Maybe wishful thinking, but I sense there may serious moves afoot by the Dem majority in Congress to show some spine for a change and halt its betrayal of the overwhelming majority of the people who want regime change at home NOW, as indicated in a recent poll.
HR 333 should be up on Tuesday (today) in the House, while the Mukasey deal goes down in the Senate.
Unlike criminal contempt, inherent contempt would not rely on the DoJ’s agreement to pursue the charges. Bush attorneys have already made clear that they would not allow attorneys in the Justice Dept. to do so.
Just more hot air from the Dems we elected to make real change. 1 year of investigations, subpoenas, etc. and not one thing accomplished.
In the meantime they roll over on Impeachment, Habeas Corpus, torture, lousy attorney general choices, funding the war, health insurance …. etc. etc. etc.
So..if the DOJ refuses to prosecute under a criminal contempt charge, will this move to inherent contempt?
And what’s the timeline here? How quickly will we know what the DOJ plans to do, once Bolton and Miers flip a big ol’ “FUCK YOU” to Conyers?
Things tend to fall through the cracks this time of year, when everyone’s looking forward to holiday breaks.
BTW, speaking of giving them 9 chances..
Way back when my son was in preschool, I butted heads with one of the new teachers about her method of dealing with him when he refused to cooperate (which was to send him to the office where he has to lay on a cot and cry until Mommy was able to leave work and pick him up and take him home, which is where he’d rather be anyway)
During the conversation, she said, “I told him over and over again..” I said, “Okay, exactly HOW MANY times did you tell him to (whatever it was she told him to do)?” She said, “Oh six or seven at least”
I said, “And there’s your problem – he’s not getting a clear message. Look him in the eyes, tell him ONE TIME ONLY exactly what he’s supposed to do, what the consequences will be if he doesn’t, and then gently but firmly follow through”
The people in this administration have to be treated like stubborn toddlers. Tell them ONE TIME ONLY exactly what is expected of them, give them consequences..then gently but firmly follow through.
RIGHT on, KBE! That is PRECISELY correct.
I have to admit I became drunk on hope. I was hoping America still exists. The concept of America is such a fine wine.
But they give us sewer water to drink and expect us to worship them.
I apologize to any Bradbloggers I have offended during my binge.
love to all dissidents. One day we will drink the true wine of freedom.