There Is Nothing Assrocket Can’t Spin
Apparently, Jamil Hussein has struck again, supplying the Associated Press with a memo that contradicts Alberto Gonzales’ testimony before Congress regarding the March 10, 2004 ‘Gang of Eight’ briefing on the Terrorist Surveillance Program.
Basically, the memo (signed by then-National Intelligence director John Negroponte) says that the briefing was about the TSP, as do briefing attendees Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA), John Rockefeller (D-WV), then-senator Tom Daschle and then-deputy AG James Comey. On Monday, Gonzales told Congress that the briefing was about some other, heretofore unknown intelligence activity that, if known, would cause Glenn Greenwald’s eyes to bleed in a delicate pattern of 1’s and 0’s arranged in such a way as to form the HTML code for five years’ worth of 10,000-word blog posts.
Somebody is clearly lying. My money’s on the memo being correct, but before we break out our Ronco™ brand Junior Kerning Kits*, we’re going to need some damage control.
Above: “When the truth is out,
And you need some spin,
Who ya gonna call?
ASS-ROCKET!”
Leaking Against Gonzales
Posted by John at 09:05 PM
Okay, ewww. I really don’t want to know about “leaking against” Alberto Gonzales. But we do this out of duty, so carry on:
This document was created after controversy developed over the international terrorist surveillance program. In response, I assume, to a request from Congress, the memo lists all dates on which Congressional leaders were briefed on the TSP. This, the AP says, “contradicts Gonzales’s testimony,” but of course it doesn’t. The memo doesn’t say that the only program discussed at the meeting was the TSP, nor does it say that the TSP was the one on which the Justice Department (Ashcroft and Comey) had suddenly changed its mind, leading to the famous hospital visit. The document, as described by the AP, confirms Gonzales’s testimony that he met with Congressional leaders shortly before visiting the hospital; to the extent that the AP describes it, it does not contradict the Attorney General’s testimony.
Folks, that is some Grade-A logic twistin’. Consider: 1) Every single Gang of Eight member who has gone on record has said the only program discussed at the March 10 briefing was the TSP. 2) The memo refers to a series of briefings ‘on the Terrorist Surveillance Program’. 3) Nobody but Gonzales has so much as hinted that some other program was discussed. 4) Gonzales is a known liar. 5) He lies so much, he lies about the lies he is about to lie. 6) In fact, he has forgotten more about lying-about-forgetting alone than most people can remember about the simple act of physically lying down.
But all of this enormously compelling evidence that it was the TSP program — and only the TSP program — that was discussed at the Gang of Eight briefing and was the reason for Gonzales and Andy Card’s Mafioso visit to John Ashcroft’s hospital bed … is so much random, unconnected data in the masterfully uncurious mind of Assrocket.
The memo doesn’t specifically say that no other program besides TSP was discussed in the briefing. Similarly, until every cubic inch of the moon has been sifted through, we can’t be certain that the green cheese isn’t there. It cannot be ruled out that God only buried dinosaur bones in Mongolia to test our faith.
Seriously, if I ever fuck up really, really badly … I kind of want Assrocket to be my lawyer:
“Yuh Honuh, if I may? Whilst it is true that mah client was cap’shu’d on live, national television, taking a large and runny dump on the only, original copy of our most sacred Constitution, it is mah intention to show the jury that due to a most peh-cue-lee-ah childhood accident, to this very day, soitain, unique propuhties of mah client’s feces act as both a cleanin’ agent and an embalmin’ tonic, and that we shall see, Yuh Honuh, befo’ this trial has run its cou’se, that mah client stands falsely and most despicably accused of heinous crimes that he did not commit … when in fact he was doing nothing less than his solemn and pay-tree-otic duty to soive and defend the most cherished legal document of this-a-heah blessed and Godly land!”
[Gavin adds: That doesn’t really sound like him. Hindy speaks mostly in choppy Midwestern declaratives with the occasional oleaginous insinuation. Imagine an angry James Stewart transforming into Olivier as Richard III:
“Never have I heard such gross and baseless speculation. Outrageous personal attack is clearly the prosecution’s only intent. ‘Outrageous’ is a charitable word for this gross outrage. Well, I never. Jiminy Christmas. And yet. . .by whom, I must ask, might the Constitution have been cleverly placed beneath my client’s buttocks at the very moment it was clear that he was taking a runny dump? Hmmm?“]
UPDATE: I forgot to highlight two more key Assrocket passages:
This is really something of a mystery. When Comey testified before the Judiciary Committee, he refused to name the surveillance program at issue. In this post, I wrote that it was obviously the terrorist surveillance program. But that assumption may have been wrong.
What can you say? It’s very noble of Hinderaker to lamely and insincerely cop to errors in fealty to douchebag Bush administration officials.
It wouldn’t be hard to figure out whether the program about which DOJ changed its mind was the international terrorist surveillance program, or something else. There is a paper trail of legal memos, etc., on the subject, and a considerable number of people know the answer to the question, including at least one unimpeachable source, John Ashcroft.
Ashcroft was in a drug haze and recovering from major surgery! The man’s memory of the day in question is “Mmm … synthesized morphine … pretty colors …” ‘Unimpeachable source,’ my ass! For my next witness, I call. . .a sleeping aardvark!
* Meanwhile, we eagerly await the Little Green Footballs lab results on the precise pica signatures of the lower-case ‘m’ and numeral ‘7’ characters found in the memo, which some theorize are not inconsistent with the typing of this document on artificial vellum crafted in the Turkish quarter of the German city of Leipzig, using a Texas Instruments Speak-and-Spell, in the year 347 B.C. … and we all know what that would mean.
I don’t mind being called a liar when I’m lying, or about to lie, to just finished lying. but no when I’m telling the truth!
I suspect that Gonzo simply is so caught up in trying to keep his story straight (though one has to wonder how hard it is to remember, “I don’t know, I don’t remember, I wasn’t even there at the time, man!”) that his default by this point is “lie and sound important while doing it”.
In other news, it should be noted that, unless I’m very mistaken about the identity of the speaker, O’Reilly has NOT, technically. been taken off the program schedule at 106.7 WJFK. He’s just on at ~1-2 AM.
I somehow never thought I’d miss Ashcroft. I never thought I’d see him as “the voice of moderation and restraint” in Bush’s first cabinet. This whole thing is really quite mind-opening.
I think the memo was fabricated by Democrats. Certainly no Republican senate staffers wrote it.
Corndogs!
Gavin adds: That doesn’t really sound like him. Hindy speaks mostly in choppy Midwestern declaratives with the occasional smirking insinuation.
It’s a stylized version of Assrocket, where he’s a pompous Southern-fried litigat-uh …
Poetic license … it’s what’s for dinner!
Compared to a Drugged up Ashcroft?
Poetic license may ass!
.
Is that what it is evidence of is it ?
You recall how did that bedside meeting ended ?
With objections to a program that none of these other people had. Threats of resignation by a Bush appointee at the 2nd bedside meeting as opposed to no such objections coming from non-Bush appointees at the 1st.
That’s evidence that the same program was being discussed at both is it ?
Likewise, Gonzales has been telling these investigations for months that any illegality, over-reach or breach of civil liberties they query didn’t happen with “this program”. The logical reaction to someone qualifying each and every answer in the same way should be to ask what other programs there are if the only one he’s happy to answer questions about had no such issues.
Instead we get this. Idiots hearing this and thinking that the real find here is a possible perjury, rather than just uncovering — about 4 months after a whole bunch of bloggers figured out the same thing — what surveillence programs have been running apart for the welll known one that he’s happy answering questions about.
Q: have you ever crashed a car
A: not this one.
Q: have you ever been caught drink driving
A: not in this one
Get the fkn point ?
The only thing that is overwhelming evidence of is that these people aren’t qualified to be holding positions as the heads of intelligence committees.
If you can go into a room for a Q and A session with Gonzales, where he’s forced to answer questions you had months to prepare and you come out of that meeting looking less qualified to keep your job than he does, you don’t get to look at the national security info no more kid.
Leaking against Gonzales? Well, that’ll happen when you go overboard on those chips with the Olestra in them.
Blog of the Year, 2004; sums it up, really.
“It’s a stylized version of Assrocket, where he’s a pompous Southern-fried litigat-uh …”
No, I know who it is – it’s the Giant Chicken Defense Lawyer character on Futurama! Nailed it, too.
“Poetic license … it’s what’s for dinner!”
Now, we fry the Chicken.
Why are we giving credence to the President’s unlawful program by calling in the “Terrorist Surveillance Program,” instead of what it is: warrantless wiretapping of American citizens in express contravention of FISA and the 4th Amendment?
Just wondering.
Knowing what we already do about this administration and its pursuit of a permanent rethuglican majority, does anyone here doubt that rove and cheneyco were spying on reporters and other politicians?
Jesus. I’m posting before reading the entire thing, but criminey! Who could watch Gonzo’s testimony and then decide that the thing to do is SUPPORT him???????
Even hard core Bushies should at least have the shame to turn their faces away and pretend he doesn’t exist.
What kind of idiot – other than George Bush – views this and thinks ‘”That’s pretty good, and I’m with him!” ??????
Get in on your gonzo predictions here!
Actually, it’s Doctor Bobo doing his defense lawyer bit from MST3K.
Nailed that one, too.
The questions I want answered: is this Yale educated (I think) attorney really this stupid, is he lying, or is he so invested in his past support that he is psychologically unable to face the truth?
Gus,
Yes.
Yes.
And yes.
You’re welcome!
To me, one of the really interesting things is the provenance of this Negroponte memo and what it tells us about how these investigations are going to cross-pollinate.
On NPR this morning they said that the memo was declassified over a year ago to defend the bush assertion that congress had been “fully briefed” on his warrantless surveillance program. But there is such an interconnected web of venal criminality and blatant mendacity in this administration that everything they use to defend one act is likely to expose misdeeds and malfeasance in others.
I like it. Keep up the pressure…
mikey
Gus: Sure, it’s hard to believe a Yalie could be that stupid. When I was at a midwestern “top 10” law school in the late 1990’s, I was amazed at the outright untruths and stupidity coming from the mouths of by brilliam right-wing peers. It’s part lies, part ideological blindness, and 100% propaganda. They are very good at making black seem like white, and, like the Jedi mind trick, is very effective on the weak-minded, who comprise an all-too-large proportion of our population.
“It’s a stylized version of Assrocket, where he’s a pompous Southern-fried litigat-uh …”
Otherwise known as Fred Thompson.
Nailed it!
[…] Update: It would seem that “Hindrocket” over at power line was not too impressed by my present. Please note that I didn’t use the Wingnutosphere adaption of his nickname to descibe him, delicate sensibilities, and all that. I’ll leave that to, you guessed it… Sadly, No! […]
Maybe not such an idiot, I’m realizing. He cannot be touched, so he’s not wasting time on the construction of bullshit justifications and the spinning of webs of lies.
There will be no blowback, fallout, consequences or spam hitting any fan.
As Bart once said, “I thought it was physically impossible, but this both sucks and blows at the same time.”
including at least one unimpeachable source, John Ashcroft
mmm-hmmm. Can we find an impeachable source now, please?
But there is such an interconnected web of venal criminality and blatant mendacity in this administration that everything they use to defend one act is likely to expose misdeeds and malfeasance in others.
Dingdingdingdingding! WE HAVE A WINNER!
You’re right, Mikey. Rather than wasting time on impeachment grandstanding, we need to keep on (keep the pressure on Our Guys, like Waxman & Conyers & Leahy & Feingold) picking apart all the myriad lies, misdeeds, and acts of both petty & grand treason committed by the Oval Office Squatter Squad over the last seven years.
Let Assrocket quibble. He’s doing Abu G a disservice, and is too dumb to know it. Gonzo would like us to think the spying discussed in March 2004 was more or less identical to that revealed in December 2005. My suspicion is that it was much, much worse.
That’s to say, Abu G would rather Congress chase him for perjury — instapardon! — than have to fess up on three years of illegal mass automated surveillance.
One final thing: that Negroponte memo wasn’t leaked. It’s been floating around for over a year.
It’s a stylized version of Assrocket, where he’s a pompous Southern-fried litigat-uh
It’s more a sort of idealized version of the complete Renaissance Man…