From our Attorney General:
“Your job as assistant U.S. attorneys is not to convict people,” Holder said. “Your job is not to win cases. Your job is to do justice. Your job is in every case, every decision that you make, to do the right thing. Anybody who asks you to do something other than that is to be ignored. Any policy that is at tension with that is to be questioned and brought to my attention. And I mean that.”
Two words.
“Prove it.”
No offense, but talking the talk and then actually seeing justice done on things like torture, wiretapping (and then seeking to exceed the Bushies on the scope of government immunity to wiretapping suits) and permanent detentions are two wildly different things.
Holder has already demonstrated that justice takes a back seat to political reality, so that quote is quite frankly bullshit.
I mean, we were able only to elect a decent, smart, moderate, not a brilliant, miracle working, revolutionist. So a lot of the criticism “from the left” of the Obama team that I see, makes no sense to me. It is like, I really wanted a magic porpise as a pet, and I got a dog; this dog is not meeting my expectations; got fur, not flippers, the tail is useless for swimming propulsion and it gets fleas! Dude, it’s a dog.
Yeah, we should completely let Holder and company get away with the same shoddy Bush legal positions just because Obama’s in charge.
The (D) makes it all worthwhile.
I can appreciate the Obama DoJ not wanting to piss off the intel community. I can appreciate the fact that many of the same Democrats we have in the House and Senate today signed off on these Bush positions. I greatly appreciate Holder proclaiming to the world “We do not torture” and closing Gitmo. A Republican administration would have done precisely none of that.
But then wanting to extend the telecoms’ immunity to wiretapping suits to the entire Federal government, leaving us with zero recourse?
There’s a big, fat line between accepting the Bush positions and then extending and expanding them. This administration crossed that line.
When I see bullshit, I call them on it. This time, the criticism of Obama is honestly deserved for a specific reason.
Or just to draw a picture for ya:
Ever heard of a guy named Allende?
Moved too fast.
Didn’t take the time to make sure he was in control of the military and police.
You know what happened to him?
There’s no way to tell from the outside whether Obama is taking a position from lack of conviction or necessity, but to expect a moderate Democrat to take the Presidency of the USA and not act as the chief executive of the empire is weird.
Not that one should accept policy decisions, but they have moved a lot faster than I had imagined they could.
“Holder has already demonstrated that justice takes a back seat to political reality, so that quote is quite frankly bullshit. “
I’m just commenting on your apparent surprise that Holder demonstrated that. Nobody who becomes US attorney general will demonstrate anything else: that’s part of the job.
Not surprise.
Just disappointment.
Not disappointed at all. In fact, one of Clinton’s many failings was that he let the Pukes keep control of DOJ.
you’ll rarely be proven wrong by taking a cynical position, but it’s okay to have higher standards.
Then, lawyers working there should be coming out of the woodwork, to call him on his statement.
The right thing
Justice
I want to Holder him to it.
Perhaps he should shut up until he is no longer a fucking hypocrite, eh?
I wish I could say I was surprised by the Obama Admin’s extension of the Unitary Executive theory…but I’m not. All along the campaign I felt like he was pandering on the issue, and since taking office he’s repeatedly (and sadly) proved me right on this.
The bitter irony of a Constitutional lawyer doing absofrackinglutely nothing to reverse the Bush Admin’s rape of the Rule of Law…
And he’s not even doing it for important things like battling Global Warming. Christ, I would put up with the execution of half the human race if it would actually stop global warming, myself included. But he’s using it to line the pockets of bankers.
Water boarding is torture. And with the quote above, I am waitng to see Justice done for those who authorized the use of torture, like John Yoo.