NYT: Stormy Outlook as Gonzales Faces Senate Democrats

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, who has faced controversy throughout his two-year tenure, is likely to enter an even stormier phase next Thursday when he appears before the Senate Judiciary Committee for the first time since control fell to the Democrats.

But he shows little anxiety about more vehement criticism of his stewardship at the Justice Department.

“They have an institutional interest to gather up information about what the executive branch is doing,” Mr. Gonzales said Friday, in an interview in which he adopted the mildly juridical tone of a law professor.

Referring to the Justice Department, he said: “We likewise have an institutional interest in maintaining the confidentially of certain kinds of information. From my perspective, there are two competing institutional interests. This is not a partisan issue. It’s an institutional issue of interests that have to be accommodated.”

But there seems to be little likelihood that the Judiciary Committee will be satisfied with that kind of summation.

Mr. Gonzales’s chief antagonist is likely to be the panel’s chairman, Senator Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, a Democrat who in recent public statements has castigated the Bush administration for years of “corrosive unilateralism” in refusing to cooperate with Congress and said he would enforce the committee’s demands for information with subpoenas if necessary.

more…
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/13/washington/13gonzales.html?ref=washington

I can hardly wait!

these vampires need... :evilgrin:

to prevent pro bono legal representation for Gitmo detainees?

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6849592

I don't get that channel!!

http://www.c-span.org/

Look at the bottom of the middle of the page, above this image:

can the Senate later vote to withdraw their consent?

WTF does that mean? "Institutional interest" and "Institutional issue"??? How on earth did this guy get a law degree? Are we sure he has one? Does he have ANY understanding of how our government works?

Gonzales, as soon as he gets a good look at the million pound shithammer swinging his way, will clam up and start giving "I'll get back to you on that" or "I hadn't considered that angle, Senator. I'll have to look at it later if you'd be so kind as to put that request in writing."

I hope at least one Senator is ready for that and at the very minimum gives this grinning little Nazi turd the dressing down he deserves.

He is the current official apologist for the concept of the "unitary executive".

advocating torture wiretapping and telling Congress the President can do ANYTHING during War time ... is treasonous

he lies.

Gonzales is the tower-tumbling peg in their little game of marbles. If the Senate can get him to slip up or foresee his impending doom, he could be as integral to the downfall of this administration as John Dean or Alexander Butterfield.

Committee Meetings/Hearings Scheduled

Thursday, Jan. 18, 2007
9:30 a.m.
Judiciary
To hold an oversight hearing to examine the
Department of Justice.

link: http://www.senate.gov/pagelayout/committees/b_three_sections_with_teasers/committee_hearings.htm

Make him sweat, Senators. Make him panic. Back him into every corner you can. Pull the pegs that support him until he wobbles. He's already planning to lie:

"Even so, Mr. Gonzales said he was looking forward to testifying. “I view these hearings as an opportunity to tell our story,” he said. “I think in many ways we have a good story to tell. Sometimes we are constrained because we are in a period of war in giving out as much information as we’d like because there are things we’d like to talk to about.”

Oh, and my prediction:

John Cornyn will say something stupid.

He is a discredit to the legal profession and to this country. No person with an ounce of humanity or morality could espouse the justifications for the illegal and inhumane actions of the current administration.

I seriously think Gonzalez is guilty of treason.