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Attorney General Alberto Gonzales

Happy six-month anniversary Missoni Dresses, U.S. attorney scandal! (And what do you get for the scandal that has everything?)

The half-birthday of the purge scandal’s explosion onto the front pages last February brings a new round of attempts to explain how Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is still collecting a government paycheck. Having taken several whacks at this puzzle myself, I appreciate the recent efforts of Massimo Calabresi, Tom Raum, Sidney Blumenthal, Dan Eggen and Amy Goldstein, the Economist, Ramzy Baroud, and the Artful Dodger. Each of these writers offers some variation on the theme that George Bush hangs on to Gonzales because the president is one or all of the following: 1) stubborn; 2) loyal; 3) terrified of the investigation and/or confirmation hearing that would follow from a Gonzales departure. They also frequently note that Gonzales is one or all of the following: 1) stubborn; 2) loyal; 3) conveniently and hilariously blundering; 4) the last line of defense between Karl Rove and the truth about what’s gone on at the White House in the last six years.

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Let’s say we can all now agree about why Gonzales still puts on a coat and tie every morning. The better question remains BCBG Dresses, why do Democrats in Congress allow him to keep his job? Why don’t they impeach him, as urged by the New York Times? Why not censure him, as Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., is now urging? My friend Ben Wittes argues that Congress can “exert budgetary pressure on all non-essential administration priorities for the department” and “decline to confirm any Justice Department nominees” if they really want to show him the door. A Democrat-controlled Congress that truly wanted Gonzales gone has options beyond the mere rending of garments and pulling of hair. But thus far, Congress has declined to force the issue.

The best and most comprehensive explanation for this has always been that they are gutless. They won’t go after the attorney general without a “smoking gun” in hand, and—in light of the White House’s policy of obfuscation, delay, and rampant claims of executive privilege—that smoking gun will materialize only if it is hand-delivered by some winged pink angel with an impressive security clearance.

There’s another explanation for the timidity of congressional Democrats. As an article in today’s Los Angeles Times by Peter Wallsten and Richard B. Schmitt observes, the dustup over Gonzales is proving invaluable to Democrats in an election year. The spectacle of Bush clinging desperately to an inept and untruthful AG is just about a campaign commercial in itself. Why impeach/censure/defund the hand that feeds you? The day Gonzales steps down is the day Democrats must hustle to find a new issue.

There is, however, a real cost to the Democrats’ strategy of pounding away at the attorney general purely for sport. The AG’s dwindling crew of cheerleaders have been claiming that this was the case for months, insisting this scandal has become an empty witch hunt. That argument is starting to look like it may have some merit. It was bad enough when congressional Democrats wanted to complain about Gonzales without actually doing anything. But now they appear to want to complain about him while handing him a big fat increase in his spying authority.

This past Sunday, a heap of Democrats voted to rush through changes to the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the law that governs electronic surveillance of anyone in this country.  The new law expands the authority of the attorney general to approve the monitoring of phone calls and e-mails to suspected overseas terrorists from unknowing American citizens. Make no mistake about it. The vote to update FISA rewarded the AG for years of missteps and misstatements by giving him expanded authority to enforce the president’s alarming constitutional vision. Sans oversight. Sans judicial approval. 

There is virtually no way to reconcile Sen. Mark Pryor’s, D-Ark., claim that Gonzales has “lied to the Senate” and needs to go with his vote to expand the reach of our warrantless eavesdropping program. And how can one possibly square Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s, D-Calif., claim that the AG “just doesn’t tell the truth” with her vote to give him yet more unchecked authority? You either trust this AG with the power to listen in on your phone calls or you do not, and the mumbled justifications for these “yes” votes (… but Gonzales shares his authority with National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell; … but the bill sunsets in six months) do nothing to lessen the impression that some Democrats mistrust Gonzales when it’s convenient, but not when it’s truly important.

Imagine that the Democrats had been hollering for the past six months that Gonzales was an out-of-control drunk. With their eavesdropping vote, they’ve handed him the keys to a school bus. Nobody was forcing these Democrats to impeach or censure the AG. But this warm pat on the back they have offered him is beyond incredible.

With this FISA vote, the Democrats have compromised the investigation into the U.S. attorney scandal. They’ve shown themselves either to be participating in an empty political witch hunt or curiously willing to surrender our civil liberties to someone who has shown—time and again—that he cannot be trusted to safeguard them. The image of Democrats hypocritically berating the attorney general with fingers crossed behind their backs is ultimately no less appalling than an attorney general swearing to uphold the Constitution with fingers crossed behind his own.

Sorry, E.J.: Rasmussen says the “Dream Act” is a 59%-22% loser with the public. His robo-poll question’s wording seems neutral enough:

Should children of illegal immigrants be given legal status if they complete two years of college or military service?

3:17 P.M.

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Red Sox Sweep: Another blow to my favorite defunct unknown lo-fi indie group, In-Flight Movie, whose pre-2004 signature song “Joseph Cotten”  was premised on a continuing curse. … P.S.: It’s still good! Builds to a rhetorical climax. … 2:18 P.M.

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A political reporter for leading news web site emails to suggest that Slate’s John Dickerson was righter than I’d thought about Fred Thompson:

Based on the speech Saturday night, his campaign is already dead and someone forget to inform him and Jeri. It was as vacuous and lifeless as it could have been. Astoundingly bad. “Sound common sense conservative principles” but no call to action, no memorable lines whatsoever.

Salon’s Walter Shapiro is more charitable:

While the speech was more forcefully delivered than other recent Thompson appearances, it was also a vintage example of his Hound Dog Macho. The slow-talking, 6-foot-5, late-starting candidate hulked over the lectern and began with this self-deprecating riff, “All of you men out there enjoying a full head of hair — enjoy it while you can.”

There was little memorable in the address that followed … The Des Moines Register only quoted Thompson’s attempt to ballyhoo his right-from-the-start credentials: “I was a conservative yesterday, my friends. I am a conservative today. And I will be a conservative tomorrow.”

Watching Thompson Saturday night Marc Jacobs Dresses, I realized how old-fashioned his podium style and his mannerisms are as a candidate. He sounded like a long-ago Southern senator from Central Casting …

Thompson is a work in progress BCBG Dresses, a candidate who has yet to test his theoretical appeal through sustained personal campaigning.

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Last week the University of Virginia decided to fight a sweeping subpoena served upon the institution in late April. State Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli subpoenaed documents in connection with five grants awarded to Michael Mann—a former UVA climate-change scientist who now teaches at Penn State. Cuccinelli is using a state fraud statute to demand thousands of e-mails between Mann and climate-change scientists around the world. The request was both broad and unprecedented. So the university filed a petition to quash the subpoena on various grounds. Academics across the country have raised alarms, signing petitions and urging Cuccinelli to back off, claiming that this novel use of prosecutorial power to investigate climate science in the academy constitutes a threat to free inquiry. (Disclosure: Richard Schragger was the principal author of such a letter from the UVA law faculty.) These letters and petitions often invoke the First Amendment and quote the U.S. Supreme Court to assert that the Constitution protects “academic freedom.”

Does it? What precisely is “academic freedom,” and why would the Constitution protect it? Who can assert “academic freedom”—individual faculty members or the university as a whole? What is the scope of the right, and does it apply to faculty at state universities or those who receive government grants? The Supreme Court has never really answered these questions. UVA v. Cuccinelli would be a good time to do so—if the case ever gets that far.

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We can start with what we do know. First, the phrase “academic freedom” appears nowhere in the Constitution. The First Amendment mentions speech, assembly, petitioning, press Chloe Dresses, and religion but not universities. Still, the Supreme Court has alluded to the special role of universities time and time again. In perhaps the most important academic-freedom case, Sweezy v. New Hampshire, decided in 1957, the high court stated that “the essentiality of freedom in the community of American universities is almost self-evident.” In 1967, in Keyishian v. Board of Regents, the court declared that “the university is a traditional sphere of free expression … fundamental to the function of society.” Writing for the court, Justice William Brennan stated, “Our Nation is deeply committed to safeguarding academic freedom, which is of transcendent value to all of us and not merely to the teachers concerned. * That freedom is therefore a special concern of the First Amendment. …”

Second, despite the court’s rhetoric, it has never pinned down exactly what academic freedom means. Much to the frustration of scholars and academics, the decisions that invoke academic freedom range widely. Some cases relate to the Red Scare of the 1950s, when teachers were required to take loyalty oaths, or professors (like Paul Sweezy) were investigated for “subversive activities.” Other cases involved the rights of state employees—again often primary- or secondary-school teachers—to associate with others on their own time, or comment on matters of “public concern” outside the classroom. Yet another group of cases concern whether the government can control the speech of public employees, organizations, or agencies that receive government funding.

But none of these cases was resolved on the basis of academic freedom directly. In some cases, the court invoked the due-process clause or freedom of speech and association. In other cases, the court upheld a government regulation but observed that the regulation did not implicate the “special” role of the university. As one legal scholar has written, “Lacking definition or a guiding principle, the doctrine [of academic freedom] floats in the law, picking up decisions as a hull does barnacles.”

In other words, the assertion of “academic freedom” raises more questions than it resolves. For example, who is protected under the umbrella of academic freedom? In Sweezy, Justice Frankfurter, writing for himself and Justice Harlan, emphasized “the four essential freedoms of the university—to determine for itself on academic grounds who may teach, what may be taught, how it shall be taught, and who may be admitted to study.” Frankfurter’s concept of academic freedom seems to protect the university (but not individual faculty members) from outside government interference. But there are also hints of an individual right sprinkled throughout the court’s decisions.

On the other hand, it can’t be true that the university or its faculty employees can do absolutely anything they want. Universities are subject to federal and state laws, including employment and nondiscrimination laws. A faculty member can’t steal from the university or make false statements to government officials or embezzle funds. The Supreme Court has held, for example, that a university can be required to turn over documents related to a faculty member’s tenure denial and her charge that she was the subject of discrimination.

The situation gets still messier when you’re dealing with public universities, where faculty are “employees” of the state, or receive state funding. The Cuccinelli subpoena actually raises both issues, since he claims to be investigating “fraud” in government grants at a state university. Does being a state employee or receiving government funds give the government the authority to dictate or regulate academic behavior? Cuccinelli certainly thinks so—he argues that he is well within his rights to challenge the misuse of state monies. And surely the university (and by extension, Virginia) can condition professors’ employment on the professors acting and performing in certain ways—can’t it?

Here is where the Supreme Court’s notion of academic freedom starts to have some actual bite—despite its conceptual messiness. While a state university can adopt policies that must be followed by its academic employees, the governments’ regulation must have limits. If the faculty members are just state employees—just like any other state employees—everything they do or say or produce would be “owned” by the state, would essentially be the “speech” of the state, and would be under the state’s legitimate control. Virtually no one believes faculty employees are just like every other state employee. Most of us would agree that they engage in a particular enterprise; one that can serve its important public function only by being independent of the government.

J. Harvie Wilkinson, on the Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit, whose chambers are just down the street from UVA, made this very observation in a case challenging a law prohibiting state employees from accessing sexually explicit material on state-owned computers. Wilkinson observed that faculty at a state university are certainly “state employees,” but “these particular employees are hired for the very purpose of inquiring into BCBG Dresses, reflecting upon, and speaking out on matters of public concern. A faculty is employed professionally to test ideas and propose solutions, to deepen knowledge and refresh perspectives. … In research and writing university professors are not state mouthpieces—they speak mainly for themselves.”

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Eleven fence pillars and eleven gardenias surround Tau Taufa’s new home, in memory of the family he lost in Australia’s worst house fire.

Mr Taufa’s wife, daughter, three grandchildren, his sister-in-law and her five children were killed around midnight on August 24 last year, when their home at Slacks Creek, south of Brisbane, went up in flames.

Since the fire, Mr Taufa, 66, has been living next door.

Over the past 40 days the family patriarch watched on as up to 150 construction workers – all volunteers – built a new home on the land where his family home once stood.

On Thursday morning, the surviving family members were handed the keys.

The bottom storey of the house had been gift-wrapped with a bright red heart sewn into the material.

A ribbon was cut and the house was officially opened.

“This really brings back my family to life,” Mr Taufa said, “even though they are in spirit.

“I can’t believe a thing like this has happened to a guy like me.

“I expected a roof, but you have built me a palace.”

The home has been named Kalua, the middle name of Mr Taufa’s wife Fusi.

The walls of the four-bedroom house are covered with family photos and a shrine has been built in the backyard.

Scrawled across it are dozens of well wishes, like: “When you lose someone you love you gain an angel you know”.

The house will be blessed on April 15 and after that Mr Taufa, his daughter Treicee and her partner Peter will move in.

Treicee lost her 16-year-old daughter Ardelle in the blaze.

Mr Taufa says his door will be open to all.

About 100 people from the tight-knit Tongan and Samoan communities as well as scores of volunteers who helped build the home watched the key ceremony.

Diane Nansen, who had been with Mr Taufa’s daughter Treicee on the night of the fire, says the new home feels just like the old one.

She says the family deserves the gesture.

“The family has been grieving for so long and they will continue to grieve,” she said.

“Just having something like this gives them a little bit of hope.”

Builders Labourers Federation (BLF) secretary David Hanna said none of the builders wanted to be paid for their work.

They felt it was an honour to help the Tafua family.

“It is a start. It is another step forward,” Mr Hanna said.

“Nothing is going to replace the home that they had and the family members, but it eases the pain.”

Mr Taufa lost his wife Fusi Taufa BCBG Dresses, daughter Annamaria Taufa Christian Audigier Clothing, and her daughters Lahaina, 7, and Kalahnie, 3, as well as his niece Ardelle Lee.

He also lost his sister-in-law Teukisia Lale, and her children Jerry, Paul, Lafoa’i, Sela and Richie, aged eight to 18.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Arab foreign ministers on Wednesday called for a U.N.-backed peace plan for Syria to be put into action after President Bashar al-Assad agreed to the proposal that urges an end to violence but does not demand the Syrian leader step down.

Arab leaders in Baghdad for an Arab League summit were expected to endorse the six-point proposal from U.N.-Arab League special envoy Kofi Annan, which seeks a ceasefire and political dialogue in what Iraq called a “last chance” for Syria.

Annan’s proposal calls for the withdrawal of heavy weapons and troops from population centres, humanitarian assistance, the release of prisoners and free movement and access for journalists. But it does not hinge on Assad leaving office.

Arab states appeared to soften their initial proposal demanding that Assad step down after Russia and China vetoed U.N. draft resolutions condemning him.

“Syria’s accepting the plan is a very important step,” Iraq’s Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari told Reuters in Baghdad.

“This is the last chance for Syria and it must be implemented on the ground,” he said.

The Annan proposal is the latest attempt to broker an end to more than a year of violence in Syria after Assad sent troops into cities to try to crush rebels seeking to end his 12-year rule.

Zebari said the League would discuss Annan’s plan but would not accept any foreign intervention in Syria.

Damascus said it would reject initiatives made at the summit relating to Syria, according to the Lebanese TV channel al-Manar.

The Arab League suspended Syria last year and has in the past called on Assad to step aside to allow talks. But members are split over how to handle increasing violence that threatens to inflame the region’s complex ethnic and sectarian mix.

Sunni powers Saudi Arabia and Qatar have led the push to isolate Syria, but other non-Gulf Arab states such as Algeria, Egypt and Iraq’s Shi’ite-led government urge more caution, fearing that toppling Assad could spark sectarian violence.

But Baghdad has suggested the Annan plan as the best way to reach common ground for league members.

“The priority is to end the violence in Syria,” said United Arab Emirates Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Anwar Qarqash in Baghdad. “We support Annan’s proposal.”

Iraq is holding its first Arab League summit in two decades and it will be the first such meeting hosted by a Shi’ite Arab leader, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

In the build-up to the summit, Baghdad courted Sunni Arab Gulf countries who have been wary of the rise of Iraq’s Shi’ite majority and closer ties with Iran since the fall of Sunni dictator Saddam Hussein.

Syrian government forces continued heavy weapons fire and their siege against opposition strongholds on Wednesday with military action and shelling reported from the southern province of Deraa to the northern Hama region.

The United Nations says more than 9,000 people have been killed in Syria’s upheaval though Syrian authorities blame foreign-backed terrorists for the violence and say 3,000 troops and police have been killed.

“We hope the Syrian brothers will respond to the Arab and international resolutions. We hope they will respond to the voice of reason and to stop the bloodshed,” said Kuwaiti Foreign Minister Sheikh Sabah Khaled Al-Sabah.

“The situation now makes a ceasefire necessary.”

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Annan said on Tuesday that Syria had accepted the proposal but he acknowledged that resolving the crisis would be a “long difficult task” and violence continued with Assad’s forces attacking rebels taking refuge across the border in Lebanon.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also greeted Syria’s decision skeptically Karen Millen Dresses, saying Washington would judge Assad on his actions not on what he said, given his record of “over-promising BCBG Dresses, and under-delivering.”

Western and Arab leaders are due to meet in Istanbul on April 1 to discuss a political transition, and U.S., Turkish and Arab officials are pushing the divided Syrian opposition to unite though they remain sharply split over how to form a post-Assad government.

While Western and Arab governments may be keen to see the end of a 40-year Assad family dynasty, they are wary of what kind of government might replace him.

Russia and China have so far shielded Assad from United Nations Security Council condemnation by vetoing Western-backed resolutions over the bloodshed. But they have backed the U.N. statement endorsing Annan’s mission.

Syria’s crisis has underscored a sharp split along sectarian lines in the Middle East, where Shi’ite power Iran and Sunni Arab Gulf rivals are jockeying for influence. Syria is Tehran’s key ally in the Arab region.

The Assad family, from the minority Alawite sect, have ruled over Syria for 42 years, but the conflict now threatens to blow open the complex ethnic, religious and sectarian divides in Syria and across the region.

* For an interactive timeline on Syria, click on link.reuters.com/pyt37s

(Writing by Patrick Markey; Editing by Louise Ireland)

World United Nations Syria

Online advertising is a remarkably complex field. Terence Kawaja has a new way for potential investors to visualize it.

The market involves hundreds of small and large companies that help advertisers reach consumers and help website publishers, mobile-application developers, search engines and other digital destinations generate revenue through advertising.

Kawaja, who runs boutique investment firm LUMA Partners, spent months putting together six new graphics that show how 1 BCBG Dresses,240 different companies fit into the following categories of online advertising: display, video, search engines, mobile Marc Jacobs Dresses, social, and commerce. (See slides below, or click here for the LUMA site.)

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BCBG Dresses

Here’s a well-illustrated guide to electrolytic rust removal by Instructables user ToolNut Chanel Dresses, which could come in handy for restoring those flea market tool finds.

BCBG Dresses

The last time I was excited about a belt buckle Emilio Pucci Dresses, I had found one with old-timey CB radio lingo embossed on the front. Fast-forward a few years and now you’re able to let everybody know your 10-4 with this sci-fi accented iPhone 4 case that doubles as a belt buckle.
[via iPhone Savior]

Freya’s Cabin is constructed from CNC-cut plywood layers pressed together, with each layer having a cutout shape like a stage set. The structure is held together with glue and tension rods that fix through pre-drilled holes in every layer. Some of the layers DKNY Dresses, including the balustrade of the lake-side front BCBG Dresses, are clear acrylic. This allows light into the middle of the structure and creates a forest-cover-like affect. The structure is raised up off the ground with lots of golden metal “stems” randomly arranged and “planted” into the concrete foundations. Freya’s gold tears are made with perforated metal sheets, copper and aluminum alloy. This shiny golden material wraps the cabin’s sides, roof, and underside.

[via Dezeen]

Mumbai, Jan 23 (IANS) When Mohanlal agreed to do a cameo in Priyadarshan’s action film “Tezz”, perhaps he didn’t know what he was getting himself, and the film’s makers, into. Now that the film is set for release, there are apprehensions that the actor’s staunch fan following would take umbrage at their icon’s abbreviated part.

Signs of swelling dissent are already evident. The first promotional trailer of “Tezz” has Ajay Devgn and Anil Kapoor in spotlight, while Mohanlal is seen fleetingly.

This has evoked protest all over micro-blogging sites, creating a mild panic situation in the production team BCBG Dresses, says a source.

“We never expected this kind of an uproar. Mohanlal has a cameo in ‘Tezz’, and that’s how he was shown in the first promo…in fleeting shots! But the uproar from his fans in the south on Facebook and Twitter has taken the producers by surprise. New trailers are now being planned where Mohanlal will be as prominent as Ajay Ed hardy Dresses,” said the source.

Incidentally, this is not the first time Devgn has been compelled to share poster space with Mohanlal. In Ram Gopal Varma’s “Company”, the same north-south divide had transpired.

“Tezz” producer Ratan Jain admits to being taken aback by the uproar.

“Frankly we didn’t expect this. We didn’t mean to undermine Mohanlalji’s stature at all. He sportingly agreed to play a cameo part because of his proximity to Priyadarshan. The heroes of our film are Ajay Devgn and Anil Kapoor. But if Mohanlalji’s fans are upset, we’ve to do something about it,” Jain said.

“We’re taking care of the situation. The next promo will feature Mohanlalji prominently.”

An interesting sidelight to the Mohanlal-Devgn poster war is that “Tezz” was meant to be pitched as Devgn’s next action film after “Singham”.

But now with the Mohanlal fans demanding attention to him in the promotional footage, it would be difficult to hightlight the action aspect in the plot.

“We’re looking into it. We need to be fair to all our actors,” said Jain.