Alberto Gonzales: A Record of Injustice
As White House Counsel
GONZALES APPROVED MEMO AUTHORIZING TORTURE: An August 2002 Justice
Department memo "was vetted by a larger number of officials,
including...the White House counsel's office and Vice President
Cheney's office." According to Newsweek, the memo "was drafted after
White House meetings convened by George W. Bush's chief counsel,
Alberto Gonzales, along with Defense Department general counsel
William Haynes and [Cheney counsel] David Addington." The memo
included the opinion that laws prohibiting torture do "not apply to
the President's detention and interrogation of enemy combatants."
Further, the memo puts forth the opinion that the pain caused by an
interrogation must include "injury such as death, organ failure, or
serious impairment of body functions—in order to constitute torture."
The methods outlined in the memo "provoked concerns within the CIA
about possible violation of the federal torture law [and] also raised
concerns at the FBI, where some agents knew of the techniques being
used" overseas on high-level al Qaeda officials. [Gonzales 8/1/02
memo; WP, 6/27/04
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8534-2004Jun26.html
Newsweek, 6/21/04 http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5197853/site/newsweek
NYT, 6/27/04
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?
res=F60E14FB3C5C0C748EDDAF0894DC404482
GONZALES BELIEVES MANY GENEVA CONVENTIONS PROVISIONS ARE OBSOLETE: A
1/25/02 memo written by White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales said "the
war against terrorism is a new kind of war" and "this new paradigm
renders obsolete Geneva's strict limitations on questioning of enemy
prisoners and renders quaint some of its provisions." The memo pushes
to make al Qaeda and Taliban detainees exempt from the Geneva
Conventions' provisions on the proper, legal treatment of prisoners.
The administration has been adamant that prisoners at Guantanamo are
not protected by the Geneva Conventions. [Gonzales 1/25/02 memo;
Newsweek, 5/24/04 http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4989481/
GONZALES ADMITTED HIS VIEWS 'COULD UNDERMINE U.S. MILITARY CULTURE':
The 1/25/02 memo shows Alberto Gonzales was aware of the risk that
ignoring the Geneva Conventions could create for the military. One
concern expressed is that failing to apply the Geneva Conventions
"could undermine U.S. military culture which emphasizes maintaining
the highest standards of conduct in combat, and could introduce an
element of uncertainty in the status of adversaries," which is what
happened at Abu Ghraib. Secretary of State Colin Powell strongly
warned against taking this decision, as did lawyers from the Judge
Advocate General's Corps, or JAG. This week, a federal judge ruled
that "President Bush had both overstepped his constitutional bounds
and improperly brushed aside the Geneva Conventions" when he
established military tribunals in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to try
detainees as war criminals. [Gonzales 1/25/02 memo; Bloomberg, 6/14/04
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?
pid=10000039&refer=columnist_woolner&sid=aJEp1ExaMybo;
New York Times, 11/9/04
GONZALES BLOCKS INFORMATION FROM CONGRESS: Historically, senators have
been allowed to review some memoranda by judicial nominees. But, in a
letter [about nominee Miguel Estrada], Gonzales told the Democrats
that the administration would not produce the memos, because to do so
would chill free expression among administration lawyers and violate
the principle of executive privilege, which protects the internal
deliberations of the president's aides. [New Yorker, 5/19/03
http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?030526fa_fact
As Texas Chief Legal Counsel
DEATH PENALTY MEMOS: GONZALES'S NEGLIGENT COUNSEL: As chief legal
counsel for then-Gov. Bush in Texas, Gonzales was responsible for
writing a memo on the facts of each death penalty case – Bush decided
whether a defendant should live or die based on the memos. An
examination of the Gonzales memoranda by the Atlantic Monthly
concluded, "Gonzales repeatedly failed to apprise the governor of
crucial issues in the cases at hand: ineffective counsel, conflict of
interest, mitigating evidence, even actual evidence of innocence." His
memos caused Bush frequently to approve executions based on "only the
most cursory briefings on the issues in dispute." Rather than
informing the governor of the conflicting circumstances in a case,
"The memoranda seem attuned to a radically different posture, assumed
by Bush from the earliest days of his administration—one in which he
sought to minimize his sense of legal and moral responsibility for
executions." [Atlantic Monthly, July/August, 2003
http://www.fdp.dk/act/030928_texas_clemency.php
MEMORANDUM ON TERRY WASHINGTON: A CASE STUDY IN INCOMPETENCE: In his
briefing on death-row defendant Terry Washington – a mentally retarded
33-year-old man with the communication skills of a seven-year-old –
Gonzales devoted nearly a third of his three-page report to the
gruesome details of the crime, but referred "only fleetingly to the
central issue in Washington's clemency appeal—his limited mental
capacity, which was never disputed by the State of Texas—and
present[ed] it as part of a discussion of 'conflicting information'
about the condemned man's childhood." In addition, Gonzales "failed to
mention that Washington's mental limitations, and the fact that he and
his ten siblings were regularly beaten with whips, water hoses,
extension cords, wire hangers, and fan belts, were never made known to
the jury, although both the district attorney and Washington's trial
lawyer knew of this potentially mitigating evidence." Nor did he
mention that Washington's lawyer had "failed to enlist a mental-health
expert" to testify on Washington's behalf, even though "ineffective
counsel and mental retardation were in fact the central issues raised
in the thirty-page clemency petition" it was Gonzales's job to review.
This all came at a time when "demand was growing nationwide to ban
executions of the retarded." [Atlantic Monthly, July/August, 2003
http://www.fdp.dk/act/030928_texas_clemency.php
GONZALES TOLD GOV. BUSH HE COULD IGNORE INTERNATIONAL LAW: In 1997,
Alberto Gonzales wrote a memo for then Gov. Bush to justify
non-compliance with the Vienna Convention. The Vienna Convention,
ratified by the Senate in 1969, was "designed to ensure that foreign
nationals accused of a crime are given access to legal counsel by a
representative from their home country." Gonzales sent a letter to the
U.S. State Department in which he argued that the treaty didn't apply
to the State of Texas, as Texas was not a signatory to the Vienna
Convention. Two days later, Texas executed Mexican citizen Irineo
Tristan Montoya, despite Mexico's protestations that Texas had
violated Tristan's rights under the Vienna Convention by failing to
inform the Mexican consulate at the time of his arrest. (Slate,
6/15/04 http://slate.msn.com/id/2102416
GONZALES GETS BUSH OUT OF JURY DUTY TO KEEP DUI SECRET: In 1996, as
counsel to Gov. Bush, Gonzales helped to get him excused from jury
duty, "a situation that could have required the governor to disclose
his then-secret 1976 conviction for drunken driving in Maine."
Gonzales argued "that if Bush served, he would not, as governor, be
able to pardon the defendant in the future." [USA Today, 3/18/02
http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20020318/3948380s.htm
As Texas Supreme Court Justice
GONZALES DOES ENRON'S BIDDING: As an elected member of the Texas
Supreme Court, "Enron and Enron's law firm were Gonzales's biggest
contributors," giving him $35,450 in 2000. Overall, Gonzales raked in
$100,000 from the energy industry. In May 2000, "Gonzales was author
of a state Supreme Court opinion that handed the energy industry one
of its biggest Texas legal victories in recent history." Since Bush
brought him into the White House, Gonzales has worked doggedly to keep
secret the details of energy task force meetings held by Vice
President Cheney. [New York Daily News, 2/2/02 ]
ACCEPTING DONATIONS FROM LITIGANTS: In the weeks between hearing oral
arguments and making a decision in Henson v. Texas Farm Bureau Mutual
Insurance, Justice Alberto Gonzales collected a $2,000 contribution
premium from the Texas Farm Bureau (which runs the defendant insurance
company in this case). In another case, Gonzales pocketed a $2,500
contribution from a law firm defending the Royal Insurance company
just before hearing oral arguments in Embrey v. Royal Insurance.
[Texas for Public Justice
http://www.tpj.org/page_view.jsp?pageid=117&pubid=60
http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=246536
Smoking Gun - vote fraud
You may have seen the associated press story about the precinct in
Cuyahoga
county that had less than 1,000 voters, and gave Bush almost 4,000 extra
votes. But that turns out to be only the tip of a very ugly iceberg.
Last
night I got an email forwarded from someone who did some remarkably
careful
sleuthing, and discovered evidence which any reasonable court would
consider sufficient to invalidate the entire Ohio election. Here's an
edited version of the message I received.
In last Tuesday's election, 29 precincts in Cuyahoga County, Ohio,
reported
votes cast IN EXCESS of the number of registered voters - at least
93,136
extra votes total. And the numbers are right there on the official
Cuyahoga
County Board of Elections website:
Check out the numbers for the following precincts:
Bay Village - 13,710 registered voters / 18,663 ballots cast
Beachwood - 9,943 registered voters / 13,939 ballots cast
Bedford - 9,942 registered voters / 14,465 ballots cast
Bedford Heights - 8,142 registered voters / 13,512 ballots cast
Brooklyn - 8,016 registered voters / 12,303 ballots cast
Brooklyn Heights - 1,144 registered voters / 1,869 ballots cast
Chagrin Falls Village - 3,557 registered voters / 4,860 ballots cast
Cuyahoga Heights - 570 registered voters / 1,382 ballots cast
Fairview Park - 13,342 registered voters / 18,472 ballots cast
Highland Hills Village - 760 registered voters / 8,822 ballots cast
Independence - 5,735 registered voters / 6,226 ballots cast
Mayfield Village - 2,764 registered voters / 3,145 ballots cast
Middleburg Heights - 12,173 registered voters / 14,854 ballots cast
Moreland Hills Village - 2,990 registered voters / 4,616 ballots cast
North Olmstead - 25,794 registered voters / 25,887 ballots cast
Olmstead Falls - 6,538 registered voters / 7,328 ballots cast
Pepper Pike - 5,131 registered voters / 6,479 ballots cast
Rocky River - 16,600 registered voters / 20,070 ballots cast
Solon (WD6) - 2,292 registered voters / 4,300 ballots cast
South Euclid - 16,902 registered voters / 16,917 ballots cast
Strongsville (WD3) - 7,806 registered voters / 12,108 ballots cast
University Heights - 10,072 registered voters / 11,982 ballots cast
Valley View Village - 1,787 registered voters / 3,409 ballots cast
Warrensville Heights - 10,562 registered voters / 15,039 ballots cast
Woodmere Village - 558 registered voters / 8,854 ballots cast
Bedford (CSD) - 22,777 registered voters / 27,856 ballots cast
Independence (LSD) - 5,735 registered voters / 6,226 ballots cast
Orange (CSD) - 11,640 registered voters / 22,931 ballots cast
Warrensville (CSD) - 12,218 registered voters / 15,822 ballots cast
The Republicans are so BUSTED.
***
I don't believe anything I read in an unsolicited email, so I went to
the
URL given in the message, which is:
http://boe.cuyahogacounty.us/BOE/results/currentresults1.htm#top
Both figures are on the same webpage but not side by side like this. The
registered voter totals are at the top of page, where there is also a
link
labeled "Ballots Cast", which will take you directly to the final
election
results. You can click or scroll back and forth to compare the figures
for
each of the precincts listed above. I checked the first few figures in
the
list and they were correct.
This is the official website of the Cuyahoga county election board,
providing irrefutable evidence that the vote was off by at least 93,000.
Kerry lost Ohio by approximately 130,000, so this is not an
insignificant
figure that can be ignored, particularly when there are numerous other
indications of voter fraud in Ohio and elsewhere. I think the only
possible
alternative is to invalidate the entire Ohio election, if not the entire
national election.
<http://michiganimc.org/usermedia/image/12/2009.jpg>
November 3 - Toledo, Ohio Hundreds
of angry Ohio residents marched through the
streets of Columbus-Ohio's Capital-this
evening and stormed the Ohio State House, defying
orders and arrest threats from Ohio
State Troopers. "O-H-I-O ! suppressed democracy
has got to go,"they chanted. After
troopers pushed and scuffled with people, nearly
a hundred people took over the steps and
entrance to the State's giant white column
capital building and refused repeated orders to
disperse or face arrest. People prepared for
arrests, ready to face jail-writing lawyers
phone numbers on their arms, signing jail support
lists and discussing non-cooperation and
active resistance (linking arms, but not fighting
back). also: Photos
<http://cleveland.indymedia.org/news/2004/11/13109.php>
What everyone should know about preferential voting
Duverger's Law: The first-past-the-post (plurality) election system
naturally leads to a two-party system. It acts to delay the emergence
of a new political force, and accelerates the elimination of a
weakening force, where proportional representation would have the
opposite effect.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger's_law
The plurality system of voting we use in the U.S. causes a "spoiler
effect" because voters who favor a third-party candidate worry that if
they vote for their preferred candidate they may actually be helping to
elect a different candidate they strongly dislike, thus making
third-party candidates "spoilers." Instead, voters often vote for their
second or third choice candidate, known as "strategic voting" or
"choosing the lesser of two evils."
Good voting systems elect the candidate most favored by the most voters
while allowing voters to vote their true preference and eliminating the
need to vote strategically.
Voting systems such as plurality do not meet this basic standard. They
fail one of the most widely accepted and critical tests for voting
systems, known as monotonicity, which states: with the relative order
or rating of the other candidates unchanged, voting a candidate higher
should never cause the candidate to lose, nor should voting a candidate
lower ever cause the candidate to win.
electionmethods.org/evaluation.htm
Preferential voting systems, such as Ranked Pairs, remove the spoiler
effect completely, and make every vote count no matter who it is cast
for. If such a system were implemented in the U.S. it would allow
alternative parties to compete in national elections. Variations of
such systems are used successfully by democracies throughout the world.
For more information on this important structural reform check out:
http://www.barnsdle.demon.co.uk/vote/vote.html
http://www.condorcet.org/rp/index.shtml
http://www.electionmethods.org
http://www.umich.edu/~cses/
http://www.fairvote.org
http://www.cfer.org/
http://accuratedemocracy.com/voting_rules.htm
http://worldpolicy.org/globalrigh...emocracy/table-pr.html
Happy Firefox 1.0 Day! Firefox is a web browser that is "taking back
the web." I
t is faster, more secure and easier than Internet Explorer. If you use
Internet
Explorer, please download and try firefox. You can download it at:
http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/all.html
for different operating systems and in different languages, including
English.
This is something you might want to broadcast to anybody who does not
want popup
s, spyware or viruses intruding through the insecure Internet Explorer B
rowser.
This is a massive sweeping gesture by the open source community, backed
strangel
y by our favorite media mogul AOL/Time Warner, in an effort to leg-up
on their c
ompetitor, MSNBC.
At any rate, please if you like Firefox spread the word. This is a good
thing. Mike
PRESS! PRESS! PRESS! PRESS! PRESS!
SUBJECT: New Election Contest Yahoogroup, 200 Members Strong!
A California paralegal and activist has formed a Yahoo Message Board to
gather evidence, and recruit Plaintiffs and lawyers to sue Ohio,
Florida,
and other states to overturn the results of the November 2, 2004
election.
Hank Ramey, who have previously worked on locall recalls in Baldwin
Park,
and Bell Gardens, and who will work on recalling California Governor
Arnold
Schwarzeneggar after this election dispute is over with, has formed
Yahoo
Message Board called People-v-Ohio-n-Florida last Thursday. The purpose
of
the group is to:
1. Gather evidence.
2. Recruit Plaintiffs.
3. Recruit legal groups.
4. Recruit lawyers.
5. Sue the states that have resulted in the fraudulent election of
George
Bush, including Ohio, Florida, Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, New Mexico,
Nevada,
North Carolina or others.
6. Obtain Judgments in favor of Senators John Kerry (D-Massachusetts)
and
John Edwardss (D-North Carolina).
7. Pray that Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist retires.
The Group has recently requested the SternAndMore group on Yahoo to
request
them and Shock Jock Howard Stern to bring in 4,000,000 Members to
People-v-Ohio-n-Florida.
Ramey is asking people to donate to blackboxvoting.org, the ACLU, and
other
groups to keep the evidence gathering going, and he is asking his own
members to send the group $3 each to pay the upkeep on internet
operations.
The group is still trying to gather evidence, and many of its Ohio
Member
will participate in stating testimony this weekend before Michael
Moore's
group to investigate Ohio voter fraud.
CONTACT:
Hank Ramey
People-v-Ohio-n-Florida-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
recallarnold.blogspot.com <http://recallarnold.blogspot.com/>
21845 Grand Terrace Rd., #23
Grand Terrace, CA., 92313
TEL.: (909) 872-1826
------- End of forwarded message -------
KG6TXH
--------------------------------------
ANOMALOUS IMAGES AND UFO FILES
http://www.anomalous-images.com
2004 ELECTION FRAUD!
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/11/05/voting.problems.ap/index.html
http://ustogether.org/Florida_Election.htm
http://www.onnnews.com/Global/story.asp?S=2524952
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20041105/ap_on_el_pr/
voting_problems
http://www.commondreams.org/news2004/1104-07.htm
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1106-30.htm
http://blog.radioleft.com/blog/_archives/2004/11/5/175844.html
http://www.blackboxvoting.org
http://www.wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,65623,00.html
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/11/08/1513252
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=4175
http://www.democraticunderground.com/
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1106-30.htm
http://www.nashuatelegraph.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041106/
NEWS02/111060040/-1/news
http://www.conspiracyplanet.com/channel.cfm?channelid=31&contentid=1642
http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/printer_13375.shtml
http://www.washingtondispatch.com/spectrum/archives/000715.html
http://www-personal.engin.umd.umich.edu/~asatanov/fraud/
http://www.ultimatetaxi.com/board/messages/389.html
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/politics/content/news/epaper/2004/11/05/
a29a_BROWVOTE_1105.html
http://www.alternet.org/election04/20416/
ReDefeatBush is calling on opponents of the Bush Administration to
rally at
LaFayette Park in front of the White House on THURSDAY at noon to
protest
both the suspicious and highly selective mismanagement of the 2004
election
by local authorities in Florida and Ohio as well as the escalation of
the
war in Iraq with the massacre underway in Fallujah. See
http://www.iraqalypsenow.com for more details about the
protest. Participants are being asked to bring noisemakers and
friends.
Our goals are to get the national news media to see the crimes
against
democracy committed in Ohio and Florida as part of a pattern designed
to
benefit Bush rather than reporting them as isolated, local, minor
glitches,
and to get Americans to face the truth about Iraq and about the huge
deception of World War I and every war since then -- that one more
war will
bring peace. Please post this message widely.
-- David
David Lytel, founder
http://www.ReDefeatBush.com |
