Cheney blocked Justice official’s promotion.

[cal04]

Vice President Dick Cheney blocked the promotion of a Justice Department official involved in a bedside standoff over President Bush’s eavesdropping program, a Senate committee learned Wednesday.”

In a written account, former Deputy Attorney General James Comey said Cheney warned Attorney General Alberto Gonzales that he would oppose the promotion of a department official who once threatened to resign over the program.

Gonzales eventually decided against trying to promote Patrick Philbin to principal deputy solicitor general, Comey said.

“I understood that someone at the White House communicated to Attorney General Gonzales that the vice president would oppose the appointment if the attorney general pursued the matter,” Comey wrote. “The attorney general chose not to pursue it.”

Philbin was one of two Justice Department officials who led a review of the classified program and provided some of the research that led Comey to refuse to endorse it, Comey said.

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/06/06/cheney-blocked-justice-officials-promotion/

Cheney blocked official's promotion
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070607/ap_on_go_co/fired_prosecutors

[jazzjunkysue]

1. Let me be the first, but certainly not the last. #1. n/t.

[sabra]

2. I wonder if Cheney threatened to take Gonzo "hunting" -- rec'd

[BuyingThyme]

3. How the fuck does a fucking vice president get to block anyfuckingthing?

[jazzjunkysue]

15. They don't usually get to choose carpeting, or drapes, do they?

But in this case, it's "Pay no attention to the vampire behind the curtain."

(I just can't call it a man.)

[proud patriot]

4. GRRRRRRRRRRRRR

:grr:

[BuyingThyme]

5. There's got to be a way to weave obstruction of justice into this thing.

Anybody care to?

[Patsy Stone]

6. Off to the Greatest!

K&R

[babylonsister]

7. Time for a lil chat with Patrick Philbin; the plot thickens - again! nt

[librechik]

8. please let this grow legs like Imus

my spider sense is tingling

we need a witness (someone in the WH" is not good enough. Gonzo will have his chance to lie again.

[Swamp Rat]

9. k&r

[Fridays Child]

10. k/r

[renate]

11. what does this part mean?

"Ok to send up directly to me, outside of system," Goodling wrote in a Jan. 19, 2006, e-mail to Paul Corts, the assistant attorney general for administration.

Does that prove conclusively that there was an established, routinely used procedure for circumventing the official communication system? Which is, what's the word...illegal.

Also, I think it's worth noting that "Cheney blocked official's promotion" is the title used by Yahoo. Since such a big deal has been made about the improper influence of the executive branch on the Justice Department, it seems kind of significant that Yahoo would state the facts of the story so baldly--is it?

[BuyingThyme]

12. Yes and yes.

(Me thinks.)

[Marie26]

13. K&R

We've gotten so used to this, it's not even shocking anymore - but weren't Vice-Presidents supposed to just go to funerals? How did this one end up running the country? This is just scary.

[Disturbed]

14. The Goodling session was real inadequate.

She should be called up again. Darth needs to be Impeached, as does Gonzo. Will Congress have the spine to do so?

[originalpckelly]

16. Oh wait...

I didn't.

Damn!

[hootinholler]

17. Once again the Senate catches up with DU. n/t

[bleever]

21. It's nice to see a trail we cleared out of the brush

mean something.

And it keeps happening.

[cal04]

18. WP:Official: Cheney Urged Wiretaps

Stand-In for Ashcroft Alleges Interference

Vice President Cheney told Justice Department officials that he disagreed with their objections to a secret surveillance program during a high-level White House meeting in March 2004, a former senior Justice official told senators yesterday.

The meeting came one day before White House officials tried to get approval for the same program from then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft, who lay recovering from surgery in a hospital, according to former deputy attorney general James B. Comey.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/06/AR2007060602297.html?hpid=topnews

[UTUSN]

19. Can this war criminal - a.k.a. "chenee" - be TRIED - now?!!1 n/t

[KoKo]

20. Okay....What's the next step. It's scary that Comey still won't say WHAT this program was.

and that NOW the program is ongoing under "another Department" according to the article. How do we know that what they supposedly FIXED (Comey) wasn't undone when the program was moved out of Justice Dept. Supervision?

AND...what the hell is a Vice President doing running this own intelligence operation and meddling in the affairs of the Justice Department? If this was Al Gore or any other VP they would have been long gone.

Shows that the P-Resident is the very pupped that we on the liberal internets have been saying since he was "installed." He's only a ceremonial President. It was Dick Cheney who was installed P-Resident and that was the PLAN all along.

That everyone has participated in this massive power grab by a VP...that includes both our Repugs and Dems is disgusting. Our Congress had to know this from the beginning but Daschle did Nothing...even when Jeffords switched parties and neither did the House ...to stop this.

They had to know that Cheney was VP...why did they allow any of this?

I hope that this is a smoking gun for Cheney. There's just too much piling up...but WaPo puts in on Page A-3 and most Americans just don't get the WaPo and will never hear about it. Most Americans didn't get Watergate either until Nixon had to resign...so I guess there's some hope there.... HOPE!