Gonzales Evades Criminal Prosecution for Misleading Congress on NSA spying

[Hissyspit]

http://rawstory.com/2009/11/gonzales-evades-criminal-prosecution-misleading-congress-nsa-program

Gonzales Evades Criminal Prosecution for Misleading Congress on NSA spying

By raw999
Tuesday, November 24th, 2009 -- 2:51 am
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The Justice Department has concluded that there is insufficient evidence to bring criminal charges against former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales for allegedly misleading Congress about the Bush administration’s warrantless eavesdropping program.

The decision was first disclosed yesterday on the blog of New York Magazine. The magazine cited public court records and federal law enforcement officials as its sources.

Although Gonzales remains under investigation by the Justice Department for two other matters, it had been allegations that he gave false or purposely misleading testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee about the warrantless eavesdropping program that placed him by far in the greatest legal jeopardy.

In not bringing criminal charges, however, investigators for the Department’s Inspector General, which conducted the investigation, hardly let Gonzales off the hook completely. They concluded that Gonzales testimony before Congress about the eavesdropping program was “confusing,” “incomplete’ and had the “effect of misleading” both Congress and the public.

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[leveymg]

1. Read this with another news item: Obama quietly backing extension of PATRIOT Act

opposed by Russ Feingold and a few others.

Obama Quietly Backs Patriot Act Provisions

NEW YORK - With the health care debate preoccupying the mainstream media, it has gone virtually unreported that the Barack Obama administration is quietly supporting renewal of provisions of the George W. Bush-era USA Patriot Act that civil libertarians say infringe on basic freedoms.

And it is reportedly doing so over the objections of some prominent Democrats.

When a panicky Congress passed the act 45 days after the terrorist attacks of Sep. 11, 2001, three contentious parts of the law were scheduled to expire at the end of next month, and opponents of these sections have been pushing Congress to substitute new provisions with substantially strengthened civil liberties protections.

But with the apparent approval of the Obama White House and a number of Republicans – and over the objections of liberal Senate Democrats including Russ Feingold of Wisconsin and Dick Durbin of Illinois – the Senate Judiciary Committee has voted to extend the three provisions with only minor changes.

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/11/23-6

The Total Information State is now permanent. The Fourth Amendment never recovered consciousness after the crash.