Kagro X has a post up at Daily Kos entitled “This will make Watergate look like child’s play.” It’s about Don Siegelman, the former Democratic governor of Alabama who was allegedly the target of a political prosecution by the Republicans. The facts are still being developed and I’m citing to a Daily Kos page, so I don’t expect anyone to take this as gospel. But, if true, the implications are astounding.

Siegelman was prosecuted for allegedly trading government favors for campaign donations when he was governor from 1999 to 2003 and lieutenant governor from 1995 to 1999, and HealthSouth CEO, Richard Scrushy was accused of arranging $500,000 in donations to Siegelman’s campaign for a state lottery in exchange for a seat on a state hospital regulatory board.

There are allegations that Karl Rove planned on neutralizing Siegelman politically through federal prosecutions. The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ordered Siegelman released from prison pending his appeal, finding that he had raised substantial questions of law and fact demonstrating the potential that the trial court had committed clear error.

In isolation, this wouldn’t be that big of a deal. However, you see something similar in the case of Georgia Thompson who was released from prison after the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals determined, upon review, that the prosecution’s evidence had been “beyond thin” in the words of one of the judges.

Then, you have the Attorney General purges under the leadership of professional amnesiac Alberto Gonzales who resigned under the pressure of an investigation into whether United States Attorneys were fired for not pursuing politically motivated and timed corruption prosecutions.

Perverting the justice system, imprisoning people, and ruining lives for political gain makes G. Gordon Liddy’s break into Democratic headquarters look like an April Fool’s joke by comparison. Again, file under, “interesting, if true.”

Hillary Clinton won big in a more or less meaningless primary race in West Virginia — points in garbage time to cover the spread, I suppose.

Of greater interest tonight is the fact that a Democrat won in a special election in Mississippi. Travis Childers beat Roger Wicker in Mississippi’s first district. That seat opened up when Roger Wicker vacated the seat for an appointment to the Senate. (I believe the Senate seat opened up when Trent Lott stepped down.)

Bush took 63% of the vote over John Kerry in 2004 in that district. This follows on the heels of special election losses by Republicans in two other normally safe seats — Hastert’s old seat in Illinois and Richard Baker’s old seat in Louisiana. One would think things will tighten up by November when all the campaigning makes the electorate say “to hell with all of them;” but at the rate things are going, Dan Burton can probably still feel safe, but the rest of the Indiana GOP delegation has to be getting a little skittish. If a Democrat can get elected in a 63% Bush district, it can plausibly happen just about anywhere.

Indiana isn’t the only state that gets goofy with the license plates. Florida is considering one with the phrase “I believe” and pictures of a cross and a stained-glass window. The plate’s proponent says he would oppose a similar plate for atheists stating, “I don’t believe.”

Personally, I’ve had enough of the specialty plates generally, and the constant drum beat of a certain vocal minority of Christians trying to mark their territory by seeking government endorsement of their religion is quite annoying.

Sylvia Smith, writing for the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, has a story on the Alternative Minimum Tax. The AMT is a secondary calculation on tax obligations, originally designed so that rich people paid at least some tax if they were too successful using exemptions and the like for tax avoidance. Unfortunately, the AMT was not indexed to inflation and now threatens middle class tax payers. In years past, Congress has passed band-aid fixes that temporarily exempt taxpayers of more modest means.

This year, Republicans are blocking Democratic efforts to save middle class taxpayers from the AMT because the Democrats’ proposals involve taxing wealthy taxpayers more heavily to avoid increasing deficit spending.

According to the Tax Policy Center, a joint program of the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution, nearly half of all taxpayers with incomes less than $100,000 will have to pay the millionaires’ tax next year unless Congress changes the law. This year, fewer than 1 percent of those taxpayers were subject to the alternative minimum tax.

The idea behind the alternative minimum tax, enacted nearly 40 years ago to prevent 155 very rich families from sheltering most of their income, was to make sure everyone paid a minimum amount.
. . .
The House bill includes higher taxes for some well-off people to offset the cost of the patch because Democrats have insisted any new spending or tax cuts be paid for.

Bush says he will veto the House bill. Mark Souder is opposed to the bill because he would prefer to add to the deficit than tax the wealthy. Mark Souder: Champion of Red-ink Republicanism.

It’s a legitimate debate as to who should pay taxes:
Current status – Middle class taxpayers.
Democratic preference – Rich taxpayers.
Republican preference – Our kids (with interest).

Sylvia Smith, writing for the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, has an article on the stalled farm bill. Apparently there are currently two competing farm bills, both of which have problems. Senator Lugar wants to amend the current version to end the crop subsidy program and replace it with a crop insurance program.

Reminds me of the old jokes about farmers’ clothes.
“Why do farmers have bills on their caps?”
“To shade their eyes enough to see the government check in the mailbox.”

“Why do farmers have a loop on the back of their boots?”
“So they can pull it out of your ass if you give them crap about their government checks.”

Something like that. I may have butchered the jokes.

Still, there are a lot of free market champions in Washington who get a bit of economic amnesia when the farm bill rolls around every so often.

Paul Krugman explains how the sainted Ronald Reagan didn’t really have a Southern Strategy at all. It was all just a series of Innocent mistakes.

Michael Mukasey was approved by the Senate as the next Attorney General. The issue calling his confirmation into question was the fact that he refused to commit to the proposition that drowning an interrogation subject constituted torture. (Technically not drowning, but “waterboarding” in which the subject only thinks he or she is drowning.)

Among those who are comfortable with such ambiguity in America’s position on torture are Indiana’s own Evan Bayh and Richard Lugar. Not voting on the confirmation were Presidential candidates Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Chris Dodd, John McCain, and Barack Obama.

I tend to agree with Patrick Leahy on this. He suggests that Mukasey is a solid individual, but moral ambiguity on torture is unacceptable. Leahy said, “I am not going to aid and abet the confirmation contortions of this administration. I do not vote to allow torture.” He spoke at more length during the committee hearings:

Nothing is more fundamental to our constitutional democracy than our basic notion that no one is above the law. This Administration has undercut that precept time after time. They are now trying to do it again, with an issue as fundamental as whether the United States of America will join the ranks of those governments that approve of torture. This President and Vice President should not be allowed to violate our obligations under the Convention Against Torture and the Geneva Conventions or disregard U.S. statutes such as our Detainee Treatment Act and War Crimes Act. They should not be allowed to overturn more than 200 years of our Nation’s human rights and moral leadership around the world.

The Administration has compounded its lawlessness by cloaking its policies and miscalculations under a veil of secrecy, leaving Congress, the courts, and the American people in the dark about what they are doing. The President says that we do not torture, but had his lawyers redefine torture down in secret memos, in fundamental conflict with American values and law. …

Some have sought to find comfort in Judge Mukasey’s personal assurance that he would enforce a future, new law against waterboarding if this Congress were to pass one. Unsaid, of course, is the fact that any such prohibition would have to be enacted over the veto of this President.

But the real damage of this argument is not its futility. The real harm is that it presupposes that we do not already have laws and treaty obligations against waterboarding. In fact, we do. No Senator should abet this Administration’s legalistic obfuscations by those such as Alberto Gonzales, John Yoo, and David Addington by agreeing that the laws on the books do not already make waterboarding illegal. We have been prosecuting water torture for more than 100 years. …

I wish that I could support Judge Mukasey’s nomination. I like Michael Mukasey. But this is an Administration that has been acting outside the law and an Administration that has now created a “confirmation contortion.” When many of us voted to confirm General Petreas, the Administration turned around and, for political advantage, tried to claim that when we voted to confirm the nominee, we also voted for the President’s war policies. Just as I do not support this President’s Iraq policy, I do not support his torture policy or his views of unaccountability or unlimited Executive power.

No one is more eager to restore strong leadership and independence to the Department of Justice than I. What we need most right now is an Attorney General who believes and understands that there must be limitations on Executive power. America needs to be certain of the bedrock principles in our laws and our values that no President and no American can be authorized to violate. Accordingly, I vote no on the President’s nomination.

Rep. Kucinich’s resolution seeking the impeachment of Dick Cheney has moved to the judiciary committee. I suspect that’s where it will die without any substantial consideration, but let’s take a look at the allegations, consider whether they are true and, if so, whether they warrant impeachment. The first article lays a case for the assertion that Dick Cheney manipulated intelligence and made misleading statements to the American people in an effort to get us into a war with Iraq. The Second article alleges that Dick Cheney mislead the American people about the nature of the relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda in an effort to get us into a war with Iraq. The Third alleges that he is now threatening aggression against Iran without any real evidence of a threat.

Some of the supporting allegations after the fold.

[Read more…]