We know that in August an investigation of Jack Abramson's corrupt activities in Guam was stopped, by the demotion of acting United States attorney for Guam, Frederick A. Black.
We now know, from the Washington Post, "that a team justice department lawyers and analysts who reviewed a Georgia voter-identification law recommended rejecting it because it was likely to discriminate against black voters, but they were overruled the next day by higher-ranking officials at Justice, according to department documents.
We now know that when the non-partisan investigators at the Justice Department concluded that the efforts to gerrymander changes in the voting district configurations in Texas, outside of the normal ten year cycle, were illegal, and that political appointees nixed what would have been a normal process of blocking the changes. The WaPo reported:
Justice Department lawyers concluded that the landmark Texas congressional redistricting plan spearheaded by Rep. Tom DeLay (R) violated the Voting Rights Act, according to a previously undisclosed memo obtained by The Washington Post. But senior officials overruled them and approved the plan.The memo, unanimously endorsed by six lawyers and two analysts in the department's voting section, said the redistricting plan illegally diluted black and Hispanic voting power in two congressional districts. It also said the plan eliminated several other districts in which minorities had a substantial, though not necessarily decisive, influence in elections.
"The State of Texas has not met its burden in showing that the proposed congressional redistricting plan does not have a discriminatory effect," the memo concluded.
We know that the republicans and the Bush administration have been trying to destroy the government infrastructure. They've been putting hundreds of judges intot he judicial system who have no respect for the constitution, and who put corporations and religions above constitutional rights and safeguards.
We've seen the Bush administration aggressively attack the media, using lies, dirty tactics and crooked administrators to destroy an independent press, to eliminate journalists with the guts to ask tough questions, to destroy public radio as an independent entity.
Many of us know that the election vote counting system is broken. We've seen how there have been a multitude of successful efforts to corrupt voter rights to vote, to keep minorities from voting.
What do we do when the organizations designed to protect the nation are corrupted? Who do you call when the "police" are part of the problem, when the judges are in on the game? This is not the first time such a situation has developed.But the worse it gets, the less options available through the justice and legal systems, the fewer the choices.
One relatively easy thing that could make a difference is if the majority of the democrats acted together to confront the corrupt, criminal assault on our nation. We should expect to lose a few false Democrats, like Lieberman,and maybe Biden, Schumer and Nelson. But if most of the congressional democrats and most of the senate democrats take a stand, together, if they come together. So far they have been a pathetic group of snivelling, non-cooperating,non-team playing loners who have failed to build upon the enormous opportunity as the American people have awakened the the Bush/Republican corruption. If we can get the message to them that they need to work together on specific strategies-- starting the ball rolling on impeachment, making a lot more noise about investigating the corruption that has come to light, including shutting down the senate for closed meetings, like Harry Ried did once. The report that the shutdown was about never came out. They should be doing it every day.
The Dems should pull together on rejecting Alito, after seeing how bad the justice department already is. Alito has been shown to be a right wing extremist who was worse than our fears. There is no way he should be allowed to become the replacement for O'Connor. The Democrats should force Bush to appoint a truly honest person without the kinds of agendas Alito and his ilk have. There are people Americans respect who would be widely acclaimed as great choices. The democrats owe it to America to tough this one out, include the ones from red states.
The only way the democrats in congress will pull together is if WE pull together. It is great that MoveOn.org is talking about backing someone to run against Lieberman in his next election primary. We need to do the same with all the Republicrats who vote with Republicans-- identify and fund strong opponents and fire their incumbent butts. And while we are working at it, we need to make a lot of noise doing it. Democrats need to be clear that they are cleaning up their acts, that the Democratic party is cleaning up its act and taking solid, visionary positions where, before, it waffled. Howard Dean might be able to pull it off. But we need to keep his feet to the fire too.
And while we're at it, let's get rid of the rot that starts at the top-- the attorney general who we know has supported torture, Alberto Gonzalez.
