White House Theatrics

If you don't know much about the FBI searching a Democratic congressman's office last week and the ensuing battle over separation of powers, read this comprehensive msnbc story.

Now that everything's heating up, with even Bush supporters questioning the legality of this raid, the top 3 people in the Justice Department are making threats of resignation if they are ordered to return the stuff they seized during that raid. The biggest fish among them is Alberto Gonzales, Attorney General. I think they've been asses about the whole thing, but if they want to resign, I'm not going to stop them. Remember, this is Alberto "killa" Gonzales, the guy who thinks the stuff practiced at Abu Ghraib was legal, that sending prisoners to other countries and then looking the other way as they're tortured is fine, and that the Geneva Conventions don't apply to prisoners if you don't want them to. If Bush is forced to find a replacement for him with his current approval ratings... well, let's just say that replacement shouldn't be to controversial. The other two I don't know so much about, but if they're on Killa's side they can't be too good.

That said, I'd be surprised if anybody resigned over this. Now for more opinions.

I'm on the side of this debate that thinks the executive branch has, yet again, greatly overstepped it's bounds. I believe that somebody should be able to enforce the laws and investigate possible criminal activity, but having the FBI raid the guy's office and take whatever they want is too much. This practice of having the federal law enforcement raid the office of an opposition politician is usually one reserved for dictators and Vladimir Putin.

An example of how this should've gone can be seen in the investigation into Scooter Libby and Karl Rove. The prosecutor was investigating a crime, so he'd do things like calling Libby and Rove in to testify, possibly issuing subpoenas for some stuff he felt he needed to look at. He didn't have the FBI raid their offices because nobody would've stood for it. His career would've been over, and he'd probably be in jail.

You know, supposedly, the FBI has a video of this Democrat accepting $100k from an informant, and they then found $90k of it in his freezer at home. If I were faced with this proof and I knew I was guilty, I'd fess up, like that Republican in California a couple months ago. The fact that Mr. Jefferson still maintains his innocence makes me suspicious of the whole thing. That said, even though he's a Democrat, I don't have a lot of faith in his progressiveness because he's from the south (Louisiana).

I guess I'm done, have a nice weekend.