Breaking: Bush to name Homeland Security Sec at 10 a.m.

[Catchawave]

see:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/

[elehhhhna]

1. Prolly hafta resched. when they tell him Gotti's dead.

[AFSCME girl]

4. heheh...

wonder what criminal he'll come up with this time? :shrug:

[nickinSTL]

2. Michael Chertoff

According to CNN.

In the red breaking news banner http://www.cnn.com

Apparently a federal appeals court judge.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

3. Michael Chertoff ....

Googlers - start your engines!!

[tlcandie]

6. Resume...

http://www.usdoj.gov/olp/chertoffresume.htm

<snip>
Birth: November 28, 1953 Elizabeth, New Jersey

Legal Residence: New Jersey

Education: 1971 - 1975 Harvard University
A.B. degree magna cum laude

1975 - 1978 Harvard Law School
J.D. degree magna cum laude

Bar Admittance: 1980 District of Columbia
1987 New York
1990 New Jersey

Experience: 1978 Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin
Summer Associate

1978 - 1979 Law Clerk to the Hon. Murray Gurfein
United States Court of Appeals
Second Circuit

1979 - 1980 Law Clerk to the Hon. William J. Brennan, Jr.
Supreme Court of the United States

1980 - 1983 Latham & Watkins
Associate

1983 - 1987 United States Attorney’s Office
Southern District of New York
Assistant United States Attorney

1987 - 1994 United States Attorney’s Office
District of New Jersey
First Assistant United States Attorney, 1987-1990
United States Attorney, 1990-1994

1994 - 1996 United States Senate
Special Counsel for Whitewater Committee

1994 - 2001 Latham & Watkins
Partner

2001 - present United States Department of Justice
Assistant Attorney General
Criminal Division

http://www.counterpunch.org/cassel06112003.html
Spreading Mischief from DoJ to the Federal Bench

<snip>
But now I have a new gremlin to watch, someone who is as intent on undermining the law and Constitution as Ashcroft. I am referring to the man behind the criminal prosecution of terrorists, Michael Chertoff. Chertoff, former chief of the Justice Department's criminal division, and a scary looking guy if ever there was one, has been elevated to the level of Court of Appeals judge--the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals, whose jurisdiction includes Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. What's so scary about Michael? Well, besides having no judicial experience and being a right-ring radical who does not believe in the Constitution and wants to rewrite federal law and rules of procedure on an ad hoc, case by case basis, as it suits him, nothing I guess.

A good place to look for Chertoff's legal philosophy is in the prosecution of Zacarias Moussaoui , now taking place in the Eastern District of Virginia. Chertoff is not the prosecutor of course, Paul McNulty of the Eastern District is. But Chertoff is McNulty's boss and he is calling the shots. So Chertoff argued the government's case in the super secret hearing before the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals last week. The government is trying to block trial judge Leonie Brinkema's ruling that Moussaoui and his lawyers have access to the government's star witnesses against him. The government has refused and appealed. Judge Brinkema, who still believes in the Constitution, rightly ruled that to deny Moussaoui that access is a blatant violation of the Sixth Amendment right to confront witnesses.
<snip>

<snip>
I have the answer, and it lies in Chertoff. Chertoff's goal, I believe, and the goal of Ashcroft and Bush in supporting this prosecution in federal court, is to subject federal trials, as they see fit, to ad hoc exemptions of whatever laws (be they constitutional, criminal code, or rules of procedure) that will suit their purposes. Their grand scheme is to ultimately cripple and dismantle the federal courts as we know them, one brick at a time.
<snip>

Prepared Statement of the Honorable Michael Chertoff
Assistant Attorney General, Criminal Division
U.S. Department of Justice
Hearing on "The Financial War on Terrorism and the Administration's Implementation
of the Anti-Money Laundering Provisions of the USA Patriot Act."

http://banking.senate.gov/02_01hrg/012902/chertoff.htm



STATEMENT OF

MICHAEL CHERTOFF

ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERALCRIMINAL DIVISION

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

JUNE 12, 2001
http://www.iwar.org.uk/ecoespionage/resources/house-cybercrime/chertoff_061201.htm

[rainbow4321]

11. His bio...including his role in Whitewater

http://www.allianceforjustice.org/judicial/research_publications/research_documents/Chertoff_Report.pdf


Uh-oh, also in this..snippit from his bio history about the questioning of a guy in California:

"no general constitutional right to be free of coercive police questioning"

[liveoaktx]

5. Does this mean Alberto *Torture Pimp* did his job and vetted whosits?

unlike the incompetent job he did with Kerik?

[Mari333]

7. He is an asshole

http://www.counterpunch.org/cassel06112003.html

[UpInArms]

8. related: Chertoff to be named head of homeland security: AP

http://cbs.marketwatch.com/news/newsfinder/pulseone.asp?dateid=38363.4054956944-830843228&siteID=mktw&scid=0&doctype=806&

WASHINGTON (CBS.MW) -- Federal Appeals Court Judge Michael Chertoff will be appointed secretary of homeland security by President Bush, the Associated Press reported Tuesday, citing administation officials. Chertoff would replace former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge at head of the agency responsible for defending the nation against terrorism. Chertoff was an assistant attorney general in charge of the criminal division of the Justice Department earlier in Bush's administration. Bush's initial pick for the job, former New York Police Commissioner, Bernard Kerik, withdrew his name from consideration after legal problems surfaced.

[Catchawave]

9. Who is Michael Chertoff (Freep article link dated 1996)

http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3aaee96d398b.htm

News/Current Events News
Source: THE WEEKLY STANDARD
Published: JANUARY 29, 1996 Author: Matthew Rees
Posted on 03/13/2001 19:45:49 PST by martoni
Date: 25 Jan 1996 WHO IS MICHAEL CHERTOFF? by Matthew Rees MICHAEL CHERTOFF, CHIEF COUNSEL TO the Senate Whitewater Committee can make smart people look stupid. Fade back to the summer of 1995. He is getting his first crack at the Clinton inner circle in the matter of the death of Vincent Foster, deputy White House counsel, two years before. In an intense cross-examination, he asks Susan Thomases, New York lawyer and close friend of Hillary Clinton, why she was notified before President Clinton of the discovery of a torn up note in Foster's briefcase six days after his death. She explains that the president was out of town. Most lawyers would follow up by asking why the president's being away presented a problem. But Chertoff commands a more expeditious means of torpedoing her explanation: He points out that Thomases herself was out of town.

more....

[Whoa_Nelly]

10. Chertoff article from 2003

http://www.opednews.com/cassel_michael_chertoff.htm

Michael Chertoff: Ashcroft's Top Gremlin;
Spreading Mischief from DoJ to the Federal Bench
By Elaine Cassel OpeEdNews.com June 16, 2003


I have been watching John Ashcroft so long that it is getting to be a little boring. Promising to use all available means to "fight terrorism," prosecuting every violation of law "to the fullest extent of the law," desperately wanting the death penalty for every possible offense, and, according to his remarks last week before the Senate Judiciary committee, wanting laws changed to impose the death penalty for even more offenses. Ashcroft changes law and procedure by signing Executive Orders, and yes, he can get away with that unless a court stops him. So far, no court has. Some congressional members, damn few, express mild dismay at his tactics, such as locking up resident aliens after 9/11 and holding some of them for months without access to family or lawyers (or charges), then deporting many on the most technical visa violations (some of them the fault of INS, over which he has authority). It never ends-the Ashcroft watch. It only gets worse, and more frightening.

But now I have a new gremlin to watch, someone who is as intent on undermining the law and Constitution as Ashcroft. I am referring to the man behind the criminal prosecution of terrorists, Michael Chertoff. Chertoff, former chief of the Justice Department's criminal division, and a scary looking guy if ever there was one, has been elevated to the level of Court of Appeals judge--the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals, whose jurisdiction includes Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. What's so scary about Michael? Well, besides having no judicial experience and being a right-ring radical who does not believe in the Constitution and wants to rewrite federal law and rules of procedure on an ad hoc, case by case basis, as it suits him, nothing I guess.

A good place to look for Chertoff's legal philosophy is in the prosecution of Zacarias Moussaoui , now taking place in the Eastern District of Virginia. Chertoff is not the prosecutor of course, Paul McNulty of the Eastern District is. But Chertoff is McNulty's boss and he is calling the shots. So Chertoff argued the government's case in the super secret hearing before the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals last week. The government is trying to block trial judge Leonie Brinkema's ruling that Moussaoui and his lawyers have access to the government's star witnesses against him. The government has refused and appealed. Judge Brinkema, who still believes in the Constitution, rightly ruled that to deny Moussaoui that access is a blatant violation of the Sixth Amendment right to confront witnesses.

<snip>
Chertoff argued to the 4th Circuit that the Court could not order the government to produce its start witness against Moussaoui because (are you ready?) he, the witness, is out of the country at an undisclosed location. True, but the witness is in the custody of the federal government! The out-of-the country argument is a sham. This is similar to a ruling recently by the federal court that ruled that Guantanmo Bay prisoners had no access to federal courts for claims that they be charged or release because-they are out of the country!! Of course, in federal custody, but that does not matter.

more...

[Moderator]

12. duplicate topic, please discuss here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1140985