Chertoff confirmation hearings today

[seemslikeadream]

CAPITOL HILL President Bush's pick for Homeland Security secretary is on Capitol Hill today for confirmation hearings.

Michael Chertoff's confirmation is not in doubt, but some groups are concerned about his track record in the war on terror. The American Civil Liberties Union is particularly troubled by Chertoff's role as assistant attorney general in permitting the round-up of ethnic Arabs and Muslims in the immediate aftermath of Nine-Eleven.

A-C-L-U legislative counsel Chris Anders says at least 700 men were detained and questioned. Some were imprisoned. No terrorism charges resulted. Anders says that's particularly worrisome because, as Homeland Security secretary, Chertoff would be supervising the Immigration Service.

http://www.woodtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=2889377

[Liberty Belle]

1. kick! Get ready for the Gestapo, Part II (after Gonzalez)

[Roland99]

2. Chertoff Buried Early Evidence of Bush Torture Campaign in Afghanistan

Just to keep everyone up-to-date on this criminal:


http://www.ilcaonline.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=1636&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
Back on Friday, June 12, 2002, the Defense Department had a big problem: Its new policy on torture of captives in the "war on terror" was about to be exposed. John Walker Lindh, the young Californian captured in Afghanistan in December 2001 and touted by John Ashcroft as an "American Taliban," was scheduled to take the stand the following Monday in an evidence suppression hearing regarding a confession he had signed. There he would tell, under oath, about how he signed the document only after being tortured for days by US soldiers. Federal District Judge T.S. Ellis had already said he was likely to allow Lindh, at trial, to put on the stand military officers and even Guantánamo detainees who were witnesses to or participants in his alleged abuse. >br>

The Defense Department, which we now know had in late 2001 begun a secret, presidentially approved program of torture of Afghan and Al Qaeda captives at Bagram Air Base and other locations, had made it clear to the Justice Department that it wanted the suppression hearing blocked. American torture at that point was still just a troubling rumor, and the Bush Administration clearly wanted to keep it that way.


Accordingly, Michael Chertoff, who as head of the Justice Department's criminal division was overseeing all the department's terrorism prosecutions, had his prosecution team offer a deal. All the serious charges against Lindh--terrorism, attempted murder, conspiracy to kill Americans, etc.--would be dropped and he could plead guilty just to the technical charges of "providing assistance" to an "enemy of the U.S." and of "carrying a weapon." Lindh, whose attorneys dreaded his facing trial in one of the most conservative court districts in the country on the first anniversary of 9/11, had to accept a stiff twenty-year sentence, but that was half what he faced if convicted on those two minor charges alone.


But Chertoff went further, according to one of Lindh's attorneys, George Harris. Chertoff (now an appeals court judge in New Jersey) demanded--reportedly at Defense Department insistence, according to what defense attorneys were told--that Lindh sign a statement swearing he had "not been intentionally mistreated" by his US captors and waiving any future right to claim mistreatment or torture. Further, Chertoff attached a "special administrative measure," essentially a gag order, barring Lindh from talking about his experience for the duration of his sentence.

[seemslikeadream]

3. Thanks Roland99 Chertoff sailed through the hearings today

and a little more here. Why didn't anyone ask about this stuff?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1197491

[Roland99]

4. And Hatch played the Hispanic race card a few min. re:Gonzales

:puke:

[Al-CIAda]

5. Yes, WHY aren't they asking those questions???

Amerika is turning darker by the hour.

[Lizardking]

6. Warcrimes

Why dont they ask this nazi zionist who he hired to help him?
Maybe he doesnt want the sheeple to know he hired Arbotov of the KGB and Markus Wolfe of the old East German Stasi.....

[Zebulon]

7. Doesn't the * administration

have anyone they can nominate who doesn't have baggage or a history of questionable dealings?

[0007]

11. Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano looks like a saint next

to some of these guys, 'eh?

[Zebulon]

12. Re: Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano looks like a saint

Heheheh. "Sammy the Bull" for Secretary of Defense. Why not? :)

[seemslikeadream]

8. Oh this is rich!

Chertoff Pledges to Weigh Civil Liberties

...

He highlighted his work as special counsel in the New Jersey legislature in examining racial profiling, and as a private attorney representing poor defendants. He also promised to ``respect those with whom you work'' - a signal to the 180,000 employees he would lead as the nation's second Homeland Security secretary.


Levin said Chertoff's reputation was that of a ``thoughtful straight-shooter,'' but the lawmaker used the word troubling to describe the Justice Department actions during Chertoff's tenure, including the development of legal theories ``circumventing legal prohibitions against torture and inhuman treatment of detainees.''

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uslatest/story/0,1282,-4773719,00.html

WHAT ABOUT Jesselyn Radack?????


The Trials of Jesselyn Radack
Douglas McCollam
The American Lawyer
07-14-2003


Sitting in her well-appointed living room in a leafy northwest Washington, D.C., neighborhood, Jesselyn Radack seems an unlikely candidate for martyrdom in the war on terror. For three years the Yale Law School graduate and self-described soccer mom made her living telling other government lawyers how to stay out of trouble.

The 32-year-old former U.S. Department of Justice ethics adviser says she thought she'd be a career government lawyer. But that was before she decided to object to the government's tactics in the John Walker Lindh case last year.

Since then she's lost two jobs -- pushed out of her Justice post and then fired from the firm that had taken her in -- and now finds herself unemployed and in limbo. Her personal challenges are daunting: under criminal investigation, ailing from multiple sclerosis, and expecting a third child in January. But far from singing the victim's song, Radack appears composed and stalwart, telling her story with short, chopping hand strokes and near-encyclopedic recall.

And her story grows more ominous as new details emerge about how far the government will go in pursuit of one of its own.


http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1056139907383



Whistleblower Charges Justice Dept. with Misconduct in Chertoff's Prosecution of John Walker Lindh

Thursday, January 13th, 2005


We speak with former Justice Department attorney, Jesselyn Radack, who charges that department officials under Michael Chertoff improperly questioned John Waker Lindh and that her memos raising ethical concerns about his interrogation were purged and not turned over to a criminal court.

Michael Chertoff, President Bush's Homeland Security Chief nominee, was praised by Senate Democrats and state lawyers this week as being a tough but fair prosecutor who would serve well as Tom Ridge's replacement.
But as his record comes under fresh scrutiny, questions are being raised about his handling of the case of John Walker Lindh - the so-called American Taliban. As head of the criminal division of the Justice Department, the 2002 prosecution of Lindh was one of Chertoff"s biggest triumphs.

But the case resurfaced the following year in Senate confirmation hearings after Chertoff was nominated to be a federal appellate judge. At that time, Senate Democrats questioned Chertoff extensively about concerns that the FBI might have improperly questioned Lindh in Afghanistan even though his family had hired a lawyer for him.
http://mparent7777.blog-city.com/read/1005311.htm


AND WHAT ABOUT Elamir - Operation Diamondback???

The Good Doctor Who Wasn't So Good


I have a theory that Elamir was not arrested, because if his case did come to court, then Chertoff's role as his lawyer in the HMO case might have been exposed. Since Elamir's HMO was supposedly a front for Bin Laden and millions of dollars were allegedly skimmed from the HMO to fund terrorism, Chertoff himself might be implicated in some way since he had to have had access to the HMO's books and Elamir's finances when he defended him.

I also have a theory that this may be why Operation Diamondback remained a criminal case and not a counterterrorism case. As head of the Criminal Division in the Department of Justice, the case would have been under the control of Michael Chertoff himself. Was this the real reason why the case came to a screeching halt with only a few arrests? Was this the reason why Randy Glass was told to drop the matter by federal agents when the case started focusing on Dr. Elamir's brother Mohamed El Amir? Was this the reason why so many federal agents were frustrated because they felt the case hadn't received the attention of higher ups in federal law enforcement? Maybe it had?

more
http://www.911truth.org/article.php?story=2005011418421...

[98geoduck]

9. Caption the Photo...

"Man, John, isn't fucking over the U.S.A. constitution and public a piece of cake."

[WillyT]

10. "Hey John... I Want My Eagle Sore !!!"

:evilgrin: