Trump Escalates Nixon War Against Justice in Slow-Motion

Saturday Night Massacre, Oct. 20, 1973, is the day that almost
saw the end of the United States as a Constitutional state

David Brinkley summed up the October 20, 1973 Saturday Night Massacre when he reported, "An investigator appointed to investigate scandals was fired because he insisted on investigating scandals."

The Trump administration is embroiled in scandals. The administration is hell-bent on destroying any institution that proposes to investigate this corrupt and unprecedented presidency.

This means the FBI, the U.S. Dept of Justice, press, non-Trump-aligned members of Congress; there is no discernible bottom to the Trump enemies list.

The preeminent investigator of Trump is Robert S. Mueller III, United States Department of Justice, appointed May 17, 2017. Mueller is under fire for investigating Trump scandals.

Mueller is charged with probing "Russian government efforts to influence the 2016 presidential election and related matters."

Mueller is acting in a manner beyond reproach, and thus we can expect today's toxic brand of Republicans to engage in character assassination of Mueller and every human resource involved in the probe, starting with the FBI.

When Trump begins his firings at the DoJ to shield his complicity in criminal conspiracies, it's certain Trump won't be guided by William D. Ruckelshaus, former administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, acting F.B.I. director and deputy attorney general under President Richard Nixon before Nixon forced out Ruckelshaus and Attorney General Elliot Richardson for not firing Archibald Cox, the Watergate special prosecutor.

Writes Ruckelshaus in the New York Times last Summer:

Mr. President, don’t worry whether you have the power to pardon yourself. But do consider the wisdom of firing the man charged by your own deputy attorney general with investigating Russian intervention into your election. ...

... the situation between the White House and Richardson began to rapidly deteriorate. Elliot called to let me know, and I returned to Washington on Wednesday evening. Three days later, Elliot and I resigned after refusing to carry out President Nixon’s order to fire the special prosecutor. Cox was then dismissed by Robert Bork, who had quickly been designated acting attorney general.

The resulting public firestorm, which became known as the 'Saturday Night Massacre,' marked the beginning of the end of the Nixon presidency. Congressional support eroded, the House Judiciary Committee began impeachment hearings and the Supreme Court ordered the release of White House tapes capturing the president and his aides plotting the cover-up. Nearly 10 months after that October night, Nixon resigned.

The events of recent weeks have eerily reminded me of those Watergate days. When accusations of Russian involvement in last year’s election first surfaced, I thought President Trump could quickly put them to rest by revealing all he knew and instructing his staff to do the same, just as President Nixon could have done with the Watergate burglary in 1972.

But President Trump hasn’t done that, even though he has consistently asserted his complete innocence. Why not lay it all out for the public to judge for itself? Are we headed for another long national nightmare? For the sake of the country, I hope not.

Donald Trump is a disgrace and one hopes the investigators appointed to investigate Trump's sleaze, corruption and possibly treason press on no matter the toxic reaction from this clear and present danger to the Republic occupying the presidency.

The Next Attorney General

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales' resignation is effective Monday, Sept. 17.

One person that the next Attorney General should not be is somebody like the soon-to-be acting Attorney General, Paul Clement.

Clement's problem, not one of intellect, is his partisan zeal. And that is precisely why the right-wingers want to see him as a federal judge, even a Supreme Court nominee. [Too late for that now.]

But the corrupt Justice Department needs someone of unsurpassed integrity and independence. Such people exist only in the imaginations of newspaper editorial writers, so we will have settle for someone like Patrick Fitzgerald, Robert Mueller and James Comey.

But the need for an attorney general approximating political independence cannot be underestimated. As the Times writes:

The Justice Department is a disaster zone. It should be the embodiment of America's commitment to the rule of law, but it has been contaminated by partisan politics. The nation's top lawyers may have broken the law, and even may have sent innocent people to jail, to advance the interests of the Republican Party.

The next attorney general will have an enormous amount of damage to undo. There is considerable evidence that United States attorneys have been coerced into using their offices to help Republicans win elections. The orders may have come directly from the White House. Top officials of the Justice Department have admitted that they evaluated lawyers for nonpolitical jobs based on their politics. And Congress is investigating whether Georgia Thompson, a Wisconsin civil servant, and Don Siegelman, the former governor of Alabama, were sent to jail to help Republicans win governorships in those states.

Making it a federal crime to oppose the Republican Party as the DoJ has selectively done ought to be a crime (it is) screaming from every newspaper and talk radio show in America (it is not).

The fact is that we may be stuck with a right-winger as the next attorney general anyway.

Clement can in theory serve out the remainder of Bush’s term, though I doubt he would wish to do so.

If Bush nominates a partisan like Theodore B. Olson, he will not be confirmed.

Bush could then make a recess appointment of a right-winger who will serve out the bulk of Bush’s term without Senate confirmation.

The Senate will make noise about bringing all appointments to a halt.

But Bush will not care about that, and does not exactly care about good relations with Congress :) .

The one person Bush will not nominate is an intellectually honest, rule-of-law individual who would actually investigate the administration’s many misdeeds, and that is precisely who the country needs.
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