When you block an investigation by law enforcement, what is that called? Obstruction of justice1, right?
And if you own a business and make it impossible for authorities to investigate a possible crime, and you do so by denying them access to the relevant information and people by saying the investigators are “not authorized” to access those resources, what would it be called? Obstruction of justice1, right?
Given that, explain this news tidbit:
WASHINGTON – Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said Tuesday that President Bush personally blocked Justice Department lawyers from pursuing an internal probe of the warrantless eavesdropping program that monitors Americans’ international calls and e-mails when terrorism is suspected2.
The department’s Office of Professional Responsibility announced earlier this year it could not pursue an investigation into the role of Justice lawyers in crafting the program, under which the National Security Agency intercepts some telephone calls and e-mail without court approval.
At the time, the office said it could not obtain security clearance to examine the classified program.
Under sharp questioning from Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter, Gonzales said that Bush would not grant the access needed to allow the probe to move forward.
“It was highly classified, very important and many other lawyers had access. Why not OPR?” asked Specter, R-Pa.
“The president of the United States makes the decision,” Gonzales told the committee hearing…
Sure, the preznit’s the “decider” (as Dubya himself put it). I guess when he decides to obstruct justice, that’s his decision to make.
Again, when do the laws apply to all of us, including the president? You’ll find the Constitution is not ambiguous on this issue.
If it were you or I who did the same thing… Or a Democrat…
[1] Depending on which law your actions were covered under, it might also be called “interfering with a criminal investigation”, “interfering with a federal investigation”, or a number of other synonyms for “obstruction of justice”.
[2] That is a significant piece of spin. We already know the domestic spying apparatus is monitoring every call, e-mail, fax, IM conversation, and web site visited—every bit of internet traffic and every use of the telephone line, and all of this regardless of source or destination. That’s why it’s called the “domestic spying scandal” and not the “international spying scandal” or the “only-when-terrorism-is-suspected spying scandal” or… To have stated it the way this article does is a blatant misrepresentation of the facts as we already know them. Anyone want to tell me the media is not slanted one way or another? If only they’d coordinate though, as I hate having to read each source with a different filter (since they all seem to lean in different directions at different times).