The District Thirteen.

“Some of the 13 manipulated the federal bureaucracy and the legal process to ‘preauthorize’ torture in the days after 9/11. Others helped implement torture, and still others helped write the memos that provided the Bush administration with a legal fig leaf after torture had already begun…Between 9/11 and the end of 2002, the Torture 13 decided to torture, then reverse-engineered the techniques, and then crafted the legal cover. Here’s who they are and what they did.“

Triskaidecaphobics, beware: From the bookmarks and in her debut for Salon, blogger Marcy Wheeler lists the thirteen officials most responsible for the Dubya-era torture regime. A baker’s dozen of orange jumpsuits, please.

Harman on the Hook.

“‘It’s the deepest kind of corruption,’ said a recently retired longtime national security official who was closely involved in the AIPAC investigation, ‘which was years in the making. It’s a story about the corruption of government — not legal corruption necessarily, but ethical corruption.” In a fascinating (and depressing) must-read, Congressional Quarterly‘s Jeff Stein lays bare a byzantine corruption scandal involving AIPAC, the Dubya WH, and Jane Harman, former Democratic chair of the House Intelligence Committee and, some grumbling aside, basically a “team player” for Dubya during the illegal and warrantless wiretaps episode. (Irony of ironies, it appears Harman’s misdeeds were caught on — a court-approved — wiretap.)

Talking Points Memo offers a handy timeline of the case here. Basically, on one level it’s your basic political quid-pro-quo. Harman told an unnamed suspected Israeli agent that she would “waddle into” a federal espionage case then extant against two members of AIPAC and gum up the works somehow. In return, “the suspected Israeli agent pledged to help lobby Nancy Pelosi…to appoint Harman chair of the Intelligence Committee after the 2006 elections.” (It didn’t take: Pelosi instead chose Silvestre Reyes.) “Seemingly wary of what she had just agreed to, according to an official who read the NSA transcript, Harman hung up after saying, ‘This conversation doesn’t exist.’“

Sordid enough. But what’s a mid-oughts scandal without the Dubya angle? After she had been caught on said wiretap, a federal investigation into Harman was approved…for awhile. But it seems Attorney General Alberto Gonzales now knew he had Harman in his pocket, and took advantage accordingly. “According to two officials privy to the events, Gonzales said he ‘needed Jane’ to help support the administration’s warrantless wiretapping program, which was about to be exposed by the New York Times. Harman, he told [CIA Director Porter] Goss, had helped persuade the newspaper to hold the wiretap story before, on the eve of the 2004 elections. And although it was too late to stop the Times from publishing now, she could be counted on again to help defend the program. He was right. On Dec. 21, 2005, in the midst of a firestorm of criticism about the wiretaps, Harman issued a statement defending the operation and slamming the Times, saying, ‘I believe it essential to U.S. national security, and that its disclosure has damaged critical intelligence capabilities.’“

Not that I need to remind anyone here, but Dubya’s use of illegal and warrantless wiretaps would, in more cases, be recognized as an impeachable offense. As it was, the Senate GOP (then in the catbird seat) held firm against hearings, and many of our congressional Dems — Feingold, Leahy, and a few other lonely souls notwithstanding — folded like a house of cards. Now, at least in the case of Harman, we know why.

Update: The NYT weighs in with their side, and it’s TLDR’ed by TPM. And Salon‘s Glenn Greenwald has a good bit of snarky fun with Harman’s recent “road to Damascus” moment regarding wiretaps.

And, Whoa, My Nights are so long.

In the big news this past week, the wheels continue to come off over at Team Dubya. First Karl Rove jumped ship. Then Tony Snow told us he’ll be off soon to make some money. And now, at long last, Alberto Gonzales has announced his resignation as Attorney General. “[W]ithin the past week, Justice aides and other officials said, Gonzales concluded that his credibility with Congress, his employees and the public was so shattered that he could not promise to remain through the end of Bush’s term, as the White House chief of staff had demanded of Cabinet officers.” Well, that, and there’s the matter of continuing investigations into Gonzales, which the Dems say will continue (and should, since there’s solid evidence he’s perjured himself.) At any rate, good riddance, Gonzales. Like too many Dubya appointments, you’ve embarrassed the nation, with your justifications for torture and illegal wiretapping as much as with your tortured evasions and denials. Frankly, this should’ve happened months ago.

In the Hands of Alberto.

Would you want this man making a life-and-death decision for you? For some reason, embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales — who hasn’t been coming across as a model of competence lately — is apparently about to receive expanded powers to fast-track state death penalty cases. “Kathryn Kase, a Houston lawyer who serves on the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers’ death penalty committee, said the Justice Department’s proposed regulations are ‘severely lacking’ because they do not provide enough oversight to ensure that defendants are receiving adequate legal counsel. ‘In our judgment they allow states to…claim they have a capital representation case that is functional, when in fact it might not be functional at all,’ Kase said. ‘It may not prevent people from being wrongfully sentenced to death.‘” The older I get, the worse the death penalty seems as public policy. Even the cruel and unusual aspect notwithstanding, it’s arbitrary, it doesn’t work as a deterrent, it’s often racist. Add Gonzales’ presumed oversight to the list of negatives.

Now will we will touch the bottom of this swamp.

“With respect to the U.S. Attorneys, there has been, I think, a bit of a witch hunt on Capitol Hill as they keep rolling over rocks hoping they can find something,” In an interview with Larry King, Cheney calls the persecuted prosecutor probe a “witch hunt,” and defends loyal capo Alberto Gonzales as “a good man, a good friend, on a difficult assignment.” (In another interview yesterday, he also claimed the Libby jury was wrong.) I doubt anyone really needs a credibility check at this point, but just in case: Cheney is also the guy who told us “we’d be greeted as liberators,” the Iraq insurgency “is in the last throes,” that “there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction” and is amassing them to use against” us, that the administration is learning “more and more“ about pre-9/11 connections between Iraq and Al Qaeda, and that the evidence of said connections is “overwhelming.” Simply put, Dick Cheney is an inveterate teller of untruths, and I wouldn’t trust him to walk Berkeley at this point, much less run the country. Impeach him already. (Cheney pic via this post.)

Congress Pushes Back.

“‘Congress will act to preserve and protect our criminal justice system and to ensure appropriate Congressional oversight in all areas essential to the well-being of the American people,’ House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said in a statement.” Faced with continued White House stonewalling and armed with a new report that underscores the adminstration’s malfeasance, the House Judiciary Committee issued contempt citations to former White House Counsel Harriet Miers and Chief of Staff Josh Bolten for their failure to honor House subpoenas on the persecuted prosecutors matter earlier this month. And, on the Senate side, Dems — with a document trail on their side — call for a perjury investigation into Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on the same day a subpoena is issued for consigliere Karl Rove. Dubya flunkies, meet the rule of law. Update: More grist for the perjury mill: FBI Director Robert Mueller contradicts Gonzales’ prior testimony.

Above the Law.

“The story isn’t who picked on a sick guy or even who did or didn’t break laws. The story is who gets to decide what’s legal. And the president’s now-familiar claim, a la Richard Nixon, is that it’s never illegal when he does it.” Dahlia Lithwick drives home the disturbing message of last week’s Comey revelations. And, also in Slate, Frank Bowman offers another reason why Alberto Gonzales should be impeached: the firing of David Iglesias. Update: In related news, Specter thinks Gonzales will soon quit, particularly if the Senate passes a no-confidence vote on him. (The White House, thus far, disagrees.)

A Mockery of Justice.

“James B. Comey, the straight-as-an-arrow former No. 2 official at the Justice Department, yesterday offered the Senate Judiciary Committee an account of Bush administration lawlessness so shocking it would have been unbelievable coming from a less reputable source.” By way of Medley, the WP blanches at a ridiculous attempt by then-White House counsel Alberto Gonzales to secure warrantless wiretaps against the will of the Justice Department. “Having failed, they were willing to defy the conclusions of the nation’s chief law enforcement officer and pursue the surveillance without Justice’s authorization. Only in the face of the prospect of mass resignations — Mr. Comey, FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III and most likely Mr. Ashcroft himself — did the president back down.“

Saving Rick Renzi.

The GOP streams of corruption cross further…Word comes out that congressman-under-fire Rick Renzi (R-AZ), who apparently forgot to mention he received $200,000 from a business partner he helped with a land deal, was pressuring one of the fired US attorneys to tell him how the probe against him was progressing. Moreover, and even more disconcerting, it seems the Gonzales Justice Department may in fact have stalled the Renzi probe in order to help the Arizona congressman get re-elected. Wow. Just when you think you’ve heard it all…The shadiness just never ends with these people.

McCain piles on.

Meanwhile, also on the persecuted prosecutors tip, McCain says it’s time for Gonzales to go. “I think that out of loyalty to the president that that would probably be the best thing that he could do.“