ashcroft's hospital concurrence

* ashcroft didnt give his hospital concurrence: "On one day in the spring of 2004, White House chief of staff Andy Card and the then White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales made a bedside visit to John Ashcroft, attorney general at the time, who was stricken with a rare and painful pancreatic disease, to try—without success—to get him to reverse his deputy, Acting Attorney General James Comey, who was balking at the warrantless eavesdropping." (link)

* georgia10 makes the point about the timing that i'd missed: "This was after the program had been in place for some two and a half years. This was after Ashcroft had presumably authorized the program ever 45 days since late 2001. Maybe it was the meds, maybe it was his conscience, but something caused Ashcroft to possibly deem the program illegal in March of 2004. The significance of this? Bush knew warrantless domestic spying outside of FISA was probably illegal, and yet he insisted on it anyway. It sure looks like Bush's crown will be tarnished by this in 2006."

* digby on blinky: "He is a living stone wall who speaks in strange parables and cliches and sometimes just pure gibberish. He falters, he stammers, he looks uncomfortable and weak. Yet he was until fairly recently perceived by most to be a strong and resolute leader." go read the rest. i'd even go a step further - the image of him that redvoters have is that he (and the entire egadministration) is a) interested in keeping them safe b) competent in doing so. there's a lot of evidence that the latter isnt true, and a lot of discussion about that - but people dont really ask about the first part of the question. we see a lot of this in the discussion about snoopgate - "Blinky will do whatever he thinks is important to keep the american people safe" - but there's really no evidence to support the contention that they even care about the safety of the citizenry. *everything* they do is political - including the spying - it has nothing to do with 'gettin terrorists.'