Elena Kagan (on SCOTUS list) filed brief urging SC not to hear Siegelman case.

From December 2009:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rebecca-abrahams/the-prosecution-of-ted-st_b_395771.html

(snip)

But the Department of Justice for some reason has not budged on overturning the political prosecutions of Democrats - begging the question as to whether it believes the Democrats were properly tried. Just last month Solicitor General Elena Kagan issued a brief urging the US Supreme Court to deny hearing Siegleman's appeal.

When asked why he thought Kagan filed the petition, Siegelman responded:

"The people making the decisions are the same people who have been making the decisions all along. We've changed things at the top but the people who are doing the work, certainly doing the work on my case are the same who worked under George Bush and Karl Rove. There's no change. These people with a vested interest in the outcome and they're going to keep fighting for the same results."

(end snip)


from yesterday:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andrew-kreig/siegelman-judge-asked-to_b_534628.html

(snip)

A bipartisan group of 91 former state attorneys general from more than 40 states formed an unprecedented coalition to file a friend-of-the-court brief to the Supreme Court arguing it should hear Siegelman's case because his actions did not constitute a crime.

But Kagan, now widely reported as a leading candidate to ascend from her post as Justice Department solicitor general to become her friend Obama's nominee for a Supreme Court vacancy, urged the high court in November to deny Siegelman a hearing. Kagan used technical legal arguments devised with the assistance of DOJ's trial prosecutors.

Since the 2006 convictions DoJ has withstood complaints that include: political prosecution orchestrated by Rove , judge-shopping , jury tampering , lying about Canary's recusal , firing a DoJ whistleblower, and suppressing evidence that DoJ tried to blackmail its central witness.

Kagan's stance already has created strong skeptics in progressive circles in Alabama, and is certain to irritate Siegelman supporters around the country if she is nominated to the Supreme Court. DOJ has requested that Fuller resentence Siegelman, now 64, to an additional 20 years in prison.

(snip)



Ahhhh yes, this will be an interesting nomination process to say the least.

I'll ask it again here...

Did Bill Kristol endorse her prospective nomination because she is related to the Kagans who are his friends and fellow treasonous war criminals from the Project for a New American Century (PNAC)?

But I don't think she has to be actually related to the PNAC Kagans for her views on the Unitary Executive theory of DictatorPresidential powers to merit skeptical scrutiny from Democrats.

Anyone who rejects Siegelman gets a rejection from me.

No on Kagan.

Next!

under the radar, too.

Bear in mind that she has a duty to do her utmost on behalf of her employer (the federal government) for as long as the government chooses to pursue that policy. The role of solicitor-general is to present the best possible legal argument that he or she can for the policy, not to decide the policy itself. So her actions in that role are not a good guide to her actual views.

I don't know whether she will be nominated or not. My gut says no, but for completely unrelated reasons to do with political strategy.

ugh

Friday, Apr 9, 2010 15:10 EDT
The death of Dawn Johnsen's nomination
By Glenn Greenwald
(updated below - Update II)

After waiting 14 months for a confirmation vote that never came, Dawn Johnsen withdrew today as President Obama's nominee to head the Office of Legal Counsel. As I documented at length when the nomination was first announced in January, 2009, Johnsen was an absolutely superb pick to head an office that plays as vital a role as any in determining the President's record on civil liberties and adherence to the rule of law. With 59 and then 60 Democratic votes in the Senate all year long (which included the support of GOP Sen. Richard Lugar, though the opposition of Dem. Sen. Ben Nelson and shifting positions from Arlen Specter), it's difficult to understand why the White House -- if it really wanted to -- could not have had Johnsen confirmed (or why she at least wasn't included in the spate of recently announced recess appointments).

SNIP; BUT GO READ IT ALL!!

The question how we restore our nation's honor takes on new urgency and promise as we approach the end of this administration. We must resist Bush administration efforts to hide evidence of its wrongdoing through demands for retroactive immunity, assertions of state privilege, and implausible claims that openness will empower terrorists. . . .

Here is a partial answer to my own question of how should we behave, directed especially to the next president and members of his or her administration but also to all of use who will be relieved by the change: We must avoid any temptation simply to move on. We must instead be honest with ourselves and the world as we condemn our nation's past transgressions and reject Bush's corruption of our American ideals. Our constitutional democracy cannot survive with a government shrouded in secrecy, nor can our nation's honor be restored without full disclosure.


What Johnsen insists must not be done reads like a manual of what Barack Obama ended up doing and continues to do -- from supporting retroactive immunity to terminate FISA litigations to endless assertions of "state secrecy" in order to block courts from adjudicating Bush crimes to suppressing torture photos on the ground that "opennees will empower terrorists" to the overarching Obama dictate that we "simply move on." Could she have described any more perfectly what Obama would end up doing when she wrote, in March, 2008, what the next President "must not do"?