Over the Shoulder… Bolder Holder

Newsweek has a big story on Eric Holder this week and his soon to be announced (probably) decision to probe Bush-era treatment of detainees — aka terrorists. He’s also looking back over his shoulder — regretfully (he says) at the Marc Rich pardon issue.
Barack Obama may have just been too clever by half in his appointment of Holder as Attorney General. Holder — a Clinton holdover and architect of the Marc Rich pardon back in late 2000 (or very early 2001) — knows how to get things done. He’s also not going to be swayed by the Obama team — he is a relative independent — operationally (he is a liberal after all).

There’s good money that he’s going to go back and investigate — via special prosecutor — the “torture” of Gitmo detainees and CIA tactics at its secret prisons during the Bush Administration. The worrisome aspect is that Obama has said he doesn’t want these investigations (which may be mere buck-passing to Holder since he hasn’t foreclosed the possibility either) and Holder — according to Newsweek — regrets the Marc Rich fiasco. As per Newsweek:

The name of the fugitive financier pardoned—with Holder’s blessing—at the tail end of the Clinton administration still gnaws at him. It isn’t hard to see why. As a Justice Department lawyer, Holder made a name for himself prosecuting corrupt politicians and judges. He began his career in 1976, straight out of Columbia Law School, in the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section, where prosecutors are imbued with a sense of rectitude and learn to fend off political interference. And though Holder has bluntly acknowledged that he “blew it,” the Rich decision haunts him. Given his professional roots, he says, “the notion that you would take actions based on political considerations runs counter to everything in my DNA.” Aides say that his recent confirmation hearings, which aired the details of the Rich pardon, were in a way liberating; he aspires to no higher office and is now free to be his own man. But his wife says that part of what drives him today is a continuing hunger for redemption.

The only thing more frightening than a politician seeking redemption is a prosecutor seeking redemption. The dictionary doesn’t have a word to adequately capture the fearsomeness and zealotry of the newly “liberated” prosecutor. I’d almost rather have a dirty prosecutor than a self-righteous one. My favorite part of the entire piece was this nugget:

Alone among cabinet officers, attorneys general are partisan appointees expected to rise above partisanship. All struggle to find a happy medium between loyalty and independence. Few succeed. At one extreme looms Alberto Gonzales, who allowed the Justice Department to be run like Tammany Hall. At the other is Janet Reno, whose righteousness and folksy eccentricities marginalized her within the Clinton administration. Lean too far one way and you corrupt the office, too far the other way and you render yourself impotent.

Where to begin? First — Tammany Hall got things done. Alberto Gonzales was incompetent. Thus Gonzales is emblematic of the early 21st century Republican Party. Janet Reno? How is an alligator wrestling, lesbian, mass killing, Cuban-kidnapping lawyer who made her reputation on false pedophile convictions (Google “Miami method” — chilling) ever considered “righteousness”. And “eccentric folksiness”? For the love of Pete — the Deliverance Mountain Men were eccentric compared to Janet Reno. She may have been the dude that rogered Ned Beatty with a dress on for all I know. Tod Browning filmed Reno family reunions. Anyway… why look to the past — the future is grim enough.

Back to the upcoming investigations. The good: First, Obama’s domestic agenda will be sidetracked until at least 2011 — by which time Congress hopefully will change hands or conservatives can gain enough seats to force changes in bills, etc. Second: I think the general public won’t support these investigations. Unlike Watergate which was fresh and there was obviously lying by Nixon and his administration, the Iran-Contra Affair which occurred in Reagan’s second term and involved giving money to our enemies — 7 years after they humiliated us by capturing our Embassy and holding our people hostage for 444 days or Clinton-Lewinsky which was just gross and also involved the sanctity of the Oval Office and a direct lie (with accompanying finger wag) — these involve looking at a past President. The people are over George W. Bush. And anything done “wrong” was done in the name of protecting us and was done to the people who have killed thousands of Americans. I sense a big shrug at first and then growing outrage at this backward-looking witch hunt perpetrated so Eric Holder can sleep better. Does any “moderate” American really want Americans to go to prison for scaring the bejeezus out of some crazy Arab Muslim who wanted to kill Americans for any and no reason? I seriously doubt it.

The bad: some really good people who thought their government supported them and acted upon that assumption — are about to lose all of their financial resources, homes, friends, jobs, marriages, etc. — even if ultimately justified. Prosecution is devastating — the accusation almost more than the conviction. These people need our prayers and our money.

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