The Seventh Sense

How's That Homeland Security Thing Coming?

From USA Today:

The Bush administration has missed dozens of deadlines set by Congress after the Sept. 11 attacks for developing ways to protect airplanes, ships and railways from terrorists.

A plan to defend ships and ports from attack is six months overdue. Rules to protect air cargo from infiltration by terrorists are two months late. A study on the cost of giving anti-terrorism training to federal law enforcement officers who fly commercially was supposed to be done more than three years ago.

"The incompetence that we recently saw with FEMA's leadership appears to exist throughout the Homeland Security Department," said Mississippi Rep. Bennie G. Thompson, top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee. "Our nation is still vulnerable."

Congress must share the blame for the department's sluggishness in protecting commerce and travel from terrorists, according to other observers.

Read the whole article.  It's a real eye-opener.

Yup, the Republican Congress is to blame as much as the Republican President.

Personally, I think we should change the name of the "United States" to "Iraq", since Bush et al are more concerned about security there than they are about security here.

Speaking of Iraq, six U.S. soldiers were killed today:

Those deaths raised the death toll for October to more than 90, the highest monthly total since January when 107 American service members died. The latest deaths brought to 2,025 the number of U.S. service members who have died since the Iraq war began in March 2003.

It's the "final throes" though, right?

My Obligatory Post on Samuel Alito

Busy day today for me, so I'll just mention a few things about Bush's nominee to the Supreme Court, and update this post (maybe) as the day goes on.

Yes, Alito is a conservative.  Yes, he's a strict constructionist.  Yes, his nomination helps Bush politically by bringing Bush's base back into the fold.  Yes, Alito has more experience than Miers. 

Which means . . . No, there is no reason to reject him.

Why not?  He's qualified, that's why not.  Or -- as I have said before with Roberts -- we lost this battle in Election 2004.

Now, there are some fear out there that he's another Scalia.  Some are already calling him Scalito or Little Nino.  I'm not entirely convinced.  From what I heard on NPR this morning (from a liberal lawyer who tried cases against Alito, as well as argued in front of him), Alito believes strongly in precedent.  Scalia, for all his bluster, does not -- he talks like he does, but he is quick to find ways to abandon precedent when it suits his political bias.  In other words, Scalia is an activist conservative; Alito appears to be, at worst, a passive one.

The talk already is about abortion.  It's always about abortion. I have to be honest: I think the issue gets overplayed when it comes to Supreme Court nominations.  Roe v. Wade isn't going anywhere.  It's not only precedent, but it is long-standing precedent.  An entire generation has come of age in the post-Roe world.  And if indeed Alito is not a precedent-bucker, he's not going to vote to overturn it.

What he will do, at worst, is chew at its edges.  When sitting on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, Alito was the lone dissenter in Planned Parenthood v Casey.  That case involved a Pennsylvania law which would have required women getting abortions to notify their husbands.  Alito is seems would have upheld the law (although I haven't read his dissent yet).  The rest of the Third Circuit deemed the Pennsylvania statute unconstitutional; as did the U.S. Supreme Court on appeal.

But that doesn't necessarily mean that Alito is anti-choice.  It is possible, for example, to believe in choice so much that you think that the father of the prospective baby has a choice as well. 

In any event, that's far different from actually being an indicator that Alito is anti-choice (I'll have to read his dissent to be sure...)

Besides, even if Roe v. Wade is overturned by this new Roberts Court, all that means is that each state will have to decide whether or not to ban abortions.  Nationally, we are 60-65% pro-choice.  Most states will keep abortions safe and legal.  I believe only the reddest of the red states will ban abortions entirely -- Mississippi, for example.  But all is not lost on this issue by far.

But, like I said, enough about Roe.  I think any concerns about it are a stretch.

So right now, my Alito mood is cautionary, but resigned.

As for more about Alito, I'll borrow Scott Lemieux's link round-up:

• SCOTUSblog has the general overview.
• PFAW on Alito, with particular emphasis on his dissent in Planned Parenthood v. Casey (he wanted to uphold the entire Pennsylvania law, including the spousal notification provision struck down by the Court.) There is every reason to believe, in other words, that at best Alito would gut Roe and at worse would overturn it. ["No, no, no!" - Ken]
• Article III Groupie, as usual, has some very good links, and also reminds us that Clement was also supposed to be a nominee, so you never know.
• Eric Muller has a personal account, suggesting that Alito is at least personally moderate.
• Jack Balkin suggests, persuasively, that Luttig would get a tougher ride from the Senate than Alito.

MORE:  Yup. Alito's got a blog, too.

MORE:  Ugh.  They're using the dead Rosa Parks for an Alito photo-op:

Wasting no time, Alito went to the Capitol shortly after the announcement to meet Senate leaders. Accompanied by two of his children and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Alito paused first to pay his respects at the coffin of the late civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks in the Capitol rotunda.

MORE -- NOTED OPINIONS OF ALITO:

Before I venture into this, let me point out something very important: you cannot understand a judge by reading the bottom line of his/her opinions.  What a judge decides is completely irrelevant compared to how he decides.

Here's an illustrative example:  Suppose the state legislature in State X passes a 10-cent gasoline tax.  A citizen's group challenges the law in court as unconstitutional.  Judge Y throws out the lawsuit.  Does this mean that Judge Y "is a friend of the oil interests"?  No.  It just means that the law passed by the legislature does not violate the Constitution.  Judge Y could hate the law personally, but recognize that the law is constitutionally permissible. 

So one has to be cautious about trying to determine what a judge is like, based solely on "who won".  It's how the judge thinks in reaching that decision that is important.  And with that, let's look at some of Alito's opinions.

A majority opinion in ACLU v. Schundler, 168 F.3d 92 (3d Cir. 1999), holding that the Establishment Clause was not violated by a city hall holiday display that contained a creche, a menorah, secular symbols of the season, and a banner proclaiming the city's dedication to diversity.

I browsed this opinion.  I guess this was one of those cases where you had to see the holiday display in order to conclude whether or not it was promoting religion.  The original holiday display was clearly religious, so city hall threw in a sleigh and other secular symbols of the season, plus the aforementioned banner.  Not sure if it was a "sham" nod to diversity or not.

A majority opinion in Fatin v. INS, 12 F.3d 1233 (3d Cir. 1993), holding that an Iranian woman seeking asylum could establish that she had a well founded fear of persecution in Iran if she could show that compliance with that country's "gender specific laws and repressive social norms," such as the requirement that women wear a veil in public, would be deeply abhorrent to her. Judge Alito also held that she could establish eligibility for asylum by showing that she would be persecuted because of gender, belief in feminism, or membership in a feminist group.

Didn't read/browse the Fatin case, but if this summary is accurate, this actually is a plus from a feminist point of view.

A majority opinion in Saxe v. State College Area School District, 240 F.3d 200 (3d Cir. 2001), striking down as contrary to the First Amendment a public school district anti-harassment policy that extended to nonvulgar, non-school-sponsored speech that posed no realistic threat of substantial disruption of school work.

A bit troubling.  While I am a strong believer in the First Amendment, the plaintiffs in Saxe were Christians who feared that that their (Christian) sons and daughters would get in trouble for "harassment" when the spoke out in public schools about the evils of homosexuality, etc.  Legally speaking, the school policy was struck down because it was too broad, but one wonders if the result had been the same if the complaining parents were, say, pro-gay.

But, on the other hand, there's this:

A majority opinion in Shore Regional High School Board of Education v. P.S., 381 F.3d 194 (3d Cir. 2004), holding that a school district did not provide a high school student with a free and appropriate public education, as required by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, when it failed to protect the student from bullying by fellow students who taunted the student based on his lack of athleticism and his perceived sexual orientation.

Now, the Shore opinion was interesting to read (okay, browse).  This poor kid was bullied and abused for being a "queer" (it's not clear, nor relevant, whether the kid actually was gay or not).  It was so bad that it was impossible for this kid to get an education.  Overturning the lower court, Alito sided with the kid, and required the Shore School District to reimburse the kid's parents for private tutelage, etc.

A majority opinion in Williams v. Price, 343 F.3d 223 (3d Cir. 2003), granting a writ of habeas corpus to an African-American state prisoner after state courts had refused to consider the testimony of a witness who stated that a juror had uttered derogatory remarks about African Americans during an encounter in the courthouse after the conclusion of the trial.

Not much to say about this.  It doesn't point to anything, even in a racial context.  It merely says that the prisoner was entitled to a hearing based on the evidence that one of the jurors was racist.

A dissenting opinion in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 947 F.2d 682 (3d Cir. 1991), arguing that a Pennsylvania that required women seeking abortions to inform their husbands should have been upheld. As Judge Alito reasoned, "[t]he Pennsylvania legislature could have rationally believed that some married women are initially inclined to obtain an abortion without their husbands' knowledge because of perceived problems--such as economic constraints, future plans, or the husbands' previously expressed opposition--that may be obviated by discussion prior to the abortion." Chief Justice Rehnquist's dissent from the Supreme Court's 5-4 [corrected] decision striking down the spousal notification provision of the law quoted Judge Alito's dissent and expressed support for Judge Alito's reasoning.

I discussed Planned Parenthood above; I still haven't read it.  The quoted Alito language is a little disturbing.  It shows a slavish acquiescence to legislative intent -- something not necessarily bad, but it can be overdone.  What troubles me is that he talks about what the legislature "could have rationally believed" -- it seems to me that if the legislature didn't make its intent clear, then the court should not engage in tea leaf reading.

More than that, Alito's Planned Parenthood rationale smacks of forced speech.  I wonder if anyone has addressed the First Amendment implications -- can the legislature constitutionally FORCE women to inform husbands of their pregnancy?  Doesn't the right to free speech necessarily encompass the right NOT to speak?

Well, my Alito mood is still cautionary, but resigned.

YET EVEN MORE:

Two things have passed by transon which give me pause.  First, this comment from GW Law Professor Jonathan Turley:

TURLEY: Oh absolutely. There will be no one to the right of Sam Alito on this Court. This is a pretty hardcore fellow on abortion issues.

COURIC: Not even Antonin Scalia?

TURLEY: They’ll have to make a race to the right, but I think it will be by a nose, if at all. …

Yikes.

Second, many on the left are talking about Alito's dissent in this case (PDF format) -- a case where the Third Circuit said that police did not have qualified immunity when being sued by a woman and her 14-year-old daughter after they were strip searched.  Alito was the lone dissenter, opining that the search was constitutional under the warrent.  Unlike some of my liberal brethren, I don't think this means that Alito is in favor of strip searches of minors.  The issue in that case was whether or not the strip search was authorized by the warrent (signed by a magistrate).  If it was, and you are angry about it, your beef is with the judge who signed the warrent, not with Alito.

What troubles me about Alito's dissent, however, is that he chastized the majority for reading the warrent to strictly and literally.  He argues that the warrent should be read applying a "commonsense and realistic" approach.  Now, when judges use phrases like this, this could be construed as being "activist".  Or certainly not strict constructionists.  It suggests that Alito -- like Scalia -- can be more "small-l" liberal in his interpretation of the law . . . when it suits him.

So my Alito mood is quite disturbed (but still somewhat resigned).

STILL MORE:  Did you know that, with Alito, there will not be five Catholic males on the Supreme Court?

WOW!  I MADE AN IMPORTANT FIND:

I was perusing Alito's dissent in U.S. v. Raybar.  That case involved whether or not Congress could regulate possession of a machine gun.

A little law geek stuff:  Under the Constitution, Congress can regulate many things.  One of those things is anything dealing with "interstate commerce" (commerce between one or more states).  Specifically, Congress can pass laws relating to anything "affecting interstate commerce".  "Affecting" is a fuzzy word -- what does that mean?  In this complex economy, can't any regulation "affect" state commerce -- at least tangentially?

So the scope of the interstate commerce clause is a difficult and perplexing one.

Anyway, an important case came down in 1995 called United States v. Lopez.  That case involved a federal regulation which sought to restrict handguns on school playgrounds.  The question was whether or not Congress had the power to pass that law -- i.e., was it a law which affected interstate commerce?  SCOTUS said "no" -- the law exceeded congressional powers.

Okay.  Back to U.S. v. Raybar.  This was decided after Lopez, and the question (again) was whether Congress's restriction on intrastate possession of machine gund (that is, possession of machine guns entirely within a single state) affected interstate commerce of machine guns.

In Alito's dissent, he criticizes the majority.  In it, we find this language (note the section I placed in bold):

The majority's second theory appears to be that Congress could have rationally  concluded that the purely intrastate possession of machine guns increases the incidence of certain crimes--the majority specifically mentions violent crime, racketeering, and drug trafficking--that are of "national concern." 

But Alito continues that "coulda" just doesn't cut it with him:

I take this theory very seriously, but my problem with it is that it rests on an empirical proposition for which neither Congress, the Executive (in the form of the government lawyers who briefed and argued this case), nor the majority has adduced any appreciable empirical proof.

Now, let's compare with the language in the summary above, from Planned Parenthood v. Casey:

As Judge Alito reasoned, "[t]he Pennsylvania legislature could have rationally believed that some married women are initially inclined to obtain an abortion without their husbands' knowledge because of perceived problems--such as economic constraints, future plans, or the husbands' previously expressed opposition--that may be obviated by discussion prior to the abortion."

Do you see what this is about?

In the machine gun case, Alito was not going to defer to Congress based on what Congress "could have rationally" intended.  No, Alito wanted "empirical proof" of what Congress intended.  (Real world result if Alito had his way: the ban on machine guns would be struck down).

But in the Planned Parenthood case, Alito was willing to providentally divine what the Pennsylvania legislature "could have rationally" intended with their spousal notification law. (Real world result if Alito had his way: a limitation on abortions by requiring spousal notification).

Now, assuming you have followed me this far, this is what I am concerned about.  It's when a judge takes two different approaches to reach a result -- a result that conservatives would prefer.  In one case, Alito is deferential to legislatures; in another, he is far less so.  A non-partisan judge would approach both issues consistently, regardless of whether the underlying issue is machine guns, or spousal notification of abortions, or whatever.

This brings to mind another judge who seems to lack a consistent judicial philosophy in order to reach a pre-destined result -- Justice Scalia.

Color me deeply troubled.

UPDATE:  Alito's dissent in Planned Parenthood v. Casey can be found here.  It's interesting because he relies on O'Connor for his position. 

His position?  Wives telling husbands that they are pregnant does not pose an "undue burden" on a woman's right to an abortion.

Does anybody believe that?  Suppose the wife wants to have an abortion and the husband does not -- a non-fanciful situation that occurs thousands of times a day, I'll bet.  The mere fact that she is legally required to inform the husband might prevent her from actually having the abortion at all.  Better to have the (unwanted) kid than to have the conflict, many women would say (rightly or wrongly).  In fact, that's surely the reason why the law was enacted in the first place.

It's that kind of micromanaging of people's private lives that gets me up in arms.  Sure -- in an ideal world, we would want women to tell their husbands, and we would want both of them to reach a decision about whether or not to have an abortion.  But we don't live in an ideal world.  And no marriage is ideal 100% of the time.  And you can't legislate idealism, people.

Anyway, back to O'Connor.  It is very interesting that the very test upon which Alito relied for his dissent -- a test explained by O'Connor -- was applied wrongly.  Alito applied O'Connor's test and said that the Pennsylvania law did not create an "undue burden".  On appeal, O'Connor applied O'Connor's test, and said that it did create an "undue burden".  So Alito got bitch-slapped a bit.  Heh.  Billmon has some additional thoughts here.

UPDATE:  Alito (as well as John Roberts) were both on Dobson's short list.  No wonder some are calling Bush "the wingnut's waterboy".

UH-OH:  Does Alito have a Vietnam/AWOL problem?

WHAT MAY BE MY FINAL THOUGHT/MOOD:  Matt Yglesius said it best:

I see no reason to think this nomination will be all that different from the last time around [John Roberts]. Republicans will be thrilled. Democrats will be unhappy.

After an uninformative confirmation hearing, Alito will be confirmed by a comfortable margin to the general approval of highbrow centrist opinion. He'll proceed to spend the next 20 years on the Court making America a somewhat worse place than it might otherwise be. Conservatives will continue to fail in their efforts to transform the country into some idealized version of the 1950s and will presumably blame this on college professors and Anthony Kennedy.

American Taliban Continues To Have A Stick Up Its Ass

I mean, really:

RALEIGH, N.C.  School principals from Newton, Mass., to Denver find themselves increasingly haunted at Halloween by this refrain: Get out, ye ghoulies!

Bowing to concerns of a wide range of groups - from Christians who consider Halloween to have pagan or satanic overtones to church-state separatists who object to the holiday's religious roots - some elementary schools are canceling their customary costume parades and Halloween celebrations.

In their place are "Fall-o-ween" events, which take note of harvest and seasonal change but that eliminate all things spooky - or controversial.

"There's been a steady growth of the number of people and the kinds of perspectives objecting to Halloween, and it's become a real issue for schools," says Charles Haynes at the First Amendment Center in Arlington, Va. "There's a lot of strangeness around this issue."

***

In Centennial, Colo., Red Hawk Ridge Elementary School, intoning Lemony Snicket's Count Olaf, ordered: "No costumes. No parade. No Halloween." Costumes that do make it to school will be "neutralized." In Hammond, Ind., the district will be costume-free Monday. In Newton, Mass., principal David Castelline, who last year dressed up as Red Sox hitter Johnny Damon, acceded to demands from religious parents to banish Halloween.

Peggy Beasley-Rodgers, principal of Raleigh's Washington Elementary School ("Home of the Wizards"), says pumpkins get decorated and teachers dress up, but costumes are allowed only as part of a "curriculum-driven" literary parade. Teachers avoid using the word Halloween, says Ms. Beasley-Rodgers, who Friday wore a shirt with the word "boo!" "Children think Halloween is the best holiday of the year," she says, "but one of the concessions that we make is we don't really do anything specifically for Halloween."

Note to religious conservatives: if your God(s) is actually threatened by children dressing up as bunnies and going door-to-door asking for candy, your God is pretty sensitive.  It's just a fun holiday!!  Get over it!!!

UPDATE: And the same goes for you, Chavez!

2005 Darwin Awards

For those unfamiliar, The Darwin Awards are named in honor of Charles Darwin, the father of evolution.

They commemorate those who improve our gene pool by removing themselves from it in astoundingly stupid ways.

The 2005 nominees are now posted at the Darwin Awards website.  Here's the nominee with the most votes (so far):

(19 March 2005, Michigan) "Unusual" and "complicated" is how the Missaukee County sheriff described the mysterious death of 19-year-old Christopher, who called 911 at 1:22am and calmly informed the police dispatcher that his neighbor had stabbed him. Suddenly he began screaming and begging for help. A woman was heard shouting in the background, "Why did you do this?" Deputies arrived quickly, only to find that Christopher had bled to death from stab wounds to his chest.

After an evening spent imbibing large quantities of alcohol, Christopher noticed a shortage in his liquor supply that could not be attributed to his own depredations. He concluded that his neighbor had stolen a bottle of booze! He menaced said neighbor with a knife, to no avail, whereupon he retired to his own apartment to brood about revenge.

Finally he figured out the perfect way to get back at that conniving bottle-thief: he would stab himself and blame the neighbor!

A witness saw Christopher enter the bathroom while he called police. When he emerged from the bathroom, he looked perfectly fine, but a moment later he began screaming as gouts of blood spewed from his chest. He ran to the door of the apartment, and collapsed.

The evidence pointed to self-inflicted wounds. Deputies found the knife that killed him in the kitchen, and an autopsy concluded that he had stabbed himself in the chest twice. The first wound may not have looked dangerous enough to him, so he took the knife and tried again, this time plunging it into his left ventricle. This wound was plenty dangerous: he had only two minutes to live.

Christopher died in vain. His deathbed accusation fell on deaf ears, as a witness stated that the neighbor was not in the apartment, and the neighbor offered to take a lie-detector test to demonstrate his innocence. All Christopher got for revenge was an accidental death sentence.

UPDATE:  And, right on cue, this guy makes a last  minute attempt to claim the award (Sorry, Rev -- I think the date cut-off has passed):

WACO, Texas (AP) -- A pastor performing a baptism was electrocuted inside his church Sunday morning when he adjusted a nearby microphone while standing in water, a church employee said.

The Rev. Kyle Lake, 33, was stepping into the baptistery as he reached out for the microphone, which produced an electric shock, said University Baptist Church community pastor Ben Dudley.

***

Lake was pronounced dead at Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center, nursing supervisor Pat Mahl said. The woman being baptized apparently had not stepped into the water and was not seriously injured.

Restoration Project

From Billmon:

George W. Bush will repair what has been damaged . . . On the first hour of the first day, he will restore decency and integrity to the Oval Office.

Dick Cheney
Speech to the 2000 Republican Convention
August 2, 2000

My fellow citizens, we can begin again. After all of the shouting, and all of the scandal. After all of the bitterness and broken faith. We can begin again.

George W. Bush
Speech to the 2000 Republican Convention
August 3, 2000

Barely a third of Americans -- 34 percent -- think Bush is doing a good job ensuring high ethics in government, which is slightly lower than President Bill Clinton's standing on this issue when he left office. (emphasis added).

Washington Post
White House Ethics, Honesty Questioned
October 30, 2005

Stupid Wall Street Journal Quote

WSJ editorial:

Unless Mr. Fitzgerald can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Mr. Libby was lying, and doing so for some nefarious purpose, this indictment looks like a case of criminalizing politics.

"Nefarious purpose"?  No, idiots.  He only has to prove that Libby intentially lied to the prosecutors and grand jury.   What do you think?  It's okay too lie under oath, if you are doing in benevolently?

Singin' In The Rain -- The Remix

Yeah, you've probably seen it before, but here it is again.  The Volkswagon ad feature Gene Kelly doing "Singin' In The Rain" like you've never seen it done before.

Click image to play.  File in Quicktime format -- may take a minute or so to begin.

I Wish I Said That

This item relating to the 2,000 death in Iraq is soooo two days ago*, but it just came across my radar now.

I'm speaking of blogwatcher Peter Daou, who critized Michelle Malkin, Little Green Footballs and others for describing the left's anti-war "vigils" as "parties":

"I find this rash of posts suggesting that anti-war activists 'celebrate' the deaths of American soldiers to be both tragic and telling. Tragic, because it represents a descent into depraved, gutter-level slander as a form of argumentation, and it is a profoundly un-American approach to a most American of activities: dissent. Telling, because it means these bloggers have nothing left to justify the deaths of Americans in Iraq but desperate and transparent attacks on those who want our troops home.

***

Bottom line: If Malkin, LGF, and Blackfive think opponents of the Iraq war are "celebrating" the deaths of American troops, let them answer the basic paradox of their position, namely, how is it that wanting our troops NOT to die is worse than wanting them to remain in the line of fire?"

Good stuff.

* Two days later, the American death toll is now 2,006.

Really Not Too Smart

Matt Yglesius observes:

Watching CNN it's obvious that the conservative strategy on these indictments is the same old playbook: Slime and defend. Except they can't slime Patrick Fitzgerald, so instead they're going to attack ... Joe Wilson. But why? Wilson has literally nothing to do with the allegations being made here. Scooter Libby said some things under oath to the grand jury. Some of those things were false. Those are crimes.

Paul Begala completes the thought:

“So now it looks like there are going to go after Joe Wilson, which is what got them in trouble in the first place.”

The Bar They Set

Standards Of Official Conduct

Memorandum
January 20, 2001

MEMORANDUM FOR THE HEADS OF EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENTS AND AGENCIES

SUBJECT: Standards of Official Conduct

Everyone who enters into public service for the United States has a duty to the American people to maintain the highest standards of integrity in Government. I ask you to ensure that all personnel within your departments and agencies are familiar with, and faithfully observe, applicable ethics laws and regulations, including the following general principles from the Standards of Ethical Conduct for Employees of the Executive Branch:

(1) Public service is a public trust, requiring employees to place loyalty to the Constitution, the laws, and ethical principles above private gain.

(7) Employees shall not use public office for private gain.

(11) Employees shall disclose waste, fraud, abuse, and corruption to appropriate authorities.

(12) Employees shall satisfy in good faith their obligations as citizens, including all just financial obligations, especially those -- such as Federal, State, or local taxes -- that are imposed by law.

(14) Employees shall endeavor to avoid any actions creating the appearance that they are violating applicable law or the ethical standards in applicable regulations.

Please thank the personnel of your departments and agencies for their commitment to maintain the highest standards of integrity in Government as we serve the American people.

GEORGE W. BUSH

Via Digby.

Recall also that when Bush first spoke about this, he said he would fire anyone involved with the leak of Plame's name.

Well, here's Exhibit A:

If Bush is at all true to his word and standards, he will fire "Official A".  Just because Fitzgerald wasn't able to indict "Official A" does not mean Official A should be off the hook from a White House which told the American people it was going to do more than just be legal, but ethical as well.

You hear me, Karl Rove Official A?