In her opening statement to the House Judiciary Committee today, Monica Goodling — the Justice Department’s former White House Liason — admitted that she had “taken inappropriate political considerations into account” while hiring career employees at the Department.

 

Later during the hearing, Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA) asked Goodling whether she believed her actions had broken the law. Goodling initially tried to dodge the question, saying “that’s not a conclusion for me to make.”

 

Scott followed up: “Do you believe that they were illegal?” Goodling again tried to squirm her way out of a straight answer, “I don’t believe I intended to commit a crime.”

 

But Scott continued to push for a real answer, listing the various types of laws that may have been broken.

 

He again asked Goodling, “Were there any laws that you could have broken by taking political considerations into account, quote, on some occasions?”

 

Goodling eventually relented, admitting, “I crossed the line of the civil service rules.” Scott clarified, “Rules? Laws. You crossed the law on civil service laws. You crossed the line on civil service laws, is that right?”

 

She said, “I believe I crossed the lines. But I didn’t mean to.”

 

Transcript:

 

SCOTT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

 

Ms. Goodling, as you just heard, I was introduced as the chairman of the Subcommittee on Crime.

 

The criminal justice system cannot function if the public does not trust the system to be fair. We expect judges and prosecutors to strictly follow the rule of law. We expect witnesses in criminal cases, in all phases of criminal cases, to tell the truth. We expect juries to be fair and impartial.

 

And this won’t work if there are partisan political considerations becoming more important than fair and impartial decisions.

 

Unfortunately, there have been credible allegations that attorneys have been hired because of their partisan views rather than their legal backgrounds, that the culture of loyalty to the administration was more important than loyalty to the rule of law, and pressure and even firing of U.S. attorneys for failing to pursue partisan political agendas rather than the rule of law.

 

These allegations are serious because, if true, they can clearly undermine the confidence the public will have in the criminal justice system.

 

It’s been hard for us to get to the bottom of it because, when we ask simply questions, you’ve accused others of not telling the truth under oath. You in fact yourself pleaded the Fifth. So it’s been hard to get to the bottom of it.

 

But let me just ask a couple of questions.

 

In your testimony, you indicate that you have — quote, may have taken inappropriate political considerations into account on some occasions.

 

Do you believe that those political considerations were not just inappropriate, but in fact illegal?

 

GOODLING: That’s not a conclusion for me to make.

I know I was acting…

 

SCOTT: (inaudible) Do you believe that they were legal or illegal for you to take those political considerations in mind? Not whether they were legal or illegal, what do you believe? Do you believe that they were illegal?

 

GOODLING: I don’t believe I intended to commit a crime.

 

SCOTT: Did you break the law? Was it against the law to take those political considerations into account?

 

You’ve got civil service laws. You’ve got obstruction of justice. Were there any laws that you could have broken by taking political considerations into account, quote, on some occasions ?

 

GOODLING: The best I can say is that I know I took political considerations into account on some occasions.

 

SCOTT: Was that legal?

 

GOODLING: Sir, I’m not able to answer that question. I know I crossed the line.

 

SCOTT: What line — legal?

 

GOODLING: I crossed the line of the civil service rules.

 

SCOTT: Rules? Laws. You crossed the law on civil service laws. You crossed the line on civil service laws, is that right?

 

GOODLING: I believe I crossed the lines. But I didn’t mean to. I mean, I…

 

SCOTT: OK.

Ho Hum, Another Corrupt Bush Official
Posted by MEC on March 31st, 2007

 

The only thing that’s going to save us from Bushevik corruption is that so many of Bush’s minions are incompetent in their corruption. For example, Julie A. MacDonald, deputy assistant secretary at the Fish and Wildlife Service of the Interior Department.

 

A top-ranking official overseeing the Fish and Wildlife Service at the Interior Department rode roughshod over agency scientists, and decisions made on her watch may not survive court challenges, investigators within the Interior Department have found.

 

At least, we hope they don’t survive the court challenges, because her judgment is definitely worse than that of the scientists who actually, you know, have knowledge about the issues they’re researching. She don’t need no steenking facts, though, because her job is to make sure that the facts are “fixed around the policy”. For example,

 

…Ms. MacDonald lobbied for a decision to combine three different populations of the California tiger salamander into one, thus excluding it from the endangered-species list, and making the decision legally vulnerable. A federal district judge overturned it in 2005, saying the decision was made “without even a semblance of agency reasoning.”

 

The policy, in this case, seems to protect industries from being inconvenienced by environmental regulations:

 

The inspector general also found that Ms. MacDonald had sent internal government documents by e-mail to a lawyer for the Pacific Legal Foundation - a property-rights group that frequently challenges endangered-species decisions. 
 

She twice sent internal Environmental Protection Agency documents - one involving water quality management - to individuals whose e-mail addresses ended in “chevrontexaco.com,” the report said.

 

After Bush is finally out of office, it’s going to take years just to clean up the mess These People are creating in government agencies.

The example of Julie MacDonald’s interference with the protection of endangered species. shows that some of the damage they’re doing may be irreversible.

ETHICS
Bush Critics Need Not Apply

A new inspector general's report, portions of which were obtained by the Progress Report, document how the top U.S. housing official, Alphonso Jackson, "urged staff members to favor friends of President Bush when awarding Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) contracts."

Jackson is a "longtime Bush friend" and former neighbor in Dallas, Texas, who "has led the $32 billion agency since March 2004."

Three top HUD officials testified that Jackson told them that "it was important to consider presidential supporters when candidates for HUD discretionary contracts were being considered,” the report states.

Jackson's chief of staff told investigators that Jackson "personally intervened with contractors whom he did not like ... these contractors had Democratic political affiliations." 

Awarding contracts on the basis of party affiliation "violates federal law."

Yesterday, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), ranking member on the Government Reform Committee, called for Jackson to resign immediately. The White House gave him "a tepid vote of confidence."

JACKSON TOLD SENIOR STAFF TO REWARD BUSH SUPPORTERS WITH CONTRACTS:

Jackson admitted to investigators "that he did have a bias, in that he wasn't likely to assist someone who would 'castigate' him or the president, although he would not interfere with a contract on that basis."

But HUD officials say "he told a senior staff meeting...that they should look at contractors' political leanings. He urged them to give contracts to supporters of President Bush, and voiced concerns about other contracts going to active Democratic donors, the aides said." 

"I have never touched a contract,” Jackson said Wednesday in his first interview about the incident. “I just ad-libbed a little more than I should have, and I regret that.”

But the report also states that Jackson "would meet with individuals who were either contractors or who wanted to obtain contracts at HUD," despite testimony from a former HUD lawyer saying "we warned him against it."

Investigators "so far have found no direct proof that Jackson's staff obeyed." HUD is refusing to release the full, 340-page report on Jackson’s conduct to the media, but the Dallas Business Journal has filed a Freedom of Information Act request to obtain it.

JACKSON ADMITS LYING ABOUT RETRIBUTION FOR BUSH CRITIC:

The HUD investigation was triggered after the Dallas Business Journal reported last April that Jackson had closed a speech "with a cautionary tale, relaying a conversation he had with a prospective advertising contractor."

The contractor had "made a heck of a proposal...so we selected him," Jackson told a group of real estate officials. "He came to see me and thank me for selecting him. Then he said something ... he said, 'I have a problem with your president.' I said, 'What do you mean?' He said, 'I don't like President Bush.' I thought to myself, 'Brother, you have a disconnect -- the president is elected, I was selected. You wouldn't be getting the contract unless I was sitting here. If you have a problem with the president, don't tell the secretary.'" Jackson continued, "He didn't get the contract.

Why should I reward someone who doesn't like the president, so they can use funds to try to campaign against the president?

Logic says they don't get the contract. That's the way I believe."

When the story first broke, a HUD press secretary said that Jackson's story was actually "hypothetical," pure fiction, since Jackson is "not part of the contracting process."

But Jackson's chief of staff said he had "personally intervened with contractors whom he did not like," and the inspector general confirmed with HUD officials that the conversation did take place, although the contractor in question never had his contract canceled.

Jackson admitted to investigators that he had "lied, and I regret having done that."

JUST THE TIP OF THE ICEBERG:

The U.S. federal government spends roughly $315 billion annually on contracted goods and services, making it "the largest consumer of goods and services in the world."

Shielded from accountability by a secretive executive branch and a drought of oversight by congressional conservatives, the cash-flush federal contracting process has become a prime source of government corruption.

Most notably in Iraq and in the Katrina-ravaged Gulf Coast, the last several years have seen an explosion in contract fraud, waste, abuse, and cronyism.

Rep. Waxman has compiled a database -- Dollars, Not Sense -- to track the extent of waste, fraud, and abuse in federal contracts. 

"Currently, there are 124 contracts in the database, and the total value of the costs incurred or projected to be incurred under the contracts is $752 billion."

Calls by progressives to establish a Truman Commission to investigate waste and fraud in Iraq contracts, and by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and others to establish a federal Anti-Fraud Commission for Katrina spending, have been repeatedly rejected by conservatives.