They Only Lie When It Matters

More evidence of the fundamental dishonesty of the Bush Administration when it comes to answering questions from meddling outsiders. During Congressional hearings regarding the renewal of The Patriot Act, Attorney General Alberto "Fredo" Gonzales laid-down this bold and decisive sound bite:

There has not been one verified case of civil liberties abuse.

Thus were those concerned about The Patriot Act's scope dismissed as nervous weaklings.

The problem is:

Six days earlier, the FBI sent Gonzales a copy of a report that said its agents had obtained personal information that they were not entitled to have. It was one of at least half a dozen reports of legal or procedural violations that Gonzales received in the three months before he made his statement to the Senate intelligence committee, according to internal FBI documents released under the Freedom of Information Act.

Gonzales' would have had less impact if he had said, for example:

The only incidents of illegally obtained personal data have been purely accidental.

It would have been more accurate and forthcoming, but would also have opened more doors of inquiry, and that's something the closed Bush Administration simply doesn't tolerate.

Whether the Attorney General outright lied depends, I suppose, on what your definition of "abuse" is. Still, here's another case of ambiguity breaking in the direction favorable to the Administration's goals. I can't think of a time when they made a misstatement that weakened their case, so it's hard for me to conceive of this kind of thing being anything but an orchestrated technique of dishonesty.

So the Attorney General lied the way the Bush Administration consistently lies. Ordinarily, that would be a big deal. Under this administration, it's pretty much par for the course.

Comments

[Squidley]

Only 18 months left....

But--what if who comes next is worse? (shudder)

[michelle]

I'm not convinced that's possible.

[Squidley]

Hillary, Obama, and Rudy come to mind.