The Next Hurrah is on the Rudy Giuliani - Alan Placa relationship.

Placa and Giuliani became friends when they were 13-14, when they began High School, and remained close friends through College. Post college Placa went to the Seminary, and Giuliani off to Law School. After he was ordained, Placa went off to Law School too. Eventually he became a Monsignor in the Diocese of Rockville Center, Long Island NY, and as we know Giuliani went to DC to Reagan's DOJ. When Giuliani needed an Annulment of his first marriage, Placa did the job.

But Monsignor Placa got into considerable trouble in the late 1990's and early 2000 era, when he not only was accused of abuse of two minors, who could not sue him or the diocese because the five year statute of limitations was long past, but when the whole huge story broke, first in Boston, and then across the country, Monsignor Placa comes up in several parts of it. While serving on Long Island, he had developed a legal strategy for dealing with abuse complaints that involved having an "intervention team" that met with family members and the abused, without revealing that Placa was indeed the Diocese Lawyer on such matters. Placa took great pride that in cases that if litigated might cost the Diocese Millions, he could frequently manipulate the situation, and get out for a few thousand. Of course the Monsignor was flying a false flag -- he was not a spiritual counsel, he was the Bishop's Lawyer. He traveled the country teaching Bishops the technique -- apparently 200 cases where he was successful outside his own diocese.

Where is the national media on this? Sara at Next Hurrah says, "To read all the bloody details, what you do is google the two names, Alan Placa and Rudy Giuliani, and you can read about it for hours, should you have a taste for Priestly Pedophilia and the investigations of recent years thereof.

Senator Edward Kennedy has a diary up at Daily Kos addressing the nation's need for immigration reform. Best line:

We must find a better solution to our immigration crisis than raids that rip families apart.

His staff will be answering questions in the comments, and he will personally respond to some tomorrow.

Update: The transcript of the press conference is here.

*****

Live-Blogging Attorney General Alberto Gonzales''s News Conference on the U.S. Attorney firings. Scroll down for updates. Also check out TRex at Firedoglake.

Shorter version: I'm responsible and accountable but I'm staying on the job and will find out what happened.

2:15 p.m. Things he believes in:

The independence of the U.S. Attorneys. The AG and all all U.S. Attorneys serve at the pleasure of the president. He believes in the role of the Senate in the confirmation process He believes in accountability. He is responsible. He accepts responsibility. He acknowledges mistakes here and will find out what went wrong.

He's overcome a lot of obstacles to become AG. He's not going to give up. He's committed to doing his job and that is what he intends to do here.

More...

Update: DOJ documents related to the scandal are here.

CREW has sent a letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales demanding the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate the firing of U.S. Attorneys.

Recent revelations indicate that a top-ranking Department of Justice official knew that statements made by top Department officials were not true. Clearly, the Department of Justice cannot investigate itself and prosecute the misconduct of DOJ officials. CREW also asked the Department of Justice’s Inspector General and Office of Professional Responsibility to investigate the situation.

Crew's position:

At daily kos, BarbinMD writes a must read post on Blue Dogs and Iraq. The heart of the matter:

I called all 43 of the Blue Dog Dems and asked:

Does the Congressman support requiring that all troops are properly rested, trained and equipped before being sent to Iraq?

A simple yes or no question. And some of the answers I received?

I'll have to get back to you on that.

Well I'm sure she does in principle...let me get back to you.

I'm pretty sure he does...let me get back to you.

Ummm, that's a sensitive issue. I'll get back to you

I'd like to run that by him. I haven't heard that question before. . . .

I was not of a strong opinion on the Fox Nevada debate. But I have always detested Bill O'Reilly. I also have contempt for Lanny Davis. Here he provides all the evidence you need:

O’REILLY: . . . The Soros-Lewis mob despises Fox News because we have their number and we report on them accurately. . . . These people use techniques perfected by Dr. Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi minister of information. They lie, distort, defame, all the time. . . . The Fox News Channel has been fair to the Democratic Party and will continue to be fair. . . Let’s go to another honest guy here [See O'Reilly calls him himself honest here], Lanny Davis. . . .

DAVIS: You know, I’m inclined to give everybody the benefit of the doubt here except the people that are calling for cancellation of the debate because they don’t like Fox. . . . We got to be talking to everybody, and I disagree with this pressure from Daily Kos and MoveOn.org to cancel the debate. I think anybody that took that pressure including John Edwards ought to be ashamed of themselves.

Lanny Davis sits with Bill O'Reilly, listens to him compare people to Nazis and says nothing, and Daily Kos and Move On should be ashamed of themselves? John Edwards should be ashamed of himself? Lanny Davis is not only detestable, he is insane.

Remember the six Imans who were removed from a U.S. Airways flight because they prayed together at the airport gate?

Six imams attending a conference in Minneapolis took time to pray at the gate before boarding a U.S. Airways flight to Phoenix. A passenger handed a note to a flight attendant pointing out the "6 suspicious Arabic men" on the plane. Disturbed by their "unsettling" behavior -- which apparently consisted of praying and asking for seat belt extensions -- the crew told the police that the imams needed to be removed. They were escorted from the plane in handcuffs and detained for five hours before authorities conceded that they posed no threat.

The Imans have sued U.S. Airways alleging discrimination.

When the men returned to the airport the next day, they said, the airline refunded their fare but refused to sell them another ticket.

More...

Actor Sylvester Stallone has been charged in Australia with illegally importing 48 vials of a hormone growth drug into Australia. He didn't declare the drug on his Customs form. Later, his hotel room and private jet were searched.

Stallone says,

It was just a minor misunderstanding. They were just doing their jobs. I just didn't understand some of the rules here."

Fair is fair, hats off to John Solomon (and coauthor Dan Eggen) for this story:

While it is unclear whether the documents, which were reviewed yesterday by The Washington Post, will answer Congress's questions, they show that the White House and other administration officials were more closely involved in the dismissals, and at a much earlier date, than they have previously acknowledged. . . . Administration officials have portrayed the firings as a routine personnel matter, designed primarily to rid the department of a handful of poor performers. But the documents and interviews indicate that the idea for the firings originated at least two years ago, when then-White House counsel Harriet E. Miers suggested to Sampson in February 2005 that all prosecutors be dismissed and replaced.

Good work from Solomon.

PFAW:

People For the American Way, which two years ago helped lead opposition to the confirmation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, today called for his resignation or removal as the first step toward holding the White House and Department of Justice accountable to the rule of law, and urged Congress to expand its oversight of the administration.

“Each scandal sheds new light on the Bush administration’s abuse of power, violation of Americans’ civil liberties, and contempt for the Constitution,” said People For the American Way President Ralph G. Neas. “Our nation’s top law enforcement official is in the middle of it, showing greater fidelity to the political interests of President Bush than to the public interest and the rule of law.”

. . . Neas said these are just the most recent in a series of developments that demonstrate Alberto Gonzales has failed to live up to his oath of office and act as the people’s lawyer, not the President’s. “The Attorney General has demonstrated time and again that Americans can’t trust him—or this administration—to follow the law, or to uphold the Constitution,” said Neas. . . . It is in the nation’s best interest for the Attorney General to resign, and if he fails to do so, President Bush should remove him from office.”

And if not that, then the Congress should impeach him. Sign the petition.

Just my opinion, not that of Talk Left.

The lastest lie from the White House is that all 93 U.S. Attorneys were being considered for firing by the President for not appropriately investigating voter fraud. Today's New York Times, White House Said to Prompt Firing of Prosecutors, ¶ 2:

Last October, President Bush spoke with Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales to pass along concerns by Republicans that some prosecutors were not aggressively addressing voter fraud, the White House said Monday.

This is an absolute and utter sham.

In the case of the fired U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas, it is almost the ultimate hypocrisy, short of the Iraq War, and every other lie the White House has told.  Tim Griffin, the replacement U.S. Attorney, has been implicated in voter fraud in the stolen Florida Presidential election in 2000.

Again speaking for me exclusively.

To hear some in the "Netroots" (Update [2007-3-13 13:6:21 by Big Tent Democrat]: A good point from Kos to me, Stoller is not the "Netroots" - though I think Stoller is a big part of the "Netroots") tell it, defunding the Iraq Debacle by the Dem Congress is pipe dream crazy talk. Here is Matt Stoller:

Respectfully, your pet solution is not THE ANSWER. There is no THE ANSWER. Strategy is actually putting out a set of parameters that actually map to reality, and the reality is that there is not the discipline in the party to do what you suggest . . .

For Stoller, defunding can not be done. At least not by Democrats. For Stoller, it takes REPUBLICANS to defund:

There's only one endgame for Iraq, and that's to force Republicans in Congress to recognize that it's their [behinds] on the line.