> U.S. v. Bush
>
> By David Swanson
> Created Nov 22 2006 - 8:15am
>
> Now, we almost all agree that Bush and Cheney have done bad things. But have
> they actually committed crimes? If you know anyone who has any doubts on
> this topic, may I recommend a brilliant little book for you to stick in
> their stocking next month?
>
> In her new book, "United States v. George W. Bush et al. [1]," former
> federal prosecutor Elizabeth de la Vega presents the case, as if to a grand
> jury, for an indictment of Bush, Cheney, Rice, Rumsfeld, and Powell. De la
> Vega does not address over a dozen clear criminal acts, including some
> openly confessed to - such as spying in violation of the Foreign
> Intelligence Surveillance Act. Instead she focuses on the area where the
> most significant harm has been done, but where the legal issues have seemed
> to many people complex and unclear.
>
> De la Vega charges that Bush, Cheney, et al., "did knowingly and
> intentionally conspire to defraud the United States by using deceit, craft,
> trickery, dishonest means, false and fraudulent representations, including
> ones made without a reasonable basis and with reckless indifference to their
> truth or falsity, and omitting to state material facts necessary to make
> their representations truthful, fair and accurate, while knowing and
> intending that their false and fraudulent representations would influence
> the public and the deliberations of Congress with regard to authorization of
> a preventive war against Iraq, thereby defeating, obstructing, impairing,
> and interfering with Congress' lawful functions of overseeing foreign
> affairs and making appropriations."
>
> That may sound like a longwinded and legalistic way of saying "Bush lied.
> People died." And more or less it is. But in some important ways it is not.
> De la Vega is arguing, as John Bonifaz did in this letter to Congressman
> John Conyers [2] in May of 2005, that there is probable cause to believe
> that the President and others have violated Title 18, United States Code,
> Section 371. This law makes it a felony "to commit any offense against the
> United States, or to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any
> manner or for any purpose...." The Congress is one such agency. To defraud
> the Congress is not the same thing as to lie to it.
>
> As Bonifaz argued persuasively, Bush has lied to Congress, thus violating
> the False Statements Accountability Act of 1996, 18 U.S.C. - 1001. But in
> many instances, both in writing and speaking, Bush and gang have been
> careful to select words that might be described as literally true while
> intentionally misleading. There are arguably many instances in which he and
> his subordinates (for whose actions he is also legally responsible) have
> avoided making false statements while nonetheless committing fraud.
>
> Bush's statements have also not been made under oath. This means they are
> not perjury. It does not mean they are legal. Nor is legality strictly at
> issue in questions of impeachment. A crime can be too minor to be properly
> an impeachable offense. An impeachable offense, an abuse of power, a threat
> to our system of government, can be committed without violating any law.
>
> Still, it is illuminating to see the legal case made in detail and with
> overwhelming evidence that Bush et alia have committed fraud. The law, it
> turns out, is much closer to common sense than common wisdom supposes it to
> be. We commonly think that pairing "9-11" and "Saddam" together thousands of
> times with the clear and successful intention of persuading people that the
> two are connected is dishonest even if you avoid literally saying "Saddam
> Hussein caused 9-11." But we suppose falsely that the law is not with us,
> that the law must stick to what was literally said. We imagine falsely that
> for a crime to have been committed, the words "Saddam Hussein caused 9-11"
> must have been spoken, and must have been spoken under oath, and must have
> been spoken by someone intelligent enough to be in command of the
> information and know he was lying. We are triply and grievously mistaken.
> There are still many laws on the books in this country that are much more
> wisely written than that.
>
> Asserting, as Cheney did, that Iraq has nuclear weapons looks like a lie.
> Worrying aloud, as Bush and Rice did, that Iraq might nuke the United States
> seems dishonest. But can it actually be criminal? Indeed it can be. De la
> Vega explains how. In her Introduction, she describes one of the goals of
> her book as follows:
>
> "I want to explain that under the law that governs charges of conspiracy to
> defraud, the legal question is not whether the President lied. The question
> is not whether the President subjectively believed that there were weapons
> of mass destruction in Iraq. The legal question that must be answered is far
> more comprehensive: Did the President and his team defraud the country?
> After swearing to uphold the law of the land, did our highest government
> officials employ the universal techniques of fraudsters - deliberate
> concealment, misrepresentations, false pretenses, half-truths - to deceive
> Congress and the American people?"
>
> Later, De la Vega adds: "[A]nyone who makes representations intending that
> the public will rely on them, has an affirmative obligation to make sure
> that they are true and accurate. Representations made with reckless
> indifference to their truth are as false as outright lies." Of course this
> makes sense. If you're the President you actually have a duty to try to do
> your job right. You're actually responsible for gross carelessness as much
> as for malice. It's nice, isn't it, to know the law sees it this way too.
>
> Fraud can be committed by lying, but also by false pretenses, false
> representations, half-truths, deliberate concealment of important
> information, misleading representations, or statements made with reckless
> indifference to truth. In this book, De la Vega demonstrates in plain
> English through an entertaining simulation of a presentation to a grand jury
> how fraud was committed over and over again in the marketing of the Iraq
> War. Breaking a little from reality for the sake of more entertaining
> dialogue, the author has imaginary grand jurors occasionally ask questions
> of the prosecutor and witnesses. After laying out the evidence Bush had that
> aluminum tubes purchased by Iraq were not intended for a nuclear centrifuge,
> one grand juror sums it up by asking:
>
> "In other words, to conclude that the Iraqis intended to use these tubes in
> a nuclear centrifuge, you'd have to assume that they deliberately ordered
> tubes that were made from inferior material, not cut as precisely as they
> needed, three times too thick, more than twice as long, half the diameter
> needed, and coated with something they'd have to take off?"
>
> Now, Bush may have assumed all of that. Cheney may have told him to assume
> all of that, and he may have nodded with his mouth hanging open and said
> "Duh, all right, whatever you say." But he had a legal responsibility as
> President not to launch a war on the basis of such questionable assumptions,
> not to conceal them from Congress and the American people, and not to exact
> retribution against those whose research called his conclusions into doubt.
>
> The aluminum tubes were one of two pieces of "evidence" that Iraq might
> someday develop nuclear weapons. The other one makes this one look solid.
> Read this book.
>
> And when you read it, bear this in mind: If we pressure Congress hard enough
> it will do the investigations early next year that will lead to impeachment
> and later criminal prosecution for these crimes. And the investigations have
> the potential to reveal much more evidence [3], but -- as De la Vega has
> shown better than anyone else I've seen, and as she thoroughly documents -
> there is already more than enough evidence on the table to justify a
> criminal indictment or a political indictment, also known as an impeachment.
>
> After you read this book, please deliver it or mail it to your Congress
> Member.
>
>
>
> --
> NOTICE: This post contains copyrighted material the use of which has not
> always been authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such material
> available to advance understanding of
> political, human rights, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues. I
> believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material as
> provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright
> Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107
>
> "A little patience and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their
> spells dissolve, and the people recovering their true sight, restore their
> government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are
> suffering deeply in spirit,
> and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous public
> debt. But if the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have
> patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning
> back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at
> stake."
> -Thomas Jefferson