{"id":409320,"date":"2010-03-09T20:27:19","date_gmt":"2010-03-10T01:27:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/firedoglake.com\/?p=72001"},"modified":"2010-03-09T20:27:19","modified_gmt":"2010-03-10T01:27:19","slug":"hans-von-spakovsky-takes-a-page-from-liz-cheney%e2%80%99s-playbook","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/409320","title":{"rendered":"Hans von Spakovsky Takes a Page from Liz Cheney\u2019s Playbook"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/p>\n

photo: PoliticalActivityLaw.com via Flickr<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Wow, Hans von Spakovsky\u00a0has taken a page from Lynn Cheney\u2019s \u201cAl Qaeda Seven\u201d slander ad and launched a patchwork quilt of personal attacks against the senior members of the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division. In an article appearing in the National Review he goes after each of them in a very personal way. Ultimately, I think the article backfires and Hans has jumped the shark.<\/p>\n

The article is actually wildly entertaining if you read it as satire. How can pointing out that someone was smart and talented enough to clerk for a federal Court of Appeals judge and<\/em> a Supreme Court Justice actually count as an insult?<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not going to dignify this hysterical screed with a link because The National Review did not earn any click-through props by printing this crap. Normally, I respect them even when I disagree with them, but this tripe is so far below their standards as to make me wonder what sort of shouting must be going on in their editorial meetings this week.<\/p>\n

For example, Hans castigates\u00a0Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez<\/a> for the sins of having worked for Senator Edward Kennedy, having been elected to the Montgomery County, Maryland legislature and belonging to Casa de Maryland.\u00a0 Oh, the horror of it all. Worse yet, according to Hans, is\u00a0Mark Kappelhoff’s sin for daring to have worked for \u2013 wait for it –\u00a0yes, the ACLU. OMG!<\/p>\n

Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General\u00a0Samuel Bagenstos<\/a> is the aforementioned victim of Hans’s insult who clerked for 9th\u00a0Circuit Court of Appeals Judge\u00a0Stephen Reinhardt. Bagenstos also clerked for my personal SCOTUS fave, Justice Ruth Ginsberg. Evidently, Hans thinks these credentials are something to be ashamed of; he really enjoyed \u201couting\u201d Bagenstos.<\/span><\/p>\n

The National Review piece reads like something from\u00a0The Onion<\/a>. If it was meant as an April\u2019s Fool\u2019s piece, they are a few weeks early. I know that\u00a0Hans gets paid by the Heritage Foundation<\/a> to come up with attacks from the right, but are they getting value for money? \u00a0If the best he can turn out sinks to the Liz Cheney level of Epic Fail, might they want to rethink how they are allocating their resources?<\/p>\n

Last semi-related point:<\/p>\n

I know that Attorney General Eric Holder thinks that the work of the Civil Rights Division is going to be his legacy\u2014that the Civil Rights Division (CRD) is,\u00a0as Senator Schumer described it, \u00a0the \u00a0\u201ccrown jewel\u201d of DOJ<\/a>.\u00a0 I have to put a pin in the AG\u2019s party balloon.<\/p>\n

It won\u2019t matter one tiny little bit how much or how great the work of the Civil Rights Division is if we fail to restore the rule of law in this country.<\/p>\n

If DOJ does not have the independence to make charging and venue decisions free from political interference; if people can be captured and held indefinitely without trial or due process, then every single civil right in this country is an illusion and the talented lawyers with sterling resumes in the CRD are wasting their time as we speak.<\/p>\n

Hans von Spakovsky’s and Liz Cheney’s efforts to delegitimize these lawyers and their work cannot compare to the effects of failing to adhere to the rule of law.<\/p>\n

Mr. Attorney General, during your confirmation hearings you promised to restore the rule of law and you told\u00a0Senator Herb Kohl that\u00a0there were some things worth resigning over<\/a>. Don\u2019t let\u00a0Senator Lindsey Graham destroy\u00a0everything else<\/a> you are trying to do.<\/p>\n

Whether or not you are able to restore the independence and integrity of DOJ is the only legacy that matters. All of the work of the CRD or the entire DOJ hinges on this effort.<\/p>\n

Tags: Eric Holder<\/a>, Hans von Spakovsky<\/a>, Lynn Cheney<\/a>, The National Review<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Share <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

photo: PoliticalActivityLaw.com via Flickr Wow, Hans von Spakovsky\u00a0has taken a page from Lynn Cheney\u2019s \u201cAl Qaeda Seven\u201d slander ad and launched a patchwork quilt of personal attacks against the senior members of the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division. In an article appearing in the National Review he goes after each of them in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4350,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-409320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4350"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=409320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409320\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=409320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=409320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=409320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}