The Limits of 'Linguistic Parsing'

Eggen notes: "A Justice official conceded during a background briefing for reporters this week that Gonzales's 'linguistic parsing' has caused some confusion, but said that he spoke accurately."

Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball write for Newsweek: "The letter by director of national intelligence at the time, John Negroponte, as well as public testimony by CIA Director Michael Hayden, seems to contradict sworn testimony by Gonzales this week about a crucial intelligence briefing for congressional leaders on activities in the White House Situation Room on March 10, 2004. . . .

"Gonzales repeatedly insisted to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday that the 'emergency' White House briefing on March 10, and his later visit to Ashcroft's hospital room that night, did not involve the president's Terrorist Surveillance Program. . . .

"His claims were met with sharp skepticism from several senators, who claimed the attorney general appeared to be trying to justify his past denials that there had been any internal disputes about the controversial program.

"'It defies credulity to believe that the discussion with Attorney General Ashcroft or with the group of eight [congressional leaders] . . . was about nothing other than the TSP,' Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer said to Gonzales at one point. 'And if it was about the TSP, you're dissembling to this committee.'

"'The disagreement on the 10th was about other intelligence activities,' Gonzales replied.

"Schumer: 'Not the TSP'?

"Gonzales: 'It was not.'"

And this just in: Laurie Kellman writes for the Associated Press: "Senate Democrats called Thursday for a special counsel to investigate whether Attorney General Alberto Gonzales perjured himself regarding the firings of U.S. attorneys and administration dissent over President Bush's domestic surveillance program.

"'It has become apparent that the attorney general has provided at a minimum half-truths and misleading statements,' four members of the Senate Judiciary Committee wrote in a letter to Solicitor General Paul Clement."

Opinion Watch

Glenn Greenwald blogs for Salon: "Beyond Gonzales' long-established chronic lying . . . the critical issue that has to be addressed is this: what did these 'other intelligence activities' entail? How can we not know the answer to that question? After all, even the President's own DOJ appointees -- who are radical enough in their own right to have authorized warrantless eavesdropping even in the face of FISA -- all unanimously and emphatically concluded that it was unlawful. And, by all accounts, it did stop -- more than three years ago.

"What this means is that our own Government was spying on us using methods even more blatantly illegal than the 'Terrorist Surveillance Program' that was revealed. Whatever these 'other programs' entailed shocked the conscience even of the right-wing Bush lawyers in the DOJ. Thus -- as Marty Lederman put it -- 'Can You Even Imagine How Bad it Must Have Been?'