Barr v. Bush

David Weigel | March 21, 2007

Libertarian Party dynamo Bob Barr appeared on CNN to speak sense on the U.S. Attorneys scandal. ThinkProgress has a video and transcript:

I would certainly say, Mr. President, your predecessors in office, your father was under great pressure when I was U.S. Attorney General in Atlanta, Georgia, to take action against me for political reasons. Your father resisted those efforts. President Reagan, your supposed hero, resisted those efforts. Please do something to assure the American public that this is an open process, that it is not run on political considerations where the rubber meets the road and that’s with the United States Attorneys across this country. Work with the congress. and let’s see if we can work this out. Because there’s far more at stake here than either you or the attorney general proving who’s the toughest hombre in this dispute.

I chatted with Barr about this last weekend for an article that'll appear before too long.

Go here and read more Reason on Barr, including several more interviews..

Comments

|3.21.07 @ 1:23PM|#

Titty cheese.

|3.21.07 @ 1:25PM|#

Well, I doubt any of this would have taken place absent the belief that they could name a successor who would serve indefinately absent Senatorial consent, so much has been done to resolve the issue already.

Christopher Monnier|3.21.07 @ 1:35PM|#

Did CNN make no mention of Barr's LP affiliation?

|3.21.07 @ 1:43PM|#

I agree with Will Allen AND Bob Barr.

Which is an odd feeling.

|3.21.07 @ 2:21PM|#

I chatted with Barr about this last weekend.

I hope you spent the whole conversation hammering him on the Drug War and his complicity there in. Cutting off every weasel response. Because as far as Bob Barr is concerned, thats all that matters. If he's ready to atone for his sins, fine. If not, he's just another Conservative asshat using the libertarians to get his hands on power, and fully intends to stab us in the back the moment he's back in the saddle.

|3.21.07 @ 2:36PM|#

Yes, because nothing allows one to climb the rungs of power quite like hitching your wagon to the Libertarian Party.

NotEvenARocketScientist|3.21.07 @ 2:42PM|#

Did CNN make no mention of Barr's LP affiliation?

I dunno about CNN, but Barr used the Libertarian word quite a bit on C-SPAN at this link.

stephen the goldberger|3.21.07 @ 3:14PM|#

Barr is disillusioned with the Republican party (like any decent member should be) and is using the Libertarian party as tool to try and sway Republicans back to ideas of smaller goverment. He's been totally honest about this and to say "fuck you" about the drug war when he can help increase the party's exposure is stupid.

Goldwater Conservative|3.21.07 @ 3:43PM|#

to say "fuck you" about the drug war when he can help increase the party's exposure is stupid.

What will the LP allow next? Tax hikers? War mongers? Eminent Domain supporters? The drug war is not some issue in high theory (a la GOLD STANDARD) it is a real issue, ruining real lives and costing real money. What is the point of the LP if they on going to compromises on what is perhaps the most disastrous policy this side of Iraq?

Goldwater Conservative|3.21.07 @ 3:44PM|#

EDIT:if they are going to make compromises

Timothy|3.21.07 @ 4:00PM|#

Warren: Don't you have a date with a pile of broken glass? Hurry up and get ready boy!

Stephen the Goldberger|3.21.07 @ 4:37PM|#

he's not running for anything he's just calling himself a libertarian. He's using the party's ideas and the label in order to try and sway public and government opinion. A symbiotic relationship can be formed without compromising any of the party's tenants.

biologist|3.21.07 @ 5:54PM|#

or tenets, either

Gene Berkman|3.21.07 @ 6:21PM|#

Bob Barr has joined with David Keene, Bruce Fein and Richard Viguerie in The American Freedom Agenda, to combat Bush's Imperial Presidency. They call for an end to military commissions, ban on the use of secret evidence, ending the President's power to name American citizens as "enemy aliens" etc.

More info @ http://www.americanfreedomagenda.org/