Here’s a quick propaganda hit.

One of the criticisms facing Attorney General Gonzales surrounding his appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday is this: Dems say Gonzales lied to the Committee during his confirmation hearings last year, when Gonzales denied that he believed the President had authority to order wiretaps in violation of law.

Recall the old Clinton dodge about how he didn’t technically lie, because “It depends on what the definition of ‘is’ is.”?

Well, here’s the Gonzales dodge, when asked by Sen Biden about his earlier confirmation-hearing denial that the president had authority to wiretap in violation of law: (I am going from my memory here —-): “Senator, you asked me if I thought the president had authority to wiretap in violation of the CRIMINAL LAWS, and FISA is not a criminal law.”

Now we come to the Washington Times, the newspaper owned by the controversial Rev. Sun Yung Moon, of the Unification Church, the newspaper that convicted felon radio pundit G. Gordon Liddy, whose history says he would do virtually anything to support his party and leader, refers to as “A Real Newspaper”.

GOP Senator Arlen Specter refused to permit Gonzales to be sworn to tell the truth at the hearing. Now, isn’t a bit suspicious when the GOP refuses to permit an embattled GOP official from being sworn to tell the truth to Congress?

The GOP did this same thing last year in the investigation of gas price gouging, when they refused to require that oil company executives be sworn in. [I wonder how often the Dems pulled this stuff, during the two years or so that they controlled the Senate in the last generation].

Being sworn to tell the truth does not mean that you have to breach national security by revealing secrets in response to questions. You can decline to answer a question, citing national security and other concerns, as witnesses regularly seem to do at Congressional hearings. OR, if you lie in the public part of the hearing [in order to mislead the enemy], and you contact the Senators privately after the hearing to clarify the record.

Let’s see how the Washington Times news report spun the swearing-in story:

In the article, ‘Enemy is listening,’ Gonzales warns, the Wash Times reporter or editor added a couple of choice pieces of pure spin in order to minimize the public relations damage flowing from the GOP NOT swearing-in Gonzales:

[snip]

But even before the first question was asked, the hearings stalled for 10 minutes in partisan rancor over whether Mr. Gonzales would raise his right hand and promise to tell the truth during his testimony.

Democrats, who said Mr. Gonzales wasn’t truthful during his confirmation hearings last year because he didn’t expose the classified program , argued that he should be sworn in [that’S NOT the alleged lie - Congress didnt ask about any particular classified program, they asked whether Gonzales BELIEVED that the president had authority to wiretap in violation of law].

Mr. Gonzales agreed to do so, but added that it wouldn’t change his testimony.

Chairman Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who ordered the hearings, decided the high-profile photo opportunity wasn’t necessary [That passage was not in quotes, implying that the Reporter is the one who decided that swearing-in Gonzales is a high profile photo opp] .