Siegelman in his own words

Don Siegelman, former Alabama governor, former political prisoner, was interviewed on Air America by Thom Hartman. You can hear the interview here.

The crooked path to justice Alabama style

But as Martin Luther King said, "the arc of justice is long, but it's true."

Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman is out on bond.

It has happened here

In case you missed the story about the political persecution of former Alabama governor Don Siegelman on 60 Minutes, here it is. Apparently the signal was mysteriously blacked out in parts of Alabama.

If you're not convinced of the criminal status of the current administration in the White House by this story, then you are conveniently deaf, dumb and blind.

Turd blossom stinks like its source

60 minutes investigates the political persecution of former Alabama governor Don Siegelman who had the temerity to face an investigation, find vindication then decide to run again, until the feds cracked down again. Now Karl Rove has been fingered in the invetigation. Forty former US Attorneys General have asked for a congressional investigation. Somehow, until Sunday night's show, the story of this political prisoner has been kept out of the national press.

Another Republican we ought to be scraping off the soles of our shoes

Someone important once wrote "the truth will out," but I have my doubts.

Still, it's encouraging to see a newpaper editor doing the kind of job he ought to be doing. Seems like Alabama Governor Bob Riley, who by some reports stole his election with the help of Karl Rove, has now been discovered dipping into the corporate pocketbook and not reporting it. It's Riley, and his associates that put his gubenatorial challenger in jail.

Smells like Florida, smells like Ohio, smells like Rove

Don Siegelman is a former Alabama governor who could be called a political prisoner. An early opponent of then governor George Bush's run for President, Siegelman lost his own re-election during an illegal Republican recount of votes in a single county.

Subsequently, Siegelman was prosecuted by a former Republican political rival connected to Karl Rove, and is now held in jail, incommunicado while his appeal is being prepared (but unable to be prepared because bureaucrats have help up the assembling of his trial transcripts.)

It can't happen here, eh.

Control the courts, steal the elections, fill the prisons with your opponents

I remember being galvanized when, as a senior in high school, I saw the Costa-Gavras film Z. It politicized me in a way that newspapers, and magazines, and even peace rallies had not before. It was, and is (still powerfully) a polemical work of art that demonstrated how a government can insidiously transform from a bureaucracy designed to serve a people into a state which could suppress and enslave people. It convinced me of the need for a vital press in a democracy. And it was an early lesson about not trusting leaders.

So when I read this investigative piece by RawStory, about the arrest, kangaroo trial, conviction and incarceration of former Democratic Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, by Bush cronies, I got a chill. It demonstrates that bad people with treacherous motives can take control of the government, if we let them, and we show no concern that they have. It shows just how easy it is to justify the jailing of opponents (right, Pervez?) This is essential reading.