Podcast #149

Gov. Don Siegelman on Supreme Court ruling; David Swanson on sneaky House vote for war funding. Gov. Siegelman may benefit from the recent Supreme Court ruling for ex-Enron CEO Jeff Skilling, which invalidated the "honest services" statute. The Court has since returned the Siegelman-Scrushy convictions to the 11th Circuit for review. Siegelman tells how Karl Rove and friends framed him, how Elena Kagan backs prosecutors over the wrongfully convicted, and his prospects for justice in the next legal rounds. Swanson, author of Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union is a tireless progressive activist and the cofounder of After Downing Street Coalition. He deconstructs the bizarre tactics used by House leaders to fund the escalation in Afghanistan without leaving fingerprints. Read his excellent article about it here. We run down the list of members who voted against the tactics and the bill for the right reasons--and can only identify 8. While many Dems spoke out against the war and escalation, only those 8 had the courage to actually vote against it--a new low. We describe the strange politics of this moment--Republicans, who all support the war, voted against the funding, while most anti-war Dems voted for it. And now, Obama threatens a veto over the part of the bill intended to stop teacher layoffs.