Don Siegelman: Free at Last!

Don Siegelman: Free at Last!, originally uploaded by Lindsay Beyerstein.

Former governor of Alabama, Don Siegelman, in conversation with Sam Seder at Netroots Nation.

Gov. Siegelman discussed how Karl Rove, Bill Canary, and two U.S. Attorneys engineered more than one politically-motivated prosecution against him. The first federal case was thrown out with prejudice after a day and a half.

The second attempt succeeded in putting Siegelman away for bribery, despite the fact that he was never even accused of benefiting financially from the offending contribution from a Republican, nor engaging in a quid pro quo of any kind. The alleged briber, Richard Scrushy, contributed to a fund for a state lottery that Siegelman oversaw soon after the governor took office. Schrushy was reappointed to a hospital oversight board that he had served on under three previous governors and wanted to quit! Siegelman had to talk him into serving for another term.

Siegelman served 9 months in federal prison until the 11th Circuit released him on appeal.

Siegelman is launching a new initiative called "Contempt for Karl Rove," which aims to force Rove to testify before Congress about Siegelman's case and the U.S. Attorney purge.

Comments

[cfrost]

There are occasions when one almost wishes dueling were still legal.

[Norman Costa]

Criticism, with a capital 'C':

First things first - Go Siegelman! Kruel Rove and his bastard children have to be exposed even if they are not punished, ultimately.

Now back to Criticism, with a capital 'C'. My comments are not specific to this photo and post from Lindsay, but I believe they are apropos, generally, to this subject and to this entire blog as a whole.

I would like to recommend a brilliant article by Morgan Meis at The Smart Set on the subject of Criticism. He focuses on literary and art criticism, but his discussion easily embraces political criticism, moral criticism, social criticism, and [fill in the blank] criticism. I quote the opening of his article:

"Criticism [in the classical sense] isn’t powerful anymore. It doesn’t drive anything, it doesn’t define what is good and bad in culture. Surely this has mostly to do with all the changes in the media landscape [the Internet] over the last few decades. Basically, culture has been democratized. It has been flattened out and multiplied. There are no longer real distinctions between high and low. There’s just more. ... Criticism is thus about doing something that is, in this era, almost impossible to do. It is difficult simply to keep up with the vast global cultural output, let alone to make determinations and judgments. So the [classical] critic lives in terror and humiliation, without purpose, without audience, without platform."

Meis comes down on the more democratic view of Criticism, but I think it's only the beginning of a very long debate. Many of the discussions on this blog site have been manifestations of 'shared intellectual conceptualization' versus idiosyncrasy, and 'the mind mirroring an objective world' versus solipsism, and on and on.

You can find the article at:
http://www.thesmartset.com/article/article06260802.aspx

[Norman Costa]

cfrost,

I like, especially, the part where you take your gloves and smack the other guy across the face.

[Rev. Bob]

An article with no place to comment? How quaint.

"George Nathan"? Are we tslking George Jean Nathan? Sounds French to me.

I'm becoming convinced that the thing that's become impossible is Horace's advice to lock our writings up in our desks for a while. These days critics need to invest in a slow internet connection. Or else think faster and type slower.

Ms Beyerstein, I'm awestruck again at your photography and reporting.

[Norman Costa]

Rev. Bob,

There is hope. You can comment on 3Quarksdaily where the article was introduced by Abbas Raza. Morgan Meis is a regular contributor to 3QD:

http://3quarksdaily.blogs.com/3quarksdaily/2008/07/nobodys-a-criti.html#comments

I would like to read more than the few comments already posted.

Transition >>>

Not to diminish Lindsay's earlier photos, but they get better all the time. Take a look at the photo of Amanda Marcotte on Flikr, large size and close up of her face - bangs and all, and see if you're not captivated for at least a few moments.