Editors' Note: Every so often we get a transmission from the planet Zontar, deep in the Remulac galaxy millions of light-years away from Earth.  Despite the vast distances of intergalactic space, events on Zontar sometimes have an amusing, if very distant, resemblance to what's going on in our own little corner of the unive- [We get the setup, now move along – Ed.] 

VICE PRESIDENT
IN WOODSHED

By Bobby Baker
White House Correspondent

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The number one topic in the Nation's Capital during the dog days of summer is a juicy story in The Washington Post describing how President Albert Gore took his Vice President "to the woodshed" over Lieberman's efforts to circumvent the administration's tightly-run foreign policy-making apparatus.

According to the Post, Lieberman, a long-time proponent of expanding the Afghan war into neighboring Iran and Pakistan, had sought to impose his own views on the intelligence community by demanding that career CIA analysts change their product to place more blame on Iran, based on information given to the Vice President by Likud Party functionary Marty Peretz.

 
Crackpot Washington lawyer David Addington enticed the Vice President into going around the policymaking process, for which Lieberman had his knuckles rapped by the President. 

The Post's account, written by investigative reporters Josh Marshall and Eric Alterman, claims that when CIA Director Bill Richardson got wind of the scheme, he marched right into the Oval Office and told President Gore that such "irresponsible free-lancing" posed grave dangers to the integrity of American intelligence and therefore all U.S. foreign and defense policies.

After briefly conferring with Defense Secretary Wesley Clark and Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke, Gore, according to the story, told his senior foreign policy team that the Vice President was going "to have some heavy-duty atoning to do." Last Friday, over their regular Friday milchichs at the White House, President Gore told Lieberman in no uncertain terms to "get with and stay with the program."

This was not the first time that the Vice President had incurred the President's wrath for attempting to short-circuit the Administration's policy planning process.  In 2005, Lieberman got his hands on a legal memo authored by two obscure Washington lawyers, David Addington and John Yoo, which suggested that the U.S. should feel free to torture Taliban fighters notwithstanding the Geneva Conventions. The Spy has learned that the memo was put into Lieberman's hands by AIPAC press aide Freddie Hiatt '76.

That incident prompted a furious response from Defense Secretary Clark, who accused the Vice President of putting the lives of future American POW's at risk and reducing America to the level of its terrorist adversaries. In response to Clark's prompting, President Gore declared that all captives, whether held by the military or the CIA, would be treated in conformity with international law.

At the time, an incredulous Clark accused Lieberman of advocating barbaric treatments such as waterboarding, the use of dogs, and subjecting detainees to extremes of heat and cold.  The chastened Lieberman agreed that no shayna yid would ever stoop to such savagery.  

The confrontations are said to have left President Gore disenchanted with his Vice President and unlikely to support Lieberman's 2008 Presidential bid.  According to one White House insider, "Lieberman's acting like he's not a part of the Executive Branch. It's absolutely preposterous."  

Gore is said to be throwing his support behind CIA Director Richardson, leading to speculation that Lieberman may switch parties and run as a Republican. Political pundits say it could be a shrewd move, as one told the Spy:  "With Senator Bush back in rehab for the third time, the Republicans lack a plausible front runner. Lieberman's got to be a stronger candidate than the bozos they've got." 

PROSECUTOR
IS DISBARRED

By Scott V. Sandiford
Justice Correspondent

ATLANTA, GA. – The final act in the long-running saga over the Georgia teenager sentenced to ten years in prison for consensual oral sex reached its climax today when the Georgia Board of Bar Overseers formally voted to disbar Cracker County District Attorney Rufus T. Firefly [Confirm name – Ed.] for his role in what is now regarded as the worst miscarriage of justice in Georgia since the lynching of Leo Frank.

Firefly had been charged with violating the civil rights of the young African-American man in question to advance his own political career in the largely-white county. "A prosecutor must always do justice and can never allow himself to be influenced by public opinion especially, where, as here, there are good reasons to believe that Georgia's ugly legacy of racism may be involved," the Board said.

 
The good citizens of Georgia await the outcome of disbarment proceedings against rogue prosecutor Rufus T. Firefly

District Attorney Firefly had invoked a rarely-used provision of the Georgia Criminal Code to indict 17-year-old Genarlow Wilson on felony sex abuse charges because the woman was only fifteen. "Hell, in Georgia, we call a fifteen-year-old virgin an Old Maid," said former Governor and ax handle wielder Lester Maddox, a longtime observer of the state's social and political scene.

Observers were particularly disturbed because, under Georgia law, sexual intercourse between an 17-year-old and a 15-year-old is a misdemeanor not normally punished by prison time. "Down these parts, we don't call that a crime, we call it Saturday night," Maddox quipped.

The prosecutor's decision to charge Wilson with a felony ignited a national uproar over the prospect of another poor black teenager being railroaded by a largely white criminal-justice system. The howls of protest reached a crescendo when Smith was convicted by an all white jury.

Talk show hosts and insult comics including Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly devoted hours of airtime to excoriating Firefly, accusing him of "nothing more than pure racism." O'Reilly even asked Wilson to provide the young lady's phone number ostensibly because he wanted to offer her an internship at Schlox News "under his immediate supervision."

Fortunately for the young man, Wilson was allowed to remain free on bail pending an appeal. Ruling from the bench, the Georgia Supreme Court threw the case out.

But Wilson and his family, still smarting from the ordeal, filed a complaint with the Georgia Board of Bar Overseers. Recognizing the gravity of the charges and the importance of appearing impartial, the Board retained San Diego attorney Carol Lam as special master to conduct the inquiry.

When Lam's report accused Firefly of "perpetrating a gross injustice," the Board decided that they had no choice but to disbar Firefly, which also has the effect of removing him from office.

Reaction to Firefly's disbarment and disgrace was wildly favorable.  Members of the Duke Lacrosse team, reached at a team meeting held at the Velvet Trapeze gentlemen's club in Raleigh, said that Wilson was a "righteous dude" who "was railroaded by the man." One of them joked, "If I had to do five years each time I did what he did, I'd be in jail until I was 129." 

Said another member of the team, after tipping one of the dancers with a bill clamped between his teeth, "this just shows that even if you're not rich and white like us, the system works for you."