Sheldon Whitehouse

I think that is an unfair thing, it is so un-optimistic about America to cloak it in those terms.

It raises issues about privacy. It raises issues about civil liberties.

You note in your testimony the importance of keeping up pressure on al-Qa'ida in the Federal Administered Tribal Areas.

I think Senator Alexander's idea of trying to take this up a little bit more formally, particularly with the new Senators, is a very good one.

There is an element in this discussion of using the rules that we do pursue to enable the better angels of our nature to come forward.

If the Senate is dignified and decent, then we can find a way to have that dignity and decency control.

When he uses words like 'pandemonium', 'carnival', 'ignominy', 'ridiculous', 'chaos', and 'spectacle' about an organization that he loves so deeply...

Do you feel you have all the authorities that you need by statute in order to generate the cooperation, the support, and the information that you need to do your job?

We see that number potentially rising into the hundreds, and as the number of bank failures... the potential for fraud involved in some of those increases.

And you mentioned 38 matters that are open directly related to the current financial crisis.

It has distinguished itself in that regard.

I could not agree more with Senator Graham's concern about that.

I have many disagreements with Attorney General Mukasey, but to his credit, he put that firewall back up.

Everything was so classified that they took my notes away, and I was only allowed to read my own notes over in the secure confines of the Intelligence Committee.

I thought in the last administration that we had to introduce the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration to the head of the Department of Health and Human Services and remind them that they worked for the same President and wondered…

I've described it as Dick Cheney's 'Little Shop of Legal Horrors.'

We'll be keeping the record open formally for a week for written questions.

This was an effort to, for want of a better word, corrupt the office so that it would do what it was told rather than provide legal advice that was dispassionate and honest.

I think it's important that there be some credibility about this review that marks this as something different.

It's not that small. I mean, when I went over to the old Executive Office building to read the super-classified opinions...

I think we need to have a coherent and consistent approach, I think an approach that involves accommodation as much as we can.

Executive privilege was used as a stonewall, and frankly they didn't care whether the theories were true or not.

I have a special regard for the Department of Justice. I know it to be an essential bulwark of our democracy and our freedom.

I have been a persistent and animated critic of what has happened to the Department of Justice under Attorney General Ashcroft, Attorney General Gonzales, and Attorney General Mukasey.

The firewall between the White House and the Department of Justice.