More On Gonzales’ Fired Attorneys
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in General Politics, Law
Yes, Clinton fired all 93 federal prosecutors at the start of his term. Yes, it interfered with investigations in process. Most of them, if not all of them, were approaching the expirations of their terms of office, however, and Clinton’s unprecedented act was mainly that he “fired” them without having nominated most of their replacements. US Attorneys serve four-year terms coincidental to the presidency, and are retained or dismissed at the end of their terms at the pleasure of whomever occupies the Oval Office. It is unusual to sack US Attorneys mid-term, unprecedented to do so with eight of them at a time, and in the case of Iglesias, to do so with one ranked by the White House as a high performer but whose home-state Senator pushed for termination because of impatience in indicting activists from the opposition party for corruption.I’m not saying that the firings were illegal, but they were certainly strange, and politically stupid. And, yes, very worthy of criticism — as have been Gonzales’ attempts to explain them away.
And since when do we accept the Clinton standard for ethical conduct, anyway?
Ever since Bush or his staff started making major gaffes, the right-wing pointed to Clinton. It’s a dumb move, but it convinced voters for a while.
Somehow, I don’t think it’ll work this time around.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 14th, 2007 and is filed under General Politics, Law. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
March 14th, 2007 at 2:26 pm
I love Captain Ed. He’s right on about a lot of things, this situation included.
March 14th, 2007 at 3:36 pm
I’m just curious, what is the fear here? That these poor attorney’s won’t be able to get jobs or is it that the position becomes politicized? Both are laughable.
March 14th, 2007 at 4:26 pm
Hi Dos -
For me its the latter, that the positions are politicized. I don’t believe the law should be interpreted depending on political affiliations/beliefs. I understand it’s a reality, it’s just one I don’t like.
March 14th, 2007 at 4:47 pm
The issue here is that once these attorneys didn’t put political prosecutions on the front burner, they were dismissed so the administration could find prosecutors who would. Is it illegal? Nope. Does it look like an partisan, cynical abuse of power? Hmmm…
March 14th, 2007 at 10:23 pm
I don’t know even where to start with that gem. Are you alleging that there was pressure to prosecute innocent individuals for their political positions/speech? Because that truly would be appalling and I would be the first to call for someone’s head. Or is it that there was pressure to prosecute the crimes of one’s political nemisis? If that be the case, welcome to a democracy. Prosecutorial discretion implicates Politics — if you don’t believe me, just talk to Scotter Libby — oh, that’s right, politics had NOTHING to do with that spectacle. Again, laughable.
March 14th, 2007 at 10:51 pm
It is one thing to fire a USA for political reasons. It is another to lie about those reasons, which Gonzales’ staff did, damaging the reputations of USAs who had recently had positive performance reviews.
Try to remember that these guys were fired in December, pushed out the door in January. There was no uproar from anyone up until the Attorneys saw the press about their being fired for performance reasons. The only way to protect their reputations & resumes was to go public, which they did.
Still, it would only have been a 2 day headline except the admission of illegality of the FBI’s surveillance in 10s of thousands of cases. Gonzales, as their boss, let it happen, if not encouraging it. Or the fact that he either did not know what his own Chief of Staff was up to or he lied to Congress.
The man needs to go. Nuff said.
March 15th, 2007 at 11:47 am
Dos, why are you even bothering to minimize this? Let’s accept that truth and democracy are mere ideals in the down and dirty world of politics. However, Gonz and Co. royally messed up by lying about it, and then getting caught red-handed and actually helped give this story legs. If nothing else, they showed the political skills of rocks, and they’re still being stupid about it. Just like Clinton was stupid about lying about his affair. The actual story itself isn’t shocking anymore, it’s the clumsy attempt of a cover-up. There’s politics for you.
March 15th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
This is true enough, Lit3Bold. But please notice how the target has now shifted. Where once the anguish was focused on the alleged political motivation of the firings – having discovered that that argument is a non sequitur – it has been converted to the much more palatable and tried-and-true issue of lying.
What is fascinating to watch though are the hacks, like some guy in Florida named Bob, try to link this episode of political klutziness to a litnany of constitutional disagreements with the DOJ – as if the “enemy combatant” status of terrorists is evil fruit from the same the tree.
Calls for Gonz. to step-down play well with the moonbats and have little effect on the rest of the electorate, because every knows it won’t happen. So the Dems are being smart in pushing this, it is a no-lose situation and an opportunity to shore up their Jonestown base, but in the end, it’s just noise that distracts us from the business at hand – detaining, torturing and spying on American citizens.
March 16th, 2007 at 12:24 pm
Two Dogs has a point, except he doesn’t mention the fact that both the FBI chief & Gonzales admitted what they did was wrong, & that a sizable minority of their illegal surveillance involved no one involved in terrorist activities. It is almost comical to see the far right spin their venom without mentioning ANY facts that deviate from their lock step opinions.
The fact remains Gonzales slandered the reputations of these people & then lied to Congress about who was & was not involved in these activities. Hell, their own paper trail proves this. Counter that . And, please try to stay on topic, for a change.
March 17th, 2007 at 9:53 am
What’s really interesting is that almost 5 times as many democrats as republicans have been the target of actions by Bush’s prosecutors…despite the fact that until recently democrats were outnumbered in congress (and republicans are far more corrupt, imo). So even before these 8 were fired, the vast majority of prosecutors were showing tremendous bias.
One comment about Clinton’s firings…presumably his appointments were subject to Congressional approval, as Bush’s are not, thanks to the sneak provision that should have never been included in the bill that should never have been passed (the so-called patriot act). One would think any overly biased prosecutorial nomination would have been disapproved or not nominated to begin with.
March 22nd, 2007 at 3:30 pm
“And since when do we accept the Clinton standard for ethical conduct, anyway?”
Since clinton was not removed from office for highcrimes and misdemeanors.
Finally clinton DID fire attorneys that he appointed, he fired over 120 attorneys, 30+ of which HE appointed.