'wheels coming off' Bush defense of US attorney firings

Thank god, at least the Democrats have some investigative power when it comes to this crap Gonzales is trying to pull off. I have yet to hear anything that resembles a proper explanation as to this group of firings.

First Pete V. Domenici (R), and now Rep. Heather A. Wilson (R-N.M.), have acknowledged calling a Federal prosecutor before the 2004 elections, about the speed of an investigation on corruption charges involving Democrats. What's going to make this even more interesting, is that the prosecutors who were being canned by the DOJ were appointed by Republicans, and it will be the Democrats who are going out to bat for them when they testify on Capitol Hill.

It should be pointed out that US Attorneys serve at the pleasure of the President. There does not need to be any reason for replacing a US attorney.

That being said, it is not standard procedure to replace a US attorney mid stream and there has been no precedence for replacing 8 6 years through a Presidents term.

Precedence does make it illegal or unethical though. The 2 congress people should be investigated for an ethics breech in calling the US attorney though. They should have known better.

I believe that's the issue here. And it would seem there is general agreement regarding the ethics involved. But it's pretty common knowledge that US Attorneys serve at the pleasure of the President and can be canned at anytime.

It's the pattern behind these firings and the questionable acts by a few members of Congress, as well as Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, that will be addressed.

At least it's great to finally see some oversight taking place in Congress again after 6 years of Republican ass kissing of the President. Our systems of checks and balances is crucial in order for our Democracy to flourish.

Freudian slip.

Digby: "We Are Now Officially In Nixon Territory"
Digby | March 6, 2007 at 06:21 PM

And it's getting worse. I would suggest that everyone keep at least one eye on the next brewing legal scandal. It's looking more and more obvious like the Bush administration fired all those US Attorneys because they were investigating Republicans or allegedly dragging their feet in investigating Democrats. In Washington state the federal prosecutor was pressured to investigate "voter fraud" where there was none.

With the vice president's office being completely discredited today and using the justice department for political purposes, we are now officially in Nixon territory.
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2007/03/next-up-by-digby-libby-verdict-is-very.html

Top GOP Sen: "There Will Be A New Attorney General, Maybe Sooner Rather Than Later"
Washington Post | Paul Kane and Dan Eggen |
Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales agreed yesterday to change the way U.S. attorneys can be replaced, a reversal in administration policy that came after he was browbeaten by members of the Senate Judiciary Committee still angry over the controversial firings of eight federal prosecutors.

Gonzales told Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) and other senior members of the committee that the administration will no longer oppose legislation limiting the attorney general's power to appoint interim prosecutors. Gonzales also agreed to allow the committee to interview five top-level Justice Department officials as part of an ongoing Democratic-led probe into the firings, senators said after a tense, hour-long meeting in Leahy's office suite.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/08/AR2007030801087.html

Krugman hits another homerun: this time it is with respect to the Bush Dept. of Injustice.



^3/9/07: Department of Injustice

By PAUL KRUGMAN

For those of us living in the Garden State, the growing scandal over the
firing of federal prosecutors immediately brought to mind the subpoenas
that Chris Christie, the former Bush "Pioneer" who is now the U.S.
attorney for New Jersey, issued two months before the 2006 election --
and the way news of the subpoenas was quickly leaked to local news media.

The subpoenas were issued in connection with allegations of corruption
on the part of Senator Bob Menendez, a Democrat who seemed to be facing
a close race at the time. Those allegations appeared, on their face, to
be convoluted and unconvincing, and Mr. Menendez claimed that both the
investigation and the leaks were politically motivated.

Mr. Christie's actions might have been all aboveboard. But given what
we've learned about the pressure placed on federal prosecutors to pursue
dubious investigations of Democrats, Mr. Menendez's claims of
persecution now seem quite plausible.

In fact, it's becoming clear that the politicization of the Justice
Department was a key component of the Bush administration's attempt to
create a permanent Republican lock on power. Bear in mind that if Mr.
Menendez had lost, the G.O.P. would still control the Senate.

For now, the nation's focus is on the eight federal prosecutors fired by
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. In January, Mr. Gonzales told the
Senate Judiciary Committee, under oath, that he :would never, ever make
a change in a United States attorney for political reasons." But it's
already clear that he did indeed dismiss all eight prosecutors for
political reasons -- some because they wouldn't use their offices to
provide electoral help to the G.O.P., and the others probably because
they refused to soft-pedal investigations of corrupt Republicans.

In the last few days we've also learned that Republican members of
Congress called prosecutors to pressure them on politically charged
cases, even though doing so seems unethical and possibly illegal.

The bigger scandal, however, almost surely involves prosecutors still in
office. The Gonzales Eight were fired because they wouldn't go along
with the Bush administration's politicization of justice. But
statistical evidence suggests that many other prosecutors decided to
protect their jobs or further their careers by doing what the
administration
wanted them to do: harass Democrats while turning a blind eye to
Republican malfeasance.

Donald Shields and John Cragan, two professors of communication, have
compiled a database of investigations and/or indictments of candidates
and elected officials by U.S. attorneys since the Bush administration
came to power. Of the 375 cases they identified, 10 involved
independents, 67 involved Republicans, and 298 involved Democrats. The
main source of this partisan tilt was a huge disparity in investigations
of local politicians, in which Democrats were seven times as likely as
Republicans to face Justice Department scrutiny.

How can this have been happening without a national uproar? The authors
explain: "We believe that this tremendous disparity is politically
motivated and it occurs because the local (non-statewide and
non-Congressional) investigations occur under the radar of a diligent
national press. Each instance is treated by a local beat reporter as an
isolated case that is only of local interest."

And let's not forget that Karl Rove's candidates have a history of
benefiting from conveniently timed federal investigations. Last year
Molly Ivins reminded her readers of a curious pattern during Mr. Rove's
time in Texas: "In election years, there always seemed to be an F.B.I.
investigation of some sitting Democrat either announced or leaked to the
press. After the election was over, the allegations often vanished."

Fortunately, Mr. Rove's smear-and-fear tactics fell short last November.
I say fortunately, because without Democrats in control of Congress,
able to hold hearings and issue subpoenas, the prosecutor purge would
probably have become yet another suppressed Bush-era scandal -- a huge
abuse of power that somehow never became front-page news.

Before the midterm election, I wrote that what the election was really
about could be summed up in two words: subpoena power. Well, the
Democrats now have that power, and the hearings on the prosecutor purge
look like the shape of things to come.

In the months ahead, we'll hear a lot about what's really been going on
these past six years. And I predict that we'll learn about abuses of
power that would have made Richard Nixon green with envy.
----------------------------------------------------------

Rove was asked to fire U.S. attorney
By Margaret Talev and Marisa Taylor
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON - Presidential advisor Karl Rove and at least one other member of the White House political team were urged by the New Mexico Republican party chairman to fire the state's U.S. attorney because of dissatisfaction with his job performance including his failure to indict Democrats in a voter fraud investigation in the battleground election state.


In an interview Saturday with McClatchy Newspapers, Chairman Allen Weh said he complained in 2005 about then-U.S. Attorney David Iglesias to a White House liaison who worked for Rove and asked that he be removed. Weh said he followed up with Rove personally in late 2006 during a visit to the White House.


Weh's account calls into question the Justice Department's stance that the recent decision to fire eight U.S. attorneys, including Iglesias, was made without the White House weighing in. Justice Department officials have said the White House's involvement was limited to approving a list of the U.S. attorneys after the Justice Department made the decision to fire them.


Rove could not be reached Saturday and the White House said it would have no immediate response. A Justice Department spokesman was not immediately available for comment.


Weh's remarks come as Congress investigates the circumstances behind the firing of Iglesias and seven other U.S. attorneys. Democrats have charged the Bush administration tried to inject partisan politics into federal prosecutions in order to influence election outcomes.


Weh recalled asking Rove at a White House holiday event in December: "Is anything ever going to happen to that guy?" What Weh didn't know was that the firings of Iglesias and the others had already been approved.


Weh said Rove told him: "`He's gone.' I probably said something close to `Hallelujah.'"


Weh said he doesn't know whether Rove was directly involved in the firing or merely familiar with Republican dissatisfaction with Iglesias.


But Weh insists this wasn't about partisan politics.


"There's nothing we've done that's wrong," he said. "It wasn't that Iglesias wasn't looking out for Republicans," he said. "He just wasn't doing his job, period."

Again, the firing of the US attorneys who refused to make political indictments is only the tip of the iceberg. A possibly bigger question is what were the actions of the US attorneys who succumbed to the political pressure.

NY Times Editorial: Bush Should Dismiss Gonzales link

Rove was asked to fire U.S. attorney
Rove was asked to fire U.S. attorney
By Margaret Talev and Marisa Taylor
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON - Presidential advisor Karl Rove and at least one other member of the White House political team were urged by the New Mexico Republican party chairman to fire the state's U.S. attorney because of dissatisfaction in part with his failure to indict Democrats in a voter fraud investigation in the battleground election state.

In an interview Saturday with McClatchy Newspapers, Allen Weh, the party chairman, said he complained in 2005 about then-U.S. Attorney David Iglesias to a White House liaison who worked for Rove and asked that he be removed. Weh said he followed up with Rove personally in late 2006 during a visit to the White House.

"Is anything ever going to happen to that guy?" Weh said he asked Rove at a White House holiday event that month.

"He's gone," Rove said, according to Weh.

"I probably said something close to 'Hallelujah,'" said Weh.

Weh's account calls into question the Justice Department's stance that the recent decision to fire Iglesias and seven U.S. attorneys in other states was a personnel matter - made without White House intervention. Justice Department officials have said the White House's involvement was limited to approving a list of the U.S. attorneys after the Justice Department made the decision to fire them.

Rove could not be reached Saturday, and the White House and the Justice Department had no immediate response.

"The facts speak for themselves," Iglesias said, when he was told of Weh's account of his conversation with Rove.

Weh's disclosure comes as Congress investigates the circumstances behind the firings of the U.S. attorneys, most of whom had positive job evaluations, including Iglesias. Democrats have charged the Bush administration tried to inject partisan politics into federal prosecutions in order to influence election outcomes.

Weh said he doesn't know whether Rove was directly involved in the firing or was merely advised of the decision.

Weh insisted this wasn't about partisan politics.

"There's nothing we've done that's wrong," he said. "It wasn't that Iglesias wasn't looking out for Republicans. He just wasn't doing his job, period."

But Iglesias, who was fired Dec. 7, said he believes politics was the driving force. He accused Republicans Sen. Pete Domenici and Rep. Heather Wilson of trying to pressure him to bring indictments against several Democrats in time for the 2006 congressional election.

Domenici and Wilson acknowledge calling Iglesias, but deny pressuring him.

Justice Department officials have revealed that Domenici repeatedly contacted officials within the department requesting Iglesias' removal. But when asked Friday whether he contacted Rove about the issue, Domenici said he could not remember.

Iglesias said Friday he believes the impatience of state Republicans raises the possibility that the Bush administration might have been more involved than officials have acknowledged.

"Part of the controversy behind this is prosecutorial discretion," Iglesias said. "What that means is it's up to the sole discretion of the prosecutor in the case of how to handle the indictment and when to issue it."

Former federal prosecutors and defense lawyers who've represented public officials in corruption cases say the allegations of political inference could undermine the reputation of U.S. attorneys as impartial enforcers of the law.

Defense lawyers trying to convince juries to acquit their clients in corruption cases often accuse the government of mounting political vendettas against their clients. But it's virtually unheard of to have the former U.S. attorney in the case to be offering possible evidence of such interference.

"Anyone with any experience within the Justice Department is completely shocked and appalled by what has been described," said Stanley Hunterton, a former federal prosecutor of 12 years who investigated organized crime in Detroit and Las Vegas. "One of the things the Department has stood for was being apolitical. Sure, politics does gets involved in the appointment process, but this is just nuts."

Several Republican activists interviewed for this story said their frustration with Iglesias dated back to before the 2004 election, and his decision to create a task force on voter fraud rather than try to prosecute Democrats who submitted allegedly fraudulent voter registrations.

They also felt that he had largely botched a corruption case against the state treasurer, a Democrat. After a mistrial, federal prosecutors eventually secured a conviction.

By last fall, Wilson's re-election campaign was in serious trouble. But Republicans, including Weh, said they remained convinced that federal indictments were about to come down against several high-profile Democrats in a long-brewing corruption investigation related to courthouse construction projects.

On Sept. 30, nine donors were summoned to Weh's house for a $5,000-a-plate luncheon with Rove.

Among them was Paul Kennedy, a former state Supreme Court justice who had advised state lawmakers on whether to impeach the state treasurer.

Kennedy also represented the accountant who went to the FBI and U.S. attorney's office with the initial evidence implicating Democrats in the courthouse corruption case.

He acknowledges that he thought indictments of Democrats would help Wilson's re-election, and possibly hurt Democrats all the way up to Gov. Bill Richardson. But he also insists that's not what was driving his impatience - that it was a matter of the serving the public interest.

"What was I supposed to do?" he asked. "Look the other way when I saw corruption? It had to go the FBI. We gave them a lot of solid evidence."

Kennedy sat next to Rove at the luncheon that day. But in an interview he insists he never discussed the matter with him. Pat Rogers, former general counsel to the state Republican Party says he can't remember whether he attended the luncheon but that he also never discussed the matter with Rove or with Bush.

Weh says neither Iglesias nor the courthouse probe came up. Instead, donors voiced concern that Republicans would lose control of the House of Representatives. Rove assured them they would not.

But between then and the election, at least three backers of the courthouse corruption case - Wilson, Domenici, and Rogers - acknowledged they were on the phone to Iglesias to inquire about the status of the investigations. Rogers represented Wilson after she won re-election by less than 900 votes.

Rogers said he asked Iglesias before the election to talk about the case. When they finally met for lunch, Rogers said he told Iglesias, "David, in my mind, the failure to bring appropriate changes and proceed on a corruption case because of the pending election is as bad as ignoring it entirely."

"I don't know whether anyone talked to Rove or President Bush about David at any time, but complaints about David would track way back to before the election of 2004," Rogers said. "It was not a secret, the unhappiness with David."

The courthouse controversy has yet to yield indictments. And for the time being, Iglesias' firing has overshadowed talk of that probe.

BBB, thanks for the excellent piece on Gonzales. He is one of the more important horrible Bush appointments. He was the guy who said that the Geneva Accords were "quaint."

Advocate


Gonzales was a scumbag from the beginning of his association with Bush. He corrupted his obligation as Attorney General to represent the American people. Instead, he continued his role as Bush's private attorney.

He should resign or be impeached.

The Bush Administration is demonstrating that it is more corrupt than the infamous Grant Administration.

BBB

On the other hand, the article BBB posted had already been posted in extenso by blueflame on the previous page. And in addition been quoted in the article BBB posted above. Its an interesting article for sure, but three times?

Chief of staff of US attorney general quits
Published: Tuesday March 13, 2007



The chief of staff to US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has resigned amid intense scrutiny of the Justice Department accused of excessive use of tough anti-terror laws and being overtly political.

Gonzales' chief of staff Kyle Sampson has resigned his position as chief of staff to the attorney general from Monday, March 12, the department said.

"Kyle Sampson has served as a key member of my team beginning at the White House and continuing here at the Department of Justice first as my Deputy Chief of Staff and then as my Chief of Staff," Gonzales said in a statement.

"I am very appreciative for his service, counsel and friendship during the last six years and I thank him for his service to the department."

Calls mounted over the weekend for Gonzales to resign, with critics saying he has failed to make the transition from being the personal lawyer of President George W. Bush to heading up the country's Justice Department.

Gonzales has been a loyal aide to George W. Bush since 1995 when the now-president was governor of Texas. Long before his nomination to the attorney general's post in 2004, he ran the Bush's legal services.

The United States has been rocked by a series of revelations that officials overstepped their authority in applying tough anti-terror laws brought in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Believed to be one of the chief architects of the president's expanded powers, Gonzales is also credited with redefining the word "torture" in interrogating terror suspects and with the US refusal to apply the Geneva Convention to such prisoners.

Gee, I guess the fiasco is all settled -- Alberto said he accepts full responsibility. Talk about empty words!

Wash Post Launches Study Among the Worst Attorney Generals
Gonzales Says He Won't Quit, As 'Wash Post' Launches Study on 'Among the Worst' Attorney Generals Ever
By E&P Staff
Published: March 13, 2007

With calls for the attorney general's resignation in the air, The Washington Post on its Web site this afternoon launched what it calls a "special report" -- a four-part study of Alberto R. Gonzales at Andrew Cohen's "Bench Conference" blog/column.

At a press briefing this afternoon, Gonzales said he would not quit but accepted "responsibility" in the scandal over the firing of eight U.S. attorneys. He said his aide Kyle Sampson, just axed, was mainly to blame.

The 'Post' series opens this way.

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales is the 80th attorney general of the United States and if recent events in the law and at the Justice Department are any indication, he is rapidly staking a claim to being among the worst. To test that claim and evaluate the man who is not just nominally called the "nation's top lawyer," we must answer three questions. To what extent did Gonzales' public record before taking office give us clues about what sort of Attorney General he has turned out to be? Has he so far been up to the task as it is ideally defined? And, finally, does he deserve to continue to serve in office?

This series will look at each question in depth. But, here, briefly, are the answers.

First, Gonzales' cronyistic record in both Texas and as White House counsel did indeed presage many of the serious problems Gonzales now faces at the Justice Department. He has run true to form over the past two years and has diverted hardly at all from his long history of dogged obedience to the President, which often has come at the cost of institutional independence and adherence to the rule of law.

Second, Gonzales is seen by many legal historians and scholars as an abysmal failure--not quite as bad as the worst attorneys general in our history, but much closer to the bottom than to the top.

And, third, given the burgeoning scandal over the dismissal of federal prosecutors at the request of the White House, there appear to be few legitimate reasons why he deserves to stay in office.

What follows, then, is really a bill of particulars drawn up by some of the nation's leading lawyers and historians, that attempts to support these conclusions.

The Case Against Alberto Gonzales
Special Report: Rough Justice - The Case Against Alberto Gonzales
Part I
Washington Post
33/13/07

Part I: Alberto Gonzales: A Willing Accessory at Justice

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales is the 80th attorney general of the United States and if recent events in the law and at the Justice Department are any indication, he is rapidly staking a claim to being among the worst. To test that claim and evaluate the man who is not just nominally called the "nation's top lawyer," we must answer three questions. To what extent did Gonzales' public record before taking office give us clues about what sort of Attorney General he has turned out to be? Has he so far been up to the task as it is ideally defined? And, finally, does he deserve to continue to serve in office?

This series will look at each question in depth. But, here, briefly, are the answers. First, Gonzales' cronyistic record in both Texas and as White House counsel did indeed presage many of the serious problems Gonzales now faces at the Justice Department. He has run true to form over the past two years and has diverted hardly at all from his long history of dogged obedience to the President, which often has come at the cost of institutional independence and adherence to the rule of law. Second, Gonzales is seen by many legal historians and scholars as an abysmal failure--not quite as bad as the worst attorneys general in our history, but much closer to the bottom than to the top. And, third, given the burgeoning scandal over the dismissal of federal prosecutors at the request of the White House, there appear to be few legitimate reasons why he deserves to stay in office. What follows, then, is really a bill of particulars drawn up by some of the nation's leading lawyers and historians, that attempts to support these conclusions.

But first, a step back. To understand better the case for or against Gonzales, to place it more squarely into context, it is important to understand that the attorney general in our federal system has to straddle a line between law and politics, between being the people's attorney and his boss' loyal cabinet member. It is not an easy thing to do and few attorneys general have done it even remotely well. The dichotomy in many ways mirrors the one that everyday attorneys face with their own clients-- am I an advocate who must facilitate what my client already has decided to do? Or am I a counselor who may tell my client on occasion that what he or she wants to do is illegal or just plain wrong?

History has given us very little guidance about where this line is to be drawn. Actually, the history of the Office of the Attorney General is a rather uninspiring one. The position was included in the Judiciary Act of 1789, the Book of Genesis when it comes to the federal judicial system, but it took nearly a century for the attorney general to have any sort of a meaningful "justice department" to run. Originally, for a few decades anyway, the attorney general was not even part of the President's formal cabinet and now, of course, some of the duties of the original attorney general reside in the White House counsel's office. Gonzales, remember, came from that office to his current post when John Ashcroft read the writing on the wall and resigned as attorney general at the start of President George W. Bush's second term in office.

By far the strongest and most persistent criticism of Gonzales, and the one focused upon in this series, is his perceived unwillingness or inability at times to play the role of counselor rather than facilitator--to act independently of the man to whom he owes his job and his public career. Gonzales has been charged, over and over again and both before and during his current tenure, as being President's Bush's in-house and in-court "yes" man, a lawyer whose main role has been to try to justify legally, at least on its face, what his boss already has decided for political or moral reasons to do anyway. This indeed, sometimes anyway, is one of the roles of attorney general. But it is wholly at odds with the other role, that of hands-off protector of the Constitution against both internal and external threats to its viability.

During Gonzales' confirmation hearing in January 2005, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D. Vt.), then ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said "the job of attorney general is not about crafting rationalizations for ill-conceived ideas; it's a much more vital role than that. Attorney general is about being a forceful, independent -- independent -- voice in our continuing quest for justice in defense of the constitutional rights of every single American." Leahy back then expressed his concern that Gonzales did not possess the temperament, training, will, or motive to act independently from the man, President Bush, to whom Gonzales has served in one way or another ever since they both came to public service. Many others since have echoed those sentiments.

It is not hard to see why these accusations seem to have stuck with Gonazales. In July 2005, after he became attorney general, after he swore to uphold the Constitution, he was asked during an interview by folks at the Academy of Achievement to list his role models. His answer? "The three biggest influences of my life, in terms of maturing me as a person, were my mom, my dad and our President, who's given me some wonderful opportunities. I've learned a lot from him in the various roles that I've seen him in, as a father, and as a governor, and as a president."

It is a nice sentiment. But not the sort of quote likely to foster confidence among others that our nation's top lawyer would be willing to stake out when necessary and appropriate legal positions that are contrary to those of his self-proclaimed hero. And, as we'll see, when the stakes indeed have been high over the past few years, and even when Gonzales worked for then-Governor Bush in Texas, Gonzales has obediently toed his boss's line. So much so, in fact, that even before the burgeoning scandal over federal prosecutors, Gonzales' work had raised the specter of the dreaded "C" word within an administration that has come to be known for it--Cronyism. Heckuva job, Alberto!

Professor Stanley Katz, a legal historian at Princeton University, says there is no agreed upon "ideal" attorney general. And he told me Tuesday morning that the job has changed tremendous over time. But he believes that Gonzales "falls short of any ideal I can think of" and says that Gonzales has inappropriately balanced his "loyalties to the President" with his "responsibilities as a lawyer." Gonzales, says Katz, "doesn't seem to see past the relationship with his boss" and has been "a willing accessory" to some of what Katz sees as the "worst excesses" of the administration's policies.

Like Gonzales, some attorneys general have merely been pliant servants of the Presidents for whom they have worked. Others have been independent voices who have butted heads over weighty legal issues with the very people who put them into office. Invariably, posterity has well received lawyers in the latter group. For example, perhaps the most famous attorney general in American history achieved that standing from historians and legal scholars merely because he stood up to his boss. Eliot Richardson was summarily fired from the post in October 1973 when he refused to assent to the wishes of President Nixon, who wanted Richardson to fire special prosecutor Archibald Cox during the Watergate scandal. Edward H. Levi also gets good marks from historians for restore public confidence in the rule of law when he was President Gerald R. Ford's attorney general.

"About the only honest and shall we say effective attorney general of the past generation or two was Ed Levi," says Stanley Kutler, a legal historian at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. "He was politically obligated to no one and was not politically or personally connected to the president. The president (Ford) for his part was quite content to let the attorney general run his own department. It was not run out of the White House--and the news this morning about the federal prosecutors typifies the problem" of an attorney general beholden to a president. In Kutler's view, too many presidents have picked too many attorneys general in the ultimate hope that the top lawyer in the Justice Department would ultimately protect the White House.

A more recent and obvious comparison and contrast to Gonzales is Janet Reno and her tenure as President Bill Clinton's attorney general. Pilloried for her role in the disaster at Waco, Texas in April 1993, Reno famously vexed her boss (so much so that he reportedly stopped talking to her) by appointing a special prosecutor to look into the Whitewater affair, a move that begat Kenneth Starr and Paula Jones and Monica Lewinsky and ultimately the impeachment of Clinton in the winter of 1999. Reno was not necessarily a politically-savvy attorney general, had no real constituency in Washington, and did not earn rave reviews from legal scholars. But she was from time to time willing to act independently in a way that put her in direct conflict with the man who had given her the job. No similar examples stand out for Gonzales.

Almost all attorneys general have struggled to adequately describe and then balance their competing political and legal goals and responsibilities. When he was installed in office in February 2005, Gonzales himself said: "There has been much discussion during my confirmation about the appropriate role of the Attorney General; certainly an important and legitimate debate about the individual viewed by many as the primary guardian of our rights and protector of our freedoms. The Attorney General is a member of the President's cabinet, a part of his team. But the Attorney General represents also the American people, and his first allegiance must always be to the Constitution of the United States."

Eric Holder, Jr., a deputy attorney general during the Clinton administration, also used the "team" analogy when he responded to me via email on this topic. "An Attorney General has to be a part of a team and yet understand," Holder wrote, "that unlike other cabinet members, he/she has a unique responsibility. As chief law enforcement officer, the Attorney General has a responsibility to be more detached, more neutral than other Cabinet officers." John Dean, President Richard Nixon's legendary White House counsel, took the reasoning one step further in an email to me Monday. He wrote: "What is most important about the Department of Justice is to not politicize it, because it really must make decisions that effect the public interest, and the criminal justice system, and if Department is a highly political entity, it will lose trust, it will lose the best and brightest attorneys who want to work there, and then we all lose."

This, then, is the fluid and dichotomous nature of the job of attorney general. It is within the context of this history that Alberto Gonzales' record at the Justice Department should be judged. But before we get to that, in Part III of this series, we need to look at his record in Texas and as White House counsel. That record is the focus of Part II, coming up tomorrow.

About this series: This is the first in a four-part series on Alberto R. Gonzales and his role as Attorney General of the United States. Part I looks at the role of the Attorney General in American history, about current perceptions about that role, and Gonzales' view of it. Part II looks at Gonzales' record before he assumed office in 2005. Part III looks at Gonzales' record as Attorney General and the final part in the series focuses upon the candidates for his successor.