Another Government Probe Of Itself That, Like The 9/11 Commission And the Torture Probe, Won't Amount To Jack Shit

My only question here is, "Why even bother?"

While some seem ready to applaud that the Justice Department announced this evening it WILL (ha!) investigate the willful destruction of the two known CIA torture tapes a judge ordered those under the Bush Administration involved in the matter NOT conveniently destroy, to me it's just another sad, piss poor example of the fox being allowed to investigate the case of chickens murdered in the hen house when it was one of the Fox's minions (in this case, the CIA with marching orders from the fox) who arranged not just the initial crime but the destruction of the evidence.

We see this again and again - hardly new to the Bushies yet they have taken it to ridiculously extremes as they have everything else - as when the Pentagon investigates its own.

This, my friends, is beyond criminal. And, as Bush would smirk and smug-it-up as he tells you, there's not one damned thing we can do to stop it while, at the same time, we know exactly what the results will be: nada, zap, ZERO. At best, they'll point to some very insignificant, powerless peon, throw the book at him while they feed him to the wolves, and then pretend it never happened.

Some democracy. And the new Attorney General Michael Mukasey can control everything this special prosecutor does and, as we've seen with his strange ignorance regarding torture and the American Constitution, he'll prove himself a loyal Bushie regardless of his distinctly token status as an alleged Democrat.

The LIE Of Rudy Giuliani's Moderate Progressive Nature

Lies and damned lies.

The myth that Rudy Giuliani is not only the most progressive of the GOP wannabes running for his party's 2008 Republican presidential nomination but SOOOO moderate even Dems would vote for him is one big lie. Glenn Greenwald in his Salon blog tackles this and is brave enough to call a heinous lie just that. Here's a snip:

The most transparent and destructive fallacy being recited by our Beltway media class is that Rudy Giuliani is a moderate or centrist Republican. Examples of this fallacy are everywhere.

The Washington Post's Jonathan Weisman yesterday twice asserted during his "chat" that Giuliani was a moderate -- first rejecting the notion that the GOP is purging moderates by citing the fact that "the frontrunner in the presidential campaign is Rudy Giuliani, an abortion rights, gay rights, gun control advocate," and thereafter claiming that GOP political operatives want Giuliani as the nominee because "they think Giuliani will mobilize moderate Republicans and independents who lean Republican." Today, his Post colleague, "mainstream" enforcer Shailagh Murray, insisted that while Ron Paul is well outside the mainstream, Rudy Giuliani is squarely within it.

The very idea that Giuliani is a "moderate" or a "centrist" is completely absurd. Regarding the issues over which the next President will have the greatest influence -- foreign policy and presidential powers -- Giuliani is as far to what is now considered the "Right" as it gets. His views on foreign policy are far more radical and bellicose even than Dick Cheney's, and his view of presidential powers makes George Bush look like Thomas Jefferson.

This whole "moderate" myth is grounded exclusively in Giuliani's non-doctrinaire views of social issues. But that's pure fallacy. Political ideology doesn't function like mathematics, where two numbers situated on opposite extreme poles can be averaged together to produce a nice, comfortable number in the middle.

That isn't how political ideology works. A warmonger with authoritarian impulses and liberal positions on social issues isn't a "moderate" or a "centrist." He's just a warmonger with authoritarian impulses and liberal positions on social issues.

Even Giuliani's allegedly "liberal" positions on social issues are completely overblown. Outside of judicial appointments, Presidents actually have very little impact on issues such as gay rights, abortion and gun control. Other than judicial appointments, what impact has George Bush had on those areas? Virtually none.

Yet when it comes to the one instrument Presidents can actually use to shape social issues -- judicial appointments -- Giuliani's decisions will be anything but liberal. He has said repeatedly that he would "appoint judges like Chief Justice Roberts, Justice Alito, Justice Scalia and Justice Thomas" -- the most conservative justices on the Court. And his closest legal confidants are the by-product of relationships he formed at the Reagan DOJ -- people like Ted Olson and Michael Mukasey -- and his appointments are almost certainly going to comport loyally to Federalist Society dogma.

Another Bushie War, on Americans: More Senseless War on Drugs, VT Style

When the Bushie Republican Governor of Vermont didn't like that a (Democrat, I believe) lawyer and part-time judge didn't get serious prison time for possession of marijuana, he didn't just get mad. No, Jim Douglas ordered all state law enforcement officials to send marijuana (NOT heroin, NOT cocaine, NOT methamphetamine) cases to the FEDS directly, bypassing local and state courts.

Now, I'm not excusing the woman lawyer/judge who as an officer of the court certainly knows basic law. And yeah, 2.5 lbs DOES sound like a lot (except that drug cops are taught to pad the weight anyway possible and go to some truly ridiculous extremes to do so, often at the behest of higher ups and prosecutors who want to hit heavier charges as well as confiscate property).

But what the fuck is going on here? The War on Drugs has been such a miserable failure. And if you want proof, look at the Miserable Failure in the White House right now, a cokehead drunk with delusions of grandeur who actually thinks he's president when, you know, it's really Dick Cheney. I'm tired of fighting a war on Americans who as adults can make their own choices for what they consume, good or bad. If being a Bill O'Reilly isn't a federal offense (yet offensive, nonetheless), being a pothead shouldn't be either, I would think. And I say that as someone who hasn't used in God... I can't tell you how long.

No less than the Times-Argus, the Barre-Montpelier, Vermont newspaper that very few accuse of being a liberal rag, is kind of aghast at what Douglas is doing. And ALL American taxpayers should be: it's taking a local problem and, for the War on Drugs - and the war for the Bushie-style Ego, dumping it on feds that apparently need to focus on otherwise law-abiding potheads rather than on Bush corruption and Osama bin Laden and company.

Repugnicants Love Torture - So Long As It's Done To Others

Much of the time, it's easy to believe you've heard it all, that nothing else can shock you.
But listening to MSNBC later Monday night, in a discussion of AG Nominee Mukasey, the way he's hedging on whether something like waterboarding is torture or not (gee, what is it if not torture?), and how this is making "a sure-fire nomination" into a testy affair, my "delicate sensibilities" were once again tested.

The offender in this case in Michael Reagan, the adopted son of former U.S. president Ronald Reagan, a right-wing talk show host who has always played very desperately into the extreme right fold because he knows he possesses neither the brain power nor the pizzazz to be anyone in his own right. Reagan, making fun of Sen. Lindsey Graham, a GOPeer himself - for having the nerve to question the Bushies' insistence that God WANTS America to torture anyone Muslim (or Dem or Progressive), uttered something like, "heck, the only thing we can be sure of is now we'd like to see Lindsey Graham waterboarded."

Nice. Really nice.

Michael Reagan has always sickened me. But this is a new low, even for him. That anyone in this country is even advocating torture - let alone making it sound like something fun to do to those who disagree with them - tells us a lot about the very wrong direction in which this country has been taken.

Terrorists on 9-11 didn't destroy our way of life - our leaders did it, and any of us who stood up and declared they could take away any rights or liberties or human rights protections from us just to keep us safe destroyed our way of life.

Why, oh why, do the extreme righters - and surprise others like Alan Dershowitz - hate America so much?

Dick Cheney, Enemy of the State (And The World)

As I posted elsewhere...

I strongly (as in STRONGLY) encourage you to find your local listing for this week's PBS Frontline for a startling, scary profile of Vice DickPresident Dick Cheney's 30+ year war to take away civil liberties at the same astonishing pace as he wants to turn the American presidency and any notion of democracy into a game only Cheney and his pals can play.

I was riveted and sickened all at once; those who maintain BIG questions about the Bush Administration's possible complicity in September 11th will find new fodder with the revelations from Cheney's own hench cretins that as buildings still burned that day, The Dick was calling in his people to stage a coup against American democracy and the U.S. Constitution while giving the president more powers than our founding fathers EVER wanted to allow.

This material, fully documented, FAR EXCEEDS the imagination of George Orwell's 1984 and the machinations of Machiavelli. And yet, with all of that, what REALLY amazed me was that the dimbulb former Attorney General (although a dimbulb HAS to burn brighter than also former AG Alberto Gonzales) John Ashcroft ACTUALLY stood up for us when Cheney demanded the feds launch the most massive domestic spying and data mining operation against the American people in U.S. history.

"I Cannot Answer Your Question Because To Do So Might Require The Truth; We Can't Have That"

And, as we all know too well, the truth (and accountability, and responsibility, and words with more than one syllable) is the worst and scariest form of terror to the Bush Administration.

If you missed the Senate Judiciary Committee's hearing this morning where Karl Rove was supposed to appear, yet did not (big surprise, eh?), but where his deputy (J. Scott Jennings) did show up just to say, "Screw you!", here's a Recap for Dummies:

Chairman Patrick Leahy: What is your name?

Rove's ASSistant: I respectfully (chortle) decline to tell you this because it might endanger national security, cause terrorists to stop fighting us over there and come fight us over here, AND possibly make the president mess his pants (again) at a time when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is not available to change his ultra-small Pampers.

Leahy: You're trying to tell us you can't even state your name for the record?

ASSistant: No, I'm stating I won't. I mean, who the fuck elected you and gave you any constitional right to question the authority of the Absolute Monarch, God's boss and mine, George Bush?

Leahy: Moving on, please state your job title and your specific responsibilities.

ASSistant: I can't tell you that.

Leahy: Why?

ASSistant: Because I don't like you. Nobody likes you. Remember when Vice President Cheney, the only man who can tell God to take a freaking hike, told you to go fuck yourself? Just as promised, sir, the Bush Administration restored much needed maturity, accountability, and leadership - not to mention a colorful disregard for just about everything without a billion dollar check attached - to Washington.

Leahy: I see. So your job is to stonewall?

ASSistant: Did I mention that in the latest revision of the Patriot Act, we plan to place all Democrats and just about anyone who earns less than a cool three million a year on a list of terrorists to be denied jobs, services, constitutional protections, AND breathing privileges? Now, if you'll excuse me (and it's not like you've got a fucking choice, you old shit), I need to go so I can get Karl's Starbucks and his daily 50 lb bag of Skittles. It's a tough job subverting democracy and making a mockery of all America claims to hold dear, but Karl and Cheney are damned good at it!

Oh, one more thing: Impeach this! [holding crotch, jiggling it]

As The Worm(s) Turn: Rove Flips The Bird While His ASSistant Refuses to So Much As Identify His Job Function

Dan Froomkin of the Washington Post offers a good take on Karl Rove's middle finger flip to the Senate Judiciary Committee today in the continuing, ever more baffling U.S. Attorney purge scandal that Rove and Bush clearly orchestrated for partisan gain; God forbid someone - anyone - in the Bush White House be held accountable for his or her actions.

For my take on how Rove's hench-weasel responded to the simplest questions posed by Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Arlen Specter (R-PA and Scotland (cough)), see this post. The fellow seemed unwilling to so much as give his name. The contempt these folks hold for anyone not part of them is just astonishing. I have to say I can find no real precedent for the extensiveness of the clear and utter disregard for any accountability for their felonious actions.

At the same time, the Bush Administration is apparently pumping its set of huge brass balls ever larger because, as it becomes clearer with each passing day that U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales cannot tell a truth and certainly has NO capacity for performing his job ("I serve at the pleasure of the president; I nap when he does!"), the Bushies want to give this dolt even MORE capability for spying on us all under FISA, without due cause and definitely without any accountability.

Elsewhere, Time Magazine states what is all too obvious to those of us paying attention: Bush won't boot Gonzo because to do so might bring some very nasty, impeachable, perhaps fully treasonous facts into the light of day. How terrible that would be - for them, that is.

Did You Miss The Unskilled, Unimpressive, And Certainly Skanky Monica Goodling?

Well, if you want to keep up on the latest in GonzoGate, read here. Nancy Pelosi's office blog offers video highlights.

For latecomers, GonzalesGate is the seemingly well-documented allegation that the White House forced the U.S. Department of Justice, through the corrupt actions of Karl Rove and Bush and the incompetency of U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales (Bush's personal attorney and not exactly Bobby Kennedy kind of material), to morph into a situation where the nation's top cops and prosecutors into a taxpayer-financed GOP hit squad.

Pretty Please?

[Could someone please bring back the nicer Monica? The one who wanted to get screwed by a president (heretofore known as a Lewinsky), rather than the one wanting to screw with every damned one of the rest of us who aren't to the far right (Badthing... er... Goodling)? Pretty please?]

Turning The Face Of American Justice Into A Partisan Clown Parade

Anyone who watched (or read the transcript from) today's "testimony" (what Washington calls what any of us would call a bullshit session) from former Dept of Justice White House liaison Monica Goodling, who cried "5th Amendment" (and damn, I'm not sure DoJ honchos RATE that right given how they hold our lives in their filthy talons) then ran and hid, only coming out under "limited immunity", should be far more than infuriated. [bhfrik did a good piece on this here.]

What U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and the White House, particularly Karl Rove and George Bush, have done is turn the highest level of justice of our nation into no less than criminal and leans heavily toward treasonous. For if the American people cannot believe in the possibility their duly elected government will behave responsibly, then we won't be much beyond where we said the Iraqi people were under Saddam Hussein.

In this case, there was no one simple infraction. We have a huge staff hired with a heavy tilt toward a law school which is considered among the worst possible in the nation (where the fundamentalist fascist form of Christianity is what they teach rather than law), that staff administered by people with no competency and then used exclusively to suppress investigations into corrupt Republicans (lawmakers, election fraud, lobbyist payoffs, et al) while forcing investigations (even when their own people reviewed the facts and found no reason to proceed with cases) of Democrats and Democrat supporters.

If we let this slide, we say, "Fine. Turn the DoJ into another wing of the extreme fascist right. It's just dandy with me if they decide to toss up a charge on me with nothing but partisan hate to back up their claims, prosecute me, and then give me the only right of ultimate appeal being the now completely partisan Supreme Court which Bush and Rove and Cheney already rigged."

Personally, I'm not willing to say that. You? [Scary part is how many Americans are far more concerned tonight with who won American Idiot... Idol.]

"Bush Won't Fire Alberto Gonzales, But YOU Can Impeach Him!"

I don't usually hand out press releases verbatim, but hey, some folks are noticing that Vermont has been the most vocal and demanding of accountability on the Iraq War of ANY state in this damned nation. Is Vermont small? Hell, yes! There aren't a million of us total, not even if you count moose and fishers (fishers is not the kind with rods but the kind with four feet and a taste for kitties). [Black fly season, however, we probably match mainland China. ::cough::]

Viral Video and Nationwide petition Call for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales's Impeachment Robert Greenwald's Brave New Films and Democracy for America launch impeachgonzales.org and lead major Movement for Impeachment

Petition States: "President Bush won't fire Attorney General Alberto Gonzales... but YOU can!"Los Angeles and Vermont? A nationwide campaign calling for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales's impeachment was launched today by Filmmaker Robert Greenwald's Brave New Films and Democracy For America.

A viral video about Gonzales and a petition calling for the House Judiciary
Committee to begin the Impeachment process are being circulated across the
internet, YouTube and at the website impeachgonzales.org today in a
nationwide movement for his removal.

The petition at impeachgonzales.org calls for the House Judiciary committee, the committee that can begin the impeachment process, to "Impeach Gonzales and restore accountability and ethical leadership to the United States Justice Department." Both Democratic and Republican leaders and citizens across the country have been calling for the Attorney General's removal over the firings of U.S. attorneys. Evidence against Gonzales has continued to mount and today's launch marks the start of an organized, nationwide effort to remove the Attorney General by Impeachment.

"Americans around the country are standing up to voice opposition to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and his politicization of the Department of Justice," said Democracy for America chair Jim Dean. "Our message is clear: Impeach Gonzales."

"President Bush will not fire the Attorney General, but the American people can call for his Impeachment" said filmmaker Robert Greenwald who directed the Impeach Gonzalez video "the video shows Gonzales has no respect for the truth, for the rules of Congress and for the people of this country- how can he lead our Justice department?

The petition will be sent to all members of the House Judiciary committee, who can begin the impeachment process as outlined in Article II of the U.S. Constitution. This massive call for impeachment comes at a time where Senate leaders Diane Feinstein and Chuck Schumer are calling for a Senate No Confidence vote against the Attorney General.

Democracy for America is a political action committee dedicated
to supporting fiscally responsible, socially progressive candidates at all
levels of government?from school board to the presidency. Robert Greenwald's Brave New Films uses film and viral video to create social
change.

On Wolfowitz and Gonzales: Volunteers To "Resign" Them On The Toes Of Our Boots?

Hey, if we can get rid of the Wolfe at the World Bank and the moronic US Attorney General with just the toes of our (steel-reinforced, please!) boots, I suspect we can find thousands if not millions of volunteers.

First them, then perhaps Rove, Cheney, and Bush!

When It's Dirty, Deluded, and Downright Despicable, Safely Assume Karl Rove Did It

[Ed. note: Hmmm... rather than the much-used excuse of "the dog ate my homework", perhaps we should just all have t-shirts which read, "Karl Rove ate our democratic government (and then shat it out all over us while ordering us to smile about it)!"]

From my posting at All Things Democrat with details provided at TruthOut:

New evidence is out that Bush's "brain" (or is it balls?), Karl Rove, not only played an already documented heavy role in the firing of federal prosecutors in remote control mode from the White House to the Justice Department (at least in theory) led by U.S. Attorney General Alberto ("I lie at the pleasure of the president") Gonzales.

It looks like Rove, besides trying to hide thousands of emails send illegally from Republican National Committee (RNC) mail servers rather than official federal government ones, also coached witnesses to lie before Congress to protect Gonzo and the Bush White House.

Note to Bushies: Where Have All The Federal Documents Gone?

Anyone who has ever worked in any kind of office knows that documents go missing occasionally. When the "office" is the federal government, the bureaucracy alone raises the amount of missing records exponentially high.

But what we're seeing today among the Bush Administration is a not just astounding but downright frightening and yes, criminal and deliberate loss of any document, file, record, or "fact" that the Bushies don't like or want others to see. This is not just me stating this: we've been hearing this for years from citizen and taxpayer organizations, from lawyers and constitutional and federal experts, from scientists and academicians, and even from Bush supporters and righties as well as from Bush haters and lefties.

As reported last night by Keith Olbermann on MSNBC's Countdown program, there are scads of cases before the courts right now that show a global-sized laundry list of documents, records, emails, and other material required by law (and in some cases, the Constitution) to be kept and maintained safely and openly by the U.S. government that have been reported "missing" from the White House and other Bush- and GOP-led organizations.

Some of these you already know about, like the "sudden" disappearance of George W. Bush's National Guard records which Bush has claimed (if only these silly documents weren't somehow eaten by the government dog) would show he faithfully fulfilled his military service since he was able to slide off from having to serve in the Vietnam War. That we have documents that show just the opposite - that Bush partied/drank/drugged his way through what little service he performed - are not supposed to be believed; no, we're supposed to believe what he (a serial liar) says about files the people on HIS watch magically "lost."

Also among the lost is much of the evidence the feds supposedly built against "terror" suspect Jose Padilla (seems like important data to lose, no?) as well as countless other never-charged detainees at Gitmo and elsewhere.

We also have many thousands of supposedly "lost" emails that reference the firing of federal prosecutors case (aka GonzalesGate or AttorneyGate or GonzoGate) with heavy White House involvement.

And I could literally go forward for the next few days just listing here the documents we "know" (because the government has claimed so) have been lost on the Bush Administration's watch.

How damned convenient. And criminal.

Got Memory? Senators Question U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales Though His Answers Are Pretty Equivocal

OK, which of you could/was quite at utterly incredulous about the testimony of the U.S. Attorney General Alberto "Fredo" Gonzales today. The whole damned thing was damned pitifully worm-lame, from the 74+ times he suggested HE couldn't quite recall or quote or do much as else.

Mr. Gonzales has no big fans among even the Republicans, one of whom suggested he either resign or re-acquaint himselfith rules and ethics OR "go homr to spend more time with his obligatory family.

More Of The Effects Of U.S. Attorney Gate/GonzalesGate

From Make Them Accountable:

An April 11 article in The Washington Post on the House Judiciary Committee's decision to subpoena hundreds of Justice Department documents related to the U.S. attorney firings noted that Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) has "joined other members in demanding records and additional information about a federal public corruption case" in Wisconsin. Regarding the case, the Post reported only that a federal appeals court in Chicago ordered a former state employee to be "released after overturning her conviction." The article did not report that Georgia Thompson -- who was not identified by name -- was convicted on charges brought by a Bush-appointed U.S. attorney just before the 2006 election, that Wisconsin Republicans used her conviction to attack Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle (D) during the campaign, that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit took the highly unusual action of ordering the defendant released during oral argument because of the lack of evidence to support the conviction, and that Feingold and five other senators have requested information about the case to investigate whether "politics may have played an inappropriate role" in the prosecution.

Perhaps Bush's Monica Has No Right To Invoke The Fifth Amendment

For the past two weeks, there has been much talk that Monica Goodling, the holier-than-thou Department of (In)Justice lawyer who thinks she sits at the right hand of God and Bush, can/cannot invoke her 5th amendment right against self-incrimination AND keep her job. But Democrats now question whether she has any right to invoke the 5th at all.

From TPM Muckraker:

But in the letter today from committee Chairman John Conyers (D-MI) and subcommittee Chair Linda Sanchez (D-CA), they wrote that Democrats weren't convinced that Goodling was invoking the Fifth for valid reasons. Goodling's lawyer John Dowd had cited earlier comments by Democrats to show that they had "reached conclusions" about the matter under investigation.

Conyers and Sanchez aren't buying it. "The fact that a few Senators and Members of the House have expressed publicly their doubts about the credibility of the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General in their representations to Congress about the U.S. Attorneys' termination does not in any way excuse your client from answering questions honestly and to the best of her ability," they wrote.

I'm with the Dems. Monica gets no "get out of jail free" card by invoking protection for herself she would grant to no one else.

Let this Monica "go down", but in a less pleasant way than Lewinsky.

Karl Rove And The "666" Tattooed Atop His Bald Head

Every large stone seems to have a snake hiding beneath it. And strangely, all too often, it's the same snake and its name is perpetually Karl Rove (that smell of something vile and dead is a good hint that Rove is Bush's beneath-rock-brain, too).

From Sunday's New York Times Op/ed:

Mr. Rove’s efforts to maintain one-party rule go deep into the government. Last week, we learned about a meeting set up by Mr. Rove’s staff with officials of the General Services Administration that was wildly inappropriate and perhaps illegal. The aim, as outlined by Mr. Rove’s deputy, Scott Jennings, seems to have been to take advantage of the billions of dollars in contracts put out by the agency every year to return Republicans to the majority in Congress in 2008. It included PowerPoint slides on vulnerable House and Senate seats.

This sort of behavior should not be all that surprising. It was not that long ago that the Bush
White House embraced the priorities of the Republican governor of Mississippi and virtually ignored the far greater needs of Louisiana’s Democratic governor after Hurricane Katrina.
Mr. Rove retreated a bit from the public eye in the heat of the Lewis Libby trial, but after avoiding indictment, he seems to have regained his confidence. Take a look at YouTube to see his bizarre, humor-challenged gyrations as “MC Rove” at an annual media dinner in Washington the other night.

The investigation of the firings of the United States attorneys seems to be closing in on Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who should have been fired weeks ago. But Congress should bring equal scrutiny to the more powerful Mr. Rove. If it does, especially by forcing him to testify in public, it will find that he has been at the vortex of many of the biggest issues they are now investigating.

The Injustice of a U.S. Attorney General Who Cannot Tell The Truth, Any Truth

Former Bush Administration U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, a man with no qualifications for the job but his prissy self-righteousness (something the Bushies prefer to actual good, honest, and competent people, quite obviously) seems so atrocious for his title that it was hard to imagine a worse human being to lead the Justice Department. Yet, somehow, Bush found worse to replace Ashcroft: his buddy, a man who has never tried or prosecuted a single case as lawyer, the disgraceful, imcompetent, and perjuring Alberto Gonzales.

Responding to Congressional testimony yesterday by a former senior aide, Gonzales met the statements with yet more perjurous lies to Congress today regarding the Karl Rove-Bush Administration purging of federal prosecutors who would not act solely as partisan water carriers for the Bush-led GOP.

Today, there is this Times editorial on the matter of Kyle Sampson's testimony:

It is no wonder that the White House is trying to stop Congress from questioning Mr. Rove, Harriet Miers, the former White House counsel, and other top officials in public, under oath and with a transcript. The more the administration tries to spin the prosecutor purge, the worse it looks.

"Who's Scripting Gonzales?"

Dan Froomkin asks this question and it's an apt one when you look back at two or more of his "public appearances" where the U.S. Attorney General appears to be a man of limited intellect and seems to work at coming off rather slavish to the president.

Each time he appears, in fact, he seems less and less capable, which leads people to wonder who else engineered the purging of the federal prosecutors from the Attorney General's office, since good ole Al doesn't seem capable of much subterfuge.

Why did Attorney General Alberto Gonzales go before the television cameras two weeks ago and deny that he knew anything about last year's firings of U.S. attorneys, when -- as we just learned from yet another Friday-night document dump -- he approved them during an hour-long meeting in November?

Did that meeting not make an impression? Did he choose to lie about it? Was he secretly drawing a distinction between giving his approval and knowing anything about what he had given his approval for?

Or was he just reading whatever was put in front of him?

It's no secret in Washington that Gonzales is not an autonomous player. His entire career has been as an enabler of George Bush. He does what he's told.

When he was White House counsel, for instance, he was widely seen as being under the thrall of vice presidential counsel David S. Addington on such signature issues as torture and presidential power.

It's not as obvious who has been his minder since he became attorney general two years ago. But presumably either he or, more to the point, the staffers who write his speeches and draw up his talking points still get their marching orders directly from the West Wing.