Ding Dong the Witch is Gone

Posted by Greg Allen on 08.28.2007

Thoughts on the resignation of Alberto Gonzales

"Al Gonzales is a man of integrity, decency and principle. ...After months of unfair treatment that has created a harmful distraction at the Justice Department, Judge Gonzales decided to resign his position and I accept his decision. It's sad that ... his good name was dragged through the mud for political reasons." — President Bush.

That statement is ironic in a number of ways that I'm sure President Bush couldn't possibly be aware of. Alberto Gonzales had a good name? Other people's politics were the cause of that name's ruin? Not so much. Alberto Gonzales' name was dragged through the mud only because taring and feathering has gone out of style. In truth, the former (thank god) Attorney General has only himself to blame for the soiling of his reputation.

Had he not worked so diligently to transform the Department of Justice into an extension of the Republican party that could be manipulated for political gain, he might have left the administration with the sort of dignity that Colin Powell managed to hold on to after his departure. Instead, Alberto Gonzales has left the sort of legacy that will tell his successor—and indeed future generations of Americans—why an impartial Justice Department devoted to the constitution is so crucial. Unfortunately, that lesson was taught by the example of Gonzales' tragic failure at both tasks.

A friend of mine from college also does editorial writing from time to time. My favorite article of his was titled "I Used to be a Republican. Why I'm Now Just a Conservative." The piece is a great personal telling of how the Bush Administration has warped almost every aspect of the federal government in a way that would be (and is) unimaginable to the Republican party of less than ten years ago.

Can you imagine Bob Dole, the 1996 GOP presidential candidate who championed small government, promoting the expansion of government powers in areas such as detention without charge, or wiretapping without a warrant? Perhaps, but only with major ideological overhauls. Alberto Gonzales, in both his tenure as White House legal council and Attorney General was the force behind those overhauls. He penned memos authorizing the use of torture against detainees. He masterminded the Administration's policy warrantless wiretapping.

For me, either of those would have been cause enough to rid our country of such a man, but then he did something that was blatantly unacceptable—even to members of his own party. Alberto Gonzales had eight U.S. Attorneys fired for the simple reason that they were unwilling to use their positions in order to bring up bogus charges on Democrats in their districts before the 2006 midterm election. Even slave-owning politicians would have found such an action patently corrupt and immoral. The Department of Justice has always had a responsibility to the United States that required it to be above the reach of partisan politics. Alberto Gonzales compromised that sacred duty in the worst way. We should be thankful he's gone.

"Attorney General Gonzales' ability to lead the Department of Justice had been undermined by his serious errors in judgment and conflicting statements. I am hopeful that the President will name a strong successor who will begin to restore confidence in the department." — Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine.

That's a Republican saying those words, and there's a reason for it. Can anyone who watched Gonzales' testimony honestly say they believe he was telling anything close to the truth? The man claimed over 60 times in one sitting that he "did not recall" and "can't remember" and worst of all "cannot recall remembering" any of the events surrounding the attorney firings. Some of the questions referred to events that had happened only weeks prior. Alberto Gonzales may be a fool, but he's not an idiot, and there's no way a man of his intelligence could plausibly claim such a faulty memory – as has been argued by Democrats and Republicans alike. The only conclusion one can arrive at, therefore, is that Alberto Gonzales was more than happy to testify before congress, in what is supposed to be one of America's most important aspects of checks and balances, and play the part of an incompetent jackass, rather than utter any statement giving the slightest hint as to his grave wrongdoing.

Fortunately, Gonzales' feigned ignorance hasn't left the public entirely in the dark. Despite the Administration's initial assertion that the attorneys were fired for "poor performance," internal documents prove that all of the eight fired attorneys received positive performance reviews. As more memos and emails came to light, the department's explanations kept changing and contradicting earlier statements. You know what kind of people often follow that pattern? Liars.

But even if the shifting and contradictory testimony weren't enough to nail Gonzales, the testimony of the fired Attorneys certainly should be. Former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias of New Mexico, one of the fired U.S. Prosecutors, described threatening phone calls he received from Republican Senator Pete Domenici about his refusal to speed up charges against the Democrats running in Domenici's home state. After the complaints were forwarded to the White House, the Attorney, who had previously been commended and even selected to train others in election law, was suddenly dismissed. The story of the other seven is much the same.

It is a shame that Gonzales resigned only because his controversy had hampered the workings of the department. Using that reasoning denied him a chance to come clean about his crimes and at least do America one service by resigning under honest pretenses. Still, perhaps his disgrace can serve as a lesson to his successor: "here's what not to do."