WP, pg1: E-Mails show administration schemed for months to make Rove aide U.S. Attorney in Arkansas

[DeepModem Mom]

E-Mails Show Machinations to Replace Prosecutor
Administration Worked for Months to Make Rove Aide U.S. Attorney in Arkansas
By Dan Eggen and Amy Goldstein
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, March 23, 2007; Page A01

Two months before Bud Cummins was fired as U.S. attorney in Little Rock, a protege of presidential adviser Karl Rove was maneuvering with the Justice Department to take his place.

Last April, Tim Griffin, a Rove aide and longtime GOP operative, sent the attorney general's chief of staff a flattering letter about himself written by Cummins, the prosecutor he was trying to replace, internal e-mails released this week show. Rove and Harriet Miers, then the White House counsel, were keenly interested in putting him in the position, e-mails reveal.

New documents also show that Justice and White House officials were preparing for President Bush's approval of the appointment as early as last summer, five months before Griffin took the job.

The unusual appointment of Griffin, now serving as the interim U.S. attorney in Little Rock, has been one of the central issues in the Justice Department's firing of eight U.S. attorneys, which led to this week's constitutional showdown between Congress and the White House over the testimony of some of Bush's closest advisers.

Some of the thousands of pages of e-mails released this week underscore the extraordinary planning and effort, at the highest levels of the Justice Department and White House, to secure Griffin a job running one of the smaller U.S. attorney's offices in the country.

The e-mails show how D. Kyle Sampson, then the attorney general's chief of staff, and other Justice officials prepared to use a change in federal law to bypass input from Arkansas' two Democratic senators, who had expressed doubts about placing a former Republican National Committee operative in charge of a U.S. attorney's office. The evidence runs contrary to assurances from Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales that no such move had been planned....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/20...

[drm604]

1. K&R

This is big.

[PSPS]

2. "The evidence runs contrary to assurances"

The evidence runs contrary to assurances from Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales

Now there's a twisted sentence, all to avoid printing the word "lie." But this is the Washington Post, after all, where they think all of this is "making a big fuss over nothing."

[aquart]

3. An operative in Hillary's old home. How convenient.

[w4rma]

6. Setting up Whitewater II? (nt)

[William769]

7. Oy vey.

[itsnot2L8]

9. Security clearance, access to reams of files....

Maybe part of Karl's package to ensure he's the guru for the next candidate.

He might be listening, so I'm not sayin' that he would pull any dirty tricks, but it is a whopper of a coincidence that this was the first AND the only one initially said NOT to be for poor performance.

[CatWoman]

12. Hey, itsnot2L8

I really like that userid.

Next time I have to change my passwords at work, I'm gonna use that!!!

Welcome to DU

[DeepModem Mom]

14. Wow, first post -- welcome to DU, tsnot2L8 !

[EVDebs]

4. The whole Mena AR thing along w/ Wackenhut+Cabazon deal near SD CA

must mean they can't keep the money trail a secret much longer. 'The Octopus' is going to get some airtime in Congress and the blowback is Worse Than Watergate, IMHO.

http://www.lycaeum.org/books/books/last_circle/5.htm

This is gonna be fun to watch.

[frogcycle]

15. "worse than watergate"

is the understatement of the century

Actually, it it the same "octopus", which we failed to eradicate then. This is a continuation of Watergate, with 30 years of mestatizing.

To quote again Michael Gross' character a the end of Tremors II -

This is going to be BIG. Really BIG. Really really BIG!

I can't wait to see the parts of graboids start raining down!

[CrazyOrangeCat]

5. K&R

[Cassandra]

8. Too bad they couldn't manage to plan...

that intensively in Iraq.

[Felix Mala]

10. I swear I heard Tony Snow say the other day:

"This is more and more looking like something that occurred entirely within the Justice Department..."

The Responsibility Administration strikes again...

[whistle]

11. From the list of 14 Characteristics of Fascism

<snip>
Political scientist Dr. Lawrence Britt recently wrote an article about fascism ("Fascism Anyone?," Free Inquiry, Spring 2003, page 20). Studying the fascist regimes of Hitler (Germany), Mussolini (Italy), Franco (Spain), Suharto (Indonesia), and Pinochet (Chile), Dr. Britt found they all had 14 elements in common. He calls these the identifying characteristics of fascism. The excerpt is in accordance with the magazine's policy.

The characteristic here would be:


13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption
Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.

<more>

http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/fasci14chars.html

[jwirr]

13. I wonder if the aide knew too much and needed to be paid off?

[IWantAChange]

16. One has to wonder how many loose tongues there are out there to fill in all the blanks on Gonzogate

[thoughttheater]

17. They're just trying to protect us...sure they are.

On Thursday Alberto Gonzales told us he is working tirelessly to be sure he has every American's back covered...especially our children. Should the firing of six top performing U.S. Attorneys make us feel better?

I don’t know about anyone else but I’ve always been suspicious of the guy that seems to go out of his way to tell you he’s "got your back covered".

See a sarcastic visual that demonstrates how many Americans feel when the Attorney General reassures us that he's got our backs covered...here:

www.thoughttheater.com

[RaleighNCDUer]

18. But according to Navarette, we are all just racists out to get Gonzales

because he is the first Hispanic AG.++++++``

[McCamy Taylor]

19. The RNC's anti-immigrant politics had assured that their own base is not supporting Gonzales, LOL

[jamesinca]

20. Has anybody been keeping a list

A list of all of the toadies, cronies and the ilk that pop up for different appointments? I think that would be useful for the future. We know of 8 attorneys that take their job serious, they were fired. We know of a ninth, his name is Patrick Fitzgerald, he was on the list, but had a case to hear first. Who are the other 84 toadies?