Wow. Huh, it's amazing to me sometimes how history can deliver such ironies.
I mean, I wonder if it will ever occur to Alberto Gonzales - as he dolefully places his personal mementoes into those cardboard boxes, lingering over a fountain pen here or a paperweight there, as he gazes sadly one last time around his office at the Department of Justice before slowly, deliberately taking the Photos Of Me With Important People down from their proud perches on his walls - I wonder if it will ever occur to him that he and his patrons in the White House weren't the first arrogant, delusional, warmongering, sadistic imperialistic fools to make the mistake of launching a surprise attack against the United States of America on a December 7.
(Also available at My Left Wing)
After six years of these bozos, it shouldn't really surprise me that they would believe they could get away with this. But somehow they did. No strangers to hubris, they.
I have been reflecting today, thinking about what it is about this U.S. attorneys scandal that has proven to have so much traction. I mean, it's not like we haven't seen plenty of criminal (and/or criminally negligent) behavior from this crowd: Iraq, Katrina, treatment of veterans, signing statements, NSA surveillance, extraordinary rendition - well, you get the idea. And those are just off the top of my head. But nothing to this point has shown the legs this U.S. attorney purge has.
I think it's because, as the e-mails released today (hat tip to litigatormom and her excellent diary) so beautifully illustrate, this was a blatant, overt, shameless attempt by the White House to cynically convert our law enforcement system into an unabashedly political tool.
That's a big no-no.
"We're a go for the US Atty plan," [Deputy White House Counsel William K.] Kelley wrote in a Dec. 4, 2006, e-mail to [Alberto Gonzales's Chief of Staff Kyle] Sampson and [then-White House Counsel Harriet] Miers. "WH leg[al], political, communications have signed off and acknowledged that we have to be committed to following through once the pressure comes."
No one at the Department of Justice or the White House is going to be able to credibly claim ignorance on this one. This one will go all the way up.
And what gives it legs is that there are no shades of grey here. There are no other back doors for the perpetrators to run out of, no windows through which they can squirm their fat white behinds in order to escape being held accountable, no glib "explanations" that can deflect the opprobrium that is sure to befall them, because every American with a brain (i.e., 72% of us) knows What Happened Here.
This isn't, Oh, well, we misinterpreted the intelligence, like everyone else did.
This isn't, Oh, well, the state and local officials didn't send the buses.
This isn't, Oh, well, we're going to fire the general who's in charge of the hospital.
This isn't, Oh, well, we believe in a "unitary executive."
This isn't, Oh, well, we're making America safer, and besides, if you're not guilty, you've got nothing to worry about.
This is a Naked.
Power.
Grab.
And the American people
- and the Congress
- and the press, f'cryin' out loud!
- know it. Viscerally.
No subtley. No nuance. No shades of grey.
No weaseling out with an embarrassed grin and a plea of incompetence.
This is W-R-O-N-G, and everybody knows it.
This was carefully planned and deliberately executed, with a clear purpose and intent, and carried out in broad daylight.
On December 7.
This time, it wasn't "Climb Mount Niitaka" that set in motion the attack that would eventually bring down an empire.
"We're a go for the US Atty plan" - that was the signal for this December 7.
And this time, in fact, I think the attackers have indeed awoken a sleeping giant.
Heh®.