Ashcroft Nostalgia

Gonzales: "I'm not sure that those are the words that I used, Mr. Chairman."

Specter: "Well, the substance of the words you used."

Gonzales: "Those are the substance of the words I used, but those are not the exact words that I used."

At which point Specter gave up and changed topics.

Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) didn't fare any better on military tribunals. Leahy asked whether Congress should simply ratify the existing system, as an assistant attorney general had urged the previous week.

Gonzales: "That would certainly be one alternative that Congress could consider, Senator Leahy."

Leahy, trying again: "Is that the administration's position, yes or no?"

Gonzales: "I don't believe the administration has a position as to where Congress should begin its deliberations."

Well, that was informative.

The big news of the hearing -- that the president had in effect killed an internal Justice investigation into the domestic spying program by refusing to grant the necessary security clearances to department lawyers -- underscores the most disturbing aspect of Gonzales's tenure: his lack of independence from the president. If Gonzales disagreed with this move -- a bad call and an even worse precedent -- he offered no hint of it at the hearing.

This is not a surprise -- after all, Gonzales's entire public career is entwined with that of George W. Bush -- but it is a disappointment. Ashcroft at least clashed with the White House over detainee policy (he fought internally to give citizens detained as enemy combatants access to counsel) and warrantless surveillance (he refused when Gonzales came to his hospital room asking that he sign papers extending the program).

To his credit, Gonzales did resist -- he supposedly threatened to quit -- when the president, pummeled by congressional Republicans over the search of a Democratic congressman's office, considered ordering Justice to return the documents. But Attorney General Gonzales doesn't seem to have any less zeal for unbridled presidential power -- or any less willingness to make outlandish arguments on its behalf -- than did White House Counsel Gonzales.

Which is precisely why he shouldn't be there in the first place -- and why I am experiencing intermittent twinges of a most unexpected emotion: Ashcroft nostalgia.

marcusr@washpost.com