Purging Prosecutors

" The O.J. Simpson defense. This is generally employed by someone who insists he will boldly investigate wrongdoing, when in fact all he need do is look in the mirror. Accordingly, Gonzales said that he will get out there and 'ascertain what happened here,' and 'assess the accountability.' He can actually start this task by simply reading what's already in the public record and connecting the dots . . .

" The Busy Executive defense. This is also known as the 'I'm so important, how was I supposed to know everything that was going on?' defense . . .

"Finally, The Decider defense: Gonzales vowed not to resign, and signaled that only his longtime patron could make that decision: 'I serve at the pleasure of the president.' Perhaps that's his trump card. Judging by what we have previously seen in this administration, Gonzales may well be in line for the Presidential Medal of Freedom."

Ed Morrissey may be a conservative, but raises a very salient question:

"One question that these memos raise is why it took so long to dismiss these prosecutors if they were performing so badly. Sampson compiled that ranking list two years ago this month. The effort seemed to be back-burnered until September of last year, when new rules on appointment of interim federal prosecutors made their way through Congress as part of a homeland-security bill. The new rules allow Justice and the White House to forego Senate approval on interim appointments, and the terminations commenced almost immediately after the law went into effect.

"If competence and performance were the reasons for the terminations, why did Justice wait almost two years to do anything about it?"

Are journalists starting to change their minds about whether socially liberal Rudy can win the GOP nomination? (The answer is yes, and the reason is the polls.) Roger Simon says we may be misreading the Republican electorate:

"On Monday, Giuliani was endorsed by David Vitter, a conservative Republican senator from Louisiana.

"When a reporter asked Vitter if Giuliani would be a 'tough sell' in Louisiana, Vitter replied: 'I don't think he is going to be at all, particularly post-Katrina.'

"Translation: When the next hurricane hits, people are going to want a president who knows what he is doing rather than a president who believes that abortion is murder.

"Some Republicans will not buy this. Perhaps most of them won't. After all, Republican media wizards have sold them on the opposite message for years. They have said that ideology is what really matters in elections, not competence. Ideology, Republicans have been told in election after election, is what gets people to the polls.

"Giuliani has a different message: He says he knows how to run things. He says he knows how to get the job done. He says America will be attacked by terrorists in the future and it would be a good idea to have a president who can handle that.