Bush's Bubble Strikes Again

Opinion Watch

Patrick M. Collins, an assistant U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, writes in a Chicago Tribune op-ed that "an effective justice system requires the support and confidence of the community at large. If the public perceives that prosecutions are influenced by partisan affiliations or political agendas, it will quickly -- and appropriately -- lose confidence in its prosecutors. . . .

"In e-mails and documents released in recent weeks, we have learned that certain high-ranking Justice officials, when considering particular top prosecutors to terminate and others to replace them, answered the loyalty question in partisan political terms. Distressingly, these Justice officials appear to have placed a premium on installing prosecutors with established partisan political resumes.

"A DOJ process that exalts partisan political loyalty over independence and fairness is a fundamentally flawed one. Political blinders are critical to a prosecutor because, without them, important decisions about how cases are investigated and prosecuted can be hijacked by improper considerations with tangible (even tragic) consequences. Naturally, this is most critical in political corruption cases, the legitimacy of which hinges on the political independence of the prosecutive team's work. . . .

"We have heard as a defense of the summary dismissal of eight U.S. attorneys that all U.S. attorneys 'serve at the pleasure of the president.' And that, of course, is true. But they must never serve only to please the president. U.S. attorneys serve the people of the United States.

"If we replace non-partisan public service with blind political loyalty, we will have sacrificed one of the core values of our judicial system."

It's worth noting that federal prosecutors rarely write op-eds. Presumably, in this case, Collins didn't think he'd get in trouble for doing so. And who's his boss? A fellow named Patrick J. Fitzgerald.

Political science professor Ross K. Baker writes in a USA Today op-ed that "clinging to a faithful but inept friend, or one who has made powerful enemies in Congress, can seriously damage a president. Had Bush not waited until after the 2006 elections to fire Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who had a long history with the family, the GOP might have kept control of Congress.

"With the staggering incompetence Gonzales has shown in the dismissal of eight U.S. attorneys, he seems ripe for amputation. The president's reluctance to break out the scalpel -- especially at a time when his administration is in an advanced state of decomposition -- tells us much about presidents whose struggle with casting-off their subordinates in a timely fashion belies the tough images they like to project. When, at long last, they get around to it, the infection has spread dangerously....

"We esteem courage in presidents, and a good test of a president's courageousness is his ability to draw his sword on a subordinate who has become a liability. That courage is put to a more rigorous but necessary test when the subordinate is a friend of long standing. Yet a president must realize that though loyalty to a friend is admirable, such loyalty should never trump what's best for the country."

The Washington Post editorial board writes; "In the uproar over the firing of U.S. attorneys, most of the attention has been focused on Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, and it will be again later this week when he testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee. But it's increasingly clear that important questions about the firings must be directed to the White House, which inspired the plan, prodded it along and may well have selected at least one target more because of partisan politics than performance. . . .

"The White House would like this to be a Justice problem, but it isn't turning out that way. 'I mean, this took place inside the Justice Department,' Vice President Cheney said Sunday on CBS's 'Face the Nation.' 'The one who needs to answer to that and lay out on the record the specifics of what transpired is the attorney general, and he'll do so.' But Mr. Cheney's rendition isn't accurate. The story unfolded inside the White House, too, and White House officials also need to 'lay out on the record the specifics of what transpired.'"

Clinton White House chief of staff John Podesta writes: "The Bush administration's ongoing evasions, stonewalling of Congress and shifting rationales for the firing of eight U.S. attorneys are part of a campaign that began when the president took office: to increase the power of the executive at the expense of the other branches of government."

Eugene Robinson writes in his Washington Post opinion column about recent statements by Karl Rove, Paul Wolfowitz and Alberto Gonzales and writes: " Rove, Wolfowitz and Gonzales are making the last-ditch argument of a cheating husband caught in flagrante: Who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes?"

E-Mail Watch

So maybe the " five million" missing e-mails (unrelated to the missing Republican National Committee e-mails) aren't really missing after all?

Here's Dana Perino at yesterday's briefing:

"Q Last week we talked about the organization, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a figure of 5 million missing emails. You had mentioned in the gaggle you thought -- you would check with the Office of Administration and perhaps that wasn't correct.

"MS. PERINO: Look, the left-wing group, CREW, came up with a number of 5 million. We don't know where they came up with that number. We've told you what we know, which is that we are aware that there could have been some emails that were not automatically archived because of a technical issue. And we have talked with the Office of Administration about that, and we're looking into those details. But given the complex nature of this issue, it might take us a little while to identify those. We do, however, know that most -- all of those emails should be available on backup tapes. And so we'll continue to look at it. This is separate from the RNC accounts, and as soon as we have more information, we'll provide it.

"Q Are you confident they're on backup tapes, or you're still in that phase of investigating?

"MS. PERINO: There should be, and we just want to make sure that there are all of them."

Virginia Tech

Bush has decided to attend this afternoon's convocation at Virginia Tech University, to honor the victims of the deadliest shooting in U.S. history.

As CNN's Suzanne Malveaux put it, "usually what happens is the president waits a little while" before showing up at a disaster scene, in order not to burden local authorities. (President Clinton waited four days before speaking from Oklahoma City in 1995)

Bush this morning also issued a proclamation ordering flags flown at half-staff through Sunday night.

Buth made his first comments late yesterday afternoon, saying: "Our nation is shocked and saddened by the news of the shootings at Virginia Tech today. . . .

"Schools should be places of safety and sanctuary and learning. When that sanctuary is violated, the impact is felt in every American classroom and every American community."

The White House's initial reaction included a defense of current gun laws. From Perino's briefing:

"Q Dana, going back to Virginia Tech, what more does this White House think needs to be done as it relates to gun issues?....

"MS. PERINO: I would point you back to the fact that President, along with Secretary Spellings, hosted last October -- October 10, 2006 -- a conference on school gun violence after the Amish school shooting and the other shootings that had happened, because the tragedies are the ones that just collectively break America's heart and are ones that we deeply feel, because all of us can imagine what it would be like to have been at your own school, your own college, and to have something happen. And those of us who are parents, or brothers or sisters of people at the schools have to take that into consideration.

"As far as policy, the President believes that there is a right for people to bear arms, but that all laws must be followed. And certainly bringing a gun into a school dormitory and shooting -- I don't want to say numbers because I know that they're still trying to figure out many people were wounded and possibly killed, but obviously that would be against the law and something that someone should be held accountable for."

As for that conference in October, Dana Milbank noted at the time in The Washington Post: "President Bush has always been a disciplined man, but yesterday he set a new standard for self-control: He moderated an hour-long discussion about the rash of school shootings in the past week without once mentioning the word 'guns.'"

Intel Watch, Part One

Mark Mazzetti writes in the New York Times: "The Bush administration's allies in Congress on Monday blocked a bill that would require the White House to disclose the locations of secret prisons run by the Central Intelligence Agency and to reveal the amount spent annually by American intelligence agencies. . . .

"Opponents of the legislation, led by Senator Jim DeMint, a South Carolina Republican, won enough support on Monday to prevent the bill from going to the Senate floor for a final vote. . . .

"The White House last week threatened to veto the intelligence bill because it contained several provisions it deemed objectionable, including a requirement that the Bush administration give Congress a detailed report about C.I.A. prison locations and interrogation methods used on high-level terrorism suspects."

Intel Watch, Part Two

Walter Pincus wrote in Saturday's Washington Post about the administration's proposed revisions to the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, "to make more non-citizens subject to intelligence surveillance and to authorize the interception of foreign communications routed through the United States."

Among the proposals: "[T]hey provide for compelling telecommunications companies and e-mail providers to cooperate with investigations while protecting them from being sued by their subscribers. The legal protection would be applied retroactively to those companies that cooperated with the government after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks."

Richard Willing writes in USA Today the administration would also "[r]equire that legal challenges to foreign surveillance operations be heard by a secret FISA court rather than in an open federal court as is now the case," and "[g]ive investigators one week rather than the current 48 hours to perform surveillance before seeking approval from a FISA court judge."

Late Night Humor

Andy Card, Bush's first chief of staff, corrects Jon Stewart on his views of Bush:

Stewart: "I would see arrogance, you would see --"

Card: "Quiet confidence."

Stewart: "Stubborn insistence on not accepting reality?"

Card: "I would say, the capacity to make a tough decision without perfect knowledge."

Stewart: "Will you be my chief of staff?"

And just for the record, asked about the fact that Scooter Libby and Karl Rove -- in spite of their public denials -- outed Valerie Plame as a CIA agent, Card stuck to an old hair-splitting talking point I hadn't heard in a while: "I don't think people at the White House knew her name. I don't think we knew her name."

Cartoon Watch

Bill Mitchell and Stewart Powell on Gonzales's challenge; Tony Auth on irresponsibility; Mike Luckovich on terror enough.

And, in honor of Walt Handelsman's Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning, here are his winning entries-- including several raucous animations. (Don't miss this one.)