What Monica Doesn't Know

Former Justice Department White House liaison Monica Goodling this morning told the House Judiciary Committee . . . very little.

Her testimony -- hugely anticipated after she refused to say a word without being granted immunity -- failed to resolve the central mystery of last year's firings of U.S. attorneys: Who wanted them fired them and why? And how extensive was the White House involvement?

Goodling described herself as a bit player who couldn't say how anyone showed up on the list.

"I wish to clarify my role as White House liaison," Goodling said in her opening statement "Despite that title, I did not hold the keys to the kingdom, as some have suggested. I was not the primary White House contact for purposes of the development or approval of the U.S. attorney replacement plan. . . . To the best of my recollection, I've never had a conversation with Karl Rove or Harriet Miers while I served at the Department of Justice, and I'm certain that I never spoke to either of them about the hiring or firing of any U.S. attorney."

Goodling did say she crossed the line in applying political litmus tests to career hires: "I do acknowledge that I may have gone too far in asking political questions of applicants for career positions and I may have taken inappropriate political considerations into account on some occasions, and I regret those mistakes," she said, later adding: "I believe I crossed the line, but I didn't mean to."

But the only smoking gun, as it were, was the knife Goodling left in Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty's back. (It was the second in just over a week, what with Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales trying to blame McNulty for the whole mess last Tuesday, a day after McNulty announced his resignation.)

Goodling, who had briefed McNulty prior to his Feb. 6 Senate Judiciary Committee testimony, charged that he was "not fully candid" with the senators "about his knowledge of White House involvement in the replacement decision [and] failed to disclose that he had some knowledge of the White House's interest in selecting Tim Griffin as the interim U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Arkansas."

Goodling said that McNulty knew that "the White House was involved in the sign-off of the plan at the end . . . and that he at least knew that that was a process that had been going on for some period of months."

Goodling also said McNulty told her not to attend a Feb. 14 briefing with senators because "if someone recognized me as the White House liaison, the members would be more likely to ask questions about the White House."

Nothing Goodling said (at least before noon, and my deadline) spoke to the concern that at least some of the prosecutors were fired because White House officials, including Karl Rove, didn't feel they were being sufficiently partisan in the exercise of their offices.

There was one tidbit, however, related to Griffin, a former aide to Karl Rove: "In 2005," Goodling said, "I had a social call at some point with Tim Griffin, who indicated to me, and he was working at the White House at the time, that he may have the opportunity to go back to Arkansas because some U.S. attorneys may be replaced, and if [Bud] Cummins was one of them, he might get a chance to go home."

How could Griffin possibly have known that? And yet, in the summer of 2006, Cummins, the U.S. attorney in Little Rock, was told to resign and Griffin was given his job.