I had an opportunity to speak with Rep Keith Ellison (D-MN) about the U.S. Attorney scandal, Don Siegelman and Karl Rove. Keith Ellison serves on the House Judiciary Committee.

The New York Times reports that Mukasey Won't Pursue Charges in Hiring Inquiry.  This isn't surprising.  It fits a pattern of the Department of Justice.  What I do find surprising is Mukasey's defense.

[I]t is important to stress that those people hired under the circumstances described in the report have been, and will be, regularly evaluated... If anyone – whether Democrat or Republican, whether appointed through a flawed process or a flawless one – is found to be handling or deciding cases based on politics, and not based on what the law and facts require, there will be a swift and unambiguous response.

Color me unimpressed.  This is the same employee evaluation process that the Department hid behind in the political firing of six US attorneys.  Now I'm supposed to believe it will protect our interests against politically motivated hiring?

But Mukasey's snow job gets worse...

Who knew? Apparently breaking civil service laws in the name of improperly hiring Republican foot soldiers to supposedly non-political positions in the Justice Department is totally cool by our newest and scumbaggiest Attorney General, Michael Mukasey

Having worked at the Department of Justice, I was particularly torqued about the hiring scandal under the wildly incompetent Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez.  I thought Monica Goodling, the criminally corrupt White House Liaison who interviewed people and asked questions like "What is it about George W. Bush that makes you want to serve him?" and "Why are you a Republican?" represented the worst of Washington, and, frankly, broke the law.

Turns out I was right

August 8, Ivory Towers, Academia. "Those who don't learn from history," it is said, "are doomed to repeat it." The tendency of history to repeat itself is well known, but not well understood. Considering the roles played by women named Monica in the Administrations of current and recent U. S. Presidents, specifically, the role that Monica Goodling played in the Bush Administration, the Justice Department, and the United States of America, and the role Monica Lewinsky played in the Clinton Administration, the White House, and the good ole USA, I have prepared a scorecard that tells the tale of the two Monicas; Goodling and Lewinsky. Dubbed "The Monica Effect," this phenomena, while perhaps trivial and admittedly hard to swallow, must be studied.

One question that has arisen, is whether, assuming Obama wins, we can get rid of the packing of government positions with Reopublican idealogues. It is important to remember that far more then any administration in the past, the Bushies have been hiring at all levels, not just legitimately politcal appointments, with prescreened right wing Repuglican idealogues.

As has been widely reported, anybody deemed too liberal or with possible Democratic ties or leanings was illegally screened out from positions in DoJ by Monica Goodling and others.

At the most simple level, the folks who did get those jobs got them on the basis of an illegal premptorary exclusion of others. Having benefited from the illegal process, can they be fired just on the basis of being the beneficiary of the tainted process? Is that enough to fire them under a new administration? Or would that be some sort of illegal witch-hunt?

Well, today's New York Times has an article by the great Charlie Savage that suggests there may be additional legal justification to fire many of them

As many of us know, the title of this diary was borrowed from Barry Goldwater's (in)famous 1964 GOP acceptance speech.  While this is the first (and likely the last) time I will ever quote a Goldwater speech here (or anywhere else), there's another line that's equally applicable today:

That, let me remind you, is the land of liberty built by decentralized power. On it also we must have balance between the branches of government at every level.

Those words need to be seriously contemplated by every House Dem today.  Yesterday's Judiciary vote on contempt for Rove and today's district court ruling rejecting spurious Executive Privilege claims make it painfully clear that the time has come for a more aggressive approach.

As the facts emerge, the truth about the Bush-Gonzales Justice Department just keeps getting stranger, doesn't it? Political interference in the hiring and firing of prosecutors, the possibly false prosecution of a former governor, and now the bizarre litmus test questions and Internet searches of Monica Goodling. You can't make this stuff up.

Or can you?

See if you can tell which are the real questions asked (illegally, of course) of civil service appointees by Ms. Goodling and which are completely made up.

Today the Justice Department's Inspector General, Glenn Fine, appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee to discuss Monday's report showing serious violations of the law in the hiring of career Department employees.  What the IG revealed today was that the attitude of extreme partisanship inside the DoJ was pervasive.  Whether people were actively engaging in politicization or just tacitly accepting it, everyone was at least aware of what was happening... everyone except for Abu Gonzales, of course, who does not recall.

So, finally, a member of the WH press corps has asked about the DOJ politicization scandal...

Too bad the question was framed in a way that gave a Grand Canyon-sized space for Dana Perino to side-step accountability.

Why not ask a few direct questions, like: Did anyone in the WH know the political screening was going on? How could the WH NOT know it was going on? Karl Rove didn't know? Didn't he know who to call to push a candidate? Weren't Goodlingand Sampson Rove's understudies/handpicked Mini-me's doing the hiring? Political screening wasn't WH policy on DOJ hiring?

Or how about: Dana, do you expect us to BELIEVE that this was a rogue operation?

Just another example of the MSM failing our nation by accepting the 'mistakes were made' dodge.  

What on earth do they have to do with with one another, you ask?  Well, in her Washington Post op ed entitled Goodlings Amok, Ruth Marcus recognizes the incongruity of connecting them, but she does so in a way that showsw the Village, of which she as a writer at the Post is a key part, has now decided the Boy Emperor has no cloths.  Please note the 2nd and 3rd paragraphs, before below the fold I offer a few observations of my own:

You might think that the two of these have nothing in common save the happenstance that both are the subject of devastating new reports: Goodling about the stomach-turning politicization of the Justice Department; the deficit about the stomach-turning state of the federal treasury.

But the linkage goes beyond the adjective. The ousted Goodling and the lingering deficit are twin manifestations of the Bush administration's overarching contempt for government and blind adherence to ideology.

Iinvite you to keep reading.

It's 98 days until the election, and I realized this morning that I left a very important item off the "list" for male F.O.O. - a cod piece and/or athletic supporter. 'Nuff said!

Last night, I alluded to a speech given by Edward R. Murrow at a radio/television convention. I've provided a link below to the full text of the speech he gave at the RTNDA Convention in Chicago on Oct. 15, 1958. To encourage you to read the whole speech, I offer this excerpt:

"We are currently wealthy, fat, comfortable, and complacent. We have currently a built - up allergy to unpleasant or disturbing information. Our mass media reflect this. But, unless we get up off our fat surpluses and recognize that television in the main is being used to distract, delude, amuse, and insulate us, then television and those who finance it, those who look at it and those who work at it, may see a totally different picture too late."

That Mr. Murrow was a prophetic SOB!

http://www.turnoffyourtv.com/...

On this note, let's Countdown for Tuesday, July 29, 2008!

In a report released yesterday, the Justice Department concluded that Monica Goodling, the former White House liaison for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, violated federal law and DOJ policy by discriminating against job applicants who weren't faithful Republicans or conservative activists.  As it turns out, 14 months after Goodling admitted to Congress "I believe I crossed the line, but I didn't mean to," the Bush DOJ determined that she did.  More important, the report demolished the knee-jerk "criminalization of politics" defense of her Republican allies.

Everyone was all up in arms Monday because former Justice Department flack Monica Goodling was revealed to have asked prospective job candidates, “What is it about George W. Bush that makes you want to serve him?” This was interpreted to be an inappropriate question because aspirants to career DoJ positions are not supposed to have to pass a partisan litmus test for what are intended to be apolitical jobs.

While Goodling might still have been feeling around for some sort of fealty, I think that folks are reading her question all wrong. Not unlike the folks at Star-Kist, this star-struck Regent University grad wasn’t looking for people that thought GW Bush had good taste; she wanted employees that thought GW Bush tasted good.

I think I've made my passions & leanings (political & otherwise) pretty clear since I began posting here some months ago. But, I'd like to think that if I'm wrong about something, I'm "big enough" to admit it. Check local listings, but gas in my part of the country is down to $3.82/gallon! So, to all you librul, Birkenstock - buyin', arugula eatin', latte' sippin', orange juice drinkin', non - flag - pin - wearin' naysayers who said that GWB & Arizona's senator's actions concerning off - shore oil drilling would make no difference, [insert Bronx raspberry here]! Remember, Senator McCentury's the man with gas!

It's 99 days until the election. So, I better begin a list and check it twice. Hip waders? Check. Helmet? Check. Protective eye gear? Check. Nose plugs? Check. Ear plugs? Check (except for when Countdown's on, of course). Brain bleach and/or colon cleanser for anyone considering voting GOP? Check and Check! So far...so good!

Keith's back at "30 Rock" where he belongs, so onto tonight's Countdown diary!

From TPM Muckraker

... Sampson often called over to the White House personnel office seeking "ideas for immigration judge postings." Sampson told a staffer to "contact the White House to get any candidate ideas that they had for immigration judges".

In one case, Sampson pushed a prospective judicial candidate who was supported by White House political director Karl Rove.

Regarding that candidate, whose name was not disclosed, Kevin Ohlson, then deputy director of the Executive Office for Immigration Review, told the IG's investigators that he was "fully aware of the fact" that Sampson was pushing Rove's pick and that was effecting the formal evaluation.

"The finger was on the scale," Ohlson said.

That candidate was ultimately appointed to be an immigration judge in October 2005, the report said. ....

TTBOMK, federal hiring discrimination rises to a felony!

Note: Tybalt had a diary up on this a few hours ago, but unfortunately it scrolled off. - o.h.

The just-released report (PDF file) from the Department of Justice's inspector general and the Office of Professional Responsibility surprised no one here with its finding that the Alberto Gonzales-led DOJ broke the law with its handling of the hirings and firings of federal prosecutors.

As is becoming painfully clear, Monica Goodling, erstwhile wonder child of Regents Univeristy (A.K.A., God U.) had a set of insightful questions for would be attorneys who wanted to work at the Department of Justice under GW Bush's disastrous reign.

One question is impossible to read without smiling:

What Is It About GWB That Makes You Want to Serve Him?