The Firing of the Pearl Habor 8

An acquaintance of mine recently asked about the Congressional Hearings being conducted over the firings of ,

Daniel Bogden, U.S. attorney for Nevada
David Iglesias , U.S. attorney for New Mexico
John McKay , U.S. attorney for Western Washington
Margaret Chiara, U.S. attorney for Western Michigan
Daniel Bogden, U.S. attorney for Nevada
Paul Charlton, U.S. attorney for Arizona
H.E. "Bud" Cummins III, U.S. attorney for Eastern Arkansas (1st to be fired)
Carol Lam, U.S. attorney for Southern California (San Diego)
Kevin Ryan , U.S. attorney for Northern California

or, because 7 were fired on December 7th, as I like to call them, the Pearl Harbor 8 (or the PH8.).

He asked, "Why is this such a big deal?"

So, in effort to educate him, as well as anticipate the distortions from the likes of Rush and Hannity, I answered him this.

First, The Office of the Attorney General gave false and misleading reasons to the public why the the PH8 were fired. Because of these false statements, the normally silent US Attorneys spoke up. Before the statements, the PH8 had tendered their resignations in silence.

Second, Office of the Attorney General gave false and misleading reasons to Congress why the the PH8 were fired.

Lying and misleading Congress is a crime. While it is not common for people to be prosecuted for this, people have. For example, Oliver North was convicted of, among other charges, aiding and abetting in the obstruction of a congressional inquiry. (That conviction was over turned on a technicality; what is usually referred to as a call a Kastigar or "Chinese Wall" violation.)

It was because of this that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’s chief of staff Kyle Sampson was asked to resign this week.

Third, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’s recent press conference indicated that he was too busy to know what was going on:

"I accept responsibility for everything that happens here within this department, but when you have 110,000 people working in the department, obviously there are going to be decisions made that I am not aware of in real time."

This, on top of recent developments, would seem to indicate that. at best,Mr. Gonzales is unaware of high level decisions. At worst, Mr. Gonzales is lying.

This mismanagement and public mendacity has caused these public statements:

"It is ultimately the president's decision, but perhaps it would benefit this administration if the attorney general was replaced with someone with a more professional focus rather than personal loyalty." --- Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif.

"I think the president should replace him. ... I think the attorney general should be fired." ---Sen. John Sununu, R- New Hampshire

Fourth, US Attorneys are political but not partisan appointees normally confirmed by the Senate. The Patriot Act gave the AG the power to circumvent that confirmation process. Nonetheless, federal prosecutors are by and large apolitical. They, like all prosecutors, must adhere (by law) to a code of ethics that exceed that of regular lawyers. That code envisions an independent and fair process without regard to partisanship.

The fact that Harriet E. Miers and Mr. Sampson rated US Attorneys on "loyalty" to the President undermines the traditional need for independence. While it is perfectly legitimate for Clinton to redirect focus away from pornography prosecutions (which he did) or for Bush to direct focus on terrorism prosecutions (which he did), it would be improper to redirect focus away from or direct focus to a person or persons based on their political identification.

The fact that White House advisor Karl Rove and Counsel Harriet Meirs were involved in the decision-making process would indicate partisanship.

Fifth, US Attorney David Iglesias received complaints by two Republican Congresspeople over the speed at which he was investigating a state Democratic case. The complaint reached the head of the New Mexico GOP who then complained to Karl Rove. According to his testimony, Mr. Rove promised that, "He's gone."

Former Deputy AG James Comey under John Ashcroft said recently of Mr.Iglesias, "[He] was one of our finest and someone I had a lot of confidence in as deputy attorney general."

Sixth, in addition, U.S. Attorney John McKay says he was pressured by Republicans to bring voter fraud charges after the 2004 Washington governor’s race, which a Democrat, Christine Gregoire, won after two recounts. Republicans were trying to overturn an election result they did not like, but Mr. McKay refused to go along. “There was no evidence,” he said, “and I am not going to drag innocent people in front of a grand jury.”

Seventh, on the reverse side, US Attorney Carol Lam (San Diego) has just secured indictments against former 3rd in command of the CIA in the same defense bribery scandal that fell Randy "Duke" Cunnigham; her doing as well.

Also, Lam had announced that she had expanded that investigation to include Representative Jerry Lewis (R-CA). Later that same day, Mr. Sampson wrote to White House Deputy Counsel William Kelley, "The real problem we have right now is Carol Lam,"

Eighth, it can be argued that the same mind set that gave us a horse judge to run FEMA and Ms. Meirs to sit on the Supreme Court is also the same that appointed Karl Rove's friend, J. Timothy Griffin, an attorney with limited criminal prosecutorial experience.

The sole reason, according to the of Paul J. McNulty, the deputy attorney general, testimony, for the firing of the Arkansas US Attorney Bud Cummins was to appoint Mr. Griffin. This is also evidenced by an email from Mr. Sampson “I’m not 100 percent sure that Tim was the guy on which to test drive this authority [of the Attorney General to appoint interim U.S. attorneys], but know that getting him appointed was important to Harriet, Karl, etc. "

Why The Reno/Clinton Firing's of 93 US Attorneys in 1993 are Irrelevant

Mr. Clinton's presidency began in 1993. As you probably already know, US Attorney's serve four year terms at the pleasure of the President. As you also know, it is customary for US Attorneys' to submit their resignations at the beginning of a new administration.

In March of 1993, AG Janet Reno, of whom I am no fan, was expediting the inevitable resignations of all 93 US Attorneys. The controversy over this at the time surrounded the speed at which the transition would happen but not that it's occurrence.

In addition, the US Attorney for D.C. was concerned that his replacement would not continue his good work involving the prosecution of Dan Rostenkowski. Fortunately, Mr. Clinton's appointment of Eric H. Holder Jr., continued the good work resulting in the and indictment of Mr. Rostenkowski on 17 counts of corruption. Rostenkowski eventually plead guilty and served 17 months in prison. Clinton pardoned him just before he left office.

The resignation of US Attorneys in 1993 offers little insight as to why 8 US Attorney's have been fired now, why Gonzales mislead the Congress, and why the White House was involved.

As an aside, in an email to Harriet Miers, Gonzales’s chief of staff Kyle Sampson (who resigned) wrote that: “In recent memory, during the Reagan and Clinton Administrations, Presidents Reagan* and Clinton did not seek to remove and replace U.S. Attorneys to serve indefinitely under the holdover provision”

*On May 9, 1981, according to the Washington Post, the Reagan administration was well on its way to replacing all of the U.S. attorneys. Reagan kept most of the US Attorneys after he was elected to a second term.