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Wednesday, March 21, 2007

Accusations of Politics in Washington

Okay, I'm confused. What is it that has the Bush haters in such an uproar now? I'm trying to figure out what went wrong here.

I'm sure you all know the story if you're following the news at all. Democrats want to subpoena high ranking people in the White House for a public interrogation on the dismissal of eight U.S. Attorneys. Congress is calling for the resignation of Alberto Gonzalez, who had publicly admitted that the situation wasn't handled correctly. The accusation is that it was a political move.

So, I looked up a previous Attorney General, Janet Reno, Bill Clinton's Attorney General. Did you know that shortly after taking office in March, 1993, she fired all U.S. Attorneys? Some questioned the move. It looked a lot like partisan retaliation for investigations into friends of President Clinton. Oh, wait, that's what the accusation is regarding Paul Charlton, U.S. Attorney for Arizona ... except Charlton is one man, and Reno fired them all. Oh, you remember Reno. She deported Elián González, refused to investigate the campaign finance fiasco in 1996, and was the one in charge of the Branch Davidian disaster in Waco. Tell me again ... why wasn't she fired?

So, the Department of Justice fired 8 of their U.S. Attorneys. Apparently that is a criminal act or something. They don't get to fire attorneys. Certainly not for political reasons. It is nonsense to think that the people who work for the president's administration (whoever that president may be) should be "on board" with the president whom they serve. All presidents are required to keep on all U.S. Attorneys, regardless of their performance, persuasion, or politics. If it means that they scuttle administration, so be it. This is politics, people! Politics should have nothing to do with it! Oh, wait ... that makes no sense.

Is there any wonder why I'm confused here?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've got mixed feelings on the whole thing, I must admit.

As a senior pastor I'd like the privelege of being able to fire all the previous staff and hire my own, but unless I belong to certain denominations who do that, I can't.

And it's probably just as well, because in my context I need to learn to accept different perspectives and work with them for Christ.

Politics, on the other hand, is often quite different. Democrats and Republicans are so polarized in their philosophy of life (not to mention their raw dislike of each other) that it would be hard to work together. So I certainly don't blame either Reno or Gonzales for their moves.

Hanley Family said...

I was wondering the exact same thing today as I was listening to the NPR report. There is no evidence of anything criminal...Bush did what is within his power to do. I doubt getting fired in a position like that even hurts your resume any. All of the hypothetical guessing about what the possible motivation could be is ridiculous.