Goodling Crossed the Line

From the New York Times:

Senior aides to former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales broke the law by using politics to guide their hiring decisions for a wide range of important department positions, slowing the hiring process at critical times and damaging the department’s credibility and independence, an internal report concluded Monday.

The report, prepared by the Justice Department’s inspector general and its internal ethics office, singles out for particular criticism Monica Goodling, a young lawyer from the Republican National Committee who rose quickly through the ranks of the department to become a top aide to Mr. Gonzales.

Ms. Goodling, who testified before Congress in May 2007 at the height of the scandal over the firings of nine United States attorneys, introduced politics into the hiring process in a systematic way that constituted illegal misconduct, the report found.

(Underlining is mine.) So, the question is, if Ms. Goodling broke the law, if her behaviour constituted illegal misconduct, WHY HAS SHE NOT BEEN CHARGED?

OK, that question was merely rhetorical. We all know that the reason Goodling has not been charged is the same reason for which she was hired. The Department of Justice, who would be responsible for laying those charges is full of partisan hacks hired through an illegal process of politicization - a massive program of obstruction of justice. The Republican-fascist bastards, who committed perjury when they took their oaths of office, are interpreting the law of IOKIYAR as being paramount and superceding all the real laws.

Goodling was hired by the Queen Bee of Partisan Corruption, Mary Beth Buchanan, after proving her partisan fanaticism working as an opposition researcher under Tim Griffin. Opposition research is of course a purely political function, and as partisan as you can get. Buchanan had to have been fully aware that Goodling was the most loyal of Loyal Bushies possible.

Rather than provide supervision of her activities, Alberto Gonzales expanded her authority (and that of Deputy AG Kyle Samson) by way of an 'unpublished' memo in March 2006, to include "the power to appoint or dismiss all department political appointees besides United States attorneys (who are appointed by the President). The delegation included authority over interim United States attorneys (who are appointed by the Attorney General) and heads of the divisions that handle civil rights, public corruption, environmental crimes and other matters." (see Wikipedia for Goodling's career details.) And what a coincidence! "Reportedly, Goodling "took a leading role" in Bud Cummins's dismissal." Cummings was replaced in that position by her old opposition research boss, Tim Griffin.

When interviewed by the inspector general, Mr. Gonzales said he was not aware that Ms. Goodling and other aides were using political criteria in their decisions for career positions. Mr. Gonzales resigned last summer in the face of mounting accusations from congressional Democrats that politics had corrupted the department.

His successor, Attorney General Michael Mukasey, said in a statement Monday after the report’s release that he was disturbed by their findings that improper political considerations were used in hiring decisions relating to some career employees.

So I guess we're expected to believe that two (three really, because John Ashcroft was not much better) successive Attorneys General could have this kind of illegal activity going on right under their noses and not even know about it. How convenient!

So what can we expect to see happen? Will Mukasey press charges against Goodling, along with Esther McDonald and Michael Elston, who were named in an earlier IG report as having also crossed the line? Not bloody likely. Will those hired illegally be let go and replaced by personnel who can redress the imbalance and blatant cronyism that these loyal Bushies have suffused into the DoJ? I doubt it. Will Congress exercise its authority and mount a full investigation into the department to at least expose the full extent of the corruption? Yeah, right - when Hell freezes over.

These hirees will simply continue on in their positions like the Bush SCOTUS appointments, like hundreds of circuit judges and thousands of little cogs in the wheel, corrupting everything they touch until the country is well and truly the police state that they were all hired to enable. I can almost smell the jackboot polish now.

TAGS: Monica Goodling, Department of Injustice, Corruption, USAttorneys Scandal