The Face of a "Loyal Bushie"

The expression "all hell is breaking loose" seems to be the most fitting (in more ways than one) way to describe the evolving story of Attorneygate. There are daily revelations of the machinations of the Bush White House to turn the DOJ into yet another arm of the GOP, such as the resignation of Monica Goodling, see Close, but no Cigar.

Via Think Progress, Gonzales’s Former Assistant Causes Turmoil As U.S. Attorney, is the other side of the purge story -- the new replacement US Attorneys out of the ranks of "loyal Bushies." And what a bunch they are! For example:

The U.S. attorney’s office in Minnesota demonstrates the havoc that ensues when the Bush administration places politics over justice. Four top staffers to Rachel Paulose, the U.S. attorney in Minnesota, have voluntarily demoted themselves in protest of Paulose’s “highly dictatorial style” of managing. Paulose has also “earned a reputation for quoting Bible verses and dressing down underlings.”

According to news reports, the staffers’ dramatic moves were “intended to send a message to Washington — that 33-year-old Paulose is in over her head.” The Bush administration tried to prevent the resignations by sending a “top justice official to Minneapolis Thursday to mediate the situation. The mediation failed.”

Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo has been the lead on this story, reporting on the upheaval in the Minnesota office:

There've been a few hints that something fishy was up in the Minneapolis US Attorney's office where 34-year old Rachel Paulose was sworn in to office last month in a lavish 'investiture' ceremony some have called a 'coronation'. Paulose's predecessor left under murky circumstances.

Coronation is right! Pomp, circumstance and a choir and color guard too. Only thing missing was her predecessor, Thomas Heffelfinger. The local ABC affiliate, Kstp, has the story and video as well. Unfortunately, it seems like Ms. Queen for a Day didn't want to give up the crown, and her imperial style didn't sit well with the career prosecutors in the office. Reporting on the latest bit of bad news, the NY Times, in Deputies to a U.S. Attorney Step Down, notes that "Ms. Paulose’s defenders at Justice Department headquarters said the criticism of her was unwarranted. They said older lawyers had difficultly dealing with a young, aggressive woman . . . ."

Oh, those sexist old pigs (and I guess that includes the woman as well)! Now, I have, on occasion, been called an aggressive female lawyer (as well as a few other terms of endearment that I won't mention), so I am hardly someone who would not defend one of my brethren (or the female equivalent of brethren). However, it does not sound to me like that is the problem here. It's the part that goes with coronation. It's the part that goes with someone who cannot tolerate any disagreement (sound familiar?). No, these staffers (including one woman) are professionals who acted even after Justice officials tried to mediate the situation and took a pay cut to do so. People in these positions are generally "team players," so things had to be extreme for them to take this kind of action. See the update from Talking Points Memo.

The other interesting part of this story related to her predecessor, Thomas Heffelfinger (the only person who wasn't invited to the ceremony). According to St. Paul Star Tribune, Nick Coleman: If Heffelfinger hadn't quit, would he have been purged?, it is unclear whether her predecessor was a purge target. See also, Minnesota Campaign Report, Heffelfinger's resignation and the U.S. Attorney "purge", which presents evidence that supports a linkage, despite denials by the former US Attorney.

And there's more. Consortiumnews, in Did Rove's Protégé Puff Up Résumé?, has the word on another replacement, Tim Griffin -- who's chief claim to fame was opposition researcher for the 2004 Bush-Cheney campaign -- noting:

Little Rock’s interim U.S. Attorney J. Timothy Griffin – already at the center of a firestorm over whether the White House has put politics ahead of prosecutorial integrity – made claims about his experience as an Army lawyer that have been put in doubt by military records.

The 38-year-old Griffin claims on his official Web site that he prosecuted 40 criminal cases while at Ft. Campbell, where he was stationed from September 2005 to May 2006. But Army authorities say Ft. Campbell’s records show Griffin only serving as assistant trial counsel on three cases, none of which went to trial.

* * * *

Cherith Beck, a Griffin spokeswoman, suggested that Griffin’s higher number might refer to all cases he worked on in any capacity.

“Just wanted to clarify, make sure you had an understanding that prosecuted means it’s a case he handled while he was there; it doesn’t mean that it went to trial necessarily,” Beck said. “Prosecuted means he handled those cases in one form or another.”

Griffin’s prosecutorial experience at Ft. Campbell is important in evaluating Griffin’s fitness to serve as the top federal prosecutor in the Eastern District of Arkansas since the bulk of Griffin’s legal career has been in political operations, such as opposition research on Democrats or work as a Republican staffer on Capitol Hill.

See also, Depends on the Meaning of the Word “Prosecuted” by All Spin Zone.

TPM, in Wisconsin Case Raises Eyebrows, and The Carpetbagger Report, in One of the 85 ‘loyal Bushies’ comes under scrutiny, discuss the case of the Wisconsin US Attorney, Steven Biskupic, who's conviction against an official in the administration of Democratic governor Doyle, which occurred right before the re-election of the governor in a closely contested race, was overturned with extraordinary speed. The appellate court dismissed the charges against the official after oral arguments on the case and ordered him immediately released from prison. This is unbelievable -- this NEVER happens. Talk about speedy justice.

As Carpetbagger Report, who also compiled a list of other questionable investigations, said:

Just to be clear, I know of no evidence to suggest that the U.S. Attorney in this district was trying to influence the election. I have no idea if Karl Rove gave Biskupic a call and said, “You know, it’s a close race. Anything you can do would be helpful.”

We do know, however, that shortly before a close election, Biskupic brought extremely thin criminal charges against a top Doyle administration official who apparently did nothing wrong.

It’s one of the lasting problems of the administration’s purge scandal — there are now constant suspicions about prosecutors’ political motivations. Now that the nation has learned that several U.S. Attorneys were pressured to bring politically-charged cases for Republicans’ benefit, and some of those who refused lost their jobs, it’s inevitable that prosecutions like this one will garner fresh scrutiny.

I think these faces need a little scrubbing.

Tags: Law, News, Attorneygate, Politics