Goodbye Gonzales

After months of investigation for various & sundry alleged scandals, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales resigned today. This was a welcome and long overdue move, in my opinion. Call me crazy, but I think it is important that the nation's top law enforcement official should focus his attention on enforcing the law. Gonzales was always more interested in finding ways for the Bush Administration to evade the law.

Be that as it may, the timing of this resignation is curious. The U.S. Attorney controversy remains unresolved. Most of the people implicated at both the White House and DOJ have now resigned, which is strange if, as the Administration contends, nobody did anything wrong. Also odd is that Gonzales announced his resignation in a solo press appearance. Unlike Karl Rove, Gonzales didn't get the reward of a Rose Garden good-bye appearance with the President.

It is also strange that Gonzales resigned before a replacement could be named. Anonymous sources are pointing at Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, whom you may remember for his stellar response to Hurricane Katrina. Bush has argued that he needs a reliable Attorney General at his side to assist in the Global War on Terror. If that's really true, you would think he and Gonzales could have worked out an exit strategy that provided for a smooth transition.

Put the pieces together and it begins to look like 1) Bush and Gonzales aren't such buddies anymore, and/or 2) some sort of news will soon emerge that won't make Gonzales look good. That's the only way I can think of to explain how all this is all happening. We'll find out soon enough, I guess.

As a farewell to Mr. Gonzales, I will leave you with this story, courtesy of Andy Borowitz.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales resigned today, effective immediately, telling reporters that he wanted to spend more time eavesdropping on his family.

Mr. Gonzales, a champion of domestic surveillance and warrantless wiretaps while in office, said he was “totally stoked” about turning his prying eyes on his own family.

“Domestic surveillance begins at home,” Mr. Gonzales said at a White House press conference. “That means nobody in my family is above suspicion, not even the little ones,” an apparent reference to Mr. Gonzales’ children.

Standing by Mr. Gonzales’ side, President George W. Bush praised his former Attorney General, singling out his “courage” for ramping up his domestic spying program on his own family.

“If every head of every household was as willing to eavesdrop on his own family as my man Alberto is, we wouldn’t need a Homeland Security Department,” Mr. Bush chuckled.

Mr. Gonzales was noncommittal when a reporter asked him a question about the role that waterboarding and other forms of torture might play in his interrogation of family members. “Nothing is off the table,” he said.