tickledgirl
03-09-2007, 03:53 PM
There's been a fair amount of news about 8 US Attorneys who got canned recently. US Attorneys (USAs) server at the pleasure of the president, and it's standard practice for a new president to "clean house" and put in their own guys. Presidents have done that for some time. Clinton did, and Bush did too when he came in.
What's a little different about this go-round is that a) Republicans snuck a provision in the the new PATRIOT act that prevents any review of new USAs and b) there's decent evidence (including testimony by USAs appointed by Bush) that they've been pressured to make political prosecutions, which is illegal. Either they got fired because they nailed Republicans (e.g. Carol Lam, who nailed Duke Cunningham and was targetting other sitting Republicans) or because they refused to nail Democrats.
It's been confirmed that at least one guy was bumped so Karl Rove's personal opposition researcher could be in charge of the prosecutor's office in Arkansas...just as Hilary Clinton was getting ready to run.
So that's what's going on with the 8 who were just kicked out. What do you suppose the 80 or so who didn't get kicked out have been up to? Well, some researchers did a study (http://www.epluribusmedia.org/columns/2007/20070212_political_profiling.html) on Bush DOJ investigations of public officials based on public reports. On the national level, 36 Dems were hit and 30 Repubs. That seems about right. After all, the USAs are Republican appointees, and it's not too surprising that there'd be tendency to target Dems, even with more Republicans in office.
But on the local level, where Ds & Rs are about 50/50, but where no one has paid close attention to the big picture, the numbers are drastically different. There were 262 investigations of Democrats, and only 37 of Republicans.
Soooo...either Dems are much much more corrupt that Republicans (must be that, right maniac? :) ), or maybe the alleged pressure on USAs really did happen, and had an effect.
What's a little different about this go-round is that a) Republicans snuck a provision in the the new PATRIOT act that prevents any review of new USAs and b) there's decent evidence (including testimony by USAs appointed by Bush) that they've been pressured to make political prosecutions, which is illegal. Either they got fired because they nailed Republicans (e.g. Carol Lam, who nailed Duke Cunningham and was targetting other sitting Republicans) or because they refused to nail Democrats.
It's been confirmed that at least one guy was bumped so Karl Rove's personal opposition researcher could be in charge of the prosecutor's office in Arkansas...just as Hilary Clinton was getting ready to run.
So that's what's going on with the 8 who were just kicked out. What do you suppose the 80 or so who didn't get kicked out have been up to? Well, some researchers did a study (http://www.epluribusmedia.org/columns/2007/20070212_political_profiling.html) on Bush DOJ investigations of public officials based on public reports. On the national level, 36 Dems were hit and 30 Repubs. That seems about right. After all, the USAs are Republican appointees, and it's not too surprising that there'd be tendency to target Dems, even with more Republicans in office.
But on the local level, where Ds & Rs are about 50/50, but where no one has paid close attention to the big picture, the numbers are drastically different. There were 262 investigations of Democrats, and only 37 of Republicans.
Soooo...either Dems are much much more corrupt that Republicans (must be that, right maniac? :) ), or maybe the alleged pressure on USAs really did happen, and had an effect.