You Gotta Lift Up Every Stone

You know, as I watch the White House stonewall and prevaricate and, yes, stonewall about the emails requested to get to the bottom of the US Attorney scandal, it just looks worse and worse. It’s becoming clearer and clearer that the Attorneys were fired because they weren’t willing to play ball on Karl Rove’s team and trump up some charges – I mean, “vigorously prosecute” – vote fraud in Democratic districts. And what’s worse, other US Attorneys, like Wisconsin’s Steven Biskupic, were all too willing to do just that to keep their jobs (more here). So what we wind up with is a compromised judicial system in the thrall of the party in power.

Not good. So bad, in fact, that the President and his crew are bending over backwards trying to cover it up, using the Republican National Committee emails for government work (to keep their dirtier dealings from being discovered), deleting emails that should have been preserved according to regulations, and then claiming executive privilege to shield them from the eyes of the representatives of the People.

They say it’s not the crime that nails politicians, but the cover-up. In this case, I think it’s both. And if Bush doesn’t stem the bleeding soon, this could very well proceed into impeachment territory. (The stomach-churning prospect of a President Cheney is keeping a lot of fingers off that trigger, I imagine.)

Attorney General Gonzales is going to testify about the firings next Tuesday, April 17. They say Bush is tremendously loyal to those he came up with, but I have to wonder: Is it possible that the only reason Gonzales hasn’t been given his walking papers yet is because it would be even worse for Bush to have him outside the tent, pissing in?

Rob