The Attorney General's No-Good, Horrible, Very Bad Day (try all of them since 2001) Posted by Heather Hurlburt

Others will write more legally-informed commentary on Alberto Gonzales' resignation.  I'll just quote, via the AP, from his farewell remarks at the Justice Department:

Even my worst days as attorney general have been better than my father's best days, said the son of migrants.

Now, I don't know anything about Gonzales' father, but I bet he was a hardworking guy who prided himself on giving his kids opportunities he hadn't had, and leaving their future -- and maybe his adopted country's future -- better than he found it.  I bet those honest goals gave him some pretty significant satisfaction even through a hard and disappointing life.

I bet he never had a day where he opened the doors for hundreds of people to be held without charge, tortured, or sent away to be tortured and killed without benefit of legal proceedings.

I bet he never did much to undermine our non-political judicial system.

And I bet he didn't say "I don't know" or "I can't recall" as much in a year as his son did in a day of Senate testimony earlier this year.

I suppose it's too much to hope that, in retirement, Gonzales can gain some appreciation for the values his dad -- and so many other immigrants whose mantle he so often sought to hide in -- seems to have done a decent job of living out. I don't really care whether he can, I suppose, but I do care whether all the rest of us can.

Comments

[Cal]

Since they passed the wiretapping bill, the Democrats have lost all credibility when it comes to criticizing Gonzales. So what if Gonzales put Bush above the Constitution and the country? So did the Democrats. We're all servile courtiers now.

This is why Shadi's attempt to craft a better message for Dems is so hopeless. A half comatose John Ashcroft has more guts and intelligence than our entire Democratic leadership.

So long as that's the case, any Democratic narrative will be as quickly forgotten as Bush's "freedom agenda."