Gonzales’ problems keep getting worse

[babylonsister]

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/10532.html

Gonzales’ problems keep getting worse
Posted 8:50 am

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was scheduled to appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee today for his make-or-break testimony, but the hearing was postponed until Thursday in light of the shootings at Virginia Tech.

With a couple of more days to prepare, Gonzales may want to come up with a coherent explanation for this.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’ assertion that he was not involved in identifying the eight U.S. attorneys who were asked to resign last year is at odds with a recently released internal Department of Justice e-mail, ABC News has learned.

That e-mail said that Gonzales supported firing one federal prosecutor six months before she was asked to leave. (…)

Gonzales has insisted he left those decisions to his staff, but ABC News has learned he was so concerned about U.S. attorney Carol Lam’s lackluster record on immigration enforcement in San Diego that he supported firing her months before she was dismissed, according to a newly released e-mail from his former chief of staff.

The e-mail, which came from Gonzales aide Kyle Sampson, appeared to contradict the prepared written testimony Gonzales submitted to Congress over the weekend in advance of his Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday. In his prepared testimony, Gonzales said that during the months that his senior staff was evaluating U.S. attorneys, including Lam, “I did not make the decisions about who should or should not be asked to resign.”

If this isn’t a smoking gun, it’s close. As the email highlighted by ABC notes, Gonzales was actively involved in discussions about firing Lam as far back as June, telling his aides that “we should adopt a plan” that would lead to her removal if she “balks” at increased immigration prosecutions. Gonzales supported the idea of first having “a heart to heart with Lam about the urgent need to improve immigration enforcement” and of working with her “to develop a plan for addressing the problem.” Sampson said another alternative would be to “put her on a very short leash.”

There are, of course, two reasons this is a big problem for Gonzales. First, it flatly contradicts his already-released planned testimony. Second, Gonzales never actually did any of the things he said he’d do in June.

On the first point, Gonzales is stuck. In an effort to seize control of the story, his office published his prepared testimony over the weekend. In retrospect, that was dumb — it gave reporters a chance to check his planned remarks against already-released emails. Sure enough, ABC found a blatant contradiction.

And if Gonzales changes the remarks now, it’ll be pretty obvious that the AG was prepared to lie to the committee, but changed his comments because he got caught.

more...

[hippiechick]

1. I guess I don't understand why they had to delay his testimony ...

... how is he or his appearance in any way related to the tragedy at VT ?


:shrug:

[babylonsister]

3. I think the tragedy would overpower anything coming from this

hearing had it been held today. I think Leahy was smart to postpone; perhaps the Gonzo testimony will get some coverage on Thursday. I don't think it would have gotten much today. Just mho...

[Frustratedlady]

4. I was rather happy to hear they put a hold on it.

All attention needs to be focused on Gonzo, rather than the horrid tragedy of VA. Of course the coverage of the shootings will go on for months, but the media and citizens may turn to the hearing once the details are laid out on the shootings. JMHO

[gratuitous]

5. It's not related, but . . .

I think it was appropriate to hold off for 48 hours. There are certainly implications in any kind of event like this for the Department of Justice, and as much as we loathe Mr. Gonzales, and as short as his tenure is likely to be after his testimony, he is for now the only Attorney General the nation has, and it's reasonable to clear his schedule for a couple of days.

In passing, I note how profoundly this tragedy has affected people all over the country. And that is how it ought to be. Whether a person has ever been to the Virginia Tech campus, just about everyone has been on a major college campus at one time or another, and can easily imagine a gunman roaming the quads and the buildings, dealing out death. And yet we are subjected to happy blather from the administration that in Iraq, when someone blows himself and four dozen other people into eternity in a marketplace in Baghdad or Basra, that it has no effect on Iraqis in Tikrit or Mosul. And that's just clearly not so, based on our own experience yesterday. I hope we've heard the last of the nonsense about "Yeah, it's bad here or there in Iraq, but everyone else is doing just great."

[tanyev]

2. D'oh!

He didn't practice for that!

[Supersedeas]

6. The snark will try to smirk it away.