Cheney In Charge

The Justice Department dumped some more documents on the Congress last night, and one of them must have made it through the filter. This is very damning for Monica Goodling.

New Justice Department communications released tonight include an email from Monica Goodling, former counsel to Alberto Gonzales, directing another official to draw up a directive giving her unprecedented authority to hire and fire political staffers. Goodling tells the official, assistant attorney general Paul Corts, to “send [it] directly up to me, outside the system.”

Remember when Goodling said that she "crossed the line" in taking political considerations into account when hiring, but she "didn't mean to"? I think that referred to her not meaning anyone to figure it out.

And Monica isn't the only one who was politicizing the Justice Department. Big Time made time for it as well:

Separately, in written answers to questions from Sen. Leahy (D-VT), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, (James) Comey confirmed that Vice President Cheney blocked a subsequent promotion for a Justice Department official, Patrick Philbin, who played a key role in blocking the recertification of the NSA warrantless wiretap program.

In a telling detail about Gonzales, the Attorney General apparently planned to promote Philbin to be principal deputy solicitor general. In other words, it would appear that for all the rest we have learned about Mr. Gonzales, he was not inclined to punish Philbin for his role in the Ashcroft-Comey recertification incident. However, Cheney intervened. In Comey's words: "I understood that someone at the White House communicated to Attorney General Gonzales that the vice president would oppose the appointment if the attorney general pursued the matter. The attorney general chose not to pursue it."

It's actually more than that. The Vice President also was involved in urging passage of the warrantless wiretapping program as Comey and his allies were trying to block it. Literally everything that's rampantly illegal about this Administration can be traced back to Cheney. I mean, Gonzales is stupid enough to lie to Congress, and Goodling is just a functionary. But Cheney is the man with the plan, the one pushing an imperial, praetorian executive branch. Digby's right that we have to get a handle on this. Cheney is running the show, and because he's not the President, the accountability is almost nil. The next time, we need to elect a President that's actually in charge.