Damn, it's good to have Congressional oversight.

According to WSJournal, SF USA Kevin Ryan
" was targeted for firing after a federal judge asked in December to see his performance evaluations. Justice Department officials refused the request, saying the evaluations were internal personnel documents. Mr. Ryan was instead added to the list of prosecutors targeted for dismissal to avoid a public fight over the release of the documents."
Sorta sounds like there were no evaluations. Didn't pevious news re: DOJ state sssome of the USA offices had not been evaluated?

Is there another shoe about to drop of?

What about the 18 day gap? Or the 16 day gap plus 2 day gap?

Are we not still waiting for a multitude of missing e-mail messages (and attachments) and memos between mid-November and early December in the period leading up the the firings on December 7th?

There must have been a flurry of relevant traffic within the DOJ between DOJ and the White House during this period, and it is being withheld by DOJ.

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Looks like screw McNulty time. Not forgetting Elston who has already given evidence behind closed doors, and potential fall guy Margolis. Hope Elston's testimony matches up with the documents being requested now by the Senate Committee.

Like I said Kyle is The Man with the Pen. Looks he has just dipped it in vitriol.

3 points:

1) Specter really should recuse himself from this investigation, given that his office was the one that slipped in the mysterious legislation that allowed the Bush administration to appoint US Attorneys without Senate approval. Even if he wasn't involved, it stinks, and the appearance of a huge conflict of interest exists.

2) Kevin Ryan is apparently the one US Attorney who was actually deemed incompetent, on both the Bush Administration's list and the regular performance list. It's well known that the SF office was demoralized, and thought Ryan was terrible.

3) Gonzales is in real trouble, I think. He has zero credibility at this point, and I don't see any purpose in him staying. Even if he survives this fight, I would suspect that every subordinate would question his directives, there would be mass leaks to the press, etc.

Shouldn't that be the "Honorable" Alberto Gonzales?

Not only should Specter recuse himself from the investigation. He should be put on the stand to testify about the origin of the directive to insert the "poisin pill" into the Patriot Act.

You're gonna need more rakes. Bigger rakes. Fleets and armadas of rakes.

I just had to check page three of the letter first - to be sure that Arlen Specter actually signed it.

You don't have to be a blind conservative not to see it, just an ignorant one to deny it.

"Is there another shoe about to drop off?

Posted by: Peter Duffy
Date: April 10, 2007 11:02 AM"

You mean from the Republican scandal centipede?

No doubt, Peter, it is "just" one more shoe ready to drop...

...it's RAINING SHOES!

Just make a list, right off the top of your head.

Anyone who can't come up with at least a dozen "shoes" already dropping, and even more to come, hasn't been reading "the blogs" for very long.

This is all just so outrageous. The Justice Department- the JUSTICE Department!. More evidence that this administration is made up of nothing but crooks and cronies.
Code word: crush
As in, "I hope Leahy will do his duty and CRUSH all these criminals."

Excellent post, osage.

Heck of a situation the neocons are in - like the people of New Orleans. Betweeen the Devil and the deep blue sea.

Good luck on getting anything. Remember, this administration would rather say f#%k you than give in to the will of Congress or the American people.

Anybody know when Monica Goodling will be/was served with her subpoena? Given her status as the current most prominent member of our Americanized Hitler Youth (spawn of Watergate era parents and reared during the Reagan head of the Hydra years when Rove was just a proud blush on Lee Atwater's cheek, with a Bible in her hand and a purity ring on her wedding finger and college diplomas awarded by God himself), watching her give testimony or simply take the 5th in front of any Democratic majority committee would be as much spectacle as feeding Christians to the lions.
No offense to my grandmother's kind of Christian.

To me, the letter reads like a prelude to obstruction charges.

From "Former MO US Attorney Todd Graves the Ninth Attorney Targeted by Alberto Gonzales" referenced above. The AttorneyGate now includes murder and intrigue: Check out this paragraph -- three US Assistant Attorneys resign and two drop dead:

Samuel Lipari became concerned that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was using the firing of appointed US Attorneys and senior assistant US Attorneys to obstruct justice in investigations involving public corruption on October 18, 2004 when white collar crime prosecuting Assistant US Attorneys Leonard Senerote, Michael Uhl and Michael Snipes were fired from the Ft. Worth Texas office of the US Attorney that had issued subpoenas in an ongoing investigation of Novation LLC and other hospital suppliers for anticompetitive practices. Samuel Lipari was especially concerned over the firings in the Ft. Worth office where the chief US Attorney responsible for Medicare fraud, Thelma Louise Quince Colbert had been found dead in her swimming pool on July 20th, 2004 and the Ft. Worth office Senior US Prosecuting Attorney that had signed the subpoenas, Shannon Ross (formerly of Kansas) was found dead in her home on September 13th, 2004. Shannon Ross's investigation of Novation LLC sparked the New York Times article "Wide U.S. Inquiry Into Purchasing For Health Care" on Saturday August 21, 2004.

Re: Kansas City USA John Wood and immigration cases.

Recently appointed USA for Kansas City, John Wood, has a built in conflict of interest in all immigration cases.

This from http://www.debbieschlussel.com/archives/2007/01/illegal_conflic.html

"While it was expected that the nomination hearings for John Wood for U.S. Attorney in the Kansas City area would be smooth sailing, that may not be the case.

"In fact, Wood has a major conflict of interest in that cannot be waived, unless he gets divorced or his wife quits her job. As we've noted on this site, Wood's wife is Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Chieftess Julie L. Myers a/k/a "The ICE Princess."

Sort of takes the wind out of the sails on the boat about immigration cases being top priority. Why appoint someone with a conflict that requires recusal in all immigration cases? Just asking.

That SPECTATOR article is really disturbing---it's pretty clear that elements of DOJ [at least in the crim division] are ready to help...but why does the SPEC piece [interesting in itself as a leak to a RW venue] seem to point the way to a Senate committee's subpoena? why are the DOJ staffers so puzzled at the direction the oversight Q+A is going? what's up?

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