Let’s Play “Boggle” the Mind!

They say that when you cannot find the ability to laugh, the very spirit of life is lost. In these troubled times, it is indeed difficult to find humor in the machinations of the US Government halls. However, there occasionally comes a revelation that gives one no choice but to chuckle, if not break out in peals of laughter. There used to be a game in which the objective is to come up with some idea or explanation that was so far fetched or preposterous as to boggle the mind. The story or explanation would be so outlandish as to almost be believable. That game comes to mind when reading about a recent interview with Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez. During that interview reported by the Associated Press, Gonzalez explains that his close and very longstanding relationship with George W. Bush is a “good thing” because it makes it easier to say “no, Mr. President, we cannot do this.” To start, the idea that Gonzalez has ever told the President that he could not do something that the White House had set out to do is, well, mind boggling.

From the early days when Gonzalez lied for the President regarding a court conference in order to shield the then Texas Governor Bush from having to testify under oath about his drug use and alcoholism in college, Gonzalez has been the consummate “Yes Man.” As White house Counsel, he accosted an invalid Attorney General John Ashcroft recuperating from surgery in his hospital bed to try to get Ashcroft to approve the President’s illegal domestic wiretapping program. Gonzalez co-wrote the astonishing legal memo that advised the White House that the Geneva Conventions were "obsolete" and that torture was an appropriate tactic to use against detainees in the President's “war on terror.” In the role of Attorney General, Gonzalez was willing to do White House bidding in the firing of US Attorneys and replacing them with candidates chosen based upon partisan loyalty and willingness to pursue voter fraud lawsuits against Democrats that could help sway elections in favor of the GOP in key states.

When asked by a reporter during the recent interview whether he could actually recall an instance in which he had, in fact, told the President that something was prohibited, Gonzalez replied, yes. He would not, of course identify or elaborate on what that might have been, attorney-client privilege, national security, classified information, etc. But here is the mind boggling question. If Gonzalez has told the president that torture, illegal domestic wiretapping, kidnapping and “extraordinary rendition,” denial of habeas corpus and access to counsel to detainees and other practices are legally permissible, can we imagine what the president must have asked about in order for Gonzalez to tell him that it was NOT allowable? It is difficult to imagine what type of cruel and inhuman or corrupt practice would spark some semblance of conscience or moral threshold in Gonzalez to force him this Yes Man to tell President Bush “No,” Think about it.