More dire news came from the U.S. Justice Department this week.
It seems that Bradley Schlozman, the former justice Department official charged with enforcing civil rights laws, favored conservatives for certain posts and refused to hire liberals. He wasn't exactly subtle about this -- referring to conservatives as "right-thinking Americans" and liberals as "commies."
Have I mentioned that he was in charge of enforcing civil rights laws? These findings by the department's inspector general are roughly equivalent to the country's drug czar getting busted while scoring crack.
What's the problem? To save myself some typing, I'm going to copy-and-paste three paragraphs I wrote back in August about hiring distinctions at the Justice Department:
"Basically, you've got two categories of people who work at the Justice Department: the political appointees and the career hires.
The political appointees are there at the direction of whichever presidential administration is in power at the time. One of the prerogatives of being president is being able to appoint the U.S. Attorney General, and to set some overarching priorities for the U.S. Justice Department.
The career hires far outnumber the political appointees. They're the ones who handle the nuts-and-bolts functioning of the department, whether the work they do falls into the category of legal, administrative or clerical. And according to federal law and Justice Department regulations, department officials aren't allowed to hire them based on their political beliefs."
Back in August, I was discussing a similar finding in another section of the Justice Department, which happened to have a local connection. Monica Goodling, originally of York County, was a top aide to former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. She and other top aides were reportedly asking potential hires about their political affiliation, and turning down anyone they decided wasn't conservative enough.
According to an internal department report, they were asking questions such as "What is it about George W. Bush that makes you want to serve him?" One prosecutor was refused a promotion over rumors of lesbianism. Another because his wife was active in the Democratic Party.
If all the allegations are true, then a bunch of higher-ups in the department were trying to turn it into an ideological fiefdom for political conservatives, which would be a serious abuse of their responsibilities.
That's not just my opinion, by the way. I got all that stuff about the two categories of hires from an interview with Dick Thornburgh, who was U.S. Attorney General under Ronald Reagan. (And a former Pennsylvania governor. And, to judge by our conversation, a really nice guy.)
I guess that one question provides the best summation of everything that was wrong with the Justice Department: "What is it about George W. Bush that makes you want to serve him?"
The Justice Department isn't supposed to be serving George W. Bush, or any other president. It's supposed to be serving the people of the United States.
I hope the people charged with running it never lose sight of that again.
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