I wish I could vote for the story instead of the man.
Senator Ted Kennedy, voting against confirming Alberto Gonzales as U.S. Attorney General, after hearing the American Dream story of the nominee’s humble, immigrant origins.
There’s something insidious, maybe unconsciously so, about the Right’s appointment of minorities to august positions in their administrations. On the surface, it all looks good: we can commend their need to be seen as “includers,” folks who though they may not push minority-friendly legislation or multiculturalism, want to give lie to the generally held belief that conservatives are no friend to people of color. (Nor the poor. Nor women.) But, in essence, the choice of candidates so radical or so incompetent only serves to fan the resentment of too many already antipathetic Americans and buoy those die-hards who claim that minorities are “not yet ready” to play with the big guys. These appointees present such administrations a win-win situation and do a great disservice to the groups they represent as they leave them in the dust.
Soon to be former Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales, “a cypher,” an “empty suit,” the man worse for the Department [of Justice] and its morale than anyone in recent history including the Watergate era" (The characterization is Daniel Metcalfe’s, recently retired career attorney in the DoJ, who served under both Republicans and Democrats for over 30 years.), seems to prove the point even more graphically than does Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.
A man who summarily allows people of questionable guilt to be executed WITHOUT EVEN REVIEWING THE CASE is not fit to be the poster boy of the son of Mexican immigrants who makes it big in the land of dreams come true. Nor is a man who cheer leads for torture, the illegal wiretapping of U.S. citizens, fires competent (an operative word in any discussion relating to Gonzales) attorneys to make room for more sycophants at the DoJ, and unconscionably and repeatedly lies to Congress.
It’s not a ladder Alberto Gonzales climbed, but a pit he dug for himself.
If you’re like me, not yet tired of the story, here’s some solid stuff on why Gonzo is gone, including, if I may, a piece I wrote in equal indignation at the time when Bush was thought to be considering him for a Supreme Court seat.
The Spanish language side of the story from Univisión, growing cooler and cooler in their support over the years.
Salon.com’s story on the clemency refusals when he was Governer Bush’s Attorney General in Texas
Ana Simo's jeremiad in The Gully Online at the hypocrisy of Latino organizations for “blithely endorsing” him and a hypothetical “what if” he tried to pull that torture **** in Mexico.
US Washington watcher Michael Tomasky writing in the Guardian of London, Sinking Ship Leaves Rat
The Hispanic American Village's All the President’s Hombres by yours truly.
Tuesday--The morning after: While the press has done nothing but report and comment on the A.G.'s exit, there has not yet been one peep out of the mainstream Latino organizations: MALDEF, NALEO, LULAC, NAHJ (National Association of Hispanic Journalists), supporters of Gonzales' appointment. Maybe there's a lesson to be learned here from African Americans who do not categorically boost one of their own, but will, for the most part, examine a person's record, ethics and suitability for a post before tooting his horn. Thomas is a case in point, an admitted and much-criticized embarrassment to the NAACP and other orgs.
