Given how sudden and surprising Gonzales’ resignation came today, it leads me to two possible conclusions:
- In the course of the investigation into the US Attorney scandal, or the warrant-less wiretapping scandal, or the instillation of Bush cronies into the DOJ whose sole task was to favor the GOP scandal, or pretty much whatever flavor of the week scandal you want to refer to, out of nowhere has come the real smoking gun evidence that would have led to blistering indictments against him and the possibility of impeachment that could have worked its way up the ladder. I have a sneaking suspicion that something like this was behind Rove’s resignation as well. This is kind of like the pound of flesh move, trading Gonzo’s resignation for stopping the look into all the scandals that have tarnished the DOJ up to this point. Each resignation that’s been offered up by the administration has seemed to be one more sacrificial offering to keep the public’s eyes out of its affairs. Time will tell if this strategy worked.
- A small but growing group of Republicans, faced with the fact that Democrats can easily mop the floor up with them on any of the scandals that the Gonzo DOJ has perpetrated in next year’s elections and finally feeling their feet to the fire, banded together and threatened to finish derailing whatever’s left of the Bush Agenda in order to save their skins for next year. This is the theory that holds more water in my eyes, because not too long ago, it seemed like Bush would be behind Gonzo not only to the end, but way past it. The only thing that I can’t figure is what kind of leverage they’d attempt to use. I wouldn’t think it would be on any Iraq issues, since their bread and butter is still the politics of fear, but they had to have had something.
It will be interesting to see in the coming weeks what comes out of this, because you know something had to really have been cooking for Gonzo to pull such a sudden about face and resign. All I know is that the fall in DC just got a lot more interesting.
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