As people continue to sift through the latest set of documents, there are plenty of updates to pass along today. But for those of you pressed for time, there's really only one thing you need to know.
I think a commenter in our document dump research thread may have been the first to notice that the emails released by the Justice Department seem to have a gap between November 15th and December 4th of last year....
The firing calls went out on December 7th. But the original plan was to start placing the calls on November 15th. So those eighteen days are pretty key ones.
The level of stupidity involved here is astonishing. Did they really think that no one would notice? Or that, if they did notice, that it wouldn't raise any questions? Its almost as if they're actively trying to make this scandal worse.
Bush apparently thinks Congress is going to blink on this. They won't. And as I detailed yesterday, Congress has both the law and precedent on their side. There are no "military, diplomatic, or sensitive national security secrets" involved here. Their claims of "executive privilege," a doctrine mentioned in neither the constitution nor the debates over ratification, will not stand. This is a battle they are going to lose.
In order for them to fight so hard in a battle they simply must know they are likely to lose, there must be something pretty significant they are trying to hide, no?
One last thought: Because the scandal involves the dismissal of Justice Dept. prosecutors under suspicious political circumstances, comparisons with Watergate were going to be inevitable. Given that, you would think the administration would want to do whatever it could to minimize the number of people making that connection.
Instead, they've done the reverse.
First, Gonzales, either intentionally or unintentionally (and I'm not sure which is worse), echoes Nixon's famous "mistakes were made" phrase. Then Bush seconds it.
And now they give us documents with 18 missing days. Not 17. Not 15. Not 42. 18.
The Watergate Nixon Tapes? 18 1/2 missing minutes.
I realize it is just a coincidence, but still... what a weird coincidence!
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