http://img.slate.com/media/1/123125/123087/2156534/2163600/wh_charts.gif
This GIF picture is an illustration of two organization charts. The chart in the top half of the picture shows the Bush-Gonzales protocol, under which there are now four hundred seventeen (417) different people at the Bush White House who are officially authorized to contact thirty or more (30 or more) people at USDOJ regarding pending criminal cases. The chart in the bottom half of the picture shows the Clinton-Reno protocol, under which four (4) people at the White House were authorized to contact three (3) people at USDOJ.

What's going in is not just an unprecedented level of politicization at the White House, but the installation of political commissars and apparatchiks into all areas of government (not just at USDOJ, but most dismally at USDOJ) to an extent that would make Andrew Jackson blush and would make Ulysses S. Grant roll over in his tomb.

This is the kind of thing that "goo-goos" (activists for "good government") have been warning about since -- forever. This is bad government.

And this is immensely worse than Watergate.
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20070420.html

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales's "Reconfirmation Hearings": Why, In the End, They Will Change Nothing
By JOHN W. DEAN
Friday, Apr. 20, 2007
. . . By and large, the Gonzales hearings had few surprises. But the few that did occur were quite telling: There was a stunning lack of Republican support for Gonzales on the Judiciary Committee, and there was a remarkable change in White House procedures for contacts with the Department of Justice.

What was not surprising, however, was Gonzales's determination to stay in the job and Bush's disinclination to remove him . . .

Senator Whitehouse's Evidence of Radical Changes to White House Procedures for Contacts with the Department of Justice
Some of the most important and revealing information during this hearing did not come from Gonzales, but rather from the newest member of the committee, freshman Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D.RI). Senator Whitehouse is the former Attorney General of Rhode Island, and a former U.S. Attorney. He thus understands well how the Justice Department should operate, and how it actually is operating.

In a premise to a question for Gonzales, Senator Whitehouse said he had found correspondence in the files of the Senate Judiciary Committee from the days when Orrin Hatch was chairman relating to an investigation of the relationship between the Clinton White House and the Justice Department (under Attorney General Janet Reno). Hatch was concerned about the independence of the Department of Justice, so he wanted to know who in the White House could speak with whom in the Justice Department. The correspondence showed that four people in the White House (the President, Vice President, chief of staff, and White House counsel) could speak with three people in the Justice Department (the Attorney General, the Deputy Attorney and the Associate Attorney General) - period.

Senator Whitehouse discovered - and created a chart to make the point - that in the Bush White House, a shocking 417 people could speak with 30 different people in the Justice Department. It was a jaw-dropper. As Chairman Leahy said, when he asked Senator Whitehouse to continue when his time expired, in his thirty years on the Judiciary Committee, he had never seen anything like the open contacts from the White House to the Justice Department that had occurred in the Bush Administration.

Gonzales really had no response when asked about this subject. But this information shows that, in this Administration, the Department of Justice has become a mere political appendage of the White House.

- - John Dean

http://img.slate.com/media/1/123125/123087/2156534/2163600/wh_charts.gif
This GIF picture is an illustration of two organization charts. The chart in the top half of the picture shows the Bush-Gonzales protocol, under which there are now four hundred seventeen (417) different people at the Bush White House who are officially authorized to contact thirty or more (30 or more) people at USDOJ regarding pending criminal cases. The chart in the bottom half of the picture shows the Clinton-Reno protocol, under which four (4) people at the White House were authorized to contact three (3) people at USDOJ.

What's going in is not just an unprecedented level of politicization at the White House, but the installation of political commissars and apparatchiks into all areas of government (not just at USDOJ, but most dismally at USDOJ) to an extent that would make Andrew Jackson blush and would make Ulysses S. Grant roll over in his tomb.

This is the kind of thing that "goo-goos" (activists for "good government") have been warning about since -- forever. This is bad government.

And this is immensely worse than Watergate.
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20070420.html

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D.RI). Senator Whitehouse is the former Attorney General of Rhode Island, and a former U.S. Attorney. Senator Whitehouse said he had found correspondence in the files of the Senate Judiciary Committee from the days when Orrin Hatch was chairman relating to an investigation of the relationship between the Clinton White House and the Justice Department (under Attorney General Janet Reno). Hatch was concerned about the independence of the Department of Justice, so he wanted to know who in the White House could speak with whom in the Justice Department. The correspondence showed that four people in the White House (the President, Vice President, chief of staff, and White House counsel) could speak with three people in the Justice Department (the Attorney General, the Deputy Attorney and the Associate Attorney General) - period.

Senator Whitehouse discovered - and created a chart to make the point - that in the Bush White House, a shocking 417 people could speak with 30 different people in the Justice Department. It was a jaw-dropper . . . Gonzales really had no response when asked about this subject.

But this information shows that, in this Administration, the Department of Justice has become a mere political appendage of the White House.
- - John Dean

And Joe Conason's solution is for the Bush-Gonzales USDOJ to prosecute itself?