It is inconceivable that any reasonably intelligent individual could have witnessed Alberto Gonzales' performance at today’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing and not recognize the blatant dishonesty and incompetence at work in the office of the nation’s chief law enforcement officer. If Mr. Gonzales can so conspicuously evade honest response to questions essential to his basic responsibilities and still retain the confidence of the President, it becomes clear that the President has profound integrity and competence problems of his own. While that thought won’t startle anyone reading Joe Conason’s articles on Salon, it could further erode away some of the remaining 30% of the electorate that have stubbornly ignored reality for the last 6 years. It’s not improbable that GWB’s approval ratings could plummet to 29.5% as a result.

Yes-Congress should not only demand a special prosecutor, but appoint one anyway, given that the president and his entire administration will do anything in their to block any effective prosecution or investigation.

The Senate Judiciary committee has the power to subpoena everyone and everything connected to this scandal-now, damn it all, go out and use it! The American people demand and deserve no less after all this incompetence and outright lying from everyone in this administration.

Fire Gonzalez, posthaste. Appoint Fitzgerald to the AG, and let heads roll!

Take back the power we so willingly gave up for a little security.

Joe, I disagree. I hope that Gonzales loses his job, but the firing of these US Attorneys is just not important enough for a special prosecutor. There are many far more important issues that Congress should be investigating and special prosecutors should be prosecuting.

We need to move away from this practice of appointing special prosecutors every time an administration screws up and then isn't completely forthcoming about it. Let's focus on torture, illegal spying, the destruction of our civil liberties.

The Republican-led Congress had essentially allowed itself to be 'bitch slapped' by the Bush Administration over the last 6 years. The Congress is finally beginning to show some oversight after the Democratic midterm victory, However, the Democrats have quickly learned that it won't be easy. Congressional investigators must run a gauntlet constructed over 6 years by secretive and vindictive Administration officials who lie as second nature.

In addition, the Democratic Congress will have to fight off Republican rearguard actions channeled through the still mainly clueless mainstream media. It comes down to Sean Connery's question in The Untouchables: "How far are you prepared to go?". As the Bush Administration has shown that it is prepared to go down to the wire, just being in the right won't be enough. When you face down a vicious and determined adversary you have to be willing to accept a lot of pain: I wonder if the Democrats are?

I also disagree with Joe. While we need some accountability in this administration, I think the public tires easily of long, dragged out special prosecutions -- especially in cases like this, where the line between obfuscation (which is not unique to members of the Bush administration) and perjury is blurry. This is not like the special prosecution into the Plame matter, where the prosecutor was named to investigate potential violations of substantive law, and only when he could charge none did he resort to a prosecution for tampering with the prosecutorial mechanism; here, you want an investigation strictly into the lies told during a congressional investigation. Here, I don't know of any suggestion that officials have done anything illegal (other than perjury), though there is substantial evidence that they have acted improperly. A special prosecutor seems to me to be overkill in this situation.

You think the administration isn't being held accountable for this scandal? You think voters won't take account of it in the 2008 elections? Ultimately, I think the congressional hearings are, in this instance, all the procedure we need to inform the American people that something smells -- even if we never know all of the details around the firings. And I think we need to strive to be consistent in our views on special prosecutors, because it's always easy to flip-flop about whether they are either critically necessary or wasteful and dangerous invasions upon executive privilege, based on who's occupying the Oval Office at the time. For self-interested reasons as well, Democrats should be cautious about making too much political hay of the misconduct of this frightful and frightening administration, because if Americans were looking for "a uniter, not a divider" seven years ago, they surely must be seeking one now.

I am guessing that this Congress (i.e. slim Democrat majority)will have difficulty appointing any special prosecutor for any of the White Houses misdeeds.

Assuming that a Democrat takes the WH in '08 and a larger majority of Democrats take Congress can anything be done in regards to prosecuting all the Bushies once they are out of power?

Obviously that doesn't help the situation over the next 2 years but the picture in my head of these folks doing a perp-walk at any point in my lifetime gives me a warm fuzzy.

Gonzales is a sacrificial lamb - he spent a month with WH staff preparing for this hearing and all he could offer was "I don't recall?" They fully expected him to get reamed and then the Bush loyalists and media suckups can belittle the Congress for it. This is designed to make the Congress look petty and ineffectual, since, yes, only the President can remove the AG unless he falls on his sword.

Either would be fine for the WH, leaving them at no greater risk of exposure than before. Rove is the actual perpetrator, and so thoroughly protected by "executive privelege" that Bush has no compunction about letting Gonzales twist in the wind.

There are so many actual illegal acts commited by this administration, that expending resources on this diversion seems a waste of time, as much as I abhor the lying and the concept of politicization of the Justice Dept - the fact that millions of official emails have been destroyed is a greater crime all by itself!

Signing statements, wiretapping, FBI crimes, extraordinary rendition, etc, etc, etc. And then there are the stealth crimes, like forcing the schools to allow prayer, allowing vouchers and forcing a conservative agenda into the curriculum in No Child Left Behind. A special prosecutor could work for the next 10 years and not uncover all of them.

There is scant cheese down this tunnel. How about condemning the whole exercise and then get started on the email issue. Let's get on with the real work at hand.