North Star Writers Group

Now that Alberto Gonzales has tendered his resignation as U.S. Attorney General, and partisan Democrats have gotten in their final puerile parting shots, it begs a couple of questions.

Why does this sort of thing surprise anybody? President Bush said that he was sad that Gonzales's "good name was dragged through the mud for political reasons." Uh, duh! This is what liberals are, what liberals do and what liberals live for.

They honestly believe that if they're not in charge of everything, death and destruction will be nigh at hand. Given those high stakes, the ends of crushing whosoever stands in their way justifies any means needed to accomplish it. To liberals, the inherent evil of Bush, Rove, Gonzales, et al is self-evident. That none of them have actually done anything wrong is irrelevant, for to liberals the Bush Administration is criminal simply for existing. (Florida 2000, remember?)

As such, it is pointless for President Bush to even try to get along with or accommodate or appease them. The only thing offering them a morsel like Gonzales accomplishes is to whet their appetite for even more fresh meat. Why President Bush cannot see this, stop feeding the beast in an insane attempt to satiate the insatiable and start fighting back is beyond me.

This also explains why the staggering hypocrisy of the left goes unacknowledged. They all but scream death to Gonzales for firing eight partisan liberal U.S. attorneys, who refused to prosecute vote fraud cases lest the result help Republicans win future elections in those districts. Never mind that when President Clinton took office, his very first act was to fire all 93 U.S. attorneys without cause, just to cover up getting rid of the one investigating him and Hillary over Whitewater. But since he was a Democrat, that was just fine and dandy. And as for "incompetence," he'll never sink as low as Janet Reno barbecuing Branch Davidians at Waco, but again being a Republican and existing is somehow clearly a worse offense than a Democrat rolling tanks on American citizens and frying some misguided people as a result.

Finally, they hate Gonzales for authorizing wire-tapping of terrorist suspects. Naturally, putting the right of innocent American citizens not to get blown to kingdom come ahead of the non-existent due process rights of non-U.S.-citizen radical Islamic terrorists offends liberals. I'm not entirely sure why, but it does.

Speaking of ululating and issuing fatwas of jihad, there's the matter of selecting a putative replacement for Gonzales and putting the poor sucker through the torture chamber – er, I mean presenting the nominee at confirmation hearings. What person with two brain cells left to rub together would possibly want to go through being patronized by and condescended to by such paragons of moral virtue as Ted Kennedy? Has it ever occurred to anyone that the best and brightest are nowhere near dumb enough to want to suffer that needless slander from a panel of total hypocrites? And perhaps that is why there might be a competence problem - the only folks willing to enter the lions' den and be trashed within an inch of their lives are those doing so purely out of personal loyalty to the president?

I'd like to offer a suggestion to President Bush – leave the office empty for the remainder of his term. There is simply nothing about the job that can justify putting anybody, much less a colleague or friend, through that kind of awful treatment. Since there really isn't anybody he could offer that Democrats would find acceptable anyway – for any use other than fodder for political target practice, that is – why waste everybody's time? And given the proximity of the next election, an informal Democrat filibuster is probably guaranteed. So don't give them another platform upon which to grandstand for TV cameras.

Alternatively, Bush should nominate someone fully willing to engage in a search-and-destroy mission and go into the confirmation hearings with all guns blazing. Since Democrats will hate whoever you pick anyway, why not really try to get their goat? There is no one more free than one with nothing to lose, after all. (And the likes of Kennedy, Patrick Leahy, et al are so overdue for a dressing down.)

But, in all likelihood, Bush will do neither and try to feed the beast once more in the vain hope it eats him last. All I can say to that on this day when Michael Vick is dominating the news is this: If you keep feeding a rabid pit bull raw meat, don't be surprised when you pull back a bloody stump for an arm.

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