TW: These pieces demonstrate why who governs in the White House is so crucial. These issues rarely receive much attention yet they are both important to the functioning of our government. How Bush governed relative to these issues reflected his philosophies on the role of government.
With the politicalization of the DOJ we see a relative bastion of bi-partisanship being destroyed. Yes partisanship has played a role in governance almost from day one but if one reads much history, one will find certain areas of government in particular national security and justice were less partisan than others.
The Bush administration pushed partisanship hard at the DOJ, unusually so.
Obama will not be a panacea but he and his team can improve things, the transition with its bi-partisan aspects already shows some signs of change.
From Pete Williams at NBC:
"A report out today describes what is unquestionably the most blatant case of inappropriate consideration of politics in the hiring of career lawyers at the Justice Department under the tenure of former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. The report is strongly critical of Bradley Schlozman, a former deputy in the Civil Rights Division who also served as its acting director.
According to the Justice Department's inspector general, Schlozman regularly made reckless comments about lawyers and applicants for jobs that he considered too liberal -- which, for him, apparently covered a lot of ground. He called some career lawyers "libs" and "pinkos" and described others as "disloyal," "not on the team" or "treacherous." Those he endorsed he called "RTA's," which stood for "right thinking Americans."
An analysis of the hirings under his watch found that 64% were Republicans or conservatives, compared with only 4% of the hirings in which he was not involved. Two percent of the hirings were Democrats or liberals under Schlozman, compared to 23% when he was not involved.
The inspector general's report concluded that Schlozman made false statements when he
testified to Congress that he did not consider political or ideological leanings in his personnel decisions. However, federal prosecutors in Washington declined to prosecute."
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2009/01/13/1743471.aspx
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