Dan Froomkin says don't be distracted, keep an eye on Rove.
According to the e-mails, Rove stopped by the White House counsel's office in early January 2005 to find out whether it was Gonzales's plan to keep or replace all or some of the U.S. attorneys that Bush had appointed in his first term.
And it just so happened that Kyle Sampson, soon to become the attorney general's chief of staff, had discussed that very issue with Gonzales a few weeks earlier. "As an operational matter," Sampson wrote in a e-mail, "we would like to replace 15-20 percent of the current U.S. Attorneys -- the underperforming ones. . . . The vast majority of U.S. Attorneys, 80-85 percent I would guess, are doing a great job, are loyal Bushies, etc., etc."
The response from White House spokesmen to this latest disclosure is that there is no conflict with their earlier story, which was that Rove opposed the firing of all 93 attorneys -- an idea they earlier credited to Harriet Miers, who succeeded Gonzales as White House counsel.
But as I first wrote in [link|http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2007/03/13/BL2007031300755.html|Tuesday's column], the proposed housecleaning of all 93 U.S. attorneys is a red herring. Not only would firing all of them have been a political and logistical nightmare, but it would have been foolish from Rove's point of view. After all, the vast majority were apparently behaving exactly as he wanted -- as "loyal Bushies."
The key question, that the White House continues to duck: Did Rove approve of -- or perhps even conceive of -- the idea of firing select attorneys? And if so, on what grounds? The latest e-mails certainly indicate that he was involved very early on.
Right now, Washington is engaged in feverish speculation about whether Gonzales is in his last days, or even moments, as attorney general. But as I wrote in my [link|http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2007/03/14/BL2007031401330.html|Wednesday column], Gonzales is a diversion.
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There are lots more links to other coverage and sources in the column.
It sounds as if things may come to a head in the next few weeks.
Cheers,
Scott.
