"Preparing the Battlefield..."

The New York Times' Steven Lee Myers had a column yesterday indicating that President Bush's last few weeks (including the increasingly-commented-upon speech to the VFW last Tuesday) has been 'preparing the battlefield' for the coming PR campaign for Iraq.

Today, AG Albert Gonzalez was, perhaps, another casualty in the preparation; like Karl Rove two weeks ago, another polarizing figure leaves the White House... and there is one less person to catch the flak that is surely heading President Bush's way over Iraq.

Commutation

Among the more notable items (the paucity of other commutations, the fact that the commutation was not reviewed by Justice Department officials, et al.) relating to President Bush's decision to commmute, rather than pardon, Scooter Libby last night, a quote from an unnamed 'senior White House official':

One senior administration official said Bush quickly made his decision yesterday after hearing that the U.S. Court of Appeals had refused to keep Libby out of prison while his appeal ran its course. This source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk freely about the president's thinking, said there is "comfort" at the White House that the decision will not hurt him politically despite the Democratic outcry.

The question follows: will this decision "not hurt him politically" because of the timing (July 4th week, where much of the country is on vacation) or because with his poll numbers so low, the Venn diagram of Bush supporters and Libby supporters is almost identical.

Very Troubling

A very troubling post by the Atlantic's James Fallows on possible implications in the fired-US-attorneys case(s). While Tom Wales was killed just one month after September 11th, it is also hard to believe that his death is not more widely publicized nationally, or that the apprehension of his killer was/is not a higher priority.

For instance, the death of local prosecutor Paul R. McLaughlin in 1995 was well-publicized here in Boston. The ultimate conviction of a gang leader in the case was appealed to the SJC, and the conviction upheld.