New E-Mail Gives Details on Attorney Dismissals

quote[ A sarcastic internal e-mail message from one top Justice department official to another appears to confirm that personal and policy differences drove the termination of Carol C. Lam, the San Diego prosecutor who initiated investigations of Randy Cunningham when he was a Republican representative from California and Representative Jerry Lewis, as well as some defense department officials.

After a colleague said in a July 8 e-mail message that he was “sad” about something, Bill Mercer, a top Justice Department official, jokingly suggested some reasons.

“That Carol Lam can’t meet a deadline,” he wrote, “or that you’ll need to interact with her in the coming weeks or that she won’t just say, ‘O.K. You got me. You’re right, I’ve ignored national priorities and obvious local needs. Shoot, my production is more hideous than I realized.’ ”

The e-mail messages show Justice Department officials, who themselves had only an incomplete account of events, scrambling to prepare Mr. Gonzales and other senior officials for Congressional testimony that turned out to be inaccurate.]

Nah, politics had nothing to do with this...