Goodlings Amok

A Common Thread in Bush's Failings

By Ruth Marcus
Wednesday, July 30, 2008

The improbable topic of today's column is Monica Goodling and the federal budget deficit.

You might think that the two of these have nothing in common save the happenstance that both are the subject of devastating new reports: Goodling about the stomach-turning politicization of the Justice Department; the deficit about the stomach-turning state of the federal treasury.

But the linkage goes beyond the adjective. The ousted Goodling and the lingering deficit are twin manifestations of the Bush administration's overarching contempt for government and blind adherence to ideology.

This administration will leave office having trashed the place -- and I'm not talking about a few "W's" pried loose from White House computer keyboards by the exiting Clinton crew. I'm referring to the myriad ways in which this administration, dismissive of the role of government, abused the enterprise it was entrusted with overseeing.

My favorite sentence in the Goodling report sums up the hiring practices in the department's supposedly nonpartisan career ranks: "Tell Brad he can hire one more good American."

This was the response by Goodling, who served as Justice's liaison with the White House, to a request from Bradley Schlozman, the interim U.S. attorney in Kansas City, Mo., to bring aboard a new prosecutor. "Good American" is Goodling's code for "Republican."

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