One of the overlooked tidbits from Peter Baker’s interesting look at the president’s state of mind right now is that the White House is actually quite divided. Bush is summoning “leading authors, historians, philosophers and theologians to the White House” for some odd bull sessions, but the president’s team isn’t exactly reading from the same playbook.
Take Alberto Gonzales, for example.
The fabled loyalty of the Bush team, though, has frayed far more than might be apparent to him. The fight over whether Gonzales should remain attorney general has exposed a deep fault line. Bush remains convinced that his old friend did nothing wrong ethically in firing U.S. attorneys, and senior adviser Karl Rove angrily rejects what he sees as a Democratic witch hunt, according to White House officials. Yet beyond the inner circle, it is hard to find a current or former administration official who thinks Gonzales should stay.
“I don’t understand for the life of me why Al Gonzales is still there,” said one former top aide, who, like others, would speak only on the condition of anonymity. “It’s not about him. It’s about the office and who’s able to lead the department.” The ex-aide said that every time he runs into former Cabinet secretaries, “universally the first thing out of their mouths” is bafflement that Gonzales remains.
Some aides see it as Bush refusing to accept reality. “The president thinks cutting and running on his friends shows weakness,” said an exasperated senior official. “Change shows weakness. Doing what everyone knows has to be done shows weakness.”
That’s actually a great line: Doing what everyone knows has to be done shows weakness. So, to show strength, Bush is negligent in his responsibilities — on purpose.
It leads to bizarre situations with surprising regularity.
President Bush limited his deliberations over commuting the prison term of I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby to a few close aides, opting not to consult with the Justice Department and rebuffing efforts by friends to lobby on Libby’s behalf, administration officials and people close to Bush said yesterday.
“We were all told to stay away from it,” said an old Bush friend from Texas who is close to Libby and would not speak for attribution. “When we called over there, they said the president is well aware of the situation, so don’t raise it. None of us lobbied him because they told us not to.”
For the first time in his presidency, Bush commuted a sentence without running requests through lawyers at the Justice Department, White House officials said. He also did not ask the chief prosecutor in the case, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, for his input, as routinely happens in cases routed through the Justice Department’s pardon attorney.
Presumably, Bush believes people who know what they’re talking about might give him guidance, if asked. So the president has chosen an alternate path — he chats with Cheney, goes with his gut, and makes sure that he doesn’t do what everyone knows has to be done.
Only 567 days to go.