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By Dennis Byrne
President Bush faces a major test of his integrity when, or if, he ever gets around to reappointing Patrick Fitzgerald as U.S. Attorney in Chicago.
The nation needs to know that Bush's failure to back Fitzgerald will betray a gapping hole in the conscience of the president. While most of America may think of Fitzgerald as the aggressive prosecutor in the Valerie Plame affair and the bombing of the World Trade Center, those of us in Chicago have a closer view of the man.
He is one of the few government officials left in Chicago and Illinois that loathes corruption, and who is in a position to do something about as the U.S. Attorney for Northern Illinois.
In that role, he has put away former Illinois Gov. George Ryan and a host of other grafters. He is scrutinizing current Gov. Rod Blagojevich's administration for its hiring practices. And he is hot on the trail of the corruption that pervades Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley's City Hall. Score another for Fitzgerald as a federal jury this week convicted Daley's patronage chief and three other men on charges that they engaged in an elaborate and long-running scheme to reward the mayor's campaign workers with choice jobs.
Read more at realclearpolitics.com
4 comments:
RE: Saving Patrick Fitzgerald: You begin the article by making the erroneous assumption that W has a conscience. Please read "The Sociopath Next Door" to understand where his mind is. Probably Cheney's & Rumsfeld's, too.
You are preaching to the choir.
Dennis, do you recall the battle that Peter Fitzgerald confronted when he nominated Patrick Fitzgerald (no relation) in the first place? The powers that be (and still be!) were against the appointment because they realized that an independent, tough prosecutor was going to end their reign of corruption. With no Peter Fitzgerald to fight, it's reasonable to wonder how we'll get the reappointment we want. I can only hope that W will be worried about the appearance of not reappointing him (ie, because of the Rove/Plame problem - not that I think Rove did anything wrong).
Fantastic article, Dennis! Thanks for bringing this issue up. Hopefully, other people will start to wake up and take notice of what is going on here.
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