Bloomberg:

In written answers to supplement his congressional testimony, ex-U.S. Attorney Daniel Bogden of Nevada said William Mercer, acting associate attorney general, gave him that rationale for his firing. Bodgen’s firing angered Republican Senator John Ensign of Nevada, who joined bipartisan criticism of the way Attorney General Alberto Gonzales handled the dismissals.

Mercer explained that “the administration had a two-year window of opportunity” to give someone “the experience of serving as United States attorney” so “the Republican Party would have more future candidates to the federal bench” and political positions, Bogden wrote.

The disclosure came as the Justice Department said its inspector general is investigating an allegation that former Gonzales aide Monica Goodling used political affiliation as criteria for screening applicants for career-level prosecutor positions.

Hey, all the Republicans want is the unity of state and Partei become the state. What could be wrong with that, especially since God is in the White House?

And it’s always nice to have yet another opportunity to see authoritarianism in action:

Bogden said that neither Mercer nor Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty offered any other explanation for his dismissal. McNulty told Bogden that the order for his dismissal came from “higher up” and that his performance in office “did not enter into the equation,” the fired U.S. attorney wrote.

Which is interesting, because now Abu G is claiming everything was delegated to underlings. (Of course, both stories could be true. Nobody’s ever found any orders for the final solution, either, because everybody “just knew” what needed to be done in the system of “working toward the Fuhrer.)

And what the higher-ups want? Silence. And if they can’t get silence, they use threats:

John McKay, fired as U.S. attorney in Seattle, wrote that during a telephone call, he understood that Elston sought his silence in return for a promise that “the attorney general would not demean me in his Senate testimony.”

Paul K. Charlton, fired as U.S. attorney in Arizona, wrote that before Gonzales testified at a Senate Judiciary Committee in January, Elston offered him a “quid-pro-quo agreement: my silence in exchange for the attorney general’s.”

How, one asks, would it be possible for Abu G—the man life form who wrote the torture memos and called the Geneva convention “quaint”—to “demean” anybody?

Oh, wait, Abu G is in a position of authority, we owe him deference, he is one of Our Betters, of course he can demean people! Sorry. I forgot.

NOTE The headline is taken verbatim from Bloomberg. I’d say it’s pretty Shrill…