I'm Confused (A Not Altogether Unfamiliar Condition For Me.)

I'm trying to make sense out of this flap over those U.S. Attorney that got themselves fired. The way I understand it, it's just a temp job, right? Your guy gets himself elected, perhaps you helped, and he likes you enough to give you the job. Now you're set for the next 4 years. 8 if you're lucky. But the job, even if it is temporary, is a good springboard for something else in 8 years. Attorney General of your state maybe. Lieutenant Governor? Hmm, maybe even a Federal Judgeship if your guy really likes you.

But, there's the flip side. Suppose you cross the Big Guy? Suppose you don't apply the same level of importance to some crimes that your boss does. You let certain cases slide, or don't pursue investigations in a timely manner. Nah, the Old Man doesn't really mean that stuff he says in speeches. Whoops, maybe he does. You get canned. Don't be so sad, Bunkie, it happens all the time. Besides, you knew that when you signed on.

Now we have a new Congress. A new Congress that realizes their own jobs may be temporary if they can't keep a scandal of some sort on the front burner for the next two years. And in you they just found one.

It doesn't really matter that you guys have been hired and fired on a whim since, well, forever. It was POLITICAL. It was a POLITICAL FIRING. That just must be bad, 'cause it sounds so capricious. believe me, how something sounds means a lot. In the previous sentence I used "capricious" because it sounds more ominous and conniving than "arbitrary".

So our new Congress is holding hearings and taking testimony and hoping that someone will mis-remember so perjury charges can be flung about again. It was so easy with Libby. There was no crime committed in that investigation either, but by cracky we got ourselves a conviction. And we've got David Gregory and Chris Matthews and Kieth Olberman and Rosie the blob all upset because those attorneys were fired on POLITICAL grounds.

But now I hear that President Bush has pulled a nomination for some Ambassadorship because John Kerry pointed out that the guy made POLITICAL donations to some group which does not agree with Senator Kerry.

Now, here's where it starts getting confusing. According to Patrick Leahy, who's holding the hearings looking into the Attorney firings, it's a really bad thing to fire someone based on POLITICS. But, according to John Kerry, it's required to consider POLITICS when deciding to hire someone.

Liberals. Can somebody please explain their thought process to me?