Rove in new controversy over e-mails

By Steve Holland

Fri Apr 13, 2007 2:12PM EDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - White House political adviser Karl Rove was embroiled in a new controversy over potentially missing e-mails on Friday, the latest twist in the firings of eight U.S. prosecutors last year.

The White House disclosed the Republican National Committee in early 2006 took away Rove's ability to delete e-mails sent and received through a party e-mail account.

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino had no explanation for why the RNC, the governing arm of President George W. Bush's political party, would stop Rove from deleting e-mails.

Perino said a White House review showed up to 5 million e-mails to and from as many as 1,700 executive branch employees might have been lost when the administration converted from Lotus Notes to Microsoft Outlook in 2002 and 2003.

Democrats looking into the Justice Department's firing of eight U.S. attorneys last year, which critics say appeared to be politically motivated, are seeking Rove's testimony and documentary evidence to determine whether he was involved.

The White House revealed this week Rove and 21 other White House officials have for years kept e-mail accounts through the RNC to conduct political business without violating the Hatch Act, which forbids government employees from using government property for partisan activities.

Democrats want to know whether Rove and the others conducted government business on the party's e-mail accounts as well to get around record-keeping requirements under the Presidential Records Act and avoid leaving a paper trail.

Scandal Threatens Gonzales

There are retorts to the White House firing of United States attorney's for political reasons that are made by the same people who did the firing.
Their main defense is the claim that President Clinton committed the same act during his presidency.

It is standard procedure when a new president takes office to clean out most if not all of United States attorney's. President Reagan did the same thing during his term and so did Bush senior.

These firings took place during key court cases involving republican cronies and appointees.
The attorneys fired for negligence or lacking performance quality also rated the highest among all 50 states for quality and performance.

This wasn't the "cleaning house" that all presidents do when coming to the White House.

This was a pick and choose policy based on party self surivial and desperation.

When asked on Meet the Press this morning if he "had any evidence that a U.S. attorney was removed and that removal jeopardized an ongoing investigation," Senator Schumer said he does and that the evidence is "becoming more and more overwhelming."

This is why the prosecutor purge is a genuine scandal. Not only is there clear evidence that the firings were unprecedented and purely politically-motivated, but Alberto Gonzales lied about it under oath and the White House keeps changing it's story. What conclusion can we draw from these lies and revisionisms other than they have something to hide? Namely, that these eight prosecutors were selectively fired because they did not sufficiently politicize their offices and succumb to pressure to do so, only later to be fired for "performance-related" reasons despite receiving exemplary evaluations.


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