One small step toward revival of America's diseased justice system comes today with word that Bush loyalists established a five-year program to flood a prestigious hiring program with young conservatives.
The story, by reporter Carrie Johnson at the Washington Post, says the honors program had been under the control of senior career officials. But John Ashcroft, former attorney general under Bush, changed that system.
As a result, critics say, many highly qualified candidates were rejected because they had experience with left-leaning nonprofit organizations or had served under Democratic judges or lawmakers.
Could this story have ramifications in Alabama? The answer appears to be yes. The report by Inspector General Glenn Fine and Office of Professional Responsibility Chief H. Marshall Jarrett is the first in a series of investigations about the reach of political considerations in hiring and enforcement at the Bush Justice Department.
Alice Martin and Leura Canary, U.S. attorneys for the Northern and Middle Districts of Alabama, reportedly are on the list of prosecutors under investigation for launching politically driven cases.
Hopefully, Fine and Jarrett will soon be turning a critical gaze to the horribly warped justice apparatus in the Heart of Dixie.
We have been showing, in our series on Alice Martin, exactly how warped our justice apparatus truly is. We have another segment in our first-person reports coming up next.
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