Doug Wrenn
A Former Staffer Still "Curries" Favor With Bill Clinton
By Doug Wrenn
Aug 6, 2008 - 11:35:26 AM

Disclaimer time. Former gubernatorial candidate and Democrat pundit, Bill Curry, is about as far to the left as I am to the right, so if he and I ever agree on an issue, keep a watch out for a solar or lunar eclipse. I respect anyone who calls them like he or she sees them, even if I disagree with his or her ideology and/or viewpoint. After all, I am also a guy who prides himself in calling them like he sees them. I almost never agree with Bill Curry, but I respect him. Despite his far left slant, even I have to admit he at least tries to be fair. His August 3rd  (Hartford) Courant.com column, "Why Pick Top Prosecutor Now," is the exception, at least, somewhat.

Mr. Curry opined about Michael Considine, President Bush's choice to fill the slot of US Attorney for Connecticut. In so doing, his commentary was relatively innocuous toward Mr. Considine, but he castigated several other of the state's pertinent Republican legal eagles for various accusations and affiliations with our former Governor turned felon, Johnny "Hot Tub" Rowland. Mr. Curry also did somewhat give a pass to Brendan Fox, referring to him as "not a bad apple." As readers of my column know, I'm hardly a cheerleader for John Rowland and some of his minions. So far, tied score.

A bitter pill is always hard to swallow, and Curry did a good job connecting all the dots. In fact, I enjoyed his piece and found it well written. But he missed, or possibly even skipped over connecting one pretty big dot.

Mr. Curry made his way to the next victim on his hit list, former Congressional candidate and US Attorney for Connecticut, and now Associate Attorney General, Kevin O'Connor. As he began hacking away, Mr. Curry wrote: "The era in which O'Connor rose may have been the darkest in the 215-year history of the Justice Department. Nine U.S. Attorneys were fired, eight for the sin of refusing to politicize their offices and one so that a pal of Karl Rove could have the job."

I would argue that the darkest time in the 215-year history of the Justice Department was when Curry's then boss, President Bill Clinton, via his grossly unqualified Affirmative Action quota filler, then Attorney General Janet Reno, requested the resignations of all 93 U. S. Attorneys while Whitewater and other Clinton scandals were brewing, although a few of those Attorneys, including now Homeland Security Chief and unofficial Elmer Fudd impersonator, Michael Chertoff, didn't resign right away and stayed on a bit longer, as David Savage wrote in his March 23, 2007 Los Angeles Times on-line article, "Replacing US Attorneys Stretches back To Reagan." The Dems have answered this charge before, that other Presidents have also "cleaned house" in their terms, and that is true, but through attrition when the respective terms of those Attorneys expire, and not all in one swoop. Reno made Nixon's "Saturday Night Massacre" look like a mild fraternity hazing.

In fact, later on his rant, Curry further chides O'Connor for a list of other grievances through commission or omission during his term as US Attorney for Connecticut, but Curry mysteriously neglected to mention the one beef I always had about Kevin O'Connor: he never did a blessed thing about the illegal immigrants here in Connecticut during his watch. Curry inferred that O'Connor in some cases acted as a partisan puppet for President Bush. Sadly, he did, as do many political appointees. The "G.W" might as well stand for "Global World," as G. W. Bush is a zealous proponent of the North American Union with a wink-and-nod policy toward our porous borders and the hordes of invading illegal immigrants. But those are Democrat issues, too, so Curry distanced himself from the whole border/immigration issue about as much as Hillary and Monica at a White House social tea.

While waxing less-than-romantic with keen, laser-point, precision memory about the (Republican) Rowland years, Mr. Curry quite conveniently skipped over the felonious follies of the Clinton years, which was when he was a counselor to then President Clinton. Then again, given the all-too-eerie controversies surrounding the deaths of Vince Foster and Ron Brown, perhaps Mr. Curry's specific lapse of memory for the Clinton era is forgivable after all. I think Mr. Curry recognizes that, too. There was a certain unsettling risk for anyone getting too close to the Clintons that seems akin with certain untimely events that tragically befell some poor folks in the recent movie, "The Happening," except of course, for certain Chinese officials currently carrying empty brief cases but sporting wide smiles.

As he wraps up his rant, Mr. Curry questions why President Bush should even bother to name a US Attorney for Connecticut when, presumably; he will be replaced when the new regime moves in after January.

That's a reasonable question, but I still agree with President Bush's decision. First of all, US Attorney for any district is an important office, and I think the position should be filled, no matter how little time may be left. Second, I wonder if the prospective nominee were to be Janet Reno if Mr. Curry would have even thought of that question, let alone asked it. And third, Mr. Curry, when the new regime does move in after January, I am fairly confident that President McCain will likely wish to retain Mr. Considine in his administration, or at least grant him "amnesty."

Doug Wrenn