Speaking publicly for the first time about his time as U.S. attorney, Karl Rove-protege Tim Griffin said today that public service is “not worth it” and that “his experience as U.S. attorney had not been worth the criticism he and his wife have endured.” Griffin reportedly “became emotional several times, choking up as he detailed his political and legal career.”

The Politico leaked word today that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) was critical of outgoing Joint Chiefs chairman Gen. Peter Pace and Iraq commander Gen. David Petraeus during a conference call Tuesday. Reid reportedly called Pace “incompetent.”

Within hours, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) released a statement charging that Reid’s remarks were “incredibly disappointing” and “highly inappropriate.”

McCain’s outrage is pure hypocrisy. Last February, when Gen. George Casey stepped down as the top U.S. commander in Iraq and was nominated as Army chief of staff. McCain was highly critical of his appointment, going so far as to issue an “extremely rare public reprimand” to Casey during a Senate hearing:

While there are very pressing questions about the future of the Army, you will, of course, in this hearing be asked to review the mistakes in American strategy in Iraq during your command, how the previous Iraq strategy was formulated, why it failed, and why it was not changed sooner, and the lessons that were learned…And you’ll need to explain why your assessment of the situation in Iraq has differed so radically from that of most observers and why your predictions of future success have been so unrealistically rosy.

Apparently only John McCain gets to have an opinion on high-ranking military officials.

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This morning, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) “revealed that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales once again used an interim appointment authority at the heart of the US Attorneys controversy that Congress banned in a bill sent to the President for signature on June 4.” In a statement to Raw Story, Leahy’s spokeswoman explained what happened:

“It just so happens the committee got notice yesterday, that on June 16, George Cardona‘s 210 days as Acting U.S. Attorney in the Central District of California will have run out and the Attorney General will appoint him as an interim U.S. Attorney at that time. (i.e. still using the end-run authority because Bush has slow-walked signing the bill).”

Cardona replaced former U.S. attorney Debra Wong Yang, who at one point had been named for firing by Harriet Miers before resigning to join a corporate law firm.

The Senate Judiciary Committee revealed today that the Justice Department’s Inspector General Glenn Fine is investigating whether Attorney General Alberto Gonzales may have acted unethically or illegally by attempting to “coach” Monica Goodling’s testimony.

In May, Goodling testified before Congress that, prior to resigning from the DoJ, she had an “uncomfortable” conversation with Gonzales, in which he “laid out” his version of the attorney firings and asked if she “had any reaction to his iteration.” Goodling said she did not think it was “appropriate for us to talk about that at that point.”

ThinkProgress raised the question of whether Gonzales’ actions could have constituted obstruction of justice. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) raised a similar concern.

On June 5, Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) sent a letter to Fine, asking, “Does the expansion of your inquiry include this matter?” referring to the Goodling allegations. Today, Fine responded:

In your letter, you referred to Monica Goodling’s testimony before the House Judiciary Committee on May 23, 2007, in which she stated that she had a meeting with the Attorney General in which the process leading to the removal of certain U.S. Attorneys was discussed. You asked whether our investigation includes this matter.

This is to confirm that the scope of our investigation does include this matter.

Read the full letter here.

In a statement released earlier today, Leahy voiced concerns that Fine’s investigation may be getting “too close for comfort” for the White House, and that the administration may try to shut it down:

The last time an internal investigation at the Department of Justice got too close for comfort the White House shut it down. I hope this investigation will not suffer the same fate as the OPR inquiry into the warrantlesss wiretapping program. This internal investigation is an important step in getting to the truth behind this matter, and they should be allowed to do their jobs without interference from this Administration.

UPDATE: Steve Benen notes, “Back on April 19, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales testified, under oath, that he had not spoken with ‘witnesses’ in the U.S. Attorney scandal about the events surrounding the purge because it would have been inappropriate. He told the Senate Judiciary Committee, ‘I haven’t talked to witnesses because of the fact that I haven’t wanted to interfere with this investigation and department investigations.’”

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