Gonzales Should Go (actually he never should have been confirmed)

With all the buzz right now about Alberto Gonzales and the U.S. Attorney scandal, we should remember that he was selected by Bush after his infamous torture memo and his public support for the Patriot Act. While some Democrats made some noise about his nomination, as a whole the Senate Democrats did not filibuster. He was also strongly supported by mainstream Latino organizations - LULAC and NCLR - who attempted to excite their community about the prospect of a Latino at such a high level of U.S. government (see this post about the behind the scenes debate between the NLG and LULAC). In the end, Gonzales has served as a poor role model for our community and to the extent people connect him to the Latino population in the U.S., he's tainted all of us.

Oh yeah, but some of us could have predicted that ...

Published on Sunday, November 28, 2004 CommonDreams.org
The Gonzales Debate: Identity Politics Meets the Right Wing
by Carlos Villarreal

Right-wing identity politics has been an effective tool used by some Republicans to move this country to the right, and as a method, it is about to accomplish a tremendous victory in the nomination of Alberto Gonzales for Attorney General and the support for Gonzales by mainstream Latino organizations. Sadly, the confirmation of the first Latino to hold such a high office will not be a triumph, but a major defeat for people of color in this country and throughout the world.

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