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November 7, 2006
The Accidental AG
GQ interviews former Attorney General John Ashcroft and it's an interesting read. For example, the following is Ashcroft's explanation on how he got into politics:
The way my life unfolded would have required the kind of vision that could make a man rich overnight. I mean, look at my career. I started out as a teacher. After five and a half years, the congressman from my district decides he’s resigning, so I decide to go and sign up. I couldn’t even name the counties in the district, but I said, “Well, I’m going to make an American election out of this.” So I go out with more naïveté than you could get in two dump trucks and a coal train. And it turns out that there are two other kooks—I put myself in the category—who also sign up. So it becomes a four-man primary, and I lose. But little did I know that in losing, I’d get the attention of the man who was being elected governor, Kit Bond, and his election would mean he vacated his position as state auditor, so he would appoint me to replace him. Now, if I had figured that out in advance, you would think that this is a guy whose counsel I should seek, because he can see around corners. But that’s the story of my life.
In another part of the interview, Ashcroft talks about one of his weaknesses:
You mentioned public outreach as a failure. What other failures did you have?Oh, my gosh. How much time do you have? One thing, I’m too hasty to make decisions. Sometimes I think that I’m so right that I don’t need to consider things carefully. That’s when I have to be very careful. One good thing about the Justice Department is that there are lots of bright people. I mean, where they’re used to flyspecking: “Not so fast there.” “And on the other hand.” “Have you thought about this?” I staged meetings just for that purpose—to guard against my own propensity to make a snap judgment.
H'mm. Looks as if someone missed the "have you thought this through" meeting on the Justice Department's decision to prosecute Arthur Andersen out of business.
Posted by Tom at November 7, 2006 4:46 AM
Comments
Tom,
I have no doubt that if this were 100 years ago you would have been screaming about the Sherman Act and how it is so unfair to business. Instead of Spitzer, you would have been railing against Teddy Roosevelt and Philander Knox.
If you are indeed correct that the handling of Andersen marks a low point in the regulation of business by government, history will agree with you. For now, it is the law of the land.
Posted by: cmilford ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://blog.kir.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at November 7, 2006 9:40 AM
Charles, what precisely do you think that the Enron Task Force did to Andersen is "the law of the land?"
Posted by: Tom K. at November 7, 2006 10:16 AM
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