Yes I know this story is a bit dated, but I would like to add my two cents (especially considering how I dealt with the topic a few months back). According to a Justice Department investigation Monica Goodling, the DOJ’s former liaison to the White House, did everything she could to make sure the people with the right politics (translation: Republicans) got hired. Those resumes minus Goodling approved ideology were tossed.

Now it would be easy to get all hyperbolic, call this the worst scandal evah, but some perspective is in order. First this is Washington D.C.,  where asking about someone’s politics is as common as dirt; however, Goodling treated the Justice Department like it was a college sorority where the only thing that mattered was fealty to Papa George Bush. Here is a question Goodling asked an  interviewee:

“What is it about George W. Bush that makes you want to serve him?”

Mmmmm. Isn’t Bush married and why was Goodling trying to hook him up with dates? The fact Goodling made it all about Bush and not about those complicated things like law and justice, says everything we need to know. Like a dull college senior, Goodling could not deal with anyone, or anything, that might question her vision of the world. A rather anti-intellectual stance that should not be near a place where justice is supposed to be  the goal.

Monday’s report singles out the department’s former White House liaison, Monica Goodling, for violating federal law and Justice Department policy by discriminating against job applicants who weren’t Republican or conservative loyalists.

“Goodling improperly subjected candidates for certain career positions to the same politically-based evaluation she used on candidates for political positions,” the report concludes.

In one instance, Justice investigators found that Goodling objected to hiring an assistant prosecutor in Washington because “judging from his resume, he appeared to be a liberal Democrat.”

In another, she rejected an experienced terror prosecutor to work on counter-terror issues at a Justice Department headquarters office “because of his wife’s political affiliations,” the report found.

Goodling’s lawyer John Dowd did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday and other attempts to reach Goodling were unsuccessful.

The federal government makes a distinction between so-called “career” appointees and “political” appointees, and the long-accepted custom has been that career workers are not hired on the basis of political affiliation or allegiance.

The 140-page report does not indicate whether Goodling or former Gonzales chief of staff Kyle Sampson could face charges. None of those involved in the discriminatory hiring still work at Justice, meaning they will avoid any department penalties.

However, Justice investigators said that Goodling may lose her license to practice law as a result of the findings.

Gonzales was largely unaware of the hiring decisions by two of his most trusted aides. The report said his aides’ decisions weeded out Democrats and that Goodling also rejected at least one lesbian job applicant.

The report marks the culmination of a yearlong investigation by Justice’s Office of Inspector General and Office of Professional Responsibility into whether Republican politics were driving hiring polices at the country’s premier law enforcement agency.

The investigation is one of several that examine accusations of White House political meddling within the Justice Department. Those accusations were initially driven by the firings of nine U.S. attorneys in late 2006 and culminated with Gonzales’ resignation under fire as attorney general last September.

The man who replaced Gonzales, Attorney General Michael Mukasey, said he is “of course disturbed” by the findings.

“I have said many times, both to members of the public and to department employees, it is neither permissible nor acceptable to consider political affiliations in the hiring of career department employees,” Mukasey said in a statement shortly after the report was released Monday morning. “And I have acted, and will continue to act, to ensure that my words are translated into reality so that the conduct described in this report does not occur again at the department.”