That the drumbeat of next year's presidential and congressional elections dominates political events in Washington is further confirmed by the resignation yesterday of US attorney general Alberto Gonzalez. After weathering mounting political storms about his record and competence over the last six months Mr Gonzalez has made his decision - and President Bush has accepted it - to minimise continuing damage to the White House and the Republican Party. An utterly compliant loyalist in Mr Bush's efforts to ratchet up executive privilege, Mr Gonzalez made an easy target, so much so that many Republican candidates insisted he must go.
His departure from the administration puts political management back in the hands of Washington insiders following the resignation of fellow Texan Karl Rove this month along with other political cronies of Mr Bush from that state. It removes an increasingly embarrassing figure from the political equation, leaving his legacy to be dealt with by more professional hands less compromised by his wilful and unquestioning loyalism to an increasingly unpopular administration.
That legacy is exceptionally bad. Mr Gonzalez was considered by most lawyers to be a partisan appointee quite out of his depth in the office of attorney general when he took the job in 2005 after spending four years as White House legal counsel. A member of the cabinet in charge of the huge Justice Department in a highly- legalistic political culture, Mr Gonzalez became embroiled in controversies over the dismissal of nine US prosecuting attorneys, allegedly on partisan grounds, last year. He also defended an anti-terrorism surveillance programme instituted by the National Security Agency which most lawyers believe infringes fundamental rights. In both cases he was accused of lying under oath, and his position had become untenable.
The Bush administration has systematically extended executive privilege and secrecy over the president's two terms, especially after the 9/11 atrocities. This was intended to place its actions increasingly beyond political accountability and legal scrutiny, in the interests of effective authority. The results were seen graphically in a series of legal decisions by Mr Gonzalez when he was White House counsel which heavily influenced the administration's response to 9/11. Recommending that terrorist suspects held in Guantánamo Bay were not prisoners of war removed them from obligations arising from the Geneva Conventions on torture. This may have suited the administration's "war on terrorism" but it did endless and continuing damage to its international reputation as an upholder of the rule of law.
The impulse to insulate executive authority in this way remains a feature of the Bush administration, especially under the influence of vice-president Dick Cheney. Mr Gonzalez was praised by Mr Bush, who said that he had been unjustly pursued by the Democrats for party advantage. But in the end he invited and deserved that fate.