Another Front of Trouble Opens Up for Gonzales

Over at nationaljournal.com, Murray Waas reports that AG Gonzales might have had personal motives for quashing the Justice Department's investigation of the Administration's domestic surveillance program:

Shortly before Attorney General Alberto Gonzales advised President Bush last year on whether to shut down a Justice Department inquiry regarding the administration's warrantless domestic eavesdropping program, Gonzales learned that his own conduct would likely be a focus of the investigation, according to government records and interviews.

Bush personally intervened to sideline the Justice Department probe in April 2006 by taking the unusual step of denying investigators the security clearances necessary for their work.

Waas says it's unclear whether Bush knew that Gonzales could be a focus when he moved to stop the investigation, which means the heat stays on the AG for now.

Meanwhile, a second Republican Senator, Gordon Smith, has now joined John Sununu in calling for Gonzales' resignation. That time-honored Washington ritual, the political death watch, has begun.