At His Pleasure

One summer, when I was in college, I worked for a laundry. My job was to open our satellite store every morning, collect the dirty clothes and take them to the cleaning plant. Then I would return to run the satellite until it was time to bring back the clean clothes for customer pickup. I had a fine boss. Just as an example, one day I told a particularly nasty customer who complained about the service that we weren't the only store in town and he might consider going elsewhere. His phone call to the boss brought me into the office where he asked me if that's what I said. "Yes, sir," I replied. With a broad smile, the boss said, "That's my job; next time let me do it."

A couple summers later, in another college town, armed with a good recommendation, I got a similar job at another laundry. But here they had not perfected the system yet, and when I arrived to pick up the clean clothes, most days they weren't ready. This new boss, in his frustration, yelled at me to do something (unspecified) while I waited. "Look busy," he said.

I was searching the classifieds for a new job when I came across an ad for my job, but without any mention of looking busy. The next morning, I went to the boss's office and asked if he was advertising to replace me, and he said, "Yes." I replied, "I quit," and went home. Because I had left him short-handed, I'm sure the weasel told everyone he had fired me. I did serve at his pleasure, so that would have been his prerogative, but as I wasn't planning a career in the laundry business, his name never graced my resume.

Last week President Bush fired eight U.S. attorneys. They served at his pleasure, and they were not performing to his standards. U.S. attorneys have routinely been dismissed by all Presidents. The dirty work this time fell to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. A truly nice man, he apologized that he had done so in an abrupt manner, unlike when the Clinton administration asked for the resignation of all 93 U.S. attorneys more surrepticiously. The people who are most upset are a group of Democratic legislators who, for purely political reasons, are attempting to embarrass the President yet again. The attorneys will rebound and find new work soon, some with the anti-American ACLU. The President and the Attorney General will be stronger for the experience.