More on the US Attorney Shake-up

The Washington Post has more on "the growing political storm over the recent U.S. attorney firings." Yesterday Deputy AG Paul J. McNulty acknowledged that a U.S. attorney in Arkansas was asked to resign so that the administration could appoint a former aide to Karl Rove, but said that the administration asked six other U.S. attorneys to step down because of "performance-related" issues. Deputy Attorney General Defends Prosecutor Firings, Wash. Post, Feb. 7, 2007.

This is the first article about the flap that names our local U.S. attorney, John McKay, as one of the ones who was asked to resign. Until now, I'd been agnostic, thinking it was possible he did indeed decide that it was time to leave government service to return to practice or teaching. (When he announced his resignation, he said private practice; later he said he'd teach at Seattle U.) People do decide to leave jobs -- and I imagine the U.S. attorney job is pretty demanding and could leave one craving a break after five years.

Earlier posts: Jan. 28, Jan. 27 , Dec. 15.

For what it's worth, Mr. McKay was one of my favorite law school commencement speakers here. I was sorry to miss his talk at the law school last October.

Thanks: Stephanie Knightlinger.