Snow: “It’s Performance”

See Tony spin the email by Kyle Sampson released yesterday. Sampson wrote in the email, to refresh your memory that “80-85 percent [of the United States attorneys], I would guess, are doing a great job, are loyal Bushies, etc.”

From this morning’s press gaggle:

QUESTION: Tony, you addressed this yesterday, the question about loyalty and how much that factors in … into the role U.S. attorneys play. You know, these emails are coming out, and this other one about their Bushies, et cetera. What is the role of loyalty in how U.S. attorneys perform?

SNOW: Again, if you want to take a look … let’s first go back to that particular memo, because in the sentence before it says, “This is an operational matter. We’d like to replace 15 to 20 percent of the current U.S. attorneys, the underperforming ones.” No mention of political loyalty; it’s performance. So I think …

QUESTION: But the next line says …

QUESTION: Excuse me …

SNOW: Then it says, “This is a rough guess. We might want to consider doing performance evaluations after Judge comes on board. The vast majority of U.S. attorneys, 80-85 percent, I would guess, are doing a great job, loyal Bushies,” et cetera. I mean, I don’t see in there that there is political loyalty tests. It’s a characterization.

QUESTION: Oh, come on. That seems to define a good job as political loyalty … the loyal Bushies.

SNOW: No, I don’t think so. It talked about underperforming, and then it talks about the history of these things. If you take a look … what you’re trying to do is cherry-pick your phrase. But the fact is …

QUESTION: You’ve never done that, have you?

SNOW: What I’m trying to do is accentuate the key phrases.

QUESTION: And we appreciate it.

SNOW: But I don’t want to start serving as the witness, the “what Kyle Sampson intended to mean” with that memo. So I’m -afraid … I’m going to let him … but the President’s view is, you need U.S. attorneys … the job of a U.S. attorney is to uphold law. And you have people who are going to be effective in that and who are going to serve the public interest.

Snow refused to say whether certain White House officials will testify to Congress, saying that’s up to White House Counsel Fred Fielding.

He also got all hazy on his earlier unambigous assertion that the idea to replace all U.S. attorney originated with Harriet Miers:

QUESTION: Can I follow on … I’m unclear. Is it still operative that Harriet Miers was the one who thought up to fire everybody?

SNOW: First, let’s … I don’t know. We know that …

QUESTION: Harriet …

SNOW: … and what I’m saying is, there was a … the original Kyle Sampson memo that everybody saw that said it was Harriet’s idea. I think the thing that we can say with assurance is that Karl remembers her raising it to him and his saying he didn’t think it was a good idea. I don’t think … I don’t think it’s safe to go any further than that, because that is all at this juncture.

QUESTION: But what do we do with the information we had from you that it was Harriet Miers’ idea?

SNOW: Well, I mean, it has been described as her idea, but whether it is … I don’t know where … I don’t want to try to vouch for origination, but let’s …

QUESTION: Is that exactly what Congress wants to get … I mean …

SNOW: Well, let me … you know, here’s … again, let’s put all this in context. The President has the presidential authority to replace anybody he wants. And so it is … but furthermore, it is … this is an idea. This is not … I’m not even … it’s not even clear that this is a recommendation as much as a musing, a possibility: Okay, we’re coming into a new administration, we’ve just had an election … what are some of the options? How do we think about making sure that we’ve got the best team available for a second term?