Jim Hightower

In 2005, Ken Mehlman, one of George W's top political advisors, addressed this thought to the federal goverment's worker bees: "One of the things that can happen in Washington when you work in an agency is that you forget who sent you there."

Yes, Ken... good point! Public employees work for the people, right? Well... not quite. Mehlman went on to explain his thought: “And it's important to remind people that you're George Bush people.... If there's one empire I want built, it's the George Bush Empire."

Oh.

Sadly, they have tried to build that partisan empire inside every part of our government, including trying to twist such low-profile agencies as the General Services Administration to serve their partisan agenda.

The GSA is a little-known outfit with a big punch, doling out some $56-billion a year in federal contracts. Last year, Bush named Republican activist Lurita Doan to head this agency, and she has not hesitated to roil it in GOP politics. In January, she convened some 40 of GSA's regional administrators for a teleconference with the White House's deputy director of political affairs. He proceeded to identify 20 congressional Democrats that the Bushites want to defeat in 2008, and Doan urged the public servants to offer up ways that GSA could "help our candidates."

Unfortunately for Doan, this little session leaked out, and she found herself facing questions from a congressional committee. No problem, though – she simply adapted the "Alberto Defense." Like Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, Doan's memory magically melted in front of the committee. Again and again, she responded that she had "no recollection" of anything that happened during the teleconference, except that "there were cookies on the table."

Doan might not remember, but we must. These bums are turning our government into their partisan plaything.