Leslie Hagan, it appears, was a bit too outstanding for the Justice Department. The attorney worked as a liaison between the Justice Department and the U.S. attorneys’ committee on Native American issues and received consistent “outstanding” marks on her evaluations. However, she is also a lesbian as well as a Republican. It was the first part that allegedly bothered people like Monica Goodling, the oft-ridiculed former Justice official involved in the firings of U.S. Attorneys.
The Inspector General is looking into credible allegations that Leslie Hagen’s contract was not renewed because of the talk about her sexual orientation despite rave reviews from co-workers who referred to her, in one form, as “The Best Qualified Person in the Nation.” Well, that depends on the meaning of qualification.
Goodling was criticized as little more than a political hack with a razor thin resume. The graduate of Regents University appears selected for a top Justice position due to the purity of her political views and loyalty to Bush. Click here
NPR reports:
Justice Department e-mails obtained by NPR show that Gonzales’s senior counsel Monica Goodling had a particular interest in Hagen’s duties. A few months before Hagen was let go, according to one e-mail, Goodling removed part of Hagen’s job portfolio — the part dealing with child exploitation and abuse.
Goodling, who left the Justice Department last year, declined through her lawyer to comment on the matter.
At the height of the scandal over the fired U.S. attorneys, Goodling admitted to making personnel decisions about career Justice Department lawyers based on improper partisan considerations.
“I crossed the line of the civil service rules,” Goodling told Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA) at a congressional hearing in May 2007.
….Someone who worked in Hagen’s office says that in a 2006 meeting, senior officials were told that Hagen’s contract would not be renewed because someone on the attorney general’s staff had a problem with Hagen. The problem, it was suggested during the conversation, was sexual orientation — or what was rumored to be Hagen’s sexual orientation.
Normally, Goodling and Bush officials seemed satisfied regardless of your performance if you were a Republican. However, as one insider put it to NPR: “To some people, that’s even worse than being a Democrat.”
For the full story, click here.
I disagree with the blog’s emphasis on alleged sexual orientation (and I shudder to use the word “alleged” because of any unnecessary negative suggestion).
It is more important that it was only RUMORED.
It is unacceptable that an employment decision was based upon sexual orientation. It is unconscionable, however, that an adverse employment decision was made at one of the highest levels of government based upon a RUMOR. A RUMOR.
Can we each appreciate how easy is it that this could happen to any one of us? We are not talking about inner-office, pointless, water cooler gossip.
We are talking about an adverse employment decision being made based upon a RUMOR.
I do not care what administration it is. I do not care who the employer is. I do not care what the rumor is. I am shaken to my very core that anyone, particularly with a JD, made and allowed an adverse employment decision based upon a mere RUMOR (and a stupid one at that).
Its called intolerance. People simply cannot go to work and work. They have to bring the human condition with them which often creates a hostile work environment. Amazing how the elite think they rise above and are better than humanity.
niblet,
I have seen what you’re talking about many, many times and it isn’t right. I don’t think we’ll agree on this part but I see the cheney-bush bunch as prime examples of what you’ve pointed out. They have consistently fired competent people and put political loyalists with low to no competence in their place. But this does seem to happen everywhere. I can’t blame lawyers because they are just as likely to represent the wrongfully dismissed as the rightfully so.
Jill
NIbbles:
It’s also harder to fire people because they’re black, female or gay too. So I suppose it’s a trade off you aren’t willing to accept. In any event, rest your head on your pillow tonight knowing we lawyers at first gave you laissez-faire employment practices and then made you more humane despite all the kicking and screaming.
Jill, I agree and competent people find a hard itme keeping their jobs much less get promoted to better ones because it is impossible to fire the nincompoops above them or alongside them that deserve to get the axe.
So true. It’s a shame that competent people ought to be able to keep their job. What has this nation come to?
It is getting to the point you can’t fire anybody for anything anytime anywhere. Nice job attorneys; job security at its worst.
Forgive me in advance for using anything from postmodernism…I think this discussion is “privilegeing” sexual orientation over all other aspects of how people think of themselves.
I just saw my neighbor briefly this morning. He is a flaming heterosexual. As I hadn’t seen him in a while I enquired what he’d been doing to which he replied, “I’ve been engaged in the usual debauchery.” Knowing my neighbor, I understood this to be the truth and said, “Well, carry on!” He’s the staunchest Repulican I know. Religionists would boot him out in no time if they could (he’s a big donor!). I bring all this up becuase sexual orientation doesn’t necessarily overlap with conservative or liberal values. Sometimes the correspondence is there, many times it just isn’t. People frequently identify with groups that are detrimental to some aspect, often a very important aspect, of who they are. Class certainly comes to mind here. And it is true that their is prejudice against LGBT people in both the major parties.
heathu:
Don’t we all long for the day when people are just people and labels belong only on soup cans.
“’…she is also a lesbian as well as a Republican.’
Words fail in trying to reconcile how a person can juggle and justify those two opposing states of being.”
Or as Michael Kinsley once described Log Cabin Republicans: “people who really, REALLY want a capital gains tax cut.”
Don’t forget…those people are massed on our norther border! Thanks for the compliment.
Jill
Jill:
That is the ‘reply-of-the-week’. This article and your reply say it all. Your humor, while dry as toast – summed up the formula that is used by anyone in the Bush Administration giving an interview on just about any subject relating to domestic or world affairs.
It’s the ‘push’ version of the Socratic method.
There was a particularly subtle nuance of “christians” with a small ‘c.’ It has inspired an idea for an article. Brililant and very funny!
In Canada they now allow lesbians to marry. Their entire govt. and social system has gone to hell. That country is non-functional. I’m so glad the upstanding christians in charge of our govt. are there doing such good work both domestically and internationally.
JT:
Incredibly, I have represented the State Repub Party Leadership in a case here. I have heard that sentiment too, but they are rarely so candid about their views when they meet en masse.
I doubt that Ms. Hagen is wedded to anything given the GOP’s (and democratic party’s) general opposition to gay marriage. I certainly understand your point. It is a shame that there is such animosity with some in the party. However, I have met many Republicans who are very supportive of gay rights or strongly take a libertarian position against any punishment for private conduct.
“…she is also a lesbian as well as a Republican.”
Words fail in trying to reconcile how a person can juggle and justify those two opposing states of being. Can a person be sooo wedded to fiscal conservatism (the erstwhile linchpin of the GOP prior to being hijacked by the religious right) that you’re willing to hang out with, work for and represent the views of people who hate you, have condemned you to their religion’s nether world and who actively work to make your personal life difficult? Amazing!