Alberto Gonzales:
I think what we’re seeing here is the president surrounding himself with loyalists who give maybe an extra push towards trying to do what facilitates what the president wants to have happen.
So their interpretation is one that perhaps you and I might — you and others that I served with might disagree with. But, nonetheless, it is an attempt by lawyers. You’re absolutely right. Lawyers are involved, because the president, quite frankly, most times isn’t a lawyer and certainly doesn’t have the time to sit down and go through the law books.
And that’s why he does take advice from lawyers. But the lawyers that he’s choosing, it appears to me, have a fierce loyalty to him. And I was very loyal to President Bush. Robert F. Kennedy was very loyal to his brother John F. Kennedy. But, nonetheless, hopefully, you have lawyers in place that make a good faith attempt to interpret the law and are honest with the president saying, you don’t have the authority to do this.
