Or, put another way, the Bush administration used the power of the White House to screen Justice Department lawyers in the same way every other President has.

This is such a non-scandal it’s not even funny.

U.S. President George W. Bush’s Justice Department improperly injected politics into hiring programs, a department investigation released on Tuesday found.

A report by the department’s inspector general and office of professional responsibility said members of a screening committee were asked to weed out “wackos” and ideological “extremists” who sought work in a competitive honors program for entry-level attorneys or as summer interns.

It said the committee rejected applicants with liberal or Democratic affiliations at a much higher rate than those with Republican, conservative or politically neutral backgrounds.

The Justice Department is part of the executive branch.  Everyone in the Justice Department serves at the discretion of the President.  If Bush wants to screen out lawyer applicants with backgrounds including liberal activism that’s his right as President, one explicitly provided him by the Constitution.

Let’s not forget that the Clintons at one point fired nearly every lawyer working for the Justice Department.  There was no controversy in the media at that because, again, that’s a power the President have.

Now, liberals may not like that the Bush administration isn’t letting a bunch of liberal activists be lawyers for the Justice Department.  Given that they’re liberals, they may feel that these applicants are somehow entitled to work for the justice department.  But just because that’s how they feel doesn’t mean it’s true.

I, for one, wouldn’t complain if Obama chose to rid the Justice Department of many of the conservative lawyers put there during the Bush administration.  It would, again, be his right to do so as President.  It’s one of the reasons why who we choose as President is so important.