This OregonLive article reveals that John Kroger’s leadership skills as AG in Oregon are less that sterling.
But now, his own staff was giving him low marks.
“The front office is more interested in good publicity than quality of legal work,” wrote one assistant attorney general in an unprecedented survey of Justice Department lawyers.
“The advent of John Kroger was at first invigorating, but now dispiriting,” wrote another, lamenting low morale.
Kroger, affable yet resolved, was taken aback by the in-house criticism, which his office released to The Oregonian under open-records laws.
“I was kind of depressed. … A lot of it was my own fault,” Kroger said, acknowledging failures to adequately explain departmental changes to his staff as he centralized decision making previously spread throughout the agency’s various divisions.
As his first months unfolded, he lost key people, sometimes in controversial ways. He went after corrupt public officials but cut deals that later were questioned as something never done before at the Justice Department [I am sure Ken Rice, Kevin Hannon, and Joe Hirko can fill in the citizens of Oregon about his nasty "deals" -- CE.] He got money for his favorite projects but watched legislators whittle away at one of the agency’s most crucial tasks — defending criminal convictions.
Poor John Kroger. He’s the little prosecutor who couldn’t.
John Kroger was louder and more obnoxious than the other prosecutors because he knew his cases were extremely weak. His M.O. as Oregon’s attorney general is the same. He isn’t likely to change.
I agree he won’t change. That actually benefits me because I can continue to despise him, without having to explain that he “used to be” a complete jerk. He’s still a jerk for everyone to see.
Kroger is so full of power he does not see that putting Lea Fastow in jail is an abuse of his power, he is so full of himself that he is able to brag about abuse and brag about bullying to get Fastow to lie against Lay and Skilling. This seems criminal to me but they keep getting away with it so why not brag in a book and act like you are bothered by these tough things. I wonder if it would bother him if he crushed a child in his grip to get the parent to tesitify? where does it stop? he decides.
it is comforting to know that it bothers him to abuse power but not enough to admit he is abusive and not enough to stop doing it.
That analogy – about the child – is excellent. And horrifying because I can’t quite picture him seeing that it is just WRONG, nevermind illegal, to do that. He doesn’t seem to have an off switch.
He wants power. He wants the EBS defendants to beg him for mercy. He would love to force them into hurting themselves with a plea deal just because it makes him look tough.
It’s truly disgusting. I’ve known genuinely powerful men, and they don’t show it because they know it’s there. They don’t have to prove it to anyone, so it doesn’t even really register into their own minds. With Kroger, *everything* is about power. Every interaction, he is trying to shame, humiliate, and lord over the other person.
He can’t just be human. He has to be a complete Nazi.
FYI – more self promotion
http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2010/08/oregon_holds_corporations_acco.html