The Washington Post‘s lead story on the Gonzales resignation refers to him as “one of the nation’s most controversial attorneys general since the Watergate era.” “Controversial” is always a bit of a subjective term to begin with, and adding the qualifier “one of” makes the statement even less meaningful. Given that there is a sample size of just 10 post-Nixon AGs, being one of the most controversial is hardly an achievement. It’s pretty clear, then, that the only purpose of using such an irrelevant historical barometer is to introduce the specter of Watergate to a story that is more about managerial incompetence.
