Obama to Pick Former Bush Official to Lead F.B.I.

[elleng]

12. I hope folks recall how strong Comey was AGAINST bush's game playing,

and probably will be. He's a public servant, NOT a political mover.

'Some Democrats had feared that if the president nominated Ms. Monaco — who oversaw national security issues at the Justice Department during the attacks in Benghazi, Libya, last September — Republicans would use the confirmation process as a forum for criticism of the administration’s handling of the attack.

As deputy attorney general in the Bush administration, Mr. Comey was a critical player in 2004 in the dramatic hospital room episode in which the White House counsel, Alberto Gonzales, and Mr. Bush’s chief of staff, Andrew H. Card Jr., tried to persuade Attorney General John Ashcroft — who was ill and disoriented — to reauthorize a warrantless eavesdropping program.

Mr. Comey, who was serving as the acting attorney general and had been tipped off that Mr. Gonzales and Mr. Card were trying to go around him, rushed to Mr. Ashcroft’s hospital room to thwart them. With Mr. Comey in the room, Mr. Ashcroft refused to reauthorize the program. After the episode, Mr. Bush agreed to make changes in the program, and Mr. Comey was widely praised for putting the law over politics.'