It's easy to forget all the shit Ashcroft said he was going to do, like misinterpret existing laws to go after porn producers, harrass gay folks, all kinds of other Christofascist shit. Then 9/11 happened, and this is a pretty good summary of what happened:
he sought to sweep away any meaningful restrictions on his power and use the fact of September 11th to do so.
But this is an attorney general who treated dissent and criticism as if it was treason, who launched the largest campaign of ethnic profiling we've seen in this country since World War II, who sought… who treated judicial review and congressional oversight as inconvenient obstacles to getting the job done.
And I think ultimately he'll be seen as a disaster, both from a civil liberties perspective and also from a national security perspective.
Did you miss the part where he said he got $100 in tips?