COMMENT: In FTR #742, we exam­ined (among oth­er things) a series of high­ly sus­pi­cious deaths of peo­ple con­nect­ed to the milieu of for­mer Alaba­ma gov­er­nor Bob Riley, Karl Rove and Jack Abramoff. These deaths, in turn, loom large in the machi­na­tions that led to the down­fall of for­mer Alaba­ma Gov­er­nor Don Siegel­man.

The inci­sive blog Legal Schnau­zer informs us that fed­er­al pros­e­cu­tor Leu­ra Canary is now being inves­ti­gat­ed by the Depart­ment of Jus­tice.

It will be inter­est­ing to see what, if any­thing, comes of this inves­ti­ga­tion. The media, of course, are fix­at­ed on the fol­lies of  Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Antho­ny Wein­er (D‑NY).

This fix­a­tion exem­pli­fies one of my favorite quotes, from the late author Edith Whar­ton. “A friv­o­lous soci­ety can only achieve dra­mat­ic sig­nif­i­cance through what its friv­o­li­ty destroys.”

“Bush-Era U.S. Attor­ney Is the Tar­get of a Fed­er­al Inves­ti­ga­tion”; Legal Schnau­zer; 6/6/2011.

EXCERPT: Leu­ra Canary, the noto­ri­ous Bush-appoint­ed pros­e­cu­tor who was at the heart of the Don Siegel­man case, is the focus of a U.S. Depart­ment of Jus­tice inves­ti­ga­tion, sources tell Legal Schnau­zer.

Canary announced her retire­ment as U.S. attor­ney for the Mid­dle Dis­trict of Alaba­ma on May 26. But sources say the ongo­ing fed­er­al inves­ti­ga­tion is the real rea­son Canary stepped down, even though Oba­ma nom­i­nee George Beck has not been con­firmed by the U.S. Sen­ate. Louis Franklin will serve as act­ing U.S. attor­ney for the Mid­dle Dis­trict, pend­ing Beck­’s con­fir­ma­tion.

A long-await­ed Alaba­ma fed­er­al bin­go pros­e­cu­tion, fea­tur­ing gam­bling mag­nate Mil­ton McGre­gor and a num­ber of state leg­is­la­tors, begins today in Mont­gomery. It is expect­ed to last about two months and fig­ures to be the biggest sto­ry of the sum­mer in Alaba­ma. But the inves­ti­ga­tion of Canary could prove to be the far big­ger sto­ry, with poten­tial­ly major ram­i­fi­ca­tions on the nation­al stage.

After all, the Canary inves­ti­ga­tion could lead to indi­vid­u­als who have helped shape her polit­i­cal agen­da, such as for­mer Bush White House strate­gist Karl Rove and U.S. Cham­ber of Com­merce Pres­i­dent Tom Dono­hue. The inves­ti­ga­tion also could show that the Oba­ma Jus­tice Depart­ment is not as use­less as it cur­rent­ly appears, indi­cat­ing Attor­ney Gen­er­al Eric Hold­er is will­ing to “look back­wards” at appar­ent mis­con­duct of the pre­vi­ous admin­is­tra­tion. . . .