Al “The Torturer” Gonzales is in the witness chair in Washington today. Readers are invited to keep track and report, particularly for Arkansas angles that might get overlooked in broader coverage. Since Karl Rove button man Tim Griffin, shoved into a U.S. attorney job in Little Rock for political reasons, started this mess, some Arkansas angles seem likely.

UPDATE: truthout.org is promising real-time coverage.

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UPDATE II: Gonzales is blaming the Arkansas Times for firing Bud Cummins, after a fashion. In congressional testimony, he cited an Insider item we did in December 2005 that indicated Cummins might not serve out Bush’s second term. That, he now says, is one reason why they put Karl Rove’s boy Tim Griffin into the job. Uh huh.

UPDATE III: Lest you have any doubt what the Rove plan was for political hit men like Tim Griffin — fire-tested in the Democratic voter suppression effort in Florida, reports say — get a load of this in the Balitmore Sun. As our editorial says: Resign, Tim.

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For six years, the Bush administration, aided by Justice Department political appointees, has pursued an aggressive legal effort to restrict voter turnout in key battleground states in ways that favor Republican political candidates, according to former department lawyers and a review of written records.

The administration intensified its efforts last year as President Bush’s popularity and Republican support eroded heading into a midterm battle for control of Congress, which the Democrats won.

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