More On Gonzales

I am still reading through your comments about my interview on Monday with former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. I appreciate that most people understand what I was trying to do, which is basically just get the man's side of things.

Mr. Gonzales has given just four interviews since leaving office in September 2007, to which the New York Timesgood! that'll do! no need to hear more! (you can read what their fairly scathing editorial here).

One of his few interviews was with TMM regular contributor and syndicated columnist, Ruben Navarette. Another was with Evan Perez, of The Wall Street Journal, and one was with NPR's Juan Williams, who was sitting in for Bill O'Reilly on the Fox News Channel.

The fourth was with me.

I have long been interested in Mr. Gonzales' take on things. The Justice Department is an object of awe, fascination and reverence for many Americans, especially to those, I might guess, who remember the department's role in advancing the civil and human rights of minorities.

I wondered how it felt to rise so high — grandson of immigrants, who were possibly undocumented, son of a construction worker, the second of eight kids — to go to Harvard Law School, to become a partner at a major Texas law firm, a Texas Supreme Court judge, White House Counsel, Attorney General (the first Latino American to hold such posts, no less).

And how did it feel to do all that only to be forced to resign after members of your own political party complain that they have lost confidence in you?

And because I believe it is best to talk to people, rather than about them, I wanted to ask him.

So I did.

There were no ground rules and no preconditions, except that Mr. Gonzales preferred to conduct the interview live, which was fine with me.

He came by himself, no handlers or spin miesters.

Some people question the amount of time we gave Mr. Gonzales, but I really don't know what to say about that. There was a lot to talk about. I still have more I want to ask him, if you want to know the truth.

I bet many of you do, too.