Lost in the kerfuffle about the Gonzales firings of 8 US Attorneys is the fact that Chuck Schumer has a hidden agenda: acting not only as the Senator from New York but as well as the Attorney General of the U.S. He pushed for the appointment of a Special Counsel, wrote at least 2 letters to the Attorney General  resquesting updates on the investigation and demanding action on the CIA referral letter respecting the public identification of Plame,. He obtained from Deputy AG Comey the promise to appoint a special counsel and looked the other way when one was appointed outside the statutory and constitutional framework for such appointments. Both Comey and Fitzgerald were well-known to him at the time having worked in the Southern District of New York .

"McNulty doesn't know when to keep his mouth shut and his head down," says a Republican staffer on the Senate Judiciary Committee. "The amount of harm he has done to his own reputation by impugning the reputations of others is remarkable."

McNulty has made no secret within his circle of political allies that he has larger ambitions than being Gonzales's deputy.

"If I had to guess, he views himself as the logical replacement for Gonzales should he be forced out," says an acquaintance who says he's familiar with McNulty's thinking. "You have Schumer calling for Gonzales to resign, and who's close to Schumer? Former DAG Jim Comey and [special prosecutor and U.S. Attorney] Pat Fitzgerald. Both of them are close to McNulty, and if you look at who got pushed out, they're USAs who weren't part of the Comey/Fitzgerald/McNulty crowd."