Dismissed on Suspicion of Lesbianism

There is no reason that Leslie Hagen should have been dismissed from her position at the Justice Department, where she worked as a "...liaison between the Justice Department and the U.S. attorneys' committee on Native American issues." By all reports, Hagen did her job well. She did an outstanding job, according to the last performance review she received:

Her final job evaluation lists five categories for supervisors to rank her performance. For each category, a neat X fills the box marked, "Outstanding." And at the bottom of the page, under "overall rating level," she also got the top mark: Outstanding.

Hagen's contract was not renewed, despite there being no one to fill the position after she left. Yet, Monica Goodling, who was intimately involved in ridding the Justice Department of those attorneys deemed not loyal enough to the Bush agenda, had a particular interest in Hagen that seemed to have little to do with Hagen's performance reviews:

The Justice Department's inspector general is looking into whether Hagen was dismissed after a rumor reached Goodling that Hagen is a lesbian.

As one Republican source put it, "To some people, that's even worse than being a Democrat."

...Someone who worked in Hagen's office says that in a 2006 meeting, senior officials were told that Hagen's contract would not be renewed because someone on the attorney general's staff had a problem with Hagen. The problem, it was suggested during the conversation, was sexual orientation — or what was rumored to be Hagen's sexual orientation.

One person at the meeting asked, "Is that really an issue?" But the decision had been made.

When George W. Bush goes away, do we get America back? Or will things like this keep happening?