You might call this circular reasoning.

Monica Goodling testified last month that Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty had told her not to join him in a closed-door meeting with the Senate Judiciary Committee because her presence might raise questions about White House involvement in the firings.

When asked about that today, McNulty confirmed that that had happened. But he had a different explanation why.

Here's his story: he thought that the Justice Department had made the firings at its own initiative, he said. It was his "own view" that the firings were not political and were based on substantive reasons. So he didn't see any reason to have the White House liaison in the meeting, because she was a political figure. Got that?