In an appearance this morning on Bloomberg television’s Margaret Carlson program, conservative columnist Robert Novak has coined a new defense for embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales: he’s a dummy, but only one of a great number of dummies that Bush imported with him from Texas. In fact he’s not even particularly dumb considering the low-IQ level of the entire group. Here are some excerpts from the transcript:

NOVAK: Margaret, the president can get rid of him any time he wants to. There’s no political setback. It would be a benefit. The president is stuck with these subpar people he brought up from Texas. That’s a failing on President Bush’s part… the Democrats that are having trouble with serious questions like funding the iraq war, deciding what to do on it, passing legislation. And so pounding on this poor Gonzalez who never should have been in a high government post in the first place is all they can do. And the Republicans, they decided there’s enough of it, but let me tell you, they think he ought to go, too . . .

NOVAK: He’s terrible. He shouldn’t be there. But there’s a lot of bad people in this administration…