A tough way to make a living

Couldn't happen to a better licker of Bush's boots.

Buried by legal bills and hard up for cash, former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales hit the college speaking circuit last month hoping to rake in big bucks. Instead, he's been raked over the coals, heckled or flat out turned down by students whose institutions he charges exorbitant fees to tap his amnesiac mind.

And things aren't likely to get any easier for Gonzo (as he's known in the tabloids) now that he has been identified as among the top Bush White House officials involved in discussions about the fate of the destroyed interrogation tapes.

Even before the CIA tapes scandal, Gonzales had become the subject of angry editorials and protests on campuses near and far. At the University of Florida last month, he was viciously heckled to the point that two students wearing black hoods and orange jumpsuits blaring the words "civil liberties"- impersonating prisoners at Abu Ghraib - walked on stage and stood next to the former attorney general as he spoke. (Until they were arrested.)

It was a tough way to make $40,000. And it stands to get tougher. Gonzales is scheduled to speak on Feb. 19 at Washington University in St. Louis, where more demonstrations are expected, according to the student body president.

The talent agency Gonzales signed up with to get him speaking gigs at colleges and universities doesn't seem to be having a ton of luck. The agency, Greater Talent Network, based in New York, sent out a blast email to schools pitching Gonzales as a top-notch get - without mentioning, of course, that he's raising money for his legal defense fund. (Given the uproar, it's a good thing the agency promises its clients "the experience to handle any crisis, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week." Though one crisis the agency cannot handle is questions from reporters about Gonzales' popularity - or lack thereof - on the speaking circuit. "No one here would answer questions from a reporter," snapped one of the associates who answered the agency's phone, before she hung up on us.)