Opinion: Or, until today, “embedded attorney general”

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However legal historians evaluate Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, compilers of journalistic cliches are likely to enshrine him in a pantheon reserved for celebrities who came to be known by distinctive epithets.

It’s a select but motley group: Slain civil-rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.; fugitive heiress Patricia Hearst; disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff; presidential assailant John W. Hinckley; and, my favorite, domestic diva Martha Stewart. (If she had not reported to prison and was shot, she could have been ‘disgraced slain fugitive domestic diva Martha Stewart.’)

But Alberto Gonzales has given them some stiff competition with his custom-designed epithet, which popped up tonight on ABC News’ story about his resignation. You guessed it: “embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.”

It would be easy to excuse a newcomer to this country who thought that “embattled” was actually part of Gonzales’ official title. I did a Nexis search and found 318 EAGs in the past three months alone.

Now that he is stepping down, Gonzales should take a vacation -- maybe in earthquake-shattered Peru or (formerly) strife-torn Northern Ireland.