Lawyer-bloggers are teeing off on the Justice Department. Glenn Reynolds has the roundup, and David Bernstein -- new to the Volokh Conspiracy -- provides the harshest rhetorical joust:

Let's see: little respect for state sovereignty (medical marijuana, same sex marriage, etc.), attempts to deny American citizens charged with terrorism-related offenses and arrested on U.S. soil access to federal courts, use and abuse of antiterrorism statutes for unrelated law enforcement purposes, and, as Instapundit reports, a nascent crackdown on that ever-present threat to American society, the pornography industry, in the middle of what is supposed to be a war on terrorism. Geez.

The best defense of Ashcroft that I've heard is that he's no Janet Reno. I don't think that's a particularly ringing endorsement.