Is the Fix In on the 9/11 Panel?

According to the Washington Post, a Bush Legal Counsel called 9/11 GOP panelists just before Clarke testified:

"White House counsel Alberto R. Gonzales called commissioner Fred F. Fielding, one of five GOP members of the body, and, according to one observer, also called Republican commission member James R. Thompson. Rep. Henry A. Waxman, the ranking Democrat on the House Government Reform Committee, wrote to Gonzales yesterday asking him to confirm and describe the conversations.

Waxman said 'it would be unusual if such ex parte contacts occurred' during the hearing. Waxman did not allege that there would be anything illegal in such phone calls. But he suggested that such contacts would be improper because 'the conduct of the White House is one of the key issues being investigated by the commission.' "

So is the panel fixed? In case you did not already know it:

1. Philip Zelikow, the executive director, worked on the Bush-Cheney transition team. His former boss was Condoleezza Rice.

2. Commission member Jamie Gorelick was a senior official in the attorney general's office during the Clinton administration.

Since they were both close enough to the terror-related events surrounding the Clinton and Bush administrations to give evidence, did they then interview themselves about their roles in the failures? Is it mere coincidence that Zelikow heads the panel and Gorelick is one of the members allowed to see all the documents, while most of the others are relegated to seeing only the summary?