An alternative view is his personality used to be what you want (in theory) as both AG and SCOTUS justice - slow, deliberate, non-partisan.
I agree; but different times called for different measures. There was also too much of a feeling of "whew, that was close, but now we can get back to normal" instead of "let's make sure that never happens again".
There's slow, and then there's taking more than four years to prosecute high-profile crimes committed in plain view.