A New Definition of "At-Will?"

Today's Sun posting about the Kangaroo Court contained this rather bizarre sentence:

The committee, set up by the Democrat-controlled legislature, is trying to decide whether the state's "at-will" employees need new protections after complaints that Ehrlich oversaw a purge of workers after he took office. Republicans have said a governor should be allowed to put his own team in place and that the probe is a matter of Democratic sour grapes.

Is there a new definition of "at-will" that I am not aware of? If there are protections in place, enacted by the legislature, for "at-will" employees in the executive branch, does that not make them no longer "at-will" employees?

"At-will" employees serve at the pleasure of the Governor. As we have routinely established, there are thousands of them in the state of Maryland. Most of the "at-will" positions were put in place during the Glendening years.

I have a funny feeling that the Kangaroo Court will continue to drag its feet into the 2006 gubernatorial election cycle. The Democratic- controlled committee will then wait and see what happens in November. I have a sneaking suspicion that these Democrats are going to drop all the talk about legislative protections if the people of Maryland are unfortunate enough to be saddled with a new Democratic administration.

EDIT (9:57 PM): The Sun has removed the quote from the new copy of the story. Interesting...