The Blame Plame Game

Look people. The President has only one path. Rove and Libby have to go.

Let's make this really simple. It is now very clear that both Turdblossom and Scooter lied (why are we paying these guys salaries? They can't even come up with cool nicknames). They either lied when they were questioned directly by Dubya (now that's a nickname!) or they lied to the Grand Jury and the FBI.

So Bush either knowingly takes the advice of liars or employs perjurers. It seems to me that there is no other way to spin this. This would be amusing if there weren't 1700 dead and 48,000 injured Americans and over 120,000 dead Iraqis. Rove lied and lots of people died.

We got into this terrible war as a result of stupid Neo-Con foreign policy and sheer ignorance of what is fueling the terrorists. Rove was one of the main geniuses behind this plan.

Let me re-cap the sordid tale for you. Desperate for some way of tying Saddam to Al Qaeda, Dick Cheney asked the CIA to investigate a possible Iraqi uranium purchase from Africa.

The CIA, at the suggestion of nuclear counter-proliferation specialist Valerie Plame, sent a man very qualified to investigate the claim, Ambassador Joe Wilson. Wilson also happened to be Plame's husband. Wilson found nothing to substantiate the Cheney claim. Further, it was determined that the original claim was a fabrication. Who did the fabricating? We may never know.

Cheney and Bush chose to ignore Wilson's findings and claimed in the 2003 State of the Union that Saddam was seeking yellowcake uranium from Africa. Wilson, irate that Bush & Co. chose to ignore his findings wrote an editorial critical of Bush and his rationale for the war.

As the mastermind behind the war, Rove needed to smear Ambassador Joe Wilson. Wilson, very well-spoken, carried too much stature. Rove was certain that the story would not die with Wilson on the case.

Rove searched high and low for some ammo. Thanks to a poorly timed memo from the CIA to Colin Powell, Rove learned some dirt on Wilson and Plame. Despite the clear marking on the memo of "Secret" Rove decided that spinning the argument for the war was more important than hiding the identity of a covert CIA operative.

So Rove planted the story, with some reporters friendly to the administration and the GOP, that Wilson was given the job of investigating the yellowcake uranium by his wife, a CIA employee. Which was a falsehood in it's own right. Plame did not have the authority to send her husband to Africa. However, back to point, it's not clear how the nepotism charge was supposed to taint Wilson but I'm sure that the phrase liberal democrat was bandied about.

The problem is that leaking any information about an under-cover operative is illegal. Treasonous in my opinion. By the way, President Bush (41, not 43) agrees with me.

Dubya, ever mindful of his public perception says that he will 'take care' of the leakers in his administration. So he investigates. He comes back and says that, definitively, no one in his administration leaked the name of a CIA operative. Both Rove and Libby are named directly as being free of leak taint. For over two years that was the party line.

Until Special Prosecuter Fitzgerald successfully had adminstration-friendly journalists found in contempt. This broke the case open. The public learned for the first time that, in fact, Rove and Libby were intimately involved with the leak.

So there you have it. The Blame Plame Game in a nutshell. An amateur move that endangered the lives of countless undercover operatives. The Watergate Burglars (or Rat Fuckers as they preferred to be known) were much more creative in their attempts to knock off their competition...the Canuck Letter was sheer brilliance. The Rove smear was just lame and ineffective.

So you have to wonder what happened...did Rove tell Dubya that he did in fact leak the info and Bush gave him a pass? Did Rove lie to Bush? Did Rove lie to the Grand Jury? It doesn't really make a difference.

Rove can't be trusted with State Secrets.

None of this is news to people that have been asking for the truth behind the war. We have been asking for several years for the proof that Saddam was tied to Al Quaeda. Little of the evidence is forthcoming and the little bit that was made public turns out to have been fabricated and shoved into the spotlight by Rove and Libby (and let's not forget about Ari Fleischer).

There are many questions. But none of them really matter. The President thinks that this comes down to indictments. But it doesn't, it comes down to how much bullshit the American public can stomach.

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Currently I'm listening to Not Home Anymore from the album "Strangers Almanac" by Whiskeytown