[Mb-civic] Rove in the spotlight Jul 15th 2005 From The Economist Global Agenda

Fri Jul 15 16:35:10 PDT 2005

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Rove in the spotlight
Jul 15th 2005
>From The Economist Global Agenda

A scandal over the unmasking of a CIA agent, which has already seen a
journalist sent to jail for refusing to reveal her source, is now putting an
uncomfortable spotlight on Karl Rove, George Bush¹s chief political adviser

UNTIL recently, the questions were largely theoretical. How far does a
journalist¹s right to protect sources extend? Is the free flow of
information more important than a criminal investigation? Judith Miller, a
New York Times reporter, has gone to jail for refusing to say who revealed
the identity of a CIA agent to her, unleashing a flurry of articles on these
academic questions. But new revelations in the scandal have dragged the
spotlight from journalists back to politicians‹and in particular to Karl
Rove, President George Bush¹s chief political guru.

In 2002, before the Iraq war, a former American ambassador named Joseph
Wilson went to Niger for the CIA to investigate claims that Saddam Hussein
had sought uranium there. Mr Wilson found the claims bogus, but Mr Bush
included the Niger story in his case for going to war nonetheless. In 2003,
after the war, Mr Wilson wrote an article denouncing Mr Bush¹s use of the
Niger claim. Soon after, a conservative columnist, Robert Novak, revealed
that Mr Wilson¹s wife, Valerie Plame, was a covert CIA operative.

Mr Novak¹s column was meant to undercut Mr Wilson¹s article‹he suggested
that Mr Wilson¹s Niger trip came at his wife¹s behest, making it seem as
though he would not otherwise have been sent. But in disclosing Ms Plame¹s
identity, Mr Novak moved the story away from Niger and uranium and towards
the ³senior administration officials² who had told him she was a spy.
Someone, perhaps one of Mr Novak's sources, also told several other
journalists including Ms Miller. The result was that Ms Plame¹s covert
career was ruined, seemingly in revenge against her husband. It looked, at
the very least, to be an unusually shameful bit of political
street-fighting.

And, potentially, a crime. The Intelligence Identities Protection Act of
1982 makes it illegal to expose undercover spooks. This put pressure on Mr
Bush to appoint a special prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, to find the
leaker. Early speculation centred on several senior aides, but attention was
before long firmly focused on Mr Rove. This delighted Democrats, who would
dearly love to bring him down. The man known to Mr Bush as ³Boy Genius² and
³Turdblossom² was the architect of the president¹s two election wins, and is
credited by friends and enemies alike with almost supernatural powers of
political cunning.

How, then, did the trickle of rumours surrounding Mr Rove become a stream
and then a flood over the course of the investigation? In his efforts to get
to the bottom of things, Mr Fitzgerald sought to have the New York Times¹s
Ms Miller and Matthew Cooper, a reporter for Time magazine, jailed for
refusing to co-operate. Time caved in, releasing Mr Cooper¹s e-mails and
notes related to the story. These confirmed that he had spoken to Mr Rove.
And on Sunday, Newsweek magazine published excerpts from one such e-mail
from Mr Cooper to his editor, confirming that Mr Rove told the reporter that
Ms Plame worked for ³the agency².

The case is, however, not yet closed, at least not the criminal case. To
have violated the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, the exposer must
be authorised to see classified information, must know the officer is
undercover, and must know that the CIA is taking ³affirmative measures² to
conceal the operative¹s identity. Mr Cooper¹s e-mail does not make clear Mr
Rove knew Ms Plame was undercover, and Mr Rove has claimed he did not know
she was a covert officer when he spoke about her employer to reporters.

However, the CIA was indeed taking ³affirmative measures² to protect her
identity. The agency has since kept her from publishing an article
clarifying what happened, saying it could damage their work. Her front
company was exposed. So regardless of whether anyone will be convicted of a
crime, the affair has the potential to become highly embarrassing for the
Bush administration. Mr Novak spoke of not one but two senior administration
sources who told him about Ms Plame. Mr Bush has said he will fire anyone
found to have broken the law and take the ³appropriate action² against
anyone who leaked classified information.

With a fight looming over the Supreme Court, Democrats may see the Plame
affair as an opportunity to weaken Mr Bush at a crucial moment

This week saw the first signs that the administration is getting rattled. In
three consecutive daily press conferences, Scott McClellan, Mr Bush¹s press
secretary, faced a fusillade of hostile questions from the usually compliant
press pool. He responded repeatedly that the administration would not
comment on an ongoing investigation. This struck the journalists as
particularly fishy, given that Mr McClellan had previously been happy to
discuss the affair, categorically denying the involvement of Mr Rove and
other advisers. Mr Bush too intoned the ³ongoing investigation² mantra, when
asked about the affair on Wednesday. Why the sudden silence?

The administration may be hoping that the less said now, the greater the
chance that it will all blow over. If Mr Rove is cleared of breaking the law
by the special prosecutor‹perhaps because it cannot be proved that he knew
Ms Plame was undercover‹Mr Bush may decide that the ³appropriate action² for
leaking secret information is no action at all. The administration that
prides itself on its discipline would then look weaselly. But that might
seem a better option than admitting any wrongdoing with a sacking,
especially of someone as important as Mr Rove. After all, no further
investigation into the matter is likely to come from a Republican-dominated
Congress. And the battle over Mr Bush¹s first Supreme Court
nominee‹following the retirement of Sandra Day O¹Connor‹has far more
long-term political importance than Mr Rove¹s fate, and may divert
Democrats¹ attention from the Plame affair.

But on the other hand, with the Supreme Court fight looming, Democrats may
see the Plame affair as an opportunity to weaken Mr Bush at a crucial
moment. A new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll shows his approval ratings
in negative territory, and for the first time more respondents rated him
negatively than positively on ³being honest and straightforward². And while
he might like to stonewall until this passes, he may not be able to. The
press corps is in high dudgeon, feeling misled by the administration while
one of their own is in a prison jumpsuit for protecting an administration
source. They are unlikely to let the matter drop.