Hire me please!

There are no standards left in politics. If there ever were they're long dead. Forget about the entire Iraq war. The pre-war intelligence was wrong and no one lost their job. Lost their job? Medals of Freedom have been issued. Promotions for Condi and crew. Job security for Wolfie. Rumsfeld is still there and looking more and more like Robert S. McNamara - glasses and all. Alberto "torture boy" Gonzales could very well be Justice for life soon after going from White House Counsel to Attorney General. Heck, two Army analysts who claimed that aluminum tubes sought by the Baghdad government were most likely meant for a nuclear weapons program rather than for rockets, a claim thoroughly disproven, have received job performance cash awards in each of the past three years! Those who can't do teach, those that can't teach teach gym and those who can't teach gym get high level presidential appointments. I don't know whether I'm disgusted or jealous.

And now we are going to have to suffer through Karl Rove, the "boy wonder" political strategist and his public relations troubles. Note how I said p.r. troubles and not political or legal troubles because there might be none so don't start the party just yet. I am refering to the outing of Valerie Plame an undercover CIA operative who was burned by two White House officials through a July 14, 2003 column by Robert Novak. Plame is married to Joseph Wilson who wrote an op-ed piece exposing the Iraq-uranium-Niger story that W highlighted in his State of the Union Address as being totally false after going to Niger on assignment for the CIA.

Rove who, as all cowards do, made a weasely statement through his weasely lawyer Robert Luskin telling NEWSWEEK magazine that Rove "never knowingly disclosed classified information" and that "he did not tell any reporter that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA." Rove's words on the Plame case have always been carefully chosen. "I didn't know her name. I didn't leak her name," Rove told CNN last year when asked if he had anything to do with the Plame leak. Notice the careful choice of words Rove and his lawyer have used since I'm sure his story will be he that he refered to "Joe Wilson's wife" never mentioning her name. Think he knew the exact wording of the "leak law" before he called Matt Cooper et al? Maybe he even got Alberto Gonzales to give him a legal opinion. Can you hear the echos of "It depends on what the definition of 'is' is."

The law requires a "knowing" disclosure of classified information specifically the name of a covert U.S. intelligence agent. And on July 11, 2003, three days before Novak outed Plame, Time magazine correspondent Matt Cooper was telling his bureau chief in an email, "Spoke to Rove on double super secret background for about two mins before he went on vacation...please don't source this to rove or even WH [White House]" So it's confirmed that Rove was a source for the outing of a CIA undercover agent and it's confirmed that at a minimum he has been peddling an elegant lie when he claimed, "I never mentioned her name." Plame was working on non-proliferation issues on weapons of mass destruction and not under diplomatic cover. Rove, on the taxpayer's nickel, dropped dime on Plame simply to send the message, "If you challenge this administration, even on fabricated claims, we will destroy you."

And don't think for a minute W didn't know Rove's participation in the leak. Remember what W said on September 30, 2003, "If there's a leak out of my adminstration I want to know who it is. If the person has violated law the person will be taken care of." No violation of law, no problem. "If there's a leak out of my adminstration I want to know who it is." Why? To give him a promotion? Rove after all is only Deputy White House Chief of Staff with room to move up one slot and they'll issue as many Medals of Freedom as they have to reward the death of any standards or decency in politics. "At long last, have you no sense of decency?" Yes, and I just got promoted for it.