A Blast from the Past

This article was written in September of 2003 as a possible explanation for why Ambassador Wilson's wife was 'outed' for being a CIA operative. It's as plausible a reason as any I've read, and chilling enough to be worth reprinting in its' entirety.

The Truth is Puttin’ on its Shoes: An Inquiry Into the "Innocent" Mr. Rove

A BUZZFLASH GUEST COMMENTARY
by James C. Moore, Co-Author of "Bush’s Brain," The Political History of Karl Rove

"A lie can travel around the world
while the truth is just putting on its shoes."
Mark Twain

I am very tired of writing about Karl Rove. Lately, though, I have felt a kind of moral obligation, and almost a patriotic duty to remind people of the man who really runs the White House. Politically, and strategically, nothing has happened in the Bush Administration without Rove’s imprimatur. Reporters have discovered Rove’s steely control in the form of what they call a "leak proof" White House. Nothing comes out of the Bush White House without Rove’s approval. Generally, that means nothing comes out of the White House.

Until Karl Rove wants something to leak.

Rove’s temper has always been his weak spot. He cannot seem to control his anger. When Ambassador Joseph Wilson wrote in the New York Times that there was no truth to the allegations that Iraq had tried to purchase yellowcake uranium from Niger, Rove is said to have gone "ballistic." No one who has known Rove for any period of time doubts that Rove was the one who orchestrated the leak, which "outed" Ambassador Wilson’s wife as a CIA agent. Rove has always made sure that his enemies knew he will strike back, and swing with deadly power.

Rove wasn’t just trying to intimidate Ambassador Wilson. If, as many believe, he is responsible for the leak, Rove wanted to send a message to everyone in the intelligence community that they all needed to keep their mouths shut. As the war was being sold, intelligence cooked, and the media spun, Rove and the White House had informed intelligence operatives and scientists that they were not to publicly repudiate the phony claims about aluminum tubes, which the White House falsely argued were part of an Iraqi gas centrifuge to make enriched uranium. One national reporter told me that calls to scientists and intelligence operatives to ask about the aluminum tubes, which turned out to be rocket bodies, yielded the confession the scientists and intelligence agents had been ordered to say nothing.

"We are not having this conversation," the reporter was told.

But if he leaked Ambassador Wilson’s wife’s name, Rove was clearly trying to tell everyone in the intelligence community that they needed to toe the line, or they might also end up living at risk. This, of course, is a scurrilous, cowardly, and unpatriotic act. To believe that Karl Rove had no knowledge of this leak, or that he was not involved, it is necessary to ignore his absolute control of all things political in the White House, his Machiavellian nature, and attention to every sparrow flying under the Bush sun.

But how did it happen?

There are a few ways Rove might have planned to exact his revenge. He could have made calls himself, to high profile reporters, or ordered staffers and political intermediaries to contact journalists with the authorization that they were speaking for "senior White House officials." Not surprisingly, "senior White House official" is Rove’s nickname among many reporters because Rove asks that the description be used virtually every time he talks to a reporter. It enables him to get out his perspective, and White House spin, without giving away his identity, and self-serving agenda. Historically, Rove has been very adept at keeping a layer of denial, and other operatives, between himself and his political misdeeds. This means there is a strong possibility that a lower-level staffer will end up taking the blame for the leak.

In this case, though, there are some telltale signs that Rove was still at the controls. Because Robert Novak wrote the original story about Ambassador Wilson’s wife, those of us who know how Rove has leaked to Novak for years became immediately suspicious. Novak has denied that "White House officials called me with a leak." When this language is parsed, it becomes clear that Rove may have managed to get a tip to his friend Novak through an intermediary, and then the columnist called Rove for confirmation. According to the Washington Post, a half dozen reporters got phone calls about the Ambassador’s wife, and, yet, it was only Rove’s friend, Robert Novak, who wrote a story. The rationale for the story, a specious motivation, was that Ambassador Wilson got the assignment to go to Niger because his wife was a CIA agent, and she made the recommendation. Is that an important enough piece of information to justify blowing the cover of a CIA agent?

Rove’s relationship with Novak is widely known in the Washington press corps. During the presidential campaign, when the chorus of questions was being asked about Mr. Bush, and the Texas Air National Guard, reporters wanted to know where Mr. Bush went during his time on assignment in Alabama. His commander said the future president had never shown up for duty. Rove told the campaign reporters that they were "making too much of a few missed meetings." In 48 hours, the exact language was used on network television by Novak, who described the controversy of Mr. Bush’s missing years as "a few missed meetings." Novak was not on the press plane to hear Rove’s original comments.

An uncontrolled temper may be Rove’s only weakness as a political counsel. In Ron Susskind’s Esquire Magazine article on Rove, he described sitting outside the presidential advisor’s White House office hearing Rove scream into the phone, "Tell him we’ll f**k him. We’ll f**k him like nobody ever has." During the presidential campaign, Rove lost his cool in front of a few hundred people on the tarmac in Manchester, New Hampshire, as I stood and watched while Rove screamed at my colleague Wayne Slater about an innocuous story of mostly recycled information.

No one, though, knows Rove’s vindictiveness better than John Weaver. Were it not for Karl Rove, Weaver might still be a leading Republican political consultant. In Texas, Rove and Weaver had been successful partners, until Weaver chose to go out on his own and build a client list. A few months later, Weaver hired an employee away from Rove. Before too long, as competition grew between Rove and Weaver, disgusting rumors began to circulate about Weaver’s personal life, and reporters and potential clients wondered about Weaver’s judgment. The stories, which many reporters have said originated with Rove, dried up Weaver’s business, and he left Texas. Eventually, Weaver became the lead political strategist to Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign. After McCain lost the bitter primary battle, Weaver discovered he was squeezed out of party work by Rove, who was now in charge of all things Republican. Weaver became a Democrat, an advisor to the Democratic National Committee, simply because Rove was never content to leave him alone.

Similar stories are innumerable in Rove’s political march to power. Anyone who has watched Rove’s rise in presidential politics, and has reported on his machinations, is not surprised to learn that Ambassador Wilson suspects Rove as being the source of the leak, or, as a minimum, a senior administration official who condoned the leak. Washington reporters, who have learned of Rove’s political discipline, are also immediately suspicious of the presidential advisor. It fits his historical pattern of behavior.

The circumstantial evidence is already in. And it points at Karl Rove.

And if the Bush Administration is serious about protecting this country, if Rove committed this treasonous act, he needs to be prosecuted under the Patriot Act he has so ardently supported.