It only seemed sporting not to return fire the Friday that Karl Rove was not indicted. After all, it was a tough day for Democrats, the left and the media. Many had spent months salivating for a Rove indictment. Hopes had not been so high since the time between last Election Day's bogus exit polls and the actual results.
Then special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald lowered the boom. There was no violation of the Espionage Act or Intelligence Identities Protection Act. There was no conspiracy to "out" Valerie Plame. There were perjury and obstruction indictments, but I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby was no Rove.
Sympathy cards almost seemed in order for our crestfallen fellow Americans.
But not for long. They would not let the lack of a Rove indictment get in their way. By the following Sunday, Democrats were demanding his resignation. Two weeks ago Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid called the Senate into closed session to expedite a report on the alleged misuse of prewar intel. Last week, he was lambasting Vice President Cheney. And those who see Iraq and every other war as another Vietnam want to turn the Plame-Wilson story into another Watergate. Never mind Libby's trial. Alas, something other than sympathy was required -- a good stiff counteroffensive.
The White House should try it sometime. Unless it likes seeing its credibility and poll ratings beaten down. If the White House won't defend itself -- and it hasn't since the 2004 election -- the public inevitably will draw its own dark conclusions in the face of the left's sustained "Bush lied" assaults in this war over the war. The ammo is certainly available, and the administration could make even more available by declassifying material.
In fact, the real tragedy of Plamegate is that White House officials even discussed Joseph Wilson's wife. Yes, why the CIA would send someone of his stripe to Niger is a good question. But rebutting his story on the merits would have been easy enough because about the only part of his tale that holds up is that he was in Niger.
Wilson didn't report to the CIA and State Department that documents showing an Iraq-Niger uranium deal were forged, as he claimed. Why? The United States didn't receive the bogus documents until eight months after Wilson's trip. His report wasn't passed around the administration in general or the vice president's office in particular, as he claimed. Why? "Because," the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee concluded, "CIA analysts did not believe that the report added any new information to clarify the issue . . . the CIA's briefer did not brief [Cheney] on the report. . . ." Because, the committee found, what Wilson reported back to the CIA actually bolstered the agency's belief that Iraq was trying to purchase uranium in Niger.
As for those 16 words in Bush's State of the Union address ("The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa"), the Butler Commission in Great Britain said this: "We conclude also that the statement in President Bush's State of the Union . . . was well-founded."
Did the administration pressure the intelligence community regarding Iraq's arms programs? The Senate committee "did not find any evidence" of this. Nor did the Robb-Silberman Commission, which reported that "analysts universally asserted that in no instance did political pressure cause them to skew or alter any of their analytical judgments."
Did the White House "manipulate" prewar intel? If so -- and that's by no means established -- it had company. The Clinton team was making the same claims as Bush's. So were other foreign governments. So were congressional Democrats prior to the Iraq war.
For starters, it's time the Bush White House -- not just the Republican National Committee or some Capitol Hill Republicans -- meet every Democratic charge with a counter-charge of hypocrisy and back the counter-charge up with video clips or transcripts.
It's instructive and fun. NBC's Tim Russert showed how when interviewing Sen. Ted Kennedy last Sunday. He asked the Massachusetts Democrat if someone talking about Iraq seeking nuclear weapons and "unmanned vehicles capable of delivering chemical and biological warfare agents" was misleading and manipulating intel? Kennedy said how "concerned" he was before being told that John Kerry had made this statement.
The ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee is similarly concerned. But here's what West Virginia Sen. Jay Rockefeller said before the war: "There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons. And will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years."
Was he manipulating prewar intel or trying to mislead the public? Or is he now trying to manipulate and mislead the public on the use of prewar intel?
The latter, of course. And the fact that even the ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee is engaging in such opportunistic politics should tell the White House it's time to fire back.
David Reinhard
