Karl Rove - Poor, Pathetic Victim

Just to keep updated: now "sources" are claiming that Rove found about Valerie Plame's identity from journalists (oh, hilarious irony!). Based on the alleged communication with Robert Novak and Matt Cooper, that actually seems pretty reasonable.

But here's my two issues (same as before):

• The Administration claimed to have talked directly with Rove about the whole affair and publicly cleared him from any "involvement." Now with each minor revelation, we find that he was ass-deep in this mess, even if he was just stuck in the middle of it. Not illegal surely. But someone in the White House is being VERY dishonest, and THAT is the overriding issue.
  
  
• Also, I just can't help thinking that if ol' Dubya was as pissed off about this leak as he originally claimed, he'd just walk down to Karl's office and say, "Hey, Turd Blossom. Listen good buddy, this whole thing is just getting out of hand, and let's face it -- we can't have these kinds of leaks. I took a firm public stand against this behavior, and I need you to just go ahead and tell the Special Prosecutor who told YOU about Valerie Plame. I ain't gonna fire you or nuthin', but I need ya to help us out here."

Because after all, Rove is not a journalist so why is he protecting his source? Sometime today, it was slipped into the press (what a coincidence!) that Rove doesn't actually remember which journalist told him ("I do remember it was a journalist, though."). Oh, how fuckin' convenient! Why didn't he just tell this story publicly two years ago? It would have incriminated neither him nor anyone else.

No, I don't think Rove is going to jail. But when exactly does the Bush Administration start acting like there are absolute standards for behavior, rather than just this soft moral relativism that has become the golden rule?

In the meantime, a new major report was released this week revealing direct and compelling links between Abu Ghraib and techniques taught and fostered at Gitmo. The media is too obsessed with the Rove sideshow to notice.

Andrew Sullivan has some compelling analysis.