Well, this is interesting…Seems Rove has now met a second time behind closed doors with the U.S. House Judiciary Committee today, according to this breaking report from Washington Post which also includes a review of newly disclosed email showing he “and other high-ranking figures in the Bush White House played a greater role than previously understood” in the U.S. Attorney Purge.
WaPo reports “The e-mails emerged as Rove finished his second day of closed-door-testimony Thursday about the firings to the House Judiciary Committee.” He had previously met with Judiciary Committee members in early July.
Keep in mind, as you read the article, that their piece feeds off of an “hour-long interview with The Post and the New York Times this month”, so the piece is likely to offer a Rove-friendly framing to be taken with a grain of salt or three. Eg. “Rove described himself as merely passing along complaints by senators and state party officials to White House lawyers.”
Marcy Wheeler at emptywheel concurs there is much “Rove spin” throughout the piece. She also asserts the newly revealed email may well have come from Rove and/or his attorney Robert Luskin who have a habit of leaking friendly documents to media whenever convenient, and in hopes of controlling the public reportage. Papers like WaPo and NYTimes have been historically all too happy to serve them to that end over the years.
The paper also reports the WaPo/NYTimes interview was “conducted on the condition that it not be released until Rove’s House testimony concluded.” So the release of the piece would seem to signal that the behind-closed-doors testimony — about which our Judiciary sources have been incredibly tight-lipped — has now ended. Rove, and Harriet Miers, however, could still be called for public testimony before the committee according to the agreement between Bush Administration attorneys and the Judiciary Committee, as (questionably) brokered by the Obama White House. It also means that Judiciary sources may well begin revealing details and/or transcripts of the interviews soon, now that they’ve concluded (as per the agreement). So, of course, Rove is trying to get out in front of that with his own spin.
Here’s WaPo’s lede…
The e-mails and new interviews with key participants reflect contacts among Rove, aides in the Bush political affairs office and White House lawyers about the dismissal of three of the nine U.S. attorneys fired in 2006: New Mexico’s David C. Iglesias, the focus of ire from GOP lawmakers; Missouri’s Todd Graves, who had clashed with one of Rove’s former clients; and Arkansas’s Bud Cummins, who was pushed out to make way for a Rove protege.
UPDATE: NYTimes’ article confirms the emails came from Rove himself. Their lede is even more favorable to him, in his attempt to downplay his role in the firings of 9 Republican U.S. Attorneys who, among other things, were not pursuing phony “voter fraud” investigations enough for the GOP, or otherwise pursuing corruption charges against Republican officials.
As in WaPo’s coverage, NYTimes offers Rove’s spin that he “did not involve himself in the details of the dismissals” and merely “went along” with the firings (rather than helped orchestrate them).
Here’s a particularly fresh spin on the entire affair from Rove, that I don’t recall seeing before…
They were just “rotating” folks? Right.
Here’s the Times’ lede:
Mr. Rove, who on Thursday completed two days of testimony in a closed session with investigators from the House Judiciary Committee, said he could not answer one of the lingering questions that the panel had hoped to resolve: whether it was the White House that came up with the idea of firing the prosecutors.
“I can’t even tell you who brought it up,†Mr. Rove said earlier this month in the office of his lawyer, Robert D. Luskin.
Mr. Rove portrayed himself as having “a lot on my plate,†though some e-mail messages about his activities, which he provided as part of the interview, indicated Mr. Rove’s interest in the prosecutors, appointed by the president.
And again, in the Times piece, the “voter fraud” canard is forwarded by Rove:
Perhaps the answer, Karl, was that while election fraud by insiders such as yourself, is certainly a concern, “voter fraud” is not actually a substantive problem — at least not at the polling place — other than for Republicans who hope to use the specter of same as a way to limit which legal voters are actually allowed to cast their legal vote. Or for Ann Coulter, who actually did commit voter fraud. Several times, apparently. Though Rove didn’t bother to sic his prosecutors on her, oddly enough.
John Boyd, a Democratic New Mexico election attorney, by way of example of the GOP’s “voter fraud” initiative in NM, where David Iglesias was pushed out as USA, offered exclusive details to The BRAD BLOG in early 2007, on the thousands of phony “voter fraud” complaints brought to the U.S. Attorney in NM by Republican officials just before the 2004 election. Just one of those complaints — a 16 year old kid who filled out a registration form as a joke — out of thousands that bogged down the office, was found by Iglesias to have any merit whatsoever.
And, of course, our coverage of the GOP’s years-long, phony ACORN “voter fraud” canard is covered in hundreds of BRAD BLOG articles. The 2008 collection is here.
UPDATE 8/3/09: Did Rove break his agreement and illegally obstruct justice in giving his interviews to WaPo and the NYTimes? Attorney and Republican whistleblower Jill Simpson says he sure did…
Did Rove commit a crime? The applicable law is titled “Obstruction of proceedings before departments, agencies, and committees,” and Simpson says Rove violated it. Breaking the law carries a penalty of up to five years in prison. Says Simpson:
“He violated the congressional investigation by talking to the newspapers. The statute is clear . . . I think we have a bingo. Mr Rove ran his mouth and should be charged and sentenced to five years. . . . By releasing what he said, he has put all who may testify on notice to doctor their testimony (accordingly). That is why his testimony was supposed to be secret. Shame on Karl. But he has committed a crime; now time will tell what they do with it. Also it is clearly an intentional act.”
The bastards on the Judiciary Committee allowed rove to testify without being sworn under oath.
They got a lot of lies and they know it – that is why the “wink-wink” don’t demand an oath.
And yeah, I know, lying to congress is a crime, blah blah blah blah blah…
But allowing him to testify without taking an oath to tell the truth just signaled that the whole thing is another charade.
The Chief Oversight lawyer for the Judiciary Committee, Elliot Mincberg, discussed Rove’s testimony last month at a National Press Club Conference sponsored by VelvetRevolution. You can watch it here. http://vimeo.com/5683710
Voter fraud is not a non-existent problem, and it’s about to become a much, MUCH bigger problem, in a different permutation than people have been conceptualizing.
Several pushes for election system changes are converging to make wholesale “voter fraud” highly likely.
1) Push to eliminate physical signatures on voter registration. Instead, we will be (and already are, in some locations) registering voters on the Internet and out in the community on little Etch-a-Sketch electronic tablets.
2) Push to permanent absentee voting and forced absentee voting, and no-fault absentee voting, depending on what will be approved by the state. There is also a federal bill for no-fault absentee voting. All forms of absentee voting are almost entirely dependent on signature verification for authentication of the voter. By eliminating the physical signature, door swings WIDE open for wholesale electronic signature comparison fraud.
4) In other words: Combination of mail-in voting and signature elimination will enable wholesale bogus votes by insiders. In addition to votes by dead people and non-existent people, and in my mind a bigger and more imminent risk: stuffing lists with thousands of actual people who are unlikely to vote. Then, having an insider pre-vote them.
This would constitute wholesale “voter fraud” (though actually votes being cast by insiders using the space created by dumping infrequent or non-voting persons into the lists).
Now, as to the emphasis on blaming the world’s ills on Rove: Interesting article, important article, Brad, but some of the efforts to shift all blame to Rove seem to me to displace culpability from the ultimate insiders, the election officials.
Think about it. Ohio, 2004. While people chase Rove around the planet, absolutely no one (including Jennifer Bruner) has shown any interest whatsoever in investigating and prosecuting the election officials that enabled the problems of 2004 to take place.
AJ said:
I’ll disagree with you respectfully there, AJ. I know some of the folks in the “back room” at judiciary, and they are neither slouches nor “wink-winkers”. They mean business. And yes, the oath doesn’t mean much, considering that lying to Congress is illegal either way. Also, I’ve heard from one source, that he actually *was* sworn in. But that’s a second hand source that I can’t confirm in any way at this time.
And with all of *that* in mind, whether the folks in back are great or not, it doesn’t necessarily mean that the folks in front will bother to do anything with any of it. Particularly if Steny, Rahm and friends order otherwise. But we’ll see. Suffice to say, I’m not *quite* as certain in their perfidy as you are, even as I share your frustration with the entire mess. In spades.
Bev –
Thanks for filling in some holes there. As the coverage of the “voter fraud” aspect was largely secondary in this article, I used quite a bit of shorthand. I should have at least noted that it was in person voter fraud at the polling place which is the red herring here, as it’s incredibly rare. (May add a word or two to the original article to clarify there.)
Beyond that, thanks for the additional thoughts, on which I agree with you here, of course.
Brad – sure, lying to congress is against the law, but so was thumbing your nose and not showing up for 2 other subpoenas.
We will see how it plays out, but if they were serious about any of this, we wouldn’t even be bloggin’ about it as summer 2009 melts into the final “dog days”.
I don’t base my pessimism on the fact he was not sworn in – its the fact that this has been dragged out for years, subpoenas have been ignored, dem leaders took impeachment “off the table” (despite running on “accountability”, and now the administration sells out his base by proclaiming he is “looking forward.”
They got away with too much, too long, to assume that this is a diligent, honest effort.
No oath is just demonstrating where this is going.
Bev – if your point is that rove is not the “evil genius” that many claim and that he is really just a political hack that stands in front of the microphones and cameras creating distractions, your point is well-taken.
The whole “bush’s brain” thing was always counterproductive and actually enabled much of the criminality because attention was deflected.
And yes, the theft in OH deserves much more attention, but then so does FL, and other local elections (are any other state results this badly manipulated?)
Election officials may have “enabled the problems of 2004 to take place”, but they are just working on behalf of much more powerful interests – powerful elite that certainly are well-beyond rove’s status.
To the end that going after them might get them to tell us who they took their marching orders from, it could be productive. But let’s not kid ourselves either – to orchestrate the theft of 2 presidential elections and “catapult the propaganda” to get away with it could only have been done by a limited group of people.
Follow the money – I prefer to call them the folks behind the military-industrial/media complex.
not froget the NON-firing of Milwaukee’s (SE WI) US Attorney, Steven Buskupic. He was on the firing list and then, after he demonstrated his willingnes to prosecute voters such as Kimberley Jude who broke election laws, he was off the firing list.
He was amazingly willing to investigate voters accused of breaking the, but he was amazingly unwilling to prosecute or investigate election officials (e.g inMilwaukee, Madison, Neenah, Racine, and Kenosha) who broke WI election law (e.g. closing the canvass of votes without reconciling the number of ballots cast to the number of ballots handed out)
In one ward the number of ballots scanned byt he scanners was 40% higher than the number of ballots handed to electors. To adjourn the local board of canvasser without reconciling this discrepancy (or at least noting and explaining it on the official election reporting form, EB-104) is a violation WI Stats 7.51(2)(a)
US Attorney of Southeastern Wisconsin, Steven Biskupic, and U.S. attorney for New Mexico, David Iglesias should ALWAYS be brought upt together.
One bent to Rove’s diktat to prosecute on did not. One was taken of the firing’s list and one was fired.
To “Another Joe” – you say: “Election officials may have “enabled the problems of 2004 to take place”, but they are just working on behalf of much more powerful interests ”
We need to stop envisioning election theft as just about a presidential election. Coshocton County, Ohio had a staggering 6,800 write in votes for a sheriff — oh, about a thousand percent increase in what’s normal — and these were in the same hand, in the same writing instrument, but from different polling places. An inside job.
No investigation, no enforcement.
Yes, I say, if necessary go after the low hanging fruit and take out the crooked election officials. Without that enabling patchwork, the master plan suddenly gets more expensive, more risky, more difficult to achieve.
Bev – I don’t think you acknowledge what we are up against. Sure – all for going after fraudulent elections at ALL levels.
But most people are not hearing the evidence about stolen NATIONAL (presidential) elections and certainly are not hearing anything about local elections, even when in their communities. Virtually no one hears about fraudulent local elections.
Crooked election officials? For some, its the main prerequisite for the job. Sure, they are “low hanging fruit” that might lead to higher ups.
The “master plan” is not contingent on who the compromised people are that fill the role of the “crooked election official.”
Nor is it contingent on which moron stands in front of the cameras as candidates. There is another moron ready and willing to step up to the plate.
Free, fair, open, and verifiable elections are not going to happen by focusing on the bit players.
Oops, meant: Virtually no one hears about fraudulent local elections IN OTHER COMMUNITIES, especially in other states.
I agree, enforce laws, go after local officials when there is evidence of crimes. But, Michael Connell, chief IT consultant to Karl Rove and created websites for the Bush and McCain electoral campaigns, if going after the folks that carry out their order will be effective.
Oh yeah, he’s dead.
If Rove is truly concerned about “voter fraud”, then he will certainly oppose mail-in, or internet voting as opposed to in-person voting and in-person/multi-party verification of those votes:
No?
Yes it is.
To some of us, the emphasis on Rove the bogie-man is beginning to look like a strategy to take the heat off the election officials.
It makes no sense to protect the election officials who were perps. Grab them, flip them, sure. Or just grab them.
I have some perspective on how crooked election officials get into office in the first place. The perps are developing their own little farm teams and recruiting each other. Busting them down will deplete their pool of recruits and will get the more inept members of the farm teams in.
By the way, is Rove even a named defendant in the Ohio case?
bev – and just how to you come to the conclusion that there is such a limited pool of folks that can be compromised by various means to do the dirty work on the front lines of election fraud?
No one is claiming to “protect” criminals. My point is that we need to go after them, but it will only change things if we can work up the chain of command.
And that will not be possible without having a wider dialog that acknowledges that:
*systematic vote fraud is orchastrated much higher up than the local election people.
*the mainstream media “catapults the propaganda” before the election (with fraudulent polls and dishonest talking points) and then uses that propaganda to shift attention from the stolen elections to justifying the results.
*the folks that do this are smart enough to “compartmentalize” the operations, breaking it down into tasks where the front-line perpetrators do not have knowledge of the larger picture.
Yes – rove is the bogey man, always have been. But he likely knows much more, which is why he has been rewarded as a mainstream media pundit now.
All I am saying is that real change involves beginning a dialog of what we are up against and I don’t see that happening.
Until we start building that dialog, nothing else matters and any action just continues to hide the truth because it doesn’t begin to address the fundamental issues.
The country can walk and chew gum at the same time.
Throw rove in prison and throw crooked election officials in prison.
Since elections are fundamental to the existence of this country, try them all for treason. Treason, remember, is punishable by the death penalty. If they’re found guilty, sentence them to death.
I’m guessing that the actual killing a few crooked election officials by electrocution would put a damper on future election tampering.
As to Rove’s minor role in fixing elections, I’d like to agree and forget that he exists but Ohio anecdotes tell a different story: how Bush, Cheney, and Rove were in Columbus meeting on Nov. 4, 2008; how on Nov. 3 in the evening Rove predicted Obama’s victory after his IT operative, Jim Connell was deposed in court in what was to become a series of hearings in which Connell planned to tell all; however, Connell died in a plane crash two weeks later. Evidently the valiant attorneys did enough to stay Connell’s hand on Election Day, to take Rove’s finger out of the dike and allow the swell of public affirmation to sweep the nation.
Connell was in charge of maintaining the websites of the GOP, which were located somewhere in Tennessee, where also, I read, the machinery that could invade and defile electronic machines was located.
Connell was quite the religious guy. Reminds me how the Iranian power mavens justified the outcome of the recent election by means of passages from the Holy Qu’ran.
How much we might have learned from him. He was warned not to fly his plane–that it was quite possible that it was being tampered with.
I was writing a book about this when I was stricken with Bell’s Palsy. I’m recovering now and hope to get back to it soon.
Just goes to show you that GOP ingenuity is limitless–how they are running the show even now. It’s excruciating.
Sev.
Rove is a PIMP, ditto for Cheney.
Rove, Cheney and now imprisoned CIA Foggo all lived in Texas when they came up with the scheme to Sextort politicians along with now imprisoned DC madam Palfrey. .
http://fbicorruption.250free.com
http://www.defraudingamerica.com/robin_head.html
Does anybody have any faith in the Justice Department under the Obama Administration? Does anybody believe that this Administration along with the Justice Department is enabling the illegal behavior of the past administration? Does anybody believe that America will ever see justice for the alleged crimes of the past administration? Does anybody want to elect a different Democratic administration and press charges against this Attorney General and Obama for conspiring along with the past administration to sweep under the rug all past crimes?
You know, this strengthens the case for American fascism… that some prefer to call “corporatism”… this ceaseless privileging of high government officials and their friends, the regularity with which they elude Rule of Law accountability for crimes like treason and trashing Constitutional guarantees and wars of aggression and torture and election rigging…. Rove is a one-man coup d’ètat, and his big accountability moment is a little private chat with the Judiciary Committee and all the spin he wants in the MSM.
That’s fascism. The whole “some of us are more equal than others” bit is fascism… an elite above the law, with a general population whose rights are abused or nonexistent, with a constabulary that [mostly] knows the difference, defers to the elite and is free to treat others roughly and without regard for consequences.
Take the jerk who arrested Professor Gates. He is caught LYING on his report, and he gets a beer at the White House instead of a suspension or demotion or fired…. I guess they just don’t want to break his spirit, even though it was miss-applied in that case… and this mercy soothes the ire of the plutocrats who don’t want the president damping the authority of their goons.
No wonder people are gouging each other’s eyes out to get public office. No wonder people are devising ways to sell those seats to the highest bidder rather than lose that profit opportunity to the hopelessly prole voters.
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Rove-s-Spin-Lands-Him-in-C-by-Roger-Shuler-090803-502.html
Good one, 99.
Also Disillusioned, the first part, anyway!
Rove is slipperier than an eel, and probably has more hive members than a queen ant.
I wonder if going after Rove is like Tantalus reaching for fruit. So tempting, yet he continually evades our grasp.
There is a lot to be said for going after the local crooks. But to let Rove get away with murder (heh, figuratively speaking, of course!) is just too much to bear.