Party over Country
I haven't written here yet about the Plame/Rove imbroglio, except indirectly through the entry about Judith Miller last week. Trust me, it's not for lack of thinking about it or reading about it. I've gone from wild hope to despair to a kind of numb passivity. At this point, I've been disappointed too many times by scandals that should have brought down the whole Bush house of cards, but haven't: Enron and Halliburton, fixed intelligence around the Iraq War, missing WMD, coercive tactics and administration lies around the Medicare prescription benefit, propaganda, bribed columnists and "Jeff Gannon"... it goes on and on.

The outing of Valerie Plame, coming as it did in response to the exposure of the Niger/yellowcake lie used to justify the Iraq War, always struck me as the worst one, the one that even Republicans couldn't really spin away. Obviously, I was wrong about this just as I've been wrong every time I thought the American people would finally say "No more." There are no universally accepted facts and explanations any longer; there's no shame on the part of the right wingers, and the harder they're pushed--Cheney, DeLay, Norquist and Rove, four of the five architects of the modern Republican Party (Dobson is #5; he's just a bigot), are now under ethical clouds of differing shades and sizes--the more viciously and desperately they'll fight back. Sadly, their followers put narrow party interests ahead of the national interest almost every time.

My favorite of all the attack lines tried out by the RNC and spokespeople this week was that this investigation is "a partisan issue." To them, it is; others might see things differently.

Following the September 11 attacks, Democratic leaders, and the large bulk of Democratic voters, stood staunchly behind a president most of them believed wasn't even legitimate. When Bush made his speech to the nation on Sept. 20, 2001, the Democratic leadership for the first time ever declined to use their airtime afterward. Al Gore, who had won a plurality of votes ten months earlier, went public to salute Bush as "my president." One lone Democratic House member, out of about 210, voted against authorizing the use of force in Afghanistan. Every Democratic Senator, if my memory holds, supported the use of force against the Taliban. The PATRIOT Act was also passed on near-unanimous votes, with only the principled, partially process-based dissent of Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI). (Later, of course, significant numbers from both parties would sound a different tune about passing complex legislation hugely expanding government powers, that most hadn't even read.)

Even in the Iraq debate some 16 months later, I think most of the Democrats who supported the use of force ultimately were saying: We trust the President to provide for the national defense. Some felt differently, to be sure; they'd seen how triple amputee and Vietnam veteran Max Cleland had been slimed and smeared in his Georgia Senate race, and read with dismay statements like Andy Card's explicitly comparing the selling of the war to marketing efforts for new product rollout. But many--including right-wing bugaboos Kerry and Clinton--authorized force with the explicit rationale that they trusted the President to use it prudently.

Now imagine that Al Gore had been awarded the presidency, had ignored all the warning signs--including the memo dated 36 days before the attack, titled "bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S."--and had suffered the catastrophe. Further suppose that he'd sat in that classroom, seemingly dazed, for long minutes after getting word, and that he'd flown around the country, delegating on the ground authority to Vice-President Lieberman, and projected a general attitude of uncertainty on the terrible day.

How long would it have taken for Tom DeLay to call for impeaching President Gore? Would Rush Limbaugh have said "We stand with our president," or would he have fulminated in rage against the Gore Administration's disgraceful dereliction of its sworn duty to protect the country? Would FOX News--and its star commentators Hannity and O'Reilly--have pledged support for the president, or joined DeLay in calling for his scalp?

What would Karl Rove have advised his Republican clients to do?

I don't consider myself a hyper-partisan. I really believe there are "good Republicans"--and I positively know there are "bad Democrats." No side has a monopoly on good intentions or even good ideas.

But it's clear to me that one party constantly puts the pursuit, retention and usage of power ahead of every other consideration, up to and including national security and the public interest. And it's not the one I'm registered with.