Bush's Washington Waterloo
As the Walls start Tumbling Down
by Tom Scott
The current series of major scandals involving some of the most powerful Republicans in Washington have now hit and hit hard to disrupt President Bush, his neocon agenda, distract aides and allies, and entwine political problems for an already weakened administration, that even party strategists and White House advisers are clueless in the shock and awe. They have brought these problems on themselves with lies.
With Deputy White House Chief of Staff Karl Rove returning to a grand jury for the fourth time, following Miller's second visit, associates said Bush's 'Turd Blossom' has been preoccupied with his serious legal troubles, a diversion that some say contributed to the already doomed handling of Harriet Miers' nomination to the Supreme Court. White House officials are privately bracing for the possibility that Rove and many other administration officials will be indicted within the next two weeks. The guilt in Washington is evident. The players have been caught. Their lies have been documented. Their boat is taking in water, faster and faster.
Even many of Bush's partners on Capitol Hill are spending time defending themselves as the president's legislative initiatives flop and flounder. The criminal indictment of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) for alleged campaign funding illegalities has thrown Republicans into one of the most corrupt periods of their 11-year reign and created an inner battle for just who is in the leadership role. With Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) dealing with a subpoena in an insider-trading investigation, a bipartisan majority led by John McCain (R-Arizona) rebuked Bush over torture policies and Ron Paul (R-Texas) has exposed Bush and his outlandish attempt of using Martial Law over the American people.
Like never before, the scandals are being sprayed from every direction and each have little or no direct connection with one another, but their accumulation has slammed a White House already beset by political problems stemming from the lies that led to the Iraq war, Hurricane Katrina and higher than high gasoline prices, according to Republican advisers close to the Bush Boat, all of whom said they could speak candidly only if they were not identified by name. It's that bad. The sky is truly falling in and Bush is blinking faster than ever before. The Lack of Leadership is obvious, if there truly ever was any and there is no road for recovery for this administration. They have over drawn Americas bank account and Americans are simply fed up.
"The Rove thing has gotten to be enormously distracting," said one adviser to the White House. "Knowing the way the White House works, being under subpoena like this, your mind is far from your work, it's on the crimes that they committed, the manipulation of America." And now the quiet whispers of Impeachment swirl Washington like a man made natural disaster as Bush hits his lowest of lows. Many say Resignation, but Impeachment seems to be the word. "This is what happens when you tamper with election results - not once, but twice."
"It is the perfect storm," said Joseph E. diGenova, a Republican and former independent counsel, who noted that so many investigations could weigh on an administration. "People have no idea what happens when an investigation gets underway. It's like getting punched in the stomach." It was going to happen sooner or later and for Americas sake, the sooner shall be the better course.
With the current problems on the table, other reports indicate that Republicans are particularly worried about the sprawling investigations of Jack Abramoff, whose business and political dealings regularly brought him into contact with dozens of lawmakers and top White House officials. And worried they should be. Among insiders, he was one of the most familiar faces among the generation of operatives and lobbyists who came to play when Republicans took control of Congress in 1994. He was even more inside than Jeff Gannon and Gannon if you will remember got up and inside a lot.
"But the one that people are most worried about is Abramoff because it seems to have such long tentacles," said former congressman Vin Weber (R-Minn.), a lobbyist with close ties to the White House. "This seems to be something that could spread almost anywhere, . . . and that has a lot of people really worried." Oh, what a tangled web we weave.
The Abramoff scandal has already resulted in two direct casualties: David H. Safavian, Rove's former business partner who was serving as the top White House procurement official, then resigned prior to his arrested on charges that he lied about and impeded an investigation into his dealings with Abramoff. And Timothy E. Flanigan, Bush's nominee for deputy attorney general of all positions, the number two job at the Justice Department, withdrew last week after questions were raised about his interactions with the lobbyist. It just gets deeper and deeper and deeper. How can Americans trust such nominee decisions by a burning Bush? We can't and aren't as reflected in the recent PEW Poll.
"The Abramoff thing is a lingering ghost to everybody," said GOP lobbyist Charles Black. "I don't know how many others are going to be caught up in it."
Twin investigations of Abramoff by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee and a multi-agency federal task force appear likely to tar a host of lawmakers the White House has relied on for passage of critical but questionable legislative initiatives. At the same time, the House ethics committee, which has been essentially shut down over a stupid staffing dispute, is expected to get back in business and look into the deadly allegations against DeLay and nearly a dozen other lawmakers, Democrats included. This is where the Abramoff and unrelated investigations could start to merge, including those of 26 Representatives that were bought by DeLay.
House Administration Committee Chairman Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio), a DeLay ally, is facing questions about ties to Abramoff, including his participation in a golf outing in Scotland that the lobbyist organized in 2002. And Rove allies have also been entangled in the Abramoff investigation. One is Ralph Reed, the former Christian Coalition leader who has struggled during a ridiculous campaign for lieutenant governor of Georgia to shake off suggestions that he received Indian gambling money to mount a lobbying effort against rival casinos. Sources say that he will not survive and when truth be known, he shouldn't. Many Republicans are now calling Washington, Bush's Waterloo. The Washington Waterloo.
The current atmosphere is not what Bush envisioned as a candidate in 2000. Coming off the Clinton years, which were dominated by independent counsel investigations and the impeachment of the president, Bush vowed to run a cleaner and more ethical Washington. "In my administration," Bush told voters in Pittsburgh in October 2000, "we will ask not only what is legal but what is right, not what the lawyers allow but what the public deserves." This of course, was just more campaign spins, lies and rhetoric that have since filled the Potomac full.
It was somehow a vow that was welcomed in a capital weary of scandal, and the Bush Boat of Lies made it through the first term without being found out strongly due to set up press conferences and an uneducated and 'hands tied' mainstream media. With the no independent counsel statute and congressional oversight committees in the hands of the president's party, the instruments of political investigations were controlled and limited but the flat out lies, like the invasion of Iraq, that have surfaced over the last couple of years have finally caught up to the once though of righteous right-winger's who have displayed a consistent tendency to lean more neocon. And NeoCons we have come to find out, they are.
Scandal historically has ripened in second terms, including Watergate for Richard M. Nixon, the Iran-contra affair for Ronald Reagan, and the Monica S. Lewinsky investigation for Bill Clinton. "It always comes back," said Larry J. Sabato, a University of Virginia scholar who has written on Washington scandals. "There may be a couple of dry years occasionally, but it is a style of American politics -- always has been, always will be. And now it's back with a vengeance." This Bush administration cannot survive the crimes they have committed nor should they.
Some administration allies lament the return of the scandal culture. "There was essentially none of that for the first five years," said Indiana Gov. Mitchell E. Daniels Jr. (R), Bush's first budget director. "That doesn't make the current situation any easier to watch." So then why Mr. Daniels did you participate we must ask? These scandals were being played out during the first five years you were budget director one must understand. Now they have surfaced. Could you not balance our checkbook? One look at our deficit says it all yet Daniels says scandal was not present during the first five years.
Of course there will always be a few that see politics behind the investigations. "Some of it is cyclical politically," said Leonard A. Leo, who has taken leave as executive vice president of the conservative Federalist Society to help promote the Miers nomination. The same Society that John Roberts lied about being a member. And Roberts, we will leave Roberts for another day soon to come. Roberts should have never happened. Far to many insiders say that he too will have his Waterloo.
Several Republicans close to Bush said they believe the CIA leak investigation has taken a particular toll, reducing Rove's role in key decisions and prompting Bush to rely on other, less devious advisers. One well-connected outside adviser cited the Miers pick as an example. He said even if Rove considered the selection a risk or mistake, he knew he was in no position to press Bush on it. And a mistake it will become. Just as Roberts will sooner than later be found out. It was all rushed through far too fast and the American people see that now.
"My sense is Rove knows he has spent a lot of so called political capital with the president on this CIA leak case," one adviser said. "No matter how close 'Turd Blossom' is to the president, there is a limit of how much capital you can spend with your partner in crime." "And they will continue to act like nothing is wrong."
Two Republicans close to the White House said officials are nervous that special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald will indict Rove and Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, the two most powerful staffers in the federal government, within two weeks. While the idea struck many on the Bush Boat as impossible a few months ago, now the common assumption is that both men are in deep trouble as the walls start tumbling down. They did in fact, bring it on, themselves. But this investigation is just the tip of the iceberg. And then there's Cheney. The list of Liars and Events is long and the Water is about to burst this Gate wide open.
