Nobody Owes Karl Rove an Apology

Wanker of the day, David Broder, writes in the Washington Post that Karl Rove is due an apology from people who suspected he was behind the outing of CIA undercover agent Valerie Plame in 2003. This comes on the same day that Richard Armitage was finally allowed to speak publicly about his role in the case.

“It was a terrible error on my part,” Mr. Armitage said in an interview. He added, “ There wasn’t a day when I didn’t feel like I had let down the President, the Secretary of State, my colleagues, my family and the Wilsons. I value my ability to keep state secrets. This was bad and I really felt badly about this.”

Mr. Armitage also confirmed that he was the anonymous government official who talked to Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward in June 2003 about Valerie Plame Wilson, the C.I.A. officer, in what is the first known conversation between an administration official and a journalist concerning her.

Mr. Armitage, who has been criticized for keeping his silence for nearly three years, said he had wanted to disclose his role as soon as he realized that he was the main source for Robert D. Novak’s column, published on July 14, 2003, which identified Ms. Wilson as a C.I.A. intelligence officer.

But he said held back at the request of Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the prosecutor. “He requested that I remain silent,” Mr. Armitage, said.

Expressing irritation over assertions in some newspaper editorials and on some Internet blogs that, by his silence, he had been disloyal to the Bush administration, Mr. Armitage said that he had followed Mr. Bush’s repeated instruction to administration officials to cooperate with the Fitzgerald inquiry.

“I felt like I was doing exactly what he wanted,” he said.

Mr. Armitage testified three times to the grand jury, the last time in December 2005. “I was never subpoenaed,” he said. “I was a cooperating witness from the beginning.”

He said he never hired a lawyer and did not believe that he needed one. “I had made an inadvertent mistake, but a mistake in any event. I deserved whatever was coming to me. And I didn’t need an attorney to tell the truth.”

That ought to put some questions to rest but it doesn't let Rove, Libby or Cheney off the hook, especially since Fitzgerald's investigation hasn't concluded and Libby's trial has yet to begin.

So, while David Broder may want the masses and his fellow journalists to bow before the great, innocent and maligned Rove in a case in which Broder admits that he thought was no big deal in the first place (the possible outing of an undercover agent was not even important enough for Broder to spend any time or effort writing about, according to him), he's spoken far too soon.

Rove was summarily demoted this past spring and the GOP has lost faith in his guidance. His rise and fall are not attributable to anyone but Mr Rove himself and for all of the people he's stepped on and over without any regard all of these years to be asked to apologize to one of the most vicious political players Washington has ever known is an affront of major proportions. In the end, no matter what is finally known about the Plame outing, there will be no doubt that Rove did contribute to her demise and that those who have pointed the finger at him as being one of this administration's main architects of smear and destroy politics - his stock in trade - will have been justified. Broder would do well to ask Rove to apologize to everyone he's wronged along the way.