Salon.com > David Paul Kuhn

All eyes on Turd Blossom

Thu, 07 Jul 2005 22:40:00 +0000

When Karl Rove was little known outside Texas political circles, he was fired from George H.W. Bush's 1992 reelection campaign for leaking information to syndicated columnist Robert Novak. According to newspaper reports at the time, Rove was terminated for passing information to Novak from a meeting of the president's chief advisors. Rove denied he was the leaker.

Today, with another Bush in office, a journalist is being jailed to protect a source that led Novak to name a CIA operative, Valerie Plame. There is fevered speculation that Novak's source was, once again, Karl Rove.

If Rove, George W. Bush's deputy chief of staff, knowingly revealed Plame's name, he could be charged with committing a felony. The same source that revealed the operative's name to Novak reportedly also spoke to two other journalists, Time magazine's Matthew Cooper and Judith Miller of the New York Times. Rove's attorney, Robert Luskin, confirmed to reporters on Saturday that Rove spoke with Cooper days prior to the publication of Novak's column in July 2003. But Luskin denied that Rove named Plame.

Collateral damage: The Earth

Thu, 07 Jul 2005 19:09:00 +0000

While London police hunted for bombers in the wake of the deadly, coordinated terrorist attacks on the city Thursday morning, it remained unclear how the bombings would affect the G8 summit in Scotland. Some observers expected the summit to remain focused on the matters at hand -- especially aid to Africa -- while others expected the attacks to decrease the already unlikely prospect of an agreement on combating global warming.

Prime Minister Tony Blair, who immediately returned to London from the G8 after reports of the attacks, seemed resolved not to let the bombings affect the gathering of the world's wealthiest nations. "Just as it is reasonably clear that this is a terrorist attack or a series of terrorist attacks, it is also reasonably clear that it is designed and aimed to coincide with the opening of the G8," Blair told reporters in Scotland. He said that he intended to return to the talks in Gleneagles, Scotland, Thursday evening after rushing to London in the wake of the bombings.

“A nightmare for liberals”

Fri, 01 Jul 2005 19:26:00 +0000

The announcement of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's retirement Friday morning set the stage for what is likely to be the most bitter congressional confrontation until the midterm elections of 2006. O'Connor was the critical swing vote in many of the U.S. Supreme Court's most divisive rulings of the last two decades. President Bush's nomination of her replacement virtually ensures a partisan high-court confirmation battle this summer.

Most of the high-court tea-leaf reading in recent weeks has focused on the possible departure of the ailing 80-year-old Chief Justice William Rehnquist. While a momentous occasion for sure, a Rehnquist retirement would not have necessarily tipped the ideological balance of the Supreme Court. President Bush would have likely replaced Rehnquist, a conservative justice, with yet another conservative justice. The resignation of the more moderate O'Connor is a different story, especially since Rehnquist's future on the court remains up in the air and a second court departure remains possible.

Republicans ride the third rail

Thu, 30 Jun 2005 19:05:00 +0000

Perhaps it was President Bush's confidence, political hubris or a sincere intent to make his historical mark after winning a hard-fought second-term election. He stood there, blue suit and red tie, at his February State of the Union address and told the firmly Republican Congress that he was going to take on the so-called third rail of politics: Social Security.

Bush mentioned the pension program by name 18 times that night, arguing that the best way to ensure solvency was to partially privatize one of the most successful public-policy programs of the modern American era. It was to be his National Park Service, his New Deal, the domestic hallmark of his presidency.

Historians were to write: President Bush took on terrorism and saved Social Security.

But six months later, after more than 30 related speeches -- he's made more speeches about Social Security than the war in Iraq since his State of the Union -- after traveling to dozens of states to bully from the White House pulpit, the president's efforts have come to nil.

Mission continued

Wed, 29 Jun 2005 03:45:00 +0000

As the American public increasingly questions the war in Iraq, and with a growing chorus of critics calling for a clear exit strategy, President Bush stuck to his guns in a speech at Fort Bragg Tuesday night. He stayed with his core theme of fighting the terrorists for the sake of freedom, and asked Americans to stay the course in Iraq.

Bush said that the war there is difficult and dangerous, that he sees the images of violence and bloodshed and that every picture is horrifying and the suffering is real" -- but the president failed to explain how he hopes to end that bloodshed, and at what point the enemy is overcome enough to declare victory and bring U.S. soldiers home.

There was little reference to the war's length, now at two years and three months. Bush spoke respectfully of the more than 2,000 Iraqi security forces lost in the line of duty, though he did not mention by number the more than 1,700 American lives lost since the war's onset, nor the far greater tally of U.S. injuries and Iraqi civilian fatalities.

Is the sacrifice worth it? President Bush asked the nation. Assuredly, he answered, It is worth it.

Dissent within the ranks

Thu, 23 Jun 2005 21:42:00 +0000

There is an unmistakable sound in Washington as politicians gear up for midterm elections: Amid plummeting public support for the war in Iraq, a growing chorus of congressional voices is opposing the Bush administration's policy.

Alarmingly for President Bush, the dissent isn't coming just from Democrats. Leading Republicans are increasingly expressing their frustration with the war effort -- and this may only be the beginning of Bush's problems within GOP ranks as Republicans assess whether they'll run as allies or critics of Bush's policy in 2006.

The Bush administration, publicly at least, still insists the war in Iraq is proceeding as planned -- even as U.S. casualties continue to mount and the insurgency shows no indications of letting up. Bush spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters at the White House on Tuesday that "the facts on the ground show that the Iraqi people are making important progress on the political front to build a free and democratic future." The next day, McClellan said that success in Iraq was critical because "wherever you stood before the decision to go into Iraq, I think we can all recognize that the terrorists have made it a central front in the war on terrorism."

Bolton in limbo

Wed, 22 Jun 2005 01:17:00 +0000

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., failed late Monday to end a Democratic filibuster on the nomination of John R. Bolton to be the ambassador to the United Nations. Forcing a cloture vote, Frist fell six votes short of the 60-vote supermajority needed to cut off debate.

But while Democrats insist they will continue to oppose Bolton's nomination, the White House itself could move to railroad him through, with President Bush going around the Senate and placing Bolton temporarily in the position through a recess appointment. Though the option is rarely utilized, a president has the constitutional power to make appointments when the Senate is in recess. As the next Senate recess approaches with the Fourth of July holiday, President Bush could appoint Bolton -- who would then hold the position through January 2007.

When asked on Sunday whether the president would exercise that power, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Fox News, "We'll see what happens this week." But on Monday, President Bush sidestepped the question. "It's time for the Senate to give him an up-or-down vote, now," he told reporters.

Just hearsay, or the new Watergate tapes?

Sat, 18 Jun 2005 00:32:00 +0000

Forced to the basement of the U.S. Capitol and prevented from holding an official hearing, Michigan Rep. John Conyers defied Republicans and held a forum Thursday calling for a congressional inquiry into the infamous British document known as the "Downing Street memo."

Three dozen Democratic representatives shuffled in and out of a small room to join Conyers in declaring that the Downing Street memo was the first "primary source" document to report that prewar intelligence was intentionally manipulated in order make a case for invading Iraq. Not only did Republican leaders consign the Democrats to the basement, Democrats claimed that the House scheduled 11 votes concurrent with the forum to maximize the difficulty of attending it. Because the forum wasn't an official hearing, it won't become a part of the Congressional Record, but members worked to make sure that the attending media and activists captured their words for posterity.

Just say no

Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:44:00 +0000

Half a century ago, Republican Sen. Robert Taft said the duty of the opposition was to oppose. Republicans were arguing the same line in 1994. Two months before the midterm elections that year, a bitter game of legislative chicken had ensued. The Republicans were filibustering a campaign-finance bill, one of the few items standing on President Clinton's legislative agenda. Amid an all-night session, as cots were set up and the theatrics began, Democratic Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell was frustrated. His party controlled Washington but couldn't pass meager campaign-finance reform. The Republican minority, Mitchell lamented, was "unprecedentedly obstructionist."

Come Election Day 1994, the obstructionists prevailed. Republicans took control of the House for the first time in four decades, and the Senate for the first time in eight years. More than a decade later, Democrats are borrowing from the Republican playbook.

Much ado about Dean

Tue, 07 Jun 2005 20:29:00 +0000

Howard Dean's career as a politician often has been defined by his bluntness. Early in the 2004 Democratic primary season, Dean's candor and tough talk, especially on the Iraq war, endeared him to many Democrats even as others said he was too unpredictable to be electable. So it should be no surprise that Dean has employed his characteristic blunt-speak in his job as Democratic National Committee chairman. But comments he made last week about Republicans have ignited a minor intra-party row -- and not for the first time in Dean's short tenure as party chair.

The latest brouhaha came after Dean's remarks on Thursday that "a lot of [Republicans] have never made an honest living in their lives." Later, Dean said he wasn't talking about hardworking Americans but Republican leaders. But over the weekend, the comment led two likely Democratic presidential candidates in 2008, former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards and Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware, to distance themselves from Dean and criticize him for shooting from the hip. "The chairman of the DNC is not the spokesman for the party," Edwards reportedly said at a Democratic Party fundraiser in Tennessee. Asked about Dean's comment on ABC's "This Week," Biden said, "He doesn't speak for me with that kind of rhetoric and I don't think he speaks for the majority of Democrats."

McCain vs. Frist

Wed, 25 May 2005 22:23:00 +0000

When Sen. John McCain stood before the microphone Monday night and announced the moderates' deal that averted the nuclear option, Majority Leader Bill Frist was nowhere to be found. He wasn't at the press conference. He wasn't a party to the deal. Despite orchestrating the showdown over the filibuster, Frist was left out of the compromise, looking like a fringe player in McCain's show.

If the confrontation over judicial nominees was an early battle among Republicans with an eye on the next presidential election, McCain, a leading centrist candidate, faced off against Frist, who is positioning himself as the conservative's conservative. And by any measure, McCain clearly won. But the filibuster drama may have exposed a larger truth about GOP efforts to succeed George W. Bush in 2008 -- neither McCain nor Frist is well-positioned to win the Republican nomination.

Indeed, the moderates' compromise may serve to undermine both politicians' White House ambitions. It all comes down to the right-wing constituency of the Republican Party. "No one had surfaced as the clear social conservative candidate even before this, and this serves to muddy it up that much more," Republican strategist Ed Goeas said. What's missing from the 2008 candidates, Goeas said, is "a Ronald Reagan conservative."

Senator Franken?

Thu, 28 Apr 2005 20:18:00 +0000

The 265th pope is being announced, and Al Franken is watching it live on CNN. The Air America radio host has his back to the microphone, as he sits in a blue sports coat, jeans and white Nikes, staring at the television across the dimly lit studio. On the line is Franken's one-time "Saturday Night Live" comrade Father Guido Sarducci. The fictional Father Sarducci is supposedly live from Rome. But the comedian who plays him, Don Novello, the Vatican correspondent for "The Al Franken Show," is calling from San Francisco. (The Swiss Guard once arrested Novello for impersonating a priest in Vatican City.)

Then the news breaks: German conservative Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger is the next pope. "It's an inside job," Sarducci moans. "You won't see the pope involved in local politics in Poland, no more, it's going to be Germany. You are going to see the wall go back up." Franken is cracking up.

But the normally outspoken comedian won't comment about the new pope. "As a Jew," he explains later, "it's none of my business." It's a rare reticent moment for Franken. His job is to make everything his business. The restraint seems oddly decorous for the man who once, to his face, accused Fox News star Bill O'Reilly of lying about his credentials at a Book Expo, leading an infuriated O'Reilly to scream, "Shut up, shut up!"

Standing by their man

Fri, 08 Apr 2005 21:38:00 +0000

There are bad weeks in politics, and then there's the week Tom DeLay is having. The House majority leader has been the subject of potentially damaging investigative stories in the Washington Post and the New York Times. Another top Republican backed away from DeLay's hair-raising comments that sounded like a call to arms against federal judges. DeLay's approval ratings have tanked to embarrassing depths and a new personal low as House leader. But as the news worsens for DeLay, Republicans are adamantly -- at least publicly -- standing by him and are marshaling the troops to his defense.

DeLay dismisses new ethics questions this week as purely partisan muckraking by the "liberal media," and for now, the conservative establishment is marching lockstep behind him. To Republicans, their House leader is indeed facing a leftist crucible. And the more they see DeLay as "attacked," the more conservatives seemingly wish to stand by him.