Editor and Publisher: The Plame Affair is Formally a Scandal

From Greg Mitchell there:

Today, July 15, 2005, may go down in history as the day when what has previously been known as the “Plame Affair” or “the CIA leak scandal” finally gets that most coveted of scandal slugs: Plamegate.

And with the eye-raising reports today from The New York Times, the Associated Press, and the Washington Post detailing Karl Rove's conversation with Robert Novak, six days before he wrote his fateful Plame column, we are suddenly into “what-did-the-president-know-and-when-did-he-know-it” territory.



In any event, the next few weeks should be riveting. Now that we know that Rove was one of Novak's sources, and that Novak had two of them, surely speculation will center on the office of Vice President Cheney and his aide “Scooter” Libby. What kind of name is "Scooter" anyway?

But more than anything, the question that will be asked today and this weekend is: What did the president know etc.?

Did Rove fill him in on his conversations with Novak and Cooper (and possibly others) a long time back? If he did and the president did nothing, should that be taken as a sign of approval, and what would that mean? If Rove didn't tell him, and this is all news to Bush, does that deserve a prompt dismissal? Or is it possible the entire smear-Wilson campaign originated in the Oval House, or the veep's chambers?

Will Alberto Gonzales get embroiled in this even before he makes it to the Supreme Court? Is former spokesman/chief spinner Ari Fleischer endangered? Will Rove still have his job when the Washington Nationals play in the World Series this autumn?

Who is the source for all the press revelations today? Likely not a new ”Deep Throat.” The New York Times opened by calling him someone who had been briefed on all of this, the AP raised that to someone in the “legal profession,” while the Washington Post went all the way and called him a “lawyer.” Speculation focuses on Rove's attorney, who if this is true, probably thinks most of this helps his client's cause. But then, such things took dramatic turns back in the Watergate days when documentary evidence, in the form of tapes, documents and testimony came out.

I disagree with those who say this is nothing compared to Watergate. Watergate was not about faking a war, and in Watergate, the name and cover of a CIA operative charged with rooting out weapons of mass destruction was not used as a political football.