If this is true, Karl Rove is toast.
WASHINGTON - An angry President Bush rebuked chief political guru Karl Rove two years ago for his role in the Valerie Plame affair, sources told the Daily News.
"He made his displeasure known to Karl," a presidential counselor told The News. "He made his life miserable about this."
Yes, but he didn't fire him, although he said publicly that he would fire anybody who had participated in the CIA leak.
As special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald nears a decision, perhaps as early as today, on whether to issue indictments in his two-year probe, Bush has already circled the wagons around Rove, whose departure would be a grievous blow to an already shell-shocked White House staff and a President in deep political trouble.
Asked if he believed indictments were forthcoming, a key Bush official said he did not know, then added: "I'm very concerned it could go very, very badly."
"Karl is fighting for his life," the official added, "but anything he did was done to help George W. Bush. The President knows that and appreciates that."
As we now know after thirty-some years, the cover-up is worse than the crime, right?
A second well-placed source said some recently published reports implying Rove had deceived Bush about his involvement in the Wilson counterattack were incorrect and were leaked by White House aides trying to protect the President.
"Bush did not feel misled so much by Karl and others as believing that they handled it in a ham-handed and bush-league way," the source said.
As I wrote before, going after Joseph Wilson' credibility isn't against the law. Doing it by "outing" Plame may or may not be illegal, but it certainly was stupid. And not very effective.
The article says that Bush was "initially furious" with Rove. But he may have, rightly or wrongly, thought that he could not get through the election without Rove and quelled his anger. Certainly a lot of other people think so. Fitzgerald's investigation began in late 2003. The question that arises now is did the White House engage in any activity or delaying tactics in order to keep Karl Rove at the White House for the 2004 election? And if they did, does any of this rise to obstruction?
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