Karl Rove’s ‘Hail Mary’

September 11, 2006

Last week, after what was deemed a successful public relations roll-out, the president’s military tribunal plan ran into some surprisingly strong Republican opposition. In particular, Sens. John Warner (Va.), John McCain (Ariz.), and Lindsey Graham (S.C.) balked at, among other things, Bush’s notion that suspects could be convicted on secret evidence that is withheld from defendants.

According to Andrew Sullivan, the Bush gang, led by Karl Rove, has a plan to respond to their concerns. Is it altering the policy to be more in line with basic principles of justice? Not so much.

Next week, I’m informed via troubled White House sources, will see the full unveiling of Karl Rove’s fall election strategy. He’s intending to line up 9/11 families to accuse McCain, Warner and Graham of delaying justice for the perpetrators of that atrocity, because they want to uphold the ancient judicial traditions of the U.S. military and abide by the Constitution. He will use the families as an argument for legalizing torture, setting up kangaroo courts for military prisoners, and giving war crime impunity for his own aides and cronies.

This is his “Hail Mary” move for November; it’s brutally exploitative of 9/11; it’s pure partisanship; and it’s designed to enable an untrammeled executive. Decent Republicans, Independents and Democrats must do all they can to expose and resist this latest descent into political thuggery. If you need proof that this administration’s first priority is not a humane and effective counter-terror strategy, but a brutal, exploitative path to retaining power at any price, you just got it.

Assuming Sullivan is right — and I think it’s fair to say his White House sources are better than mine — the next question is what McCain, Warner, and Graham are going to do in response. Digby predicts that they’ll “sputter a little bit and then do the big el- foldo.”

Given what we’ve seen, it’s hard to come to any other conclusion.

You know,I hate to say this, because I don’t want to sound disrespectful of people who lost what those families lost the way they lost it, but asking victims to have any sort of perspective on the administration of justice is just about impossible, and I say that from my own experience. A burglar does not deserve the death penalty, but when I was burglarized and lost all my camera gear, I was really pissed off that he only got a year in county once they caught him. Now expand that minor little bit by a million times and you’d be close to what these people feel, and there is no way they have any balance on the subject. Of course they’re going to say “give me the rope and I’ll hang them myself!” It would be impossible for them not to have those feelings.

And for Karl Rove to manipulate that honest hatred of the killers of these people’s loved ones is not just a “Hail Mary” pass but truly the most dispicalbe thing this most-dispicable-pig-in-the-history-of-American-politics has ever done. As Sullivan also said of him in his post, Rove may not be a genius, but the fact he has no scruples whatsoever is what makes him as dangerous as he is.

  • I have an idea! Let’s just sit back, and wait for them to implode! It will work this time!

    The important thing is to never, ever make a forecefull allegation about their ethics and character. That would be unsportsman like.

    Everyone, stay in formation and remain in the open! We civilized Red Coats will not stoop to the barbaric guerilla warfare of the colonies!

  • If they were a little more troubled about this, on top of getting the word out, they would quit. How these people can live with the decision that are made and then continue to work in the WH is mind bogling. I feel dirty reading about it.

  • An issue I would like to see discussed intelligently somewhere sometime is the idea that our judicial system isn’t up to the task of dealing with terrorists. There is, with some justification, the belief that our courts are designed for making deals rather than administering justice, that there is a technicality for every occasion. The terror trials so far have pretty much played to that perception as well. On the other hand, the cases that the Bushes have brought to court are so flawed it hasn’t really settled the issue.

    I haven’t seen an in-depth analysis of this question. And this distrust of our courts system is something the Bushes exploit when they push their illegal actions.

  • “He will use the families as an argument for legalizing torture, setting up kangaroo courts for military prisoners, and giving war crime impunity for his own aides and cronies.” – Andrew Sullivan

    Right now, right now John Warner should be contacting every Pentagon and World Trade Center family member he has ever talked to, and ask them to stand with him on the steps of the Capital and have them beg the Congress to set up trials for the 9/11 plotters that accord to the Constitution and due process.

    How is it suddenly necessary to try these guys after five years? Why NOW? We have to abandon every principle of Western Democracy for these fourteen guys? It just isn’t so!

  • What? McCain’s “Straight Talk Express” headed for the repair shop again? If McCain keeps losing wheels like this, he won’t have ANY credibility for 2008.

    All the Democrats have to do is document when McCain stood-up and when he shortly later fell down. A supposed man of principle who almost always folds is just another version of a “flip-flopper.” Get the “tar and feathers” ready for chicken-hearted McCain.

  • Further – this is an old political tactic: “are they ‘soft’ on criminals?”

    Using the outrage of victims was how the California Three Strikes Law was passed. There is no “punishment appropriate to the crime” as there would have been if it was limited to violent crimes. A man outraged by his daughter’s death put forward an initiative (back by the far right) to “lock ’em all up and throw away the key,” which has nearly bankrupted the state and created a system that is beyond control and beyond reform in its present condition. Nobody – citizens, victims, criminals – is served by this.

    At Nuremburg, the perpetrators of what were considered the worst crimes in history were afforded the same protections any American, British or French citizen expects, and no one had any problem administering justice in that condition.

    Rove’s move is the equivalent of whipping up the local population to burn my grandfather’s barn in 1918 for the “crime” that his last name was Weist (never mind he was the grandson of a man who came to America with a Prussian price on his head for taking part in the anti-Prussion Revolution of 1848 – we needed to whip up “war fever”).

    Too bad Rove will never face his own Nuremburg Trial.

  • ***Everyone, stay in formation and remain in the open! We civilized Red Coats will not stoop to the barbaric guerilla warfare of the colonies!***
    —————————————-Memekiller

    Sorry, Meme old chap—but a fuzzy little kitten like yourself simply does not stand in front of a tsunami, put up its little paw, and mew “stop.” You should know that. Now go have some cheesy tuna, and get out of the tsunami’s way.

    As for Herr Rove?

    We’re coming to get you, Karl baby—and the ghosts of “nine-eleven” are coming to get you, too. Think of it as “a very barabric form of rapture,” Karl—but in this case, you’ll be getting on the “down” escalator….”

  • I’m informed via troubled White House sources,
    This is how the White House beats the crap out of allies without completely losing them. Someone puts out word that it’s all Rove’s doing and that someone reaches out to keep the mauled allies on board. Good-Cop-Bad-Cop.

  • If Rove could get away with it he’d put the corpses of the victims on strings and make them dance about and demand Bush-style justice against their attackers.

    And am I the only one who thinks that in Karl Rove’s wettest dreams the terrorist attacks occur at the end of October? It has got to be getting harder to keep people whipped up to the appropriate “Yeees, Maaster” fervour for almost two months.

    Dale – Just as an aside, I respectfully disagree. ( I had a similar conversation with a friend on Friday.) Like a rose, a criminal is a criminal is a criminal. We can always turn to the UK, which dealt with the IRA, for the How to Prosecute Terrorists Manual.

    Applying criminal laws uniformly also takes away some terrorist recruiting propoganda. Right now it seems the US has been trying to sweep up anyone who might be connected – no matter how tenuously – with terrorism. Some poor SOBs just happened to have the same last name as a real bastard. If you nab a guy, haul him half-way around the world, slam him in jail for a year or two and then say oops, sorry and send him home, he is going to be angry. He might be more than willing to talk about the hypocrisy of the U.S. Every single prisoner who was mistreated in Abu-Gharib became a tool that terrorists can use to incite potential recruits (in addition to just making people more prone to take pot shots at the soldiers).

    If the US followed the rules for only arresting people based on reasonable belief that they conspired or are conspiring to commit a crime, if prisoners got the benefit of due process, if the rules on humane treatment were as clear as possible (and political wanks didn’t make excuses for violations) this would happen a lot less frequently. The US would stop making tools for creatures like Osama bin Laden.

    And as an added bonus it would relieve the strain on the the soliders who have to go out and do the grabbing.

  • Anyone who votes to limit our constitutional rights, legalize torture and institute kangroo courts is supporting the terrorists and their goals. Why do they hate America? The Democrats need to make it clear that they will be voting for America and against the terrorists.

  • Here’s the frame:

    The Republicans swore to defend the Constitution, but Karl Rove had other plans. His plan is to scare America into handing him more blank checks.

    This country is strong enough to survive a few terrorist attacks and still retain the freedoms that Bush claims they hate us for having.

  • I agree with much of what was said above me. I certainly hope that the right-wingnut pundits (are you listening Ann) will condemn this use of families of victims. Isn’t this the same scenario that Ann railed against with the 9/11 widows?

    The question keep coming to mind: Have you no decency?

  • “Isn’t this the same scenario that Ann railed against with the 9/11 widows?” – GreyGuy

    No. The big difference is that now Ann “The Bitch” Coulter will agree with the families. So obviously they would be doing the right thing.

  • Well, one could ask what the fuck business of Karl Rove’s it is how the United States prosecutes these monsters. That’s the first part: isn’t our Constitution sufficiently precious that it shouldn’t be subject to the exigencies of an election campaign?

    (The Republican answer to this is obvious, but it would be nice to see them have to sweat the question.)

    For another, one could ask what exactly it was about Stalinist show trial procedure that Dick’n’Bush are so hot to emulate.

    This is beyond disgusting. I’m almost surprised that Rove didn’t push the enablers in Congress to pass legislation altering the calendar to move Sept. 11 much closer to Nov. 7…

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