Rove against the world

December 1, 2007

Last week, in one of his more breathtaking lies, Karl Rove told a national television audience that it was Congress, not the Bush White House, that pushed for an Iraq war resolution in advance of the 2002 midterm elections. Rove said the administration was “opposed” to moving “too fast,” and that the president and his aides wanted the debate “outside the confines of the election.”

Since then, there’s been one thing everyone, on both sides of the aisle, can agree on: Rove is lying through his teeth. Then-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle said Rove either has “a very faulty memory, or he’s not telling the truth,” a sentiment echoed by then-House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt’s office.

Rove’s former colleagues are just as blunt. Former White House Chief of Staff Andy Card not only said Rove is wrong, but added, “[S]ometimes his mouth gets ahead of his brain.” Former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer concluded, “I think Karl in this instance just has his facts wrong.” Former Bush counselor Dan Bartlett added, “This is the first time I’ve ever heard Karl say that.”

Confronted with this reality, Karl Rove did what we’d expect him to do: he repeated the lie as if reality had no meaning.

Rove repeated his assertion in an interview yesterday, pointing to comments made by Democrats in 2002 that they wanted a vote. “For Democrats to suggest they didn’t want to vote on it before the election is disingenuous,” he said.

Rove could have very easily explained that he misspoke during his interview last week, or misunderstood the question. But not this guy — he lied, got caught, was thrown under the bus by his former colleagues, and then went back and repeated the lie all over again.

For what it’s worth, the WaPo did a report on this, but seemed reluctant to use the “f” word (“false), or the “l” word (“lie”). The Post headline reads, “Rove’s Version of 2002 War Vote Is Disputed.”

I think the phrase editors were looking for was “proven false.”

December 1, 2007 at 3:01 pm

I Rove’s world, he did not lie. In the real world it is considered lying by omission, but that doesn’t count in the Republican world.

There probably was ‘a’ democrat somewhere before the election in 2002 that muttered, (out of context) that there should be a vote. According to Republican values, you can spin that any way you see fit.

That’s all that counts in Rove’s world, nothing else matters. Get with the program. 🙂

This is part of a trend by conservatives to clean up their legacy and deny how they played politics after 9/11 rather than showing concern for the best interest of the country.

This isn’t the first time Republicans have rewritten history. At different times they have claimed both that the vote was not and was a vote to go to war. I have more on how they have been trying to rewrite history at Liberal Values:

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=2460

“A lie told often enough becomes the truth.” V. I. Lenin

Rove says Democrats are being “disingenuous” about the vote, i.e. they are being insincere, but hell they too are politicians, so what’s new? They will always be insincere so what type of accusation is that? Point is they aren’t lying and he is. This is Rove just stirring the pot as usual, trying to mix the faintest morcel of fact, we went to war, with his usual crock of lies, who’s decision was it.

Tom Daschle said Rove either has “a very faulty memory, or he’s not telling the truth,” a sentiment echoed by then-House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt’s office.

If this is what passes for bluntness, don’t show me any euphemism. Doesn’t anyone say he lied, or is it just that the press won’t repeat it?

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The Post headline reads, “Rove’s Version of 2002 War Vote Is Disputed.”

“Shape of the Earth: Views Differ.”

Well, give Karl credit; throwing down a five-syllable red herring like “disingenuous” is normally enough to throw most journalists off the scent.

The only thing more shameful than Republicans never ever saying the truth , no matter how obvious it is, is the media’s refusal to call them on this crap. Given how the media rolled over and died in the last decade, the advent of the internet came not a moment too soon.

Paul Krugman:

Krugman’s version of his appearance is disputed

I say I’m 6′4″, and thin as a rail. But this version is disputed by Republicans and even some Democrats, who say I’m 5′7″ and could stand to lose a few pounds.

Republicans are going to BLAME Democrats for EVERYTHING. That’s their M.O.

“…The Post headline reads, “Rove’s Version of 2002 War Vote Is Disputed.”

This is the most upsetting part of all…the press. Always trying to cover for anyone on the right no matter how outrageous the lie. There is no “dispute”. What happened to investigating and reporting the truth so there is no “dispute”.
Rove is a dirty tricks gutter political advisor who by all accounts should be in prison.

When I was a teen there was this guy who would steal from big name stores and never get caught. He was slick and bragged often about how good he was at stealing. He would steal and give it away to friends and even strangers. He only stole from big name stores justifying it by saying they were too rich. In some sense he would think of himself as a kind of Robin Hood. Just because he was good at it didn’t make it any less a crime. It didn’t make him a genius or insightful or special in any way. He just got away with it. No one regarded him as an expert in store management and operations…he only managed to not get caught.
Rove has no expertise on anything except how to get away with smearing and cheating in political elections. He engaged in criminal activities in politicizing the DoJ, and preventing prosecutions of republicans and pushing prosecutions of democrats. He engaged in “caging” activities and dirty tricks politics. He interfered in elections as in the Florida vote count etc., etc., etc.

But I’d bet money that not even Bush was aware of the corrupt deals he was making internationally and with other crime families. Rove’s continued involvement in the political discussions makes on thing clear…he didn’t quit his post to spend more time with his wife and family. I believe Bush cut him loose as he discovered just how low Rove had been going. I expect to see more information on Rove’s corruption to be discovered soon. Bush won’t give him up…but he also is done protecting him. Now…for all those emails sent to the RNC….go get him.

Rove is raving, insane, nuts.

Is the press afraid of being sued for libel? Rove’s pockets can’t be that deep any more….

Well, let’s just call this what it is– he’s trying to pin the disaster of the Iraq war on congress, rather than where the blame belongs on Bush and his cabinet. That makes it easier to see why people would step up and take exception.

He’s saying, “We ended up in a war because you made us rush into making the decision” when the truth is vice versa, which is what John Kerry and all the Democrats have been saying all along.

Rove is a traitor. The only thing we should be discussing with regard to Rove is how he betrayed his country and when he will be in jail.

On the other hand, Bush, in a previous televised speech, noted that God had instructed him to invade Iraq and remove Hussein, and after all, God IS a democrat.

Rove wants desperately to be the new G.Gordon Liddy, who loved to proclaim proudly that he was the only one of the convicted Watergate conspirators to never admit his own guilt.

His legacy will be as a laughing stock.

Like every good con, this one does contain a grain of truth: Bush didn’t actually want a new resolution on Iraq to begin with. The White House had already decided in the summer of 2002 that the original Gulf War resolution, which authorized the president (it didn’t say which president) to use military force in compelling Iraq’s compliance to certain UN resolutions, along with the fact that Iraq had still not fully complied with all of those, gave them all the authority they needed to invade.

So in that context it kind of was the Democrats who wanted a new resolution. But of course their objective was to try and slow things down a little and hopefully give diplomacy and inspections a chance to work before plunging into war, as Bush seemed intent on doing at first.

Exactly why Bush relented and finally did ask congress for a new resolution has always been something of a mystery. There was talk at the time of an intervention by the elder Bush since he announced the decision right after returning from a trip to Maine to see the folks. If that were the case however, it seems to have worn off pretty quickly. But I happened to reread the the draft resolution the White House original proposed the other day though and knowing Bush the way we know him now the language struck me as rather ominous.

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This joint resolution may be cited as the `Further Resolution on Iraq’.

SEC. 2. AUTHORIZATION FOR USE OF UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES.

The President is authorized to use all means that he determines to be appropriate, including force, in order to enforce the United Nations Security Council Resolutions referenced above, defend the national security interests of the United States against the threat posed by Iraq, and restore international peace and security in the region.

Reading that again now in the light of all that’s happened since, I have to wonder if the whole charade might have been intended as a ploy to try and expand his mandate beyond Iraq. Thank god that one was DOA.

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