# Did Karl Rove out the CIA Agent? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 2, 2005, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791 "2005-07-02T03:04:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 25
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/481 "2005-07-17T18:18:24Z")
> [@Ptolemais](#): > > Bush always wins. I certainly hope all Tighty-Righties™ share your hubris. Combined with the White House’s determination to never give an inch, this will work out just the way we Nassty Liberals planned it; it stays front page all the way into the 2006 campaign, Bush’s agenda is hopelessly derailed, and America dumps the Republicans in the biggest turnaround since The Contract On America. We don’t even need a conviction, all we need is more of Bushco’s stuff-necked obstinacy, and this will grow into an anchor around his neck that will drown him in an ocean of bad ink. So, please continue spreading these talking points on every forum you can, and we will continue to applaud smugly from the brier patch! ---
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/482 "2005-07-17T18:27:02Z")
> [@Ptolemais](#): > > Bush always wins As when he said “[Bring em on!](http://icasualties.org/oif/)”? ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/483 "2005-07-17T19:29:10Z")
> [@Ptolemais](#): > > This whole scandal came about because Valerie Plame and her husband (an incompetent, untrustworthy, self-aggrandizing asshole of the first order) cooked up a mini-conspiracy to hijack the Niger mission in order to _spike_ it. Which, incidentally, is a _much_ bigger story than Who-said-what-to-Rove or What-Rove-said-to-whom. No, the scandal and bigger story is that Bush and his peoplem had been cooking the data and lying all along in order to justify their war. Wilson went to Niger at the government’s request and came back with a “negative” report. Knowing about the report, the state of the union speech still included the uranium, totally ignoring Wilson’s report. This is when the shit hit the fan. That’s when Rove outed Plame. > [@Ptolemais](#): > > Still, I have been amused by the sight of Joe Wilson tap-dancing on TV and elsewhere in a desperate attempt to prevent everyone from closing the circle on the story (it started with Joe and it’s going to end with Joe). It was especially funny watching Joe hide behind Chuck Schumer (playing the bully-bodyguard) - as if Chuck won’t hesitate to pitch Joe overboard when it becomes politically expedient. Bullshit. Rove is the one dancing. He has been named as the source of the leak by Cooper. It started with Rove, it will end with Rove. The vultures are starting to circle, and so is the FBI and CIA. They want him. Have some more Koolaid. ---
**Author:** ![Ptolemais](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4bbf92/32.png) [@Ptolemais](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ptolemais)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/484 "2005-07-17T21:08:34Z")
No one commented on Mr. Steyn’s article: [http://www.suntimes.com/output/steyn/cst-edt-steyn17.html](http://www.suntimes.com/output/steyn/cst-edt-steyn17.html) Amazing. Talk about dodging the issue… Joe Wilson is a pathological blowhard. You’ve met someone like him at every wedding or class reunion you’ve ever been to. I can practically hear him now: “That’s right, baby, Cheney personally sent me to Niger - me, Joe Wilson, diplomat extraordinaire.” To which Cheney’s office replied: “Huh?” Joe’s wife, Valerie “Jane Bond” Plame, super secret agent, is a figment of his own imagination. If she worked behind a desk at NFL headquarters, she would magically become the greatest place-kicker the game ever saw, to hear Joe tell it. But to return to the point… I am willing to bet that not one person on this forum is willing (or able) to rebut a single point in Steyn’s article. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/485 "2005-07-17T21:20:19Z")
> [@Ptolemais](#): > > I am willing to bet that not one person on this forum is willing (or able) to rebut a single point in Steyn’s article. Before I get started? What’s the bet? ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/486 "2005-07-17T21:28:59Z")
Let me know what you want to bet. I was gonna do it for free, but now that there’s an opportunity to win a wager I’ll wait. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/487 "2005-07-17T21:32:34Z")
> [@Ptolemais](#): > > I am willing to bet that not one person on this forum is willing (or able) to rebut a single point in Steyn’s article. > [@](#): > > Steyn’s article > Just about everybody on the face of the earth except Wilson, the White House press corps and the [moveon.org](http://moveon.org) crowd accepts that Saddam was indeed trying to acquire uranium from Africa. [President’s 2003 State of the Union:](http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/01/20030128-19.html) > [@](#): > > The International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed in the 1990s that Saddam Hussein had an advanced nuclear weapons development program, had a design for a nuclear weapon and was working on five different methods of enriching uranium for a bomb. The British government has learned that **Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa**. Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production. Saddam Hussein has not credibly explained these activities. He clearly has much to hide. [Condoleeza’s excuse for letting the bullshit yellowcake stuff slip in:](http://www.iraqwatch.org/government/us/wh/us-wh-rice-073003.htm) > [@](#): > > Q That’s the speech where he made the case for war? > > DR. RICE: Well, this is one of the speeches in which he made the case for war. And in that speech, a line had been there about the uranium issue and Saddam Hussein seeking uranium in Africa. And Director Tenet had called Steve Hadley and he told him, in no specifics, he told him, I don’t think you should put that in the President’s speech because we don’t want to make the President his own fact witness. Both Steve and Director Tenet remember the conversation in that way. > > What we learned later, and I did not know at the time and certainly did not know until just before Steve Hadley went out to say what he said last week, was that the Director had also sent over to the White House a set of clearance comments that explained why he wanted this out of the speech. I can tell you, I either didn’t see the memo, I don’t remember seeing the memo – Don’t you even remember the 16 words flap? ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/488 "2005-07-17T21:37:25Z")
> [@PatriotX](#): > > but now that there’s an opportunity to win a wager I’ll wait. Sorry **Patriot**. Maybe he’ll decide that the SOTU is irrelevent, and you can pick up a few bucks on some other error. ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/489 "2005-07-17T21:40:59Z")
> [@Ptolemais](#): > > No one commented on Mr. Steyn’s article: > > [http://www.suntimes.com/output/steyn/cst-edt-steyn17.html](http://www.suntimes.com/output/steyn/cst-edt-steyn17.html) > > Amazing. Talk about dodging the issue… Your bringing it up was a dodge, which has already been pointed out. "He made me do it is not an excuse for violating federal law, burning intelligence sources, and risking our apparatus for human intelligence on WMD > [@](#): > > I am willing to bet that not one person on this forum is willing (or able) to rebut a single point in Steyn’s article. What’s the over/under on bullshit in the story? I’m willing to rip the shit out of it, but not for money. You have to promise to remember and understand. However, you seem to be a particularly brain-dead republican lockstepper, so I’m not sure you could live up to that side of the bargain. If I’m wrong, I apologize, and I’d be happy to do it. Let me know. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/490 "2005-07-17T22:35:03Z")
The crisis. Dive into the murk of Mr. Steyns opinon piece, and go a-googling for Og only knows how long, only to finish up and find that smug sumbitch **PatriotX** already standing next to the cured pelt… So maybe just some quickies, some of the low hanging fruit. > [@](#): > > …As her weirdly self-obsesssed husband Joseph C. Wilson IV conceded on CNN the other day, she wasn’t a ‘‘clandestine officer’’ and, indeed, hadn’t been one for six years. So one can only ‘‘leak’’ her name in the sense that one can ‘‘leak’’ the name of the checkout clerk at Home Depot… Mr. Steyn is coy. Indeed, Mr. Wilson made a statement that is open to that interpretation. His own interpretation is that he meant to say that _as of the moment_ that her status was revealed, her clandestine career was over. Since he was the one speaking, I feel secure in accepting his version of his own words. Since they were, in fact, his. > [@](#): > > …had been trying to acquire ‘‘yellowcake’’ – i.e., weaponized uranium… Yellowcake is not, by any stretch, “weaponized”. It is merely a somewhat more purified form of the ore. The process of converting “yellowcake” into weapons grade uranium is lengthy, expensive, and highly complex. It involves a whole lot of highly specialized equipment that Saddam did not possess, and could not obtain, fantasies about aluminum tubes notwithstanding. Mr. Steyn seems remarkably ill-informed for a man who can peer into the mind of another and ascertain his motives and character with such precision. The rest of Mr. Steyn’s opinion piece is speculation, based on nothing more than his presumed perpicacity and his stunning insight into the minds of others. But he offers no facts to rebut, merely his own interpretation of events. What would you have us refute? Is Joe Wilson “narcissistic”? I dunno. “Wierdly self-obsessed”? I dunno. Did he leave on his mission with a preset agenda of undercutting the reputation of Beloved Leader? Dunno. But neither does Mr. Steyn. Nor do you. But here’s the thing: if GeeDubya had not presented this alarming fantasy _as fact_, Joe Wilson would have had nothing to say! Mr. Steyn presents his opinions as facts. They are nothing of the sort. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/491 "2005-07-17T23:56:31Z")
You jerks. I called dibs. He prob’ly won’t want to bet now. I’ll throw a stray bit of kindling on to the fire [**Comprehensive** Report of the Special Advisor to the DCI on Iraq’s WMD](http://www.cia.gov/cia/reports/iraq_wmd_2004/) had this to say: "[ISG has uncovered no information to support allegations of Iraqi pursuit of uranium from abroad in the post-Operation Desert Storm era.](http://www.cia.gov/cia/reports/iraq_wmd_2004/chap4.html) **ISG has not found evidence to show that Iraq sought uranium from abroad after 1991** or renewed indigenous production of such material—activities that we believe would have constituted an Iraqi effort to reconstitute a nuclear weapons program. As part of its investigation, ISG sought information from prominent figures such as Ja’far Diya’ Ja’far—the head of the pre-1991 nuclear weapons program. Regarding specific allegations of uranium pursuits from Niger, Ja’far claims that after 1998 Iraq had only two contacts with Niamey—neither of which involved uranium. \*\*So far, ISG has found only one offer of uranium to Baghdad since 1991—an approach Iraq appears to have turned down. \*\*" Surely the CIA and the ISG are someone other than “Wilson, the White House press corps and the [moveon.org](http://moveon.org) crowd.” Of course, while Mr. Steyn implies a time period, one that would render his comment relevant he does not specifically state such. So, I suppose he could be talking about some time in the past prior to the Gulf War and entirely unrelated to anything having to do with Mr. Wilson. So much for [del]baby’s candy[/del] easy money. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/492 "2005-07-18T00:01:53Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > The crisis. Dive into the murk of Mr. Steyns opinon piece, and go a-googling for Og only knows how long, only to finish up and find that smug sumbitch **PatriotX** already standing next to the cured pelt… To be fair, the yellowcake = weaponized uranium was quite blow to Mr. Steyn’s ‘credibility’ as they say. It truly showed him to be uninformed and/or fear mongering. ---
**Author:** ![Atticus\_Finch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ec9cab/32.png) [@Atticus\_Finch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atticus_Finch)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/493 "2005-07-18T01:06:06Z")
> [@Ptolemais](#): > > Joe Wilson is a pathological blowhard. … I can practically hear him now: “That’s right, baby, Cheney personally sent me to Niger - me, Joe Wilson, diplomat extraordinaire.” > > To which Cheney’s office replied: “Huh?” Here’s some more bullshit. Can you please point to a cite for Wilson saying anything of the sort? Are you perhaps referring to [this statement](http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_07_10.php#006082), in which he says nothing of the sort? > [@](#): > > Joe’s wife, Valerie “Jane Bond” Plame, super secret agent, is a figment of his own imagination. If she worked behind a desk at NFL headquarters, she would magically become the greatest place-kicker the game ever saw, to hear Joe tell it. You’re right. She was not in fact under cover, and neither was her front organisation. The CIA’s request for a grand jury investigation into the leaking of the name of a covert operative was begun mistakenly because the CIA mistakenly thought she was covert. Her safety, that of her colleagues and sources were not compromised and neither was the national security. She wasn’t undercover at all, and people have just forgotten to mention this at any point during the two-year investigation. \ ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/494 "2005-07-18T01:07:08Z")
[http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news\_features/dont\_quote\_me/multi-page/documents/03917099.asp](http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/dont_quote_me/multi-page/documents/03917099.asp) Just an article I saved about Mr. Steyn. Just so you know where he’s coming from. Brilliant guy. But, I like the final lines… > [@](#): > > Mark Steyn has carved out a nice little spot for himself within the world of right-wing punditry. He earned it not on the strength of his arguments or the accuracy of his so-called facts, but, rather, on his cultured, forceful writing style. And, of course, by making the truth serve his purposes, rather than the other way around. Sure, he’s no worse than Rush Limbaugh or Ann Coulter. But he’s no better, either. That writing style fools 'em every time. ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/495 "2005-07-18T01:21:35Z")
> [@Steyn](#): > > Just about everybody on the face of the earth except Wilson, the White House press corps and the [moveon.org](http://moveon.org) crowd accepts that Saddam was indeed trying to acquire uranium from Africa. Bullshit. Blix, the CIA, the ISG, Most of Europe knew better. > [@Bush](#): > > The International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed in the 1990s that Saddam Hussein had an advanced nuclear weapons development program, had a design for a nuclear weapon and was working on five different methods of enriching uranium for a bomb. The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa. Bullshit. Bush already knew that Wilson had refuted this Niger yellow cake claim and he said it anyway. > [@Rice](#): > > And Director Tenet had called Steve Hadley and he told him, in no specifics, he told him, I don’t think you should put that in the President’s speech because we don’t want to make the President his own fact witness. Both Steve and Director Tenet remember the conversation in that way. > > What we learned later, and I did not know at the time and certainly did not know until just before Steve Hadley went out to say what he said last week, was that the Director had also sent over to the White House a set of clearance comments that explained why he wanted this out of the speech. Tenet tried to get the speech changed, but “somebody” apparently refused, thinking it wouldn’t be noticed by the “stupid voters”. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/496 "2005-07-18T03:59:10Z")
IIRC, they did change the speech just enough, they installed a “trap door” by making the reference to “British intelligence has discovered”. Admittedly, I’m relying on memory here, but I’ll betcha one or another of our resident Googlemonsters could ferret it out toot damn sweet. Besides, I’ve got a mind like a steel…leg-grabbing thingy. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/497 "2005-07-18T05:04:09Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > IIRC, they did change the speech just enough, they installed a “trap door” by making the reference to “British intelligence has discovered”. It’s up there in post #487, along with Condi’s explanation of how she fucked up and yellowcake ‘slipped’ into the SOTU when it shouldn’t have. The British trap door didn’t work very well. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Highwayman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@The\_Highwayman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Highwayman)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/498 "2005-07-18T05:51:09Z")
Does anyone ever get tired of slapping these idiot conservative fucktards with fact after fact only to have them not learn a single thing? I mean, you can shove the same sort of shit they have shrilly cried “foul” about in the past, that is, lying to a grand jury and jeopardizing those fighting the war on terror, in their face and they will still tell you it smells like roses. Or maybe **Turd Blossoms**. They screamed from the top of mountains about how meaningless the equivocations read into “I did not have sexual relations with _that_ woman” but not, ever so hypocritically as typical of their party, about the equivocation upon equivocation on the most obscure of point regarding the Rove case. Rove is a scumbag shitheel of the most vile sort. He is grade-A sack of crap, fat-assed piece of lying pig shit. Now that I have that off my chest, I say to all those who hold the same opinion on this matter. Take heed. I had an argument with this dumbass who watches only **Faux News** because “CNN is too liberal” about Clinton’s economic success. After referring to Clinton as being a “lame duck” president he went on to state that the economic success in the 90’s was due to the **Contract on America**. However, when the topic shifted to Reagan and the economic success he had, it was, of course all Reagan’s and not the democratic controlled Congress at the time. This is typical of their doublespeak and highlights the catalogue of lies which is the foundation of the Republican mythos and ideology. Who are we trying to convince? Ourselves? The World? Who? Are we going to let this argument be bogged down in the facts when **BU$HCO** simply manufactures lies that the ideologues gobble up without a question and regurgitate back at us? It seems to me that the more we deal with their lies, the more either message becomes easier to not think about and leads to mindlessly taking one side or the other. I say, let’s stay focused. This is something that is giving them nightmares for sure. I saw a CNN poll, which are usually pretty good indicator of the prevailing political winds, where the question of Rove being sent to jail (i.e. the much hoped for “frog marched” out of the White House) was resoundingly in the affirmative. Let us shape our message for the masses who now seem willing to listen. ---
**Author:** ![choie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/choie/32/7829_2.png) [@choie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/choie)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/499 "2005-07-18T06:15:33Z")
I’m ignoring our guest friend out of sympathy, as he must have some seriously painful hemorrhoids from dragging so many things out of his ass. Instead I’ll turn to something that so far is getting little or no play: a possible connection between the Plame outing and (drumroll) Bush’s controversial pick for UN ambassador, John Bolton. What’s the link? Here ya go: In the _New York Times_ yesterday, read this paragraph, which outlines how Rove got a memo regarding Wilson’s Niger trip and Plame’s CIA status: > [@](#): > > “…When Mr. Wilson’s Op-Ed article appeared on July 6, 2003, a Sunday, Richard L. Armitage, then deputy secretary of state, called _Carl W. Ford Jr._, the assistant secretary for intelligence and research, at home, a former State Department official said. Mr. Armitage asked Mr. Ford to send a copy of the memorandum to Mr. Powell, who was preparing to leave for Africa with Mr. Bush, the former official said. Mr. Ford sent it to the White House for transmission to Mr. Powell. It is not clear who asked for the memorandum,…” Emphasis is mine. Who is Carl Ford, Jr.? You may remember him from such films as: “A Brave Lone Republican Breaks Ranks” and “I Worked with a Scumbag: The John Bolton Confirmation Story.” Seriously, Ford – who’s a self-described loyal republican/Bush fan – was the former colleague of Bolton who gave absolutely devastating testimony against Bolton back during the confirmation hearings. He basically said that Bolton is an intimidating thug who abused power right and left. As you’ll see in this quote, taken from [The Washington Post](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A46436-2005Apr12.html) > [@Carl W. Ford](#): > > Bolton’s behavior “brings real question to my mind about his suitability for high office,” said Carl W. Ford Jr. He told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which is considering Bolton’s nomination, that he is a loyal Republican, a staunch supporter of Bush and a “huge fan” of Vice President Cheney. “I’m as conservative as John Bolton is,” Ford said. “But the fact is that the collateral damage and the personal hurt that he causes is not worth the price that had to be paid.” So. What if Bolton was the mystery man who requested the Wilson/Plame memo? For that matter, what if John “Personal Vendettas My Specialty” Bolton was the leaker along with Rove? And hell, as long as I’m connecting dots, do you guys remember that part of the reason for the Democrats’ filibuster during the Bolton confirmation was that they’ve been denied background/classified info about Bolton, a perfectly understandable request that Bush is refusing? Any possibility that the reason Bush _et al_ are withholding this classified info is that it holds the smoking gun regarding Bolton’s connection to the Plame leak? _We’re through the looking-glass, people …_ BTW, I think Rove’s on _Time_’s cover this week. Doesn’t look like the press are backing off … well, not until Tom Cruise goes on Oprah again, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791/500 "2005-07-18T06:30:32Z")
I don’t know whether to be amused or astonished at how convoluted the right-wing spin has been on this screwup. > [@The Highwayman](#): > > Does anyone ever get tired of slapping these idiot conservative fucktards with fact after fact only to have them not learn a single thing? Stupid Bush apologists make the Uncle Cecil cry. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791.md?page=24) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-karl-rove-out-the-cia-agent/310791.md?page=26)