Recently Karl Rove has been indirectly quoted (in news service reports) as telling fellow Republicans that had it not been for SCANDALS breaking in the news just weeks before election 2006, then Republicans would have retained control of the Congress in that election.
Well, true... IF you take away the JACK ABRAMOFF _BRIBERY_ scandal (found GUILTY under federal prosecution); the BOB NEY BRIBERY scandal, the DUKE CUNNINGHAM BRIBERY scandal, the TOM DeLAY resign-from-Congress-under-indictment SCANDAL, and the MARK FOLEY using Congressional teenage pages as dating-service scandal, then, indeed, the Republicans may well have won that election.
But then again, IF you take away "Former Secretary of Defense DICK CHENEY, and then current Secretary of Defense DONALD RUMSFELD, did EXACTLY NOTHING when told by the CIA director George Tenent, IN PERSON, all through the summer of 2001:
"Al Qaida attacked the USS Cole successfully in October of 2001 using a suicide-bomb attacker, and they are DETERMINED TO ATTACK _IN THE USA_ in a large and spectacular manner, probably by attempting to hijack airliners"....
- well, IF you take away the GROSS NEGLIGENCE and DERELICTION OF DUTY of those two (former or current) Secretaries of Defense (Rumsfeld and Cheney) when presented with compelling documentation that America was under threat... then there MIGHT HAVE BEEN _SOME_ PREPARTIONS to make the 9-11 plot just a tad more difficult... possibly a "GENERAL TRAVELLER's ADVISORY" such as the FAA issues routinly, on every day of the year, to warn American passengers and crews that some destinations may be hazardous to travel through, for example routine traveller's advisories about flying to Haiti or Yemen or any other dangerous destinations.
Clearly, Vice President Cheney and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld OBSTRUCTED _ANY_ possible preparations to make the 9-11 plot more difficult in the long summer of 2001, thereby leaving American airline passengers and aircrews as sitting ducks when the terrorist hijackers eventually carried out their plot.
Now, getting back to KARL ROVE: Karl Rove's SPECIALTY, his DEFINING CHARACTERISTIC, is ABUSE OF POWER.
Without even going into the long train of Mr. Rove's abusive and possibly criminal election violations, let's just look at his "IF Republicans had avoided those scandals, they would have won election 2006" statement at face value:
Clearly, Mr. Rove does not think the BRIBERY and CORRUPTION crimes were the problem... it was the fact that those crimes were PROSECUTED and won CONVICTIONS in the headlines that were the problem!
Mr. Rove would like to be able to OBSTRUCT JUSTICE!
Indeed, we know that one of the prosecutors PURGED by Attorney General Gonzales at the behest of the Bush-Rove White House was... CAROL LAM, the US Attorney who SUCCESSFULLY PROSECUTED Representative Cunningham!
Make no mistake: KARL ROVE is all about PURGING from the government anyone who does not put PERSONAL ALLEGIANCE to George W. Bush and the Republican Party ABOVE the rule of law.
