The Gaping Hole In Rove’s Defense
The Gaping Hole In Rove’s Defense
Yesterday, Karl Rove testified for almost four hours before a federal grand jury about his previous statements pertaining to the leak of an undercover CIA agent’s identity. Rove offered this stunning defense:
Rove’s testimony focused almost exclusively on his conversation about Plame with Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper in 2003 and whether the top aide later tried to conceal it, the source [close to Rove] said. Rove testified, in essence, that “it would have been a suicide mission” to “deliberately lie” about his conversation with Cooper because he knew beforehand that it eventually would be revealed, the source said.
Rove wants the grand jury to believe that he wouldn’t have lied in 2003 about his role in the Plame affair because he knew journalists would ultimately tell the truth. But in fact, President Bush and the White House believed in 2003 that journalists would remain silent about the case and would refuse to name their sources:
“I have no idea whether we’ll find out who the leaker is — partially because, in all due respect to your profession, you do a very good job of protecting the leakers.” [Bush, 10/7/03]
Rove was first interviewed by the FBI around the same time that Bush made this statement. All throughout late-2003 (when Ashcroft was still heading the investigation), the White House had reason to believe that the Plame investigation was not going to seek the testimony of reporters. Recall, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald was not even appointed until the beginning of 2004. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported it wasn’t until 2004 that journalists were contacted to testify.
The evidence suggests that when Rove testified in October 2003, he did not believe Matt Cooper would be ultimately be forced to testify against him in July 2005.
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only a matter of time — he’s going down
April 27th, 2006 at 12:26 pmHis motives aren’t what make a lie…the fact that what he said is demonstrably false and he knew it is what makes it a lie.
April 27th, 2006 at 12:27 pmIs this the best Rove can do?
As my children might say; That’s really weak sauce!
April 27th, 2006 at 12:29 pmWhat is done in the dark…
…WILL ultimately come to the light…
April 27th, 2006 at 12:31 pmAh, yes, when all else fails there is the “that would have been stupid defenseâ€. It appears that Karl Rove has chosen this to be a piece of his final efforts to avoid indictment. I’ve always found the very notion of this defense flawed. The premise of the defense is that smart people wouldn’t do stupid things or make decisions that could rationally be expected to lead to negative consequences. In Rove’s case, as I understand the issue, the argument is being used to explain an oversight to reveal all the details of his conversation with Matt Cooper (specifically the part about Valerie Plame)…in essence he simply forgot that portion of the conversation but to lie would have been stupid…and Rove knows people don’t think he is stupid.
The unspoken assertion by those who use this defense (Tom DeLay comes to mind) is that they may use their intelligence to walk right up to the line, but they are also smart enough to never cross that line…basically they know the rules so well they can navigate them like a skilled tightrope walker. On the surface it sounds reasonable and plausible.
Unfortunately, history often seems to contradict this defense and the premise upon which it is founded. That’s not to say these individuals are stupid…they are actually quite bright. However, what people may miss is an understanding that whatever these people possess in terms of smarts sometimes pales in comparison to the zeal with which they seek wealth, prestige, or power. In essence, smart people, not unlike others who lie and manipulate, are not above self-deceit in order to augment lofty goals, obtuse egos, and an unbridled hunger for power.
In the end, it’s a mistake to evaluate these situations on the basis of the individual’s intelligence…and historically juries often don’t. It’s not difficult to understand that a jury also evaluates where arrogance, greed and the desire for power sit in relation to intelligence. One’s desire for the former has a direct impact upon the amount of intelligence that is applied to any particular activity to achieve the latter.
The mathematical genius who abandons math for theater is not necessarily stupid. He is simply motivated by other interests and the application of his intellect may or may not be the dominating part of his life equation. Those who know this individual may know that he is smart but they may also know that a passion for theater, despite its failure to be a reasonable and rational calculation, is able to override the application of intelligence. He may well fail in theater while still being a very smart man.
Why would anyone assume the actions of politicians are any different? A better analysis of how these individuals and their scandals unfold is described by the “choose your poison principleâ€â€¦what compels; controls. In looking at Karl Rove there is little doubt he is passionate and motivated. His history is littered with demonstrations of aggressively pursuing his objectives. To presume he would never cross the line, given his obvious intensity, would shift the use of the “that would be stupid defense†to Patrick Fitzgerald and a full Grand Jury. That would likely require a lot of smart people to look stupid. Is Karl Rove smart enough to pull that off? Perhaps.
read more observations here:
http://www.thoughttheater.com
April 27th, 2006 at 12:32 pmC’mon Karl -Ashcroft was ya man then. Nice try.
April 27th, 2006 at 12:39 pmLiar liar pants on fire The grand jury will indict him for obstruction of justice and lying to investigators. Plus many more will be charged as all tired to keep the secret.
April 27th, 2006 at 12:41 pmKarl Rove has NO defense but he knows how to LIE very well, so even Fitzgerald might fall for Turd Blossom’s con job?!
April 27th, 2006 at 12:47 pm#5 Daniel,
Nice thoughtful post. Good job. I would also add that Rove’s defense of “I’m too smart to do something that stupid” falls apart when you consider that he has done stupid things in the past and he has crossed the line before (if not legally, then morally).
April 27th, 2006 at 12:54 pmRove is no smarter than I am–we both got the same on our SATs :-) (I saw some trivia question which asked what his SAT score was–he got one question wrong, too!)
April 27th, 2006 at 12:57 pm“It would have been foolish…”, “it would have been a suicide mission…”. You know, all of these quotes attributed to Rove or his mouthpiece are very reminiscent of the infamous Nixonian “…It would have been wrong..” when discussing the Watergate coverup with Erlichman and Haldeman in the Oval Office. Not a denial, but a tortuous exculpatory statement based upon dismissal of a possible act as improbable. Rove’s arse is toast, it’s just a matter of time, as was the case with Nixon.
April 27th, 2006 at 12:58 pmIf Rove knew the information about his conversation with Matt Cooper would be revealed eventually, then he also knew the information existed. Sort of puts a hole in the “I simply forgot all about it” defense, doesn´t it? Trying to convince the grand jury he didn´t lie, he makes it clear he didn´t forget. It´s nice to see Rove shoot himself in the foot like that.
April 27th, 2006 at 1:03 pmIt’s about time that there are some consequences for his actions. Even if he will be pardoned at some point down the road, there needs to be a message sent to teh corruption in Washington – that even they are not above the law.
April 27th, 2006 at 1:04 pmConsider the Aspen,
April 27th, 2006 at 1:07 pmall their leaves
turn golden
together!
Every pig has his Saturday.
April 27th, 2006 at 1:09 pmSo Karl wants the Grand Jury to believe that he knew better than to lie about talking to Matt Cooper, but at the same time, they are to believe that he “forgot” part of what it was they talked about? “I’m not stupid, I just forget things sometimes”. Karl, you are not paying your attorney enough! (snicker, snort)
April 27th, 2006 at 1:14 pmthe thing about the entire investigation is that Rove is not a target of the investigation. AP had coverage this morning talking about rove being questioned yesterday, and they were implying that they’re shooting for both bush and cheney and rove doesn’t matter. I tend to disagree with this because he is a pretty dangerous person in the world of politics and i’d love to see him convicted and sent away for atleast long enough to fix the problems that have risen out of the bush administration, but at the moment it doesn’t look like he’s going to be indicted for anything more than perjury and obstruction if Fitz even bothers coming after him. I’m pretty sure they just want to use him as a resource for the information that is really needed to go after the real targets.
April 27th, 2006 at 1:20 pmIt’s hilarious that Rove’s lawyer, Bob Luskin put out a statement about Rove’s grand jury testimony AFTER he testified. Thats reasonable, however the statement was written BEFORE Rove took the stand. So of course what Luskin said was true at the time he put it out. How about now?? Hmmm?
April 27th, 2006 at 1:25 pm# 12 – You beat me to the punch.
My thoughts – How could he know that the conversations would eventually be revealed if he could not even remember having them?
Can’t have it both ways – either he knew they would be revealed and would therefore have to have remember the conversations to have had any knowledge of their eminent revelation or he did not remember the conversations and could not therefore have any way of knowing that they would be revealed.
Suck on it Karl!!!
April 27th, 2006 at 1:32 pmRexanimate: The only people who know whether Rove is a target are Fitzgerald and, maybe, Rove and Luskin. Only one of them is talking (Luskin), and there’s no particular reason to believe he’s telling the truth.
Also:
– Notifying a target of target status is a courtesy, not a requirement.
– Once you agree to cop a plea and provide evidence, you’re no longer considered a target and therefore can say truthfully that you are not.
So there’s really no way for us to know Rove’s “official” status. But the consensus of the bloggers with prosecutorial and/or criminal-defense experience that I’ve read suggests that a fifth grand jury appearance cannot possibly be good for Rove.
April 27th, 2006 at 1:35 pmRex,
That whole “target” issue is smokescreen. Remember on the run up to the Libby indictment, there was the same game played.
Rove will knowhe is a target about an hour before we do.
99% of the info we hear on the news is being spun by Roves lawyers or Bush’s henchmen in the media.
Pay it very little attention.
-GSD
April 27th, 2006 at 1:55 pmI wonder if ol chimpy will pardon rove?…..count on it.
April 27th, 2006 at 1:56 pmIt’s all too confusing…
April 27th, 2006 at 2:00 pmPlease allow me to point out the obvious: “I forgot” is probably the single most common defense used by defendents in perjury cases. It seems to me that if it worked very often Prosecutors wouldn’t even bother charging people with perjury. Incidentally, anybody know what Fitz’s score is when it comes to perjury charges versus perjury convictions?
April 27th, 2006 at 2:02 pmThe Three Stages Of Republican Criminal Denial
April 27th, 2006 at 2:03 pm1. I didn’t do it, because that would have been breaking the law, and I’m not a lawbreaker.
2. I did it, but it my lawyers assure me that it wasn’t technically illegal.
3. I did it and it was illegal, but this whole investigation is politically motivated. I’ve been entrapped by the Vast Left Wing Conspiracy.
Rove must be running the DeLay playbook.
Karl Rove testifies:
GJ1 -I did not talk to reporters.
GJ2 -I did not talk to reporters.
GJ3 -I did not talk to reporters.
GJ4 – Okay, I talked to reporters but did not remember having done so.
GJ5 – Okay, Okay, I did talk to reporters and I did remember having done so but only after I was reminded of my knowledge that the conversations would come out… so I did not lie in my first four GJ testimonies because knowing that you can’t remember that which you know will become public is not lying unless you knew it before it became known… you know what I mean… I’m going to jail aren’t I?
April 27th, 2006 at 2:05 pmLol…I believe Rove is using the “Chewbaca Defense”.
April 27th, 2006 at 2:06 pmRemember, too, that a few weeks ago, they announced that Rove would be taken out of the Deputy Chief of Staff in charge of Doemstic Policy job and assigned to get the 2006 elections rigged up,er, I mean, shored up. As it becomes more and more clear that an indictment is pending, I expect that Rove will announce his resignation and, probably within a week, announce his new job at the RNC where he’ll be doing the same thing for the 2006 elections, only he’ll be under Ken Mehlmanboy (or whoever is the head of the RNC these days.) Just my own “wacky conspiracy theory.”
April 27th, 2006 at 2:22 pmRove:…and…and ….i’m not responsable because the devil made me do it.
April 27th, 2006 at 2:22 pmRegan:..I don’t recall x 100
Backtrack from Coldheartedtruth:
Logic Challenged Left
April 27th, 2006 at 2:36 pm
#31 – Coldlimptruth – see posts 12, 19, and 27… they show how Karls word contradict Karls words.
April 27th, 2006 at 2:42 pmRember Cooper quoting Rove, “I’ve already said too much” to end the conversation. It’s something you wouldn’t forget if you had crossed a line you didn’t intend to.
April 27th, 2006 at 2:46 pmimprison the entire bush cabinet and staffers. they are all disgusting
April 27th, 2006 at 2:50 pm“I have no idea whether we’ll find out who the leaker is — partially because, in all due respect to your profession, you do a very good job of protecting the leakers.â€
Bush threw out a compliment, which on principle means that he had an alterior motive. Paraphrasing with the facts – as he and the press both new them at the time – he might as well have said:
“I have no idea whether anyone will find out that Rove was the leaker on my orders – because the press has been doing a good job of protecting us.”
April 27th, 2006 at 3:14 pmGood catch, #12 Sara and #19 GW
April 27th, 2006 at 3:29 pmOf course, you make the critical point. Rove entrapped himself in a lie to the Grand Jury.
I don’t know if we will ever try someone for the treasonous act of exposing an CIA agent, but we certainly can find a number of BushCo staff who have lied under oath. We can even show that GW lied also — except he never takes an oath.
Liars always lie about their lies and about the fact that they surely would have been stupid to lie in the first place. Except they rarely expect to be caught in a lie, but they usually are caught in a web of increasingly complicated lies. They usually can’t remember which lie they told to whom. Eventually all the lies fall like a house of cards.
April 27th, 2006 at 3:35 pmOne word: pardon.
April 27th, 2006 at 3:39 pm# 36 – Thanks for the nod Marie.
I agree that this is the critical point.
At least on the surface – this appears to be enough to bring a perjury charge… right?
April 27th, 2006 at 3:39 pm“I have no idea whether we’ll find out who the leaker is — partially because, in all due respect to your profession, you do a very good job of protecting the leakers.â€
Shorter Bush: “We can lie and spin about this because I know you won’t rat us out.”
April 27th, 2006 at 3:45 pmif you havent seen the documentary “Bush’s Brain” you should check it out. its all about karl rove and his political bashings oh im sorry i mean carreer.
April 27th, 2006 at 3:59 pm#17- You said about Karl: “indicted for anything more than Perjury, and Obstruction.” Like it is no big deal? Hmm… Remember when President Clinton was impeached by Congress for perjury? The Senate did not convict him, though. If the Republicans are defending Libby for the same thing, and are trying to downplay Karl’s situation as well, while freaking out for years, and continuing to do so even now, over Clinton, they are showing their political bias, and their disrespect for our laws. Why the double standard?
April 27th, 2006 at 4:00 pmI don’t believe Karl lied. I won’t rest until I find the real leakers. Would Karl be soo stupid as to lie to a federal grand jury. I didn’t kill them although the blood matched my DNA, I mean I believe Karl. Would I lie? Would Karl lie? If you can’t believe me and Karl, who can you believe? I didn’t kill Nicole and Ron and Karl didn’t lie, cover up and conspire to cover up? Karl is 100 percent innocent? If the case don’t fit, you must acquit.
April 27th, 2006 at 5:02 pm#42 CB
April 27th, 2006 at 5:27 pm“…they are showing their political bias, and their disrespect for our laws.”
So they should change their m.o. now? Do leopards change their spots?
Of course, there is a double standard, carried out by the hypocrites called Republiscums, who think their farts don’t stink, but everything Democratic is demonic.
I was once sued in small claims by a driver who ran his car into mine. His claim in court was that he couldn’t have run into me because it wouldn’t be logical for him to do so.
He did not win the case.
Karl’s just about done.
April 27th, 2006 at 7:39 pmOK, let me get this straight…
1. It has been proven (through Cooper) that Rove broke the law and leaked Plame’s name.
2. He obviously remembered leaking her name because he wrote an email about it after.
3. He was contacted before testifying and told that it was known that he leaked to Cooper.
4. He then testifies that he doesn’t recall leaking the name to Cooper.
5. NOW, he says that it would have been a “suicide mission” for him to deliberately lie and not confess when testifying earlier about Cooper.
Right, it was. That’s not a defense, it’s an admission about how much trouble you are in.
Ruh Roh, Rover is over.
April 28th, 2006 at 12:18 amIt was mentioned that Rove did not initially recall his telephone conversation with Cooper “amid the hundreds of calls†he deals with each day.
Ok, let’s be conservative and assume “hundreds†means 200 and let’s say each call lasts 3 minutes. This means Karl spends a solid 10 hours a day on the phone.
So how did he get to be so rotund? He doesn’t have time to eat.
April 28th, 2006 at 3:54 amLets not get ahead of ourselves.
Rove has been implicated in many “illegal” activities and has yet managed to escape the long hand of the law.
April 28th, 2006 at 5:10 amKarl Rove is NOT an elected official of our government! He is an appointed stooge of the Bush Regime, whose position is paid by the taxpayers! We the people have a right to demand that he be fired for crimes against the state! He must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and given the maximum prison time allowable by law!
April 28th, 2006 at 7:19 amWhy would I lie, since I knew it would eventually come out that what I said was not the truth?
1. It might not come out until after the next elections cycle.
2. It might not come out at all.
3. If it did come out, I could always say “I forgot.”
4. It’s my word against hers.
5. It was Clinton’s fault. You have a pre-9/11 mentality.
Another question is why, once you found out that you had misinformed the Grand Jury, why did you sit on that information for 6 months, during which time Ashcroft went out, and Fitzgerald came in?
Why would I lie???? Why was Saddam connected to 9/11? Why did he kick out the WMD inspectors? Why did he have WMD’s.
Visit the Schapira blog at schapira.blogspot.com …
… and tell ‘em Big Mitch sent ya!”
April 28th, 2006 at 12:16 pmWhy would I lie, since I knew it would eventually come out that what I said was not the truth?
1. It might not come out until after the next elections cycle.
2. It might not come out at all.
3. If it did come out, I could always say “I forgot.”
4. It’s my word against hers.
5. It was Clinton’s fault. You have a pre-9/11 mentality.
Another question is why, once you found out that you had misinformed the Grand Jury, why did you sit on that information for 6 months, during which time Ashcroft went out, and Fitzgerald came in?
Why would I lie???? Why was Saddam connected to 9/11? Why did he kick out the WMD inspectors? Why did he have WMD’s.
Visit the Schapira blog at What we know so far …
… and tell ‘em Big Mitch sent ya!”
April 28th, 2006 at 12:18 pmConcerning the Plame leak, did Rove attend one of those mandatory ethics classes led by Harriet Miers? Did Cheney?
April 29th, 2006 at 11:37 am(This is my favorite part of the story. Can Republican hypocrisy get any more outrageous?)