It’s not just the rightwinger wackos who have been spouting IT of late, plenty in the mainstream media have also joined in the chorus.
‘IT’ being that there is NO cancer on the presidency, countering one of the well known Nixon/Watergate phrases. This has been in response to the current fact that ONLY Scooter Libby has been charged in the Joseph Wilson/Valerie Plame scenario.
Curiously however, not a single one of these talking heads or keyboarding bottoms have apparently even been looking or searching for a such a cancer. But they are damn sure there is none.
I sure am glad that none of these political ‘oncologists’ chose to enter the medical field. Can’t you envision these individuals offering this diagnosis to a patient: “We really aren’t sure if you have cancer or not but we don’t want to look too closely. So, let’s just save a lot of time, trouble and expense and say you are cancer-free, okey-dokey?”
Now I am not going to espouse some grand conspiracy theory about a cancer on the presidency. It would be foolhardy to do so without concrete evidence. What I will offer is that the following ‘cancer cells’ absolutely deserve greater attention and resources from those in the media who are still willing and able to explore to see if there is a connection to the ‘dots’ that would demonstrate a malignancy.
Let’s start with Kenneth Tomlinson, the latest poster appointee for all that is wrong with the Bush Administration. Various news reports state that an Inspector General inquiry indicates a number of legal infractions committed by Tomlinson during his tenure at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the Broadcasting Board of Governors. What is also indicated via email evidence is a series of contacts between Tomlinson and Karl Rove. What in the world is White House consigliere Rove needing to discuss with Tomlinson? Just asking.
Over the past year or so, a number of federal departments and agencies were found to have illegally ‘greased the palms’ of various journalists (using that term loosely) for the expressed written consent of said journalists in opinion columns. One of these fraudulent ‘professionals’ received close to a quarter of a million dollars for his cheerleading services. Has anyone tracked the email or phone call ‘trails’ between these covert propagandists and the Bush Administration? Just asking.
Let’s take Jeff “Bulldog” Gannon. He is the boy-toy-for-hire, who somehow ‘massaged’ his way into a position in the White House press corps and a few overnight stays at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue until he was exposed as not even qualified to be Bill O’Reilly’s waterboy at FOX NEWS. Who thought that one up? Just asking.
Then there have been the multiple reports of Bush Administration ‘creative’ editing of scientific surveys and analyses by those ‘experts’ on a busman’s holiday (loan) from various corporate interests. Interests that have so generously contributed to the financial well-being of the Bush political campaigns and the republican Party. In each instance, where does the email or phone call paper trails lead regarding such directives to cut-n-paste? Just asking.
It is a fact that very, very little takes place in the Bush Administration without the imprimatur of Karl Rove. He manages everything. He will tear a new one for any freelancers who do not follow his directives.
For those skeptics of the above statement, check out the Ron Suskind January 2003 Esquire article titled “Why Are These Men Laughing?” One excerpt is very telling:
“…I arrived at his (Rove’s) office a few minutes early, just in time to witness the Rove Treatment, which, like LBJ’s famous browbeating style, is becoming legend but is seldom reported. Rove’s assistant, Susan Ralston, said he’d be just a minute. She’s very nice, witty and polite. Over her shoulder was a small back room where a few young men were toiling away. I squeezed into a chair near the open door to Rove’s modest chamber, my back against his doorframe.
Inside, Rove was talking to an aide about some political stratagem in some state that had gone awry and a political operative who had displeased him. I paid it no mind and reviewed a jotted list of questions I hoped to ask. But after a moment, it was like ignoring a tornado flinging parked cars. “We will fuck him. Do you hear me? We will fuck him. We will ruin him. Like no one has ever fucked him!” As a reporter, you get around curse words, anger, passionate intensity are not notable events but the ferocity, the bellicosity, the violent imputations were, well, shocking. This went on without a break for a minute or two…”
So please do not simply outright dismiss the idea that Karl Rove is incapable of being the genesis of any of the above events and circumstances. Look at his reaction in the Suskind snippet. Rove’s ethical perversions reach out all over this country. Nothing that can be employed for political benefit goes unused or untouched in RoveLand.
There are just a small sample of the plethora of Bush Administration ‘cancer dots’ that are deserving of exploration. Who has the tenacity, the strength, the financial backing but more important, the willingness, to take up this task and diagnose if indeed a malignancy is present? The gauntlet is hereby thrown down.
And besides the above, even Patrick Fitzgerald isn’t done just yet. There may still be a frogmarching parade.
The hallelujahs of ‘cancer-free’ may be premature.