What It's All About

Lest there be any doubt as to what's driving the Karl Rove/Valerie Plame brouhaha, Skinner at Democratic Underground spells it out for us in the context of an urgent plea to his ideological co-belligerents to fight the Roberts nomination hammer and tong:

Some people have been arguing that the Roberts nomination is a "distraction" from the Karl Rove affair. This is simply wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. A nominee to the Supreme Court is not a "distraction" from anything. This is as serious as politics can get. The Supreme Court is losing a moderate voice, and the Bush Administration is trying to place an extreme right-wing ideologue in her place. This is a lifetime appointment, for a guy who is only 50 years old! He might be on the court for thirty years.

The effects of placing another conservative on the court are VASTLY MORE SERIOUS than anything that could happen because of this Rove situation. In Rove, we could cripple a GOP Administration for a couple years, tops. In Roberts, there is the potential to change the course of this nation for decades.

Ah. So hounding Karl Rove is all about crippling the Bush administration. It's not about justice. It's not about protecting the identity of covert CIA agents. It's not about doing what's right or best for the country. It's just ugly political street-fighting. Kneecap the administration so they can't function for a couple of years, and they'll be so discredited that the Democrats will be able to reclaim their rightful grip on the levers of power in 2008.

The amazing thing about this is that millions of Americans in the Democratic party think it perfectly acceptable and indeed cheer it on. Sad.