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Broder: Newsweek Owes Rove Apology
Washington Post columnist David S. Broder is calling on Newsweek and other media sources to apologize to presidential aide Karl Rove for linking him to the disclosure of Valerie Plame’s identity as a CIA operative. "For much of the past five years, dark suspicions have been voiced about the Bush White House undermining its critics, and Karl Rove has been fingered as the chief culprit in this supposed plot to suppress the opposition,” Broder writes. "Now at least one count in that indictment has been substantially weakened – the charge that Rove masterminded a conspiracy to discredit Iraq intelligence critic Joseph Wilson by ‘outing’ his CIA-operative wife, Valerie Plame.” Broder notes that in a July 2005 cover story on Rove, Newsweek – while acknowledging that the special prosecutor probing the leak had said Rove was not a target of the investigation – stated: "But this isn’t just about the facts, it’s about what Rove’s foes regard as a higher truth: That he is a one-man epicenter of a narrative of evil.”
Broder also pointed to former Clinton aide Sidney Blumenthal and his book "How Bush Rules: Chronicles of a Radical Regime,” which includes a section based on a memo from Time magazine’s Matt Cooper that said Rove had confirmed to him Plame’s identity.
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"To Blumenthal, that was proof that this ‘was political payback against Wilson by a White House that wanted to shift the public focus from the Iraq War to Wilson’s motives,’” Broder writes. And he cites an American Prospect cover story in August 2005 declaring that Rove "is a powerful bully. Fear of retribution has stifled those who might have revealed his secrets.” It now has come to light that the primary source for the revelation of Plame’s identity was not Rove or an ally, but Richard L. Armitage, a deputy secretary of state at the time and "no pal of Rove or President Bush,” Broder reports. In an earlier opinion piece, the Post disclosed that Armitage "was one of the Bush administration officials who supported the invasion of Iraq only reluctantly. He was a political rival of the White House and Pentagon officials who championed the war . . . "It follows that one of the most sensational charges leveled against the Bush White House – that it orchestrated the leak of Ms. Plame’s identity to ruin her career and thus punish Mr. Wilson – is untrue.”
As for the media sources that implicated Rove, Broder writes: "These and other publications owe Karl Rove an apology. And all of journalism needs to relearn the lesson: Can the conspiracy theories and stick to the facts.”
Editor's note:
Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
Bush Administration Inside Cover Stories
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