Novak and Rove Un-Break Up

by emptywheel

There's a fascinating detail in Novak's self-hagiography about his break-up with his BFF Karl Rove during the CIA Leak investigation. In the middle of a longish description of their relationship, Novak describes missing Rove's company--as well as his leaks--during the three years when he and Rove didn't talk.

Indeed, in fourty-four years as a Washington reporter, I never had better access to a White House as I did to start the George W. Bush administration. Karl Rove was a grade A-plus source. While he did not dispense state secrets, confidential political plans, or salacious gossip, Rove always returned my phone calls. He knew everything, and while he did not tell me all that he knew, he never lied or misled me and often steered me away from a bad tip.

Geraldine and I were guests of the Roves at a small dinner party in his Washington home, and he came to breakfast at my apartment. He was a regular speaker at the Evans-Novak Political Forum, and always attended my annual dinner party at the Army and Navy Club the night before the spring Gridiron dinner. We shared an interest in American political history, agreeing on a preference for William McKinley over Theodore Roosevelt.

When our relationship ended abruptly and completely for three years because of the CIA leak case, I missed him as a fascinating conversationalist as well as my best Bush administration source.

At least according to Novak, this warm relationship ended one day, presumably after September 29, 2003, and Novak and Rove didn't speak for three years.

You'd think the reason would be legal--as two key witnesses to the case, it might be considered obstruction for the two to talk (putting their September 29, 2003 conversation aside). So, they put their relationship on a hiatus for the entire time Rove was under investigation. Right?

No.

Rove received the sorta-all clear from Fitzgerald on June 13, 2006. But Novak and Rove did not resume their BFF relationship until three months later, in September.

On September 19, I received a telephone call from Karl Rove to volunteer some information about a column he heard I was about to write. That broke a three-year absence of substantive conversation between us that had been imposed by Rove's lawyers. I doubted that our intimacy ever could be restored, but his unsolicited call confirmed that the case was closed.

There are three reasons I can think of why Rove would wait three months before reaching out to his mouthpiece. First (and least probably), he only reached out when he had a story he needed to plant. While Rove could have been a source for any of the three articles Novak wrote in the week following their un-break-up (a column on Bolton's difficulties getting approved by the Senate, a general column on the election, a column on Republican defections regarding the Military Commissions Act), the election column is not detailed enough to require Rove's input and the MCA is not necessarily Rove's gig. Further, these aren't stories of greater magnitude than any other story since June.

Alternatively, Rove's lawyers may have held off on allowing him to speak to Novak until Armitage came forward on September 7. While many reports had made clear that Armitage wouldn't be charged before that point, perhaps they wanted to hold off until they were sure that Armitage would not be charged.

I'm most interested, though, in a third possibility--that Rove and Novak's un-break-up was tied not to Armitage coming forward as it was to Novak's responding to Armitage's public statements. Novak ties the two closely in his book. This is the paragraph that precedes the one where Novak describes his un-break-up with Rove.

I had to write one more column about the case, on September 14, because of Armitage's false accounts of his answer to me when I asked why the CIA sent Wilson to Niger: "I don't know, but I think his wife worked out there." I related what he really told me ("His wife works at CIA, and she suggested that he be sent to Niger." "His wife works at CIA?" I asked. "Yeah, in counterproliferation.") I concluded: "Armitage's silence for ... 2 1/2 years caused intense pain for his colleagues in government and enabled partisan Democrats in Congress to falsely accuse Rove of being my primary source. ... Armitage's tardy self-disclosure is tainted because it is deceptive."

While the sequence of the paragraphs doesn't mean there's a connection, I do think it possible that Rove reached out to Novak not because Armitage came forward, but because Novak made a public refutation of Armitage's claims. Most specifically, Novak refuted Armitage's version of whether Armitage mentioned that Valerie Wilson worked at counterproliferation department.

The detail would be interesting because Novak's statements about who told him about CPD are one part of his story that has changed the most--a problem that continues to Novak's book itself. And the different versions of whether Armitage told Novak that Valerie worked in CPD (or even WMD) was one of the discrepancies that the FBI and Fitzgerald were still pursuing as late as Fall 2004. Add in Novak's vagueness about when he and Rove spoke about Valerie, and it's possible the CPD might serve as a marker that Rove spoke to Novak earlier than he and Novak say he did--and that Rove, not Armitage, was the source of Novak's blabbing about CPD with Wilson's friend. Furthermore, if anyone shared the CPD detail with Novak, it would mean that person should have known it was very likely that Valerie was covert.

Did Rove hold out on his BFF Novak until he was sure that Novak had protected him in his testimony?

Comments

[Jane S.]

EW--a couple of type-os in your first Novak book excerpt--2 ors in the first paragraph, guests instead of guess in the second paragraph. I know it must be hard typing those lies!

Is it just me or does anyone else feel like Rove has been guiding this incessant "Move On" ad crap? Did the defeat of the Webb deployment amendment get any coverage and that ad still gets like 15 minutes of every news cyle even though it ran 2 weeks ago?

[emptywheel]

Thanks Jane--fixed.

And yes--it's pretty clear Rove is still involved in messaging. I wonder if he still has his security clearance?

[Jodi]

My God!

So what?

Let it go, emptywheel. It is torturing you.

[albert fall]

Jodi:

We let go after the statute of limitations has passed, not before.

Also, active concealment of the facts by Bush probably prolongs the statute.

[katie Jensen]

Yea, and let's let go of the debate about string theory while we are at it. Yep, the answers to the universe are known if you want them to be. All you have to do is make it up. There is no heart in the facts, as Colbert would say.

[bmaz]

Heh heh. Several months back, starting maybe as far back as February or March, and continuing on until a couple of weeks after his resignation, I recall many different participants here, including me (heh heh, I might have suggested it), discussing whether or not Alberto Gonzales (among others like Goodling, Sampson, Schlozman etc.) had violated ethical standards as lawyers and were, therefore, subject to a bar complaint. I know William Ockham was one, maybe Jane S., ... Anyway, apparently there has indeed been a bar complaint against Gonzales filed in Texas and the Texas bar has initiated an investigation. Do any of our Texas friends here know anything about that, heard anything, seen press coverage or anything?

[Mad Dogs]

Rove, as Chief Weasel, didn't come out of his hole for 3 months until Novakula sounded the all clear.

And when the Chief Weasel did re-surface, he was all chubby grins and fanny slaps 'cause he'd skated once more. No big, bad Wolf was gonna chew his ass, you betcha!

Now back to the business of weaseling full-time. C'mere ya dumb little bunnies. I've got some...ahemmm..."carrots"... to give ya.

[ecoast]

bmaz - The complaint against Gonzo was turned down by the Texas bar. The complainant wrote a diary on Dailykos announcing it, quoting from his correspondence with the Bar Association and their inane replies.

[do-si-do]

It's just like when Loggins & Messina broke up and Simon & Garfunkel. sniffle. Novak & Rove made such sweet music together...

[bmaz]

ecoast - Thanks. That figures. State Bars are usually under the purview of a state's supreme court. Gonzales, although for a short and undistinguished time, was on the Texas Supreme Court and the Bush family has a very strong voice in the court today. More failure of accountability; it is shameless. Irrespective of their decision, I can guarantee that Gonzales did indeed violate the ethical cannons.

[bmaz]

Loggins and Messina is fine, but must we equate Simon and Garfunkel with Novak and Rove? Man, thats rough...

[William Ockham]

bmaz,

I never filed a complaint. I wanted to file one against Miers, but the House never followed through on citing her for contempt. I think it would be harder for a complaint to be ignored if she was cited.

[bmaz]

WO - Thanks; I didn't think you had filed it, I just thought you might have heard something on it. Per ecoast, apparently the obvious has resulted from the filing. Even with a contempt finding (there actually has been one; it is just not ratified by the full house), I am not sure that in Texas, given it's, ahem, unique way of doing things, it would go anywhere against Miers even with a contempt citation from the full house. Thanks again.

[victoria2dc]

Anyway, apparently there has indeed been a bar complaint against Gonzales filed in Texas and the Texas bar has initiated an investigation. Do any of our Texas friends here know anything about that, heard anything, seen press coverage or anything?

**********************************

Yes! The complaint was filed by an attorney who wrote a diary or two about it on dailykos! He was very serious about it and seemed to have worked hours on putting the documentation together. Where did you see the story? I hope they take his license away.

However, I don't know the name of the diarist or the name of the diary. You should find it with a search.

[Boo Radley]

Jodi the condescending tone in your 11:12 is positively revolting. Please apologize to emptywheel.

[eyesonthestreet]

O/T

If anyone is interested, Richard Mellon Scaife's divorce papers are on the web:

Documents from
Richard M. Scaife
v. Margaret Ritchie Battle Scaife

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07266/819835-85.stm

In one item it claims "Request for reduction in alimony," we learn that this no ordinary income, for RMS makes 10 times more per month than the last richest man to file for divorce.

Can't beat the wife's name, though.

[bmaz]

I hope Battle Scaife is a true battle axe on this!

[eyesonthestreet]

Yes, I agree bmas. ....and that she becomes extremely "Ritchie"

[AJ]

Jodi honey -- I am sure they are missing you over at the People magazine website.

[JohnLopresti]

To do the first thing Rove's Novak would expect with the date certain Friday, September 29, 2006, might be to re-peruse that WashingtonPost article byline WHamilton echoing Andrew Card's AutoExculpatory remarks on the occasion of the eve of BobWoodward's StateOfDenial semi-apologia; the jive rap in the WaPo blurb rambles about minutia of the dumpRumsfeld movement within the administration. There is synchronicity in this article's publication date being the same as NovakRove unRapprochement, September 29; but little seems to correspond to rekindling the newly Lufkin Blessed restoration of using Novak for quotidian propaganda or items which might have extra verve if Novak could publish something that would denigrate mere centrists.

I agree it might be more useful to re-scan the prior month. Yet, the Woodward tome stirred Armitage to subsequent further pronouncements. It is also true that September 2006 Frist was in high dudgeon polemicizing about the right to torture prisoners, hold them without counsel, try them in secret, prohibit them from confronting their accusers, deny them access to the rigged and unrigged evidence against them, and all those themes for which BushCheneyNeoCons were positively salivating, and, perhaps reluctantly so, Rove, as well, but the latter only for the added bludgeonFactor which whets the appetite of the least scruppleBound of politicoes. Maybe Rove also enjoyed the unHippocraticness of Frist's complicity in that feud, besides enjoying the fertile production of slogans to take into the autumn by-elections that year, 2006.

Then again, I continue wondering about the 2004 Judy transcript which even in 2007 was still redacted in part. I would expect that around the time Rove got his plenary indulgence from Fitzgerald, goldBarsLufkin, maybe Novak, and a few other people at that stage of the Plame-Libby investigation would have seen what we have yet to see in the public version of that testimony document.

Actually, I could admit even as yet I have missed viewing the Florida ballot rigging scam documentary which Rather aired within the past month, evidently that election plot was well underway by early autumn 2006; and, though Rove had been handed the impossible task of saving his party from doom in that election, and was to fail, he may have known some people were arranging for skewed printing and chadProne cardboard stock to be substituted for the highrade standard product in the raw materials manufacture in the Philippines, later shipped to FL and with successful outcome for the perpetrators, as statistically significant numbers of ballots disqualified. All the kind of gravy Rove would like on the election banquet. So, in summary, I am still looking. I admit to avoiding Novak's writing, but there is an ongoing project looking through the e-archives here.

The Woodward excerpts published October 1, 2006 in WaPo are there.

Two more items surfaced in this search. A Frist effort to obsolete the FISA court; NYT used to have a valid link there, but I am still redesigning NYT searches since their unplugging their payWall. Maybe that link remains valid. The article referenced appeared during the week prior, i.e. September 14. And, around that part of September 2006 it was clear to lots of us Mark Warner likely was headed back to state political races rather than the lofty goals he brought to the ambitious needleParty of Ykos notoriety; though technically the formal announcement of the end of the TestingTheWatersForWarner campaign occurred ColumbusDay 2006.

[radiofreewill]

"Bob Novak."

"Hey, uh Bob, it's Karl! How are ya!"

*crickets*

"Uh, Bob, it's me Karl!"

"Karl Who? I don't know any Karl!?"

"Bob! It's me, Karl Rove."

"No, no, you can't be Karl Rove! He dropped off the face of the planet years ago! That guy's a myth! The last time I saw Karl Rove, he and I were having a damn good laugh over tagging that ass-clown Armitage with the CPD-leak that Karl got from Shooter - who, get this, was reading Old Shavehead's e-mail on the sly! - Poor little Armitage, he never saw it coming!"

"Bwahahahahahahahaha!"

[jackie]

Judy Miller is an interesting person. Apparently she was one of the last people to talk to David Kelly. Given who David Kelly was/doing, is the tie -in to Valerie Plame, her day job and whom she was investigating, somewhere there?

[Jodi]

Boo Radley

it wasn't condesending. I meant it more like from one girl to another girl about a guy. Sort of like "Hey get over him. There was nothing there to start with. Move on!"

AJ

couldn't find it if I tripped over it.

[Chris Loosley]

it wasn't condesending

Too bad, girl. EW obviously didn't recognize your tone before telling you what to do with your well-intended consolations.

[c]

Get ready for some serious sparks to fly regarding Rove. Guess who got a copy of the letter Fitz wrote to Luskin re: Rove status thanks to FOIA and guess what it says? Someone who I know that works at a certain website said its going to come out in conjunction with an interview of Plame timed with publication of her book

[Jodi]

Cymro,

I did a search. I see no reference to my comment by emptywheel.

[AJ]

Jodi --

maybe you missed the fact that "girl talk" is what they do over at People.com -- it's ok honey. They'll take you back.

[Jodi]

AJ,

ok, the "girl talk" issue is clear, but on the second one, they can't take me back when I haven't been there. Perhaps you are confusing me with someone you know over there?

[itwasntme]

EW the clairvoyant...